David Walliams, Podcasts on Netflix & National Treasures

Hello and welcome to this episode of The Rest is Entertainment with me Marina Hyde and me Richard Osman. Hello Marina. Hello Richard and I'm so terribly sorry but I'm just going to have to say that Congratulations are in order to you. First of all, you are the biggest selling author of last year and you are also getting an OBE. And also for services to podcasting. And I was surprised.

Because I thought, I'm amazed I've got one Marina hasn't, I guess. Listen, I guess the king listens and he has a favourite. It's not for services to pocket. I don't think anyone's ever got any sort of... gong for services to podcasting it won't be long no it won't be moments but i wish so many congratulations and of course you deserve everything that comes to you i'm thrilled oh thank you i always think you deserve everything that comes to you as a real double-edged sword

It's a really amazing thing to say to anyone. Do you know what? You deserve everything that comes to you. Yeah, you deserve. And I'm fixing you with an eye when I say that you deserve everything that is coming to you. May you have the 2026.

You deserve. So we're still apart. Which we hate. But what are we talking about today? Well, we are going to talk about David Walliams, who has been dropped.

by harper collins hugely successful children author and we're going to talk about that particular story and how it's played out and how it's sort of gone quiet which i think is a very intriguing part of it too we waited a couple of weeks just to see what the fallout was and thus far there hasn't been any so we'll we'll talk about what that might signify uh we're also going to talk about um national treasures aren't we because we've had some polling done by our

Great friends at More In Common. We will give you the absolute definitive list of who British people believe to be national treasures and in what order.

And who would win certain elections if only fans of certain national treasures were allowed to vote? Williams is not currently on that list, but plenty of people are. We are also going to talk about... podcasts on tv and uh there's lots of interesting deals um in that space um including one not too far from home it's a big thing for 2026 yeah a very big thing

So we'll begin with David Walliams, who is obviously the hugely successful children's author and television presenter and actor before, as we knew. He has been dropped by HarperCollins over alleged inappropriate behaviour. with female staff members at HarperCollins. And The Telegraph ran a story about this. I should say, we have to say right at the very top of this, David Walliams denies...

all knowledge of this. It says none of the allegations were even put to him by HarperCollins in their investigation of this. I think it's sort of interesting because stories, lots of stories are all... perceived stories about david welliams have been chased for a very long time by all sorts of different outlets and there are certain stories or certain

kind of areas where people just say in all sorts of areas of public life, oh, this is an open secret. Everybody knows about this person and their behavior. Again, I will say he would say, well, where's the evidence i've got masses of lawyers and all sorts of things and i quite understand that because unless you can stand it up it's difficult to run any of those stories but by way of background i would say that he is by

miles the biggest selling children's author in this country well i'd say in in his in his age group he is julia donaldson yes exactly in his age group which is which is a big age group and he sells countless millions of books and has done for A very long time. So he's been a golden goose for HarperCollins.

often laid two eggs a year because he would do two books a year. And I think in something like in 2018, I think he accounted for something like 44% of HarperCollins' entire children's book sales. HarperCollins were pushing his Santa and Son book, which is the book he's got at this Christmas. The Instagram account was pushing it all. And then suddenly the next day he was dropped.

There are so many questions about this. To go back to the Telegraph story which came out, it suggested there was inappropriate behaviour with female employees that one had left. left HarperCollins after a five-figure payout that women employees were advised to either work in pairs and also to not visit his home again. He says none of these allegations were ever put to him and that is interesting in itself.

um if true and and that he denies it all but to me that story is quite striking in lots of ways richard first of all there aren't any anonymized accounts of those women which i think is quite interesting often when you get a story like that you know the guardians run all sorts of things i don't know as an example let's say the noel clark allegations which i'm not saying are the same as these at all um but to give you an example

you have lots of anonymized voices of women and people tend to not want to go on the record. But in that story, people were described as well-placed sources. So they've obviously spoken to people at HarperCollins, but we don't know if those... were the women or the executives. But if they were the women, they have said, you can't even run my story as an anonymous story. Yes, so the story is literally, there's one story which is Harper Connors has dropped him and these are the reasons.

it has dropped him. There's no investigating beyond that. There's no talking to people who might have been at the heart of the allegations. So it's a huge story, but... It is one story and one story only, which is HarperCollins, under its new managing director, which also I know we'll get on to more, has dropped him. I assume he was at the end of a contract. So I think what they've actually said is we are not going to publish.

any more books by you and that's the only story we have so far which is why we've waited a couple of weeks just to see if there was more to come and thus far there hasn't been if if something comes out Just after we've finished editing this podcast, we will return with an update. But it's interesting. There's lots of interesting questions here. First of all...

