Snowcast

Ruth Madeley was born in Westhoughton, near Bolton, and studied English and creative writing at university. She always wanted to work in the entertainment industry and thought that her path lay in scriptwriting. She was born with spina bifida and, as an ambulatory wheelchair user, Ruth just didn’t see herself represented on screen However, a work experience placement at the BBC led to an unexpecte...

Dan Schreiber was born in Hong Kong, grew up in Sydney, and moved to England at the age of 19. Once here, Dan was hired as a researcher on the BBC panel show QI . And it was a job that Dan was born to do - one that combined his love for facts and comedy. In 2008, Dan launched The Museum of Curiosity on BBC Radio 4 and, after that, came No Such Thing As A Fish - a hugely popular podcast that's cloc...

Liz was born in France, grew up in Ireland, and studied biochemistry and wildlife biology at university. She has since travelled the world studying animal behaviour. And her documentaries include Drowning in Plastic, Galapagos and Should We Close Our Zoos? Liz is also part of Our Changing Planet , a seven-year-project for the BBC, visiting vulnerable habitats - to chart changes and the fight...

Waad Al-Kateab is a BAFTA-winning and Oscar-nominated filmmaker. Born in Syria, Waad left home at 18, to study at the university of Aleppo.  In 2011, she began shooting video on her phone, while attending pro-democracy protests. Waad went on to document the next five years in Aleppo, capturing life, loss and emergency care in the besieged city - as well as the birth of her first daughter Sama...

Carol Morley is an acclaimed filmmaker, whose work includes short film, documentary and drama.  She was born in Stockport, and spent her teens enjoying the Manchester music scene, before moving to London - where she studied Fine Art, Film and Video, at Saint Martins College. Her 2000 documentary, The Alcohol Years , showed a fearlessness and an early interest in identity. Carol’s since been d...

Classics professor Dame Mary Beard was a bright child, who was bumped up a year at school, went on archaelogical digs as a teen, and studied classics at Newnham College. After completing her PhD, Mary taught at King’s College in London, before returning to Cambridge - where she remained for nearly forty years. During her long academic career, Mary has written many best-selling books. When her 2008...

Ava Glass is the pen name of Christi Daugherty. She was born in Texas and worked as a crime reporter before moving to the UK. A few years after settling in London, Christi was recruited to work in the communications department of the Home Office - tasked with helping the public understand what the intelligence services do, to keep us safe. This wasn’t a straightforward job, given the secretiv...

In November 2019, Steve Gallant was serving a life sentence for murder when he confronted the terrorist Usman Khan. Steve had been allowed out on day release, to attend a Learning Together event, near London Bridge. Learning Together was an initiative that brought students and prisoners together - and helped change many lives for the better. But on this dreadful day, two young graduates were fatal...

The British-Trinidadian artist Zak Ové was born into an artistic family. After studying at St. Martin’s School of Art, he worked as a photographer and as a director of television and music videos.  At the age of 40, Zak had an epiphany while filming in Trinidad. Feeling a distance from his subject matter, Zak realised that he wanted to be a “maker” and that sculpture would allow him to expres...

Sarah Sands grew up in Tunbridge Wells and cut her teeth on a local newspaper in Kent, before moving to the diary, on the Evening Standard. She later edited the Standard but not before spending some time at The Telegraph, and re-designing the Sunday edition, with the launch of two new magazines. In 2017, Sarah moved into broadcast journalism, as editor of Today . While at the BBC, she steered Radi...

Michael Mansfield became a barrister in 1967 and, since then, he’s worked on some very high-profile cases in the UK