Dish

Proud Mancunian Emma Barnett is an award-winning journalist, broadcaster and author. She began in print journalism before landing a job on radio at LBC in 2012. Emma became known for her agenda-setting interviews, delivered in a warm but forensic manner, and it wasn’t long before a career at the BBC beckoned. She hosted a daily three-hour show on Radio 5 Live for many years before moving to Radio...

East London comedy and stage actor Kiell Smith-Bynoe studied drama and began gigging and writing sketch shows from a young age. His hit improv show Kool Story Bro sold out in London and the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. Kiell landed his first professional TV job on the ITV drama Whitechapel in 2012. He is best known for his roles in Stath Lets Flats on Channel 4 and in the much-loved BBC series Ghost...

The Queen of Country Pop has sold over 100 million albums worldwide and won five Grammy awards, but her path to stardom was not easy. Growing up in poverty, Shania’s mother sent her out to sing in bars and clubs at a young age to make ends meet. Fame found her at 30 and, to this day, Shania Twain remains the only female artist to have three consecutive diamond albums in the US. Her record-breaking...

Harry Hill is one of the UK’s most respected entertainers. He studied medicine at St George’s Hospital Medical School in South London before quitting to become a comedian. Harry spent 10 years hosting his multi award-winning TV show Harry Hill's TV Burp, which at its peak was watched by more than six million people on a Saturday night. These days, Harry is one of the hosts of Junior Bake Off on Ch...

National treasure and proud Bristolian Stephen Merchant struck gold when he collaborated with Ricky Gervais on a little comedy series called The Office in the early 2000s. Buoyed by their TV success, Stephen and Ricky branched out into a brand new medium and became one of the pioneers of podcasting. The Ricky Gervais Show became the most downloaded podcast in the world at the time, securing them a...

Nick Mohammed is a comedian, writer and actor. In the UK, he is best known for his character Mr Swallow, who he developed more than 20 years ago. Nick played Nate in the hit series Ted Lasso, opposite Jason Sudeikis, earning him Emmy nominations for Outstanding Supporting Actor In A Comedy Series in 2021 and 2022. He created, wrote, executive-produced and co-starred in Sky One's Intelligence, alon...

Comedian and broadcaster Joel Dommett grew up on a farm in Gloucestershire but, with no interest in getting his hands dirty, he set off for the bright lights of London. He is blessed with funny bones and, after some challenging years on MTV News, he set his sights on stand-up comedy. A stint in the Jungle in 2016 secured his big break and he returned the following year as the host of I'm a Celebri...

Dua Lipa is one of the biggest pop stars on the planet. She has won three Grammys and picked up her seventh Brit award in March for Best Pop Act. Last year, she collaborated with Mark Ronson on Dance the Night, which featured on the Barbie soundtrack, and appeared in the film as Mermaid Barbie. This year is proving to be Dua’s most successful yet with the release of her highly anticipated third st...

The actor and writer join Nick and Angela to talk about the new series of The Responder. Martin Freeman is a man of many genres and he has mastered most of them in his 27 year career. We first fell in love with him as Tim in The Office in 2001; he gained cult status as Dr Watson in Sherlock in 2010; and then hit the big time as Bilbo Baggins in The Hobbit in 2012. Martin won a Bafta and an Emmy fo...

Lily Allen burst onto the music scene in the mid-2000s with her debut album Alright, Still. It received critical acclaim and a Grammy nomination for Best Alternative Music Album. Recently, Lily appeared in the West End production of Martin McDonagh’s The Pillowman and also starred in Dreamland, a six-part television series based on Sharon Horgan’s Bafta Winning short about four sisters living on t...

Marian Keyes is one of the most successful Irish novelists of all time. She has written more than 20 books and sold over 35 million copies worldwide. Marian studied law in Dublin to placate her parents but had no interest in pursuing a legal career. Instead her rebellious nature took her to the UK where she lived in a squat in East London. It never occurred to Marian that she might be a writer unt...

Kaya Scodelario has grown up in the spotlight. The British-Brazilian actress shot to fame as Effy on E4’s comedy-drama Skins. The show has remained popular with audiences since the early noughties, tackling issues such as teen addiction and mental illness. That success propelled Kaya to the big screen, where she won roles in two massive movie franchises, Maze Runner and Pirates of the Caribbean. K...

Jordan North and William Hanson are an unlikely pair. They met at the BBC in 2012 and walked away assuming it would be a one-off. However, fate had other plans and today they are best friends and present a very successful podcast together called Help I Sexted My Boss. Each week, their listeners share hilarious dilemmas and Jordan and William respond with very different advice. The duo now have a s...