How do you handle the back catalogue of someone who you are no longer saying, I'm not going to publish any new books by, but as we say, he sells huge amounts of books. So I'm sure someone else may well publish him.

You may find that other people will publish him, but I don't think any of the big ones. But how do you handle the back catalogue? And in children's publishing, the back catalogue is... incredibly lucrative much more so than in adult publishing if you've got you know a classic from if you've got Agatha Christie or if you've got

you know, Jane Austen, then that's very valuable. But for children's authors, books published five years ago, 10 years ago, are almost as valuable now as they were five years or 10 years ago. There's constant repeat business. So actually, that's a question I haven't seen. discussed anywhere but it's a huge question because those books are immensely lucrative

for them because everyone's already earned out every penny they're ever going to earn out from that stuff. So every single book they sell, every single book that David has written over a very long period is pure profit for everybody. and really really really good money publishers really are back catalogue houses and children's books are one of the key drivers of that back catalogue so david walliams work up to now is vastly more profitable

than david william's next book however profitable that might be agreed um and i think you know that was as we say there have been all sorts of different rumors in television in publishing in whatever for many years and there's a certain sort of thing where people say oh something is an open secret they often don't know what the open secret is in but there's a sort of perception that there's an open secret about someone and

It's intriguing as to why it hasn't been coloured. Well, I think that, first of all, as I would say as a journalist, these things are so-called open secrets are surprisingly difficult to stand up. They haven't got accounts from the women who were alleged to have been victims of difficult behaviour of one type or another. I would say that HarperCollins hasn't denied that story.

And you haven't seen them say no. But I have to say I have some sympathy with those women's rather depressing alleged trade-off because what the Telegraph story says is that as well as one five-figure payoff...

The internal solution to the alleged problems with David Walliams was that women should see him in pairs and not go to his house. Now, if that is true in 2024... that a corporation or 2025 that a corporation put those measures in place then oh dear me because I'm not quite sure who you're protecting there it seems much more like you're protecting your very lucrative

author than you are protecting your staff there is a much much easier way of protecting your staff which is to remove the source of the of the source of the issues which is what they've just done finally exactly but that's that's the quickest and easiest way to to do that which for many years they didn't do

Yes, and if that is true that they did that, and if it is true that what David Walliam says is that not one of these women's allegations has ever been put to me, this is what he says for his lawyers, then in my view, you don't have an internal investigation.

you have what many other people would class as an internal cover-up, because that is not the proper way to run an investigation of anything, to say, oh, you know, see each other in pairs, don't go to his house, and we're not going to put the allegations to you, okay? So Harvard Collins might say that, but that they didn't do that, but they haven't said that, have they? What they have said is...

After careful consideration and under the leadership of its new CEO, HarperCollinsUK has decided not to publish any more titles by David Williams. That is very key, I think, that statement under its new CEO because... Kate Elton is the new CEO of HarperCollins, but she came very unexpectedly in October to covering that position on an interim basis because the former CEO of HarperCollins, Charlie Redmayne. Left very, very suddenly in October. No reason was given. No comment.

the press release had no comment on his time or achievements there what you'd normally say you know we thank him for his service etc he's decided to pursue other opportunities but there are also suggestions that And I'm speaking to people inside publishing that maybe at some point the Telegraph had had to go to them.

with the with what they knew about this particular David Walliams story which as we say is very very contained but if they had to approach them at any point which they would have had to do in the the writing of that story then maybe that felt like oh hang on this thing that everyone claims is an open secret um and i'm not saying that it's a true one or not but it's an it's certainly an alleged open secret

Maybe that's coming out and maybe we have to now do something because it's finally about to break cover. As you say, it's not really in a murder because genuinely, as I say, Charlie Redmayne left just before the Frankfurt Book Fair, which is the gossipiest week. in all of publishing. And so nobody came back from Frankfurt any closer to the truth of why he'd gone. He's made no comment. HarperCollins have made no comment. It seems to be that rarest of things, which is a secret.

well kept. And so it may just be coincidental that they've moved from a male CEO to a female CEO and this story has surfaced at roughly the same time and a different decision has been made about David Williams' future. It might just have been that he'd reached the end of his contract which meant that they could say we're not publishing further books by him and there's no law suit or anything like that to be got through because you know you could

you're allowed to let someone go at the end of their contract so there's all sorts of things that it could be and it's very unusual to come across a story where no one can quite tell you what it is even as you say this open secret

There are certain people we've talked about on this podcast before where there are open secrets about and you're desperate for it to come out and it does come out and you think, great, finally, the law can take its course. This one, I'm not absolutely certain what the open secret is.

there's a quality street of open secrets all sorts of different things and across you know in in television as well to some degree he has had sort of been semi-cancelled from television i would say because In the Britain's Got Talent thing, he was recorded on mic but obviously off air during the recording of it, making disparaging remarks about...

contestants i think one pensioner got called the c word three times there was sort of sexually suggestive things about a female contestant um obviously not the kind of thing you hear on a family show yeah the c word was not codger No. He actually successfully sued Fremantle, who made Britain's Got Talent.

for breach of his privacy and whatever saying you know he had a recent expectation that those comments wouldn't be made public but anyway whatever reason he successfully brought them to a settlement with him when they where they apologized for the you know misuse of his moments which he might reasonably regarded to be private or or not to be aired at all um but after that he i noticed he was on the would i lie to you christmas special yeah on boxing day

yeah and they were a bit stuck there because um as as we know they filmed those things six months ago in fact there was a whole joke little riff about that but i i wonder and i'm He had very little airtime or things to do on that episode. And as we know, obviously, they record much more than they need. And he was sort of, I mean, he was edited out of it, would you say? Well, there was the...

accusation by people who were at that recording, which is a completely separate accusation, that he made two Nazi salutes in the course of a piece. And there's a piece in that with Helen George from Call the Midwife about I won't say if it's true or a lie in case you haven't watched it. No spoilers about she sprained her arm on Strictly by waving too much. So a lot of people were waving. And you can imagine at some point some Nazi salutes were made, which is.

Not the greatest taste in the world, but those shows, you know, you record for two hours. But like, in exactly the same way with the recording from Britain's Got Talent, someone in the audience... let this be known, talk to the papers. I think the papers are very, very keen to, well, two things happening, the papers are very, very keen to pounce on any David Williams stuff that they can stand up, stuff that did actually happen that they can write.

i realized i've called in david williams a number of times here that's that's that's what he started out as it was david and then there was another david williams at equity and so he came back from the equity thing and said i've changed my name to david walliams he clearly did this in the woodland it special and he clearly said the things he said on britain's got talent so that happens but there's also a thing of a lot of people will have a lot of defenders in those situations and

If those things happen and lots of people immediately spring to their defence, you know it was fairly simple and innocent and was nothing to do with any other behaviour they've ever done. Nobody seemed to spring to his defence.

In either of those cases, which I always think is interesting because lots of people make mistakes or misjudge things in a studio. And usually a production team will sort of gather around and look after them, but not if they feel... that maybe this person is fair game can i say by the way if this is frustrating for people listening this is the problem with all of these it's an open secret it's this it's that you cannot

say something that is against. If we said, oh, I heard this, I heard that, I heard this, that's against the law. If you can't prove anything, you'll immediately be taken to court and that's... that's the story and we should say that he famously has very very uh litigious lawyers that's absolutely what

lawyers are for but you rely and we talked about them before on brilliant investigative journalists finding stuff that does stand up you cannot go on a podcast you cannot go on television and say i heard this

this is something i heard if over a series of years you've heard the same things and 20 other people in different parts of the industry have heard the same things that's when journalists start sniffing around and that's when they look for something they can stand up like harper collins dropping you this and they go okay is this the one

that opens the floodgates is this the one where we can start putting out feelers and discover stuff that people for a million very good reasons have not wanted to go public with or is there nothing So it's hard for us to discuss. It's hard for the culture to discuss. Well, let's talk about those floodgates. Yeah. I think that's interesting that you say, okay.

Clearly that telegraph story was written and I would have thought they would have gone several times during the writing of that to HarperCollins. And as I say, none of it's been denied by HarperCollins.

what you're hoping when you're a journalist in that situation is that's the first story you get out of out there and then it's broken cover and because of that you get bring in to get people saying okay i want to talk i want to be anonymous i would and by the way there will be across all the newsrooms except maybe less so the times because they're they They're both owned by Rupert Murdoch, but they will now be trying to get a hold of further. They want to bring the story on.

People forget that all stories start like that from the most famous one ever, like Watergate. What can we get over the line? What's the first thing? And then you can end up running multiples of scores of stories on the same subject as more and more things happen. people will be continuing to dig on this and they will be right now.

I should say David Walliams denies all knowledge of this. It says none of the allegations were even put to him by HarperCollins in their investigation of this. Now, shall we go to a break? And we'll be on many lighter notes when we come back. national treasures, and so on. That place is mayhem. That is impressive. And if these walls could talk. Do you cry a lot? I do.