Siobhán McSweeney always wanted to be an actor but her parents wanted her to be a teacher. Undeterred, she completed a science degree at University College Cork and moved to London to study at the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama. Siobhán’s big break came in 2018 when she was chosen to play Sister Michael in Derry Girls. The show was a huge hit and Siobhán won a BAFTA for her performance i...

Elizabeth Day is a household name, an award-winning writer and presenter of one of the most successful podcasts in the UK. On How to Fail, she speaks to luminaries such as Gloria Steinem, Phoebe Waller-Bridge and Bernadine Evaristo about the things that haven’t gone right - and what we can learn from them. It’s fair to say that Elizabeth Day’s superpower is her vulnerability. She has written candi...

Nick and Angela kick off season 5 with the inimitable Claudia Winkleman Claudia Winkleman studied Art History at Cambridge but soon decided a career in Art was simply too quiet for her. She left the gallery and wandered into television, appearing on shows like Holiday on the BBC, This Morning on ITV and Liquid News on BBC three in the nineties. Her big break came in 2004, when she began presenting...

Nick and Angela welcome their final guest of season 4 to Dish HQ. Amol Rajan was born in Kolkata and raised in south London. As a boy he dreamt of becoming a cricketer and would watch tapes of Shane Warne on repeat. He studied English at the University of Cambridge before beginning a career in journalism, becoming one of the youngest ever UK editors of a national newspaper, the Independent, in 201...

Nick and Angela welcome an OG Derry girl to Dish HQ. Saoirse-Monica Jackson grew up in Northern Ireland and studied acting at the Arden School of Theatre in Manchester. She is best known and loved for her portrayal of Erin Quinn in the Emmy award-winning series Derry Girls. Over three seasons the 90s-set comedy became the most popular show on Channel 4 and is now a hit with a global audience on Ne...

Nick and Angela welcome an author and charity co-founder to Dish HQ. Dawn O’Porter was born in Scotland but grew up in Guernsey with her aunt and uncle. She spent three years at the Liverpool School for Performing Arts but decided that acting wasn’t for her and got into TV instead. Dawn made her name making documentaries, which explored topics like dieting, dating, pregnancy and polyamory. She mov...

Nick and Angela welcome one of the world’s favourite actors to Christmas dinner at Casa Grimshaw. Florence Pugh comes from a family of performers and cooks, so it’s no surprise that she has mastered both. Her first big role came in 2016, when she played Katherine in Lady Macbeth and by 2020 she was nominated for an Oscar for best supporting actress as Amy March in Little Women. In 2023 Florence st...

Nick and Angela welcome the world’s number 1 chef to Dish HQ. Massimo Bottura hails from the Emilia-Romagna region of Italy, the nation’s food capital. A renowned restaurateur, hotelier and contemporary art aficionado, Massimo established Osteria Francescana, his three-Michelin-star restaurant in Modena, in 1995. The eatery was voted the world's best restaurant in 2016 and 2018 and features in the...

Nick and Angela welcome the UK’s favourite PE teacher to Dish HQ. The Body Coach began his career as a personal trainer in south-west London in 2012. Joe Wicks harnessed the power of social media and soon thousands of people were following his food and fitness content. During the Covid pandemic, he launched PE with Joe and live-streamed daily workouts for kids stuck at home, which became a global...

Nick and Angela welcome a wine expert to Dish HQ. Helen McGinn is an award-winning author, drinks writer and TV wine presenter. Having cut her teeth as a supermarket wine buyer, she went on to found a blog, The Knackered Mother’s Wine Club, which has since become a best-selling book. Helen is the much-loved wine expert on BBC1’s Saturday Kitchen and writes a monthly wine column for Waitrose Food M...

Nick and Angela welcome a professional stargazer to Dish HQ. Dr. Maggie Aderin-Pocock MBE is a renowned space and science educator and a prominent figure in the field of astronomy. She began watching the skies from her council flat in North London as a child and went on to study physics and mechanical engineering at Imperial College London. It is Maggie’s ambition to go to space one day and last y...

Nick and Angela welcome their most anticipated guest so far to Dish HQ. Miriam Margolyes OBE is renowned for her acting career spanning over five decades, but it is her inimitable sense of humour that has earned her a special place in the hearts of audiences worldwide. Miriam was the voice of the Cadbury’s caramel bunny in 1990, won a BAFTA for her role in The Age of Innocence in 1994 and portraye...