They'd have a lot to say. What in God's name is this pit? Don't get too close. You know, if you've seen the show, I'm scared of that. Ugliest House in America, season premiere, Wednesday at 8 on HGTV.

Welcome back, everybody. Now, we are talking about national treasures. It's a term often bandied about. Bandied about as often as open secrets, national treasures, but more fun. So we asked our good friends at More In Common, who have done lots of polling for us before, to... definitively find out who in British entertainment is a national treasure so we have the full results here now I'm just gonna you know me if I do a list

What do I always do? I go from 10 to 1 or 5 to 1 or 3 to 1. This is the one list where there's absolutely no need to do it. I don't even understand the rules anymore, but okay. Listen, we asked a series of things about national treasures, people of different political persuasions, people of different ages, the whole country. Every single way we cut this, every single way we cut this, the same name is number one.

on every single list, every age, every region, every political persuasion. Number one on every list of people's national treasures is David Attenborough. David Attenborough. So I'm not worrying about number one. Number two is surprising to me, in a wonderful way, in a happy way. But here's the issue now, and this is, come on. So number two is where the interest starts, so we don't go to number two now. Okay, so you're right. Now I still don't understand the rules, do I?

So number two sort of becomes number one now, if that makes sense. Yes. Okay. There are only seven people who got more than half the country saying they're a national treasure. There's only seven people on that list and not a single one of them. is under 75 years old. So I think that's quite nice. There is something, there is definitely, obviously in national treasured and national treasurehood, you need the longevity to it.

that you have to feel that I think that's part of ours. We have to feel they're kind of morally reliable and they have been over a period of time.

um because otherwise it doesn't really count and you need all of those and lots of different generations need to buy into them so we'll talk about political party breakdown and age breakdown and stuff in a moment but i'm just going to do this Top seven or seven to two anyway, because this is the Attenborough list. Number seven, Mary Berry in her 90s. Absolutely fair enough. National treasure. Number six, Sir Trevor MacDonald.

Number five, Joanna Lumley. Number four, Paul McCartney. Number three, the youngest man in this top seven, the youngest man to have over 50% of the nation. to think he's a national treasure Elton John and number two so behind Attenborough who we know is unassailable and unimpeachable number two national treasure again we go into the 90s, Dame Judi Dench. Which I think is brilliant. To me, that shows you the value of doing a few really big commercial films, in her case.

I don't think she'd be on that list without Bond because however much I absolutely adore and revere Judi Dench she is almost above all a theatre actress but she would do various films but I have to say that

Being M in those films and being also, I think there is something significant about the role, that kind of benign but steely representation of the British state. There is something about that that... it's allied with her real personality and helped her kicked her up right to number two in national treasuredom which i think is quite interesting i don't think you'd expect it yes and because i think the state of being a national treasure is that thing of

everybody individually likes and respects that person and then there has to be a lightning rod where everyone starts to recognize that everybody else

likes and respects that person. As you say with Judi Dench everyone already liked and respected her and when she's M then everyone suddenly sort of has the license to talk about her and they all go oh no I love her too and so something that already existed coalesces and we all kind of go okay are we agreed yep national treasure okay there we go that's the national treasure that feels to me what that is but also that national treasures have to represent in our

version of it because it's different it culturally it's different in all sorts of countries in in japan it's all about sort of national preservation in france it's all cultural prestige it there's lots of different ways of looking at but i definitely think in the uk a national treasure needs to represent something about our idealized sense of ourself and that they either reflect British values or British humor or

in their part of shared national memory in some cases i think that with someone like trevor mcdonald they've kind of been there at those moments quote unquote and they're associated with those kind of key moments in public life and good works is important but it's interesting I think with someone like Elton John I mean he has obviously done lots of good works but you need to do both

but there is something peculiar about ours which is particular i think to the uk which is they've got to be still one of us not showy yes exactly

a hundred percent um and actually weirdly i mean do you remember when um david beckham who was angling for a knighthood for a long time and speaking of leaked comments in which people get called the c word i think he actually called the honors committee um unappreciative c words and said it was a disgrace he'd been snubbed wow i think that was back then to do with kind of rumors about his tax affairs but

he has now been knighted and i think people have a slightly different view and i would say that a big part of what made people have that different view about david beckham is one single incident one thing he did was very one of us he cued with all the ordinary people to see the late queen elizabeth ii lying in state and he stood in that queue for nine or ten hours with all the ordinary people do you remember the famous queue yeah and that was very much like

OK, from someone that was really a big part of his one of us thing again, because once you've kind of spun out into the echelons of being the Beckhams, you're not to some degree, you're not one of us. But he was able to become. one of us again by uh but with that one sort of gesture so judy judy dents gets on the list because she was m and david beckham gets on because of q yeah now talking of beckham

So we've had our top seven, because they're the ones that more than half of the British people think are national treasures. But the rest of our top ten is made up of David Beckham at number ten, Stephen Fry at number nine, and Michael Palin. at number eight so that entire top 10 the entire top 10 i'm going to give you a quiz question in a minute every single one of them is a knight or a dame every single one of the top 10 has been either knighted

Or damed. What do they say for damed? That does show that they're quite on the pulse, the honours committee. I think that's very interesting.

They reflect people's feelings rather than have led them by giving them these honors. They've reflected actually very accurately how people feel about these people. Who do you think, David Beckham, by the way, is... So there's no one under 50 in that top 10, but he's only just 50. Who do you think is the first person on the National Treasures list who is not a sir or a dame? J.K. Rowling.

jk rowling absolutely right the first person on the list at number 11 who is neither a knight or a dame closely followed by in fact the same score but they just they score lower on various uh different things followed by martin lewis money saving expert and dawn french So they're just bubbling under outside the top 10. Dawn French, 43% of people think Dawn French is the national treasure. Same as J.K. Rowling and Martin Lewis. Dawn French not only beats Jennifer Saunders...

But she beats her ex-husband, Lenny Henry. They've both got 39. The rest of the top 20, you get some sort of younger people. You've got Emma Thompson, Olivia Colman, Hugh Grant is there. Ant and Dec we put in together because... How can you not? They have to exist together. Exactly. And at the bottom of that top 20 was Peter Kay. And then just outside it Adele Ed Sheeran and Miriam Margulies. A couple of little match-ups.

We put Clarkson on the list. We asked people if they thought Clarkson was a national treasure. And we also put Gary Lineker on that list and asked if people thought he was a national treasure. Who do you think won out of those two? With which voters? Overall. Clarkson? It was Clarkson. Clarkson, 34% of people think Clarkson is the National Treasure. 29% of people think Gary Lineker is the National Treasure, which is pretty good going, I would say. Oh, you'll take it, yeah. But...

Those two people bring us on to politics. So if only people who think that certain people and national treasures were allowed to vote, who would win the election? See what you think about these two lists.

conservatives there's no scenario in which they win conservatives live dem's green there's no scenario in which they win but labor and reform are sort of they divvy up most of the rest of these national treasures so labor wins the election with fans of gary lineker gareth southgate adele ed sheeran claire balding claire balding is a very interesting bellwether because she's an almost exact three-way tie between labor reform and conservative

She's the only person who's within 1%, all three of those parties. Labour still wins with Nigella Lawson, with Jamie Oliver, with Stormzy. Labour wins with Simon Cowell by quite a lot. He's quite a heavy indicator of Labour voting. Is he now? Simon Calvary, your national treasure. Yeah. Alison Hammond, Claudia Winkleman, and Bob Mortimer. We end strong there. Okay. Reform. Reform would win the election with fans of Anton Deck.

JK Rowling, Mary Berry, Judi Dench, David Beckham by one point, by one point from Labour, Paul McCartney, Elton John, David Attenborough, all the big ones. Stephen Fry. and then you've got jeremy clarkson martin lewis joanna lumley and michael palin so a lot of the top 10 there a lot of the younger ones are labor skewing almost all of the top 10 are reform skewing the person who gives the

Biggest swing to green would be Alison Hammond. I know not why. And the person with the biggest skew to the Conservatives would be Jamie Oliver. The biggest reform skew. is Clarkson and J.K. Rowling. They're the two biggest indicators of whether you would be a reform voter or not would be a desire for Jeremy Clarkson and J.K. Rowling to have national treasure status. That's so interesting. We also did.

Because you're allowed to say anyone on this list who's a national treasure. So the final thing we asked is, you're only allowed to choose one. You can only choose one national treasure. okay if everybody in britain there's just one we're all going to agree there's one national treasure and that list is quite different number five on that list is david beckham number four on that list is joanna lumley

Number three on that list, if you're only allowed to choose one national treasure, everyone in Britain, Martin Lewis, money-saving expert. Number two on the list, Dame Judi Dench. Number one on the list, if we're only allowed one national treasure. I think we know. We go out where we came in. Sir David Attenborough, 44% of people said if we only have one national treasure, almost half of the people in Britain agree on the same person. And that is Sir David Attenborough.

place to have yeah the only thing that half of the people in this country agree isn't that absolutely extraordinary but thank you so much for uh to more in common and you can see they're going to put full results and all the kind of details of uh all the voting on that you can uh if you

go on x or instagram and follow more in common you can see a lot more information about all of that and we will link to all of that in our newsletter as well all the all the facts and figures very important research yeah

Now for our final item today, do you remember the first day we ever recorded this podcast? And I think that you and I thought we were, you know, you think you're in an audio medium.

And Tony Pasta, one of Goalhanger's co-founders who was in the studio with us said, yeah, just to let you know, we're going to do something. We're going to actually film this because we sort of think that people are starting to watch podcasts. And I'm thinking, oh my God, well, I'd have worn something different, you know, et cetera. Okay.

That now is only a little bit over two years ago. The phenomenon of people watching podcasts is so extreme now that I don't think we should really even call this. a podcast any longer and you have to sort of call it a show for want of a better term and you almost can't really call people listeners because Something like seven, the most one recent survey found that 72% of podcast listeners prefer to watch it on video and over much more than half of ours watch it rather than listen to it.

um and there's you you can so you can basically watch podcasts in three different on three different platforms youtube which is by far the most mature and popular spotify which is obviously a big investor and player and podcasting but Most recently and most splashily, Netflix, it's all coming soon because podcasts are coming to Netflix. Now, they recently took a whole load of podcasts from The Ringer.

um spotify studios in the ring who are american they do bill simmons podcast a sporting podcast lots of big sport ones the rewatchables good hang with amy polar serial killers but they're partnering with Netflix to bring podcasts to Netflix starting early in 2026.

And now the rest of football will be going to Netflix for the period of the World Cup next summer and they'll have a studio in New York and they'll broadcast daily. I must say to all those armchair media analysts who... always thought they understood talent pay and that the BBC had spent years overpaying Gary Lineker. I wonder, do they think he's getting paid less by Netflix than he was paid in a year by the BBC? The answer might shock you if you're an idiot.

But Netflix are really doing this. They're behind the scenes. They're really going for this. They're making big offers for Slate. They want to make originals. They want to break the dominance of YouTube and they can do all of this because.

Primarily because podcasts have become video. And most of these popular podcasts are essentially chat shows, talk shows. They're a talking format and people... will since the pandemic since the rise of youtube people just simply will accept much much lower production values in fact they prefer it because That's what they want from a podcast. I mean, there's levels and limits, but...

anything you watch on TV comes with certain expectations. And if you watch a Saturday night TV show, your brain expects it to be a certain thing and look a certain way. And if you want to see Joe Rogan chatting for three hours, you expect that to look. a completely different way and for years and years quiz shows were like this magic bullet for terrestrial television because they were this thing that was cheap to make that you could do in volume and that people

loved and you're thinking oh my god it doesn't get any better than this we can't you know there's no way of making tv more popular and cheaper than this and podcasts come along and because they weren't supposed to be a visual medium they were saying oh no this is just us talking in a room so that's what people are used to the first few come along

appear on screen and people watch them and they want to watch them they want to watch three people talking in a room because it feels real and it is real and most importantly it is what they expect it's what their brain expects and as soon as you start to

watch them you think oh we now have a thing that is usually twice three times four times the length of a quiz show can be made for a tenth of the price of the quiz show and that has an enormously loyal fan base and everything that for years the reason I loved making quiz shows was bang for buck was

amazing value for money was amazing and you could do something that you cared about and loved and give to people who enjoyed it and loved it at a price point that seemed to me a bit more reasonable for making television now podcasts are doing that

It's ramped up, you know, I was going to say times 10, but divided by 10. It's an extraordinary insight into human nature psychology, why we watch what we watch when we watch it and what we want from it. And it's come completely organically. Yeah. Netflix's need to get into it. It's emblematic of lots of stories we often discuss. Netflix need to grow.

last year they repeatedly had these situations where they would have these earnings calls and they you know they they're widely perceived to have won the streaming wars although they will have youtube really And they seem to be the emperors of all they survey. And then suddenly, you know, they have these wonderful earnings calls. They tell you all the great things they've done and their share price drops 5% the next day, even after saying we're going to buy Warners.

The reasons for that are sort of various, but investors now expect a huge amount from Netflix. because it has been so successful so there's always the question has it run out of steam you know where are its opportunities for growth and once you've matured in lots of different markets subscriber growth is much more of a challenge but particularly I think what they're interested in is consumption growth per user.

Some analysts say, oh, people spend an hour a day with Netflix. Netflix say people spend two hours a day with us. But that is absolutely nothing, as we know, compared to what people used to spend with what we used to call, you know, with linear TV.

And actually what Netflix, having said, you know, you can have anything you want and you can have it at the moment you want it. This is what streaming promised that you could, it was on demand and it was exactly when you wanted it. Actually, what they've realized is pretty beneficial is. TV that you can sort of leave on companion, that companion thing that people used to have with linear TV. People do have that with podcasts. They might have it.

in the background where they're doing something else they might be fully engaged with it but they you can keep people on the platform longer if you have this type of content like oh you know sort of friendly faces that they like that they have these so-called parasocial relationships ted sarandos said he's the co-ceo of netflix said the lines between podcasts and talk shows are getting very blurry

This is back in April. And as the popularity of video podcast grows, I suspect you'll see some of them find their way to Netflix. Well, that is exactly what you're seeing. And part of the reason I think is very interesting is... Netflix really want to be relevant to their audiences. They like that. They want immediacy. They want that creative vibe. And how many times have you and I said, what's fun about doing a podcast is immediacy, like you can say.

oh I can just get this thing out there right now the rest of television as we know takes a very long time to make and it's very interesting I think podcasts Netflix have really shied away from the news business, but in the same way that they don't do sport until they do.

they've shied away from the news book business but they love topicality and podcasts give you that sort of news adjacent thing you can be talking about things in the culture and in the news and whatever but you're not sort of delivering news you're not you know you're not

having journalists you're not um kind of having to cover every story in the same way as with sport what netflix have done is If you're CBS or one of those people in the States who are paying, I mean, tens of billions for the rights to various different sports. You don't have to buy the games right. Maybe you could just have the cool after game podcast or you could have the thing that so you get that sense of sport or topicality or whatever it is or news adjacent thing.

you're not having to buy the sort of rights to this or run a massive news organization. And I think that that is particularly appealing to Netflix who want to be in the culture, but not in those particular ways necessarily. and also it's time spent on the platform so one of the key things about most podcasts is they're like radio shows in that they're on all year round and that's the point of it that's that's the

There's always in any endeavour like this a contract you make with viewers or listeners, which is I will do this. And the contract you make on podcasts is we will always be here. So if it becomes part of your routine, like if you're doing a quiz show.

it will always be there we will we will put in the work that this stuff is always there and if you do that if netflix want to do eight more episodes of the diplomat right they're going to spend 70 80 100 million on that and it will be absolutely brilliant and it will be eight hours long if they buy a podcast they've got eight hours a month for the next 10 years it just it's non-stop and it stays on their uh in their library

If you've got, if Netflix had six hit podcasts, let's say, and let's say those podcasts were doing two hours a week each, which is sort of normal for a lot of podcasts, then suddenly you've got 12 hours a week every single week. of engagement with something which apart from the upfront money you're paying is quite cheap to produce has an awful lot of viewer loyalty

has a topicality, which means you can talk about other Netflix shows and you can talk about, you know, there's all sorts of other things you can do with it. And it's an enormous library that... constantly keeps getting bigger and bigger and bigger if you think of how much the friends library is worth to um netflix you think well if you if you had a podcast that was enormous your library just keeps growing and growing and growing

and growing and never stops growing so you have the loyalty of people watching it every week and then you have this enormous library of content that people love and that constantly keeps people on your platform yes i mean i think it's it's interesting

This remains an experiment for them. And if it doesn't work for whatever reason, then they will pull out of it. So what they will have done is that they will have what some people would say they've overpaid, although not in their eyes.

maybe by other standards to get these slates. But they'll see it as good business. And I agree because they are... buying into the experiment at least remember they did that to acquire scale in other areas they to attract filmmakers or writers or actors or whatever who didn't feel they wanted who weren't sure about this new entity netflix they paid huge amounts of money and they gave masses of

of control um and creatives did come to them in the end um it's interesting that and it's essential really that The deal with The Ring and Spotify and with Restless Football is that you take your shows off YouTube in exchange for this. That's what the money is for, right? Yeah, that's what it is. And whether that will worry...

YouTube to be honest you of course you're worried to some degree about losing your highest profile podcasters to Netflix because they've got very deep pockets but I i think that they probably don't need to care that much about it because first of all we don't know if it will work and netflix needs hundreds maybe thousands of hours of high quality video podcasts to compete with youtube

And so having said that, it is interesting that they're going for it. And I do think that there's a big part of this idea as we talk about like consumption growth of just trying to have something that in. again mirrors the old world of linear tv where it's a form of companionship or radio where it's on and you leave it on and it's with you in the background or in the foreground whatever it is but you have it on a lot more than you do now

On a philosophical point, I have lots of meetings now with TV companies about new ideas and things. It's constantly that thing of, does this need to be in a studio with a host talking to camera up front? Can it just be... boom we're in a studio someone's talking there's a you know everyone is starting to think how do you take the podcast aesthetic and put that into regular linear tv as well from my perspective doing podcasts it's lovely that people

watch it I get it I absolutely understand it because you have to use things however you choose to use them it's never how I've ever approached it I don't think of a visual medium in any way whatsoever

For me, every single thing is the words. It's immediacy, it's intimacy, and that's all it is. And you watch it, listen to it. I genuinely couldn't care less because I don't think it makes any difference to how a podcast... is put together although people say they like the expressions and they like to see and i know people who say oh i actually the first time i ever you know watched

rest is football on video i was like oh i now i'm hooked because i want to or smart list or one of those big us ones they like to see the interaction but you mustn't think about it because that's that's when people start not doing podcasts properly because they start pretending that

to do banter and they're pretending to do their reactions and putting pranks on each other and then it just becomes what television turned into which is forced banter and you know that's that that's the thing that uh must be left aside but i do it's everything's going to look different but yeah the joy of this is just talking about stuff we find interesting and trying to do it intimately and immediately and that is that's the real benefit to

is that you get to be news adjacent in the same way you get to be sports adjacent but you don't have to buy the rights and you don't have to run a newsroom. And actually, it's quite I mean, so many people now are coming to their news via the filtration medium of podcasts, which I think is sort of fascinating. And it can only be good for democracy.

Well, yes, as if it even needed a shot in the arm, Richard. Yeah, exactly. It's already healthy. And it's interesting within many, many news organizations now, everything is perceived as... you're suddenly thinking we're just going to how can we be a print online print i'm talking about how can we be a words organization we have to be a video organization we have to almost go video first and newsrooms

of news of news what was once newspapers news outlets across the world are now thinking to what extent can we sublimate our news stories into something that looks a bit more like a podcast or short form video or anything because that is where everything is going and if we just carry on writing this as just words or whatever it we can't do this anymore. So essentially we're delivering the same thing, but we're just doing it in a completely, in a different format.

That is the shift that's happening right across those kind of genres. Isn't it a genre? I don't know. But that's definitely the shift that's happening there as well. So everything is going towards this.

you know relatively low production value I mean very not even relative I mean hugely low production value I mean look at us form a video I mean look at it look at us i mean we're not together which we're very sad about but um i i think the most expensive hour of podcasting we have ever done it was less than five thousand pounds of raw costs and that was because when joey came to greece which i loved um and i you know every time yes please um but but when you think of how much an hour of

you know old-fashioned television or even stuff that you see on um netflix now that isn't sort of drama or whatever costs you can see why this is appealing yeah and saves money for huge movies and huge high-scale tv as well so listen it's um it is what it is on that i'm not going to take a uh i'm not going to take a view on it

Now, Richard, have you got any recommendations? Yes, I finally, or we finally saw Multi Supreme.

which I just absolutely adored. And it's one of those things that you think, oh, it's been so hyped. And we talk a lot about the Hollywood hype machine and, you know, Timothee Chalamet going on everything. And you're like, oh, God, it's so... obvious all this stuff god just make good films you have to worry about this and all the hype is worth it it's so terrific and it's so unusual and it's the sort of film that they don't make these anymore but they do

absolutely loved it it was in a full cinema as well and I wasn't a huge fan of uncut gems which is cut from a very similar cloth I found that too stressful but

But this, it has the same stress levels, but with a performance of such originality and charm by Timothee Chalamet. I absolutely loved it. I'm away, but I'm seeing it the minute I get back. And I'm very excited about it. He is a proper... he is a proper movie star um a list or not oh a list of course look at how it is by the way it's open brilliantly for the type of film it is i mean absolutely brilliantly and he

has this extraordinary way of promoting things that is different to other people and um yeah i mean he is a movie star and he is a movie star that makes young people go and watch movies so he's he's a good thing in my book

He's the last movie star on Thursday. We will see you for a Q&A. Look forward to that very much. And on Friday for our members, we're talking about... It's the second part of our story about the KLF, who... burned a million pounds and we'll find out why and if they really did do it and the answer is yes they did see you on Thursday everyone see you on Thursday

So what's really going on between Donald Trump and Venezuela right now? I'm Gordon Carrera, national security journalist. And I'm David McCloskey, author and former CIA analyst. And we together are the hosts of The Rest is Classified in our latest emergency episodes. We go deep into the inside track of what's really going on in the spy war in Venezuela. And we're looking at how, with the help of the CIA,

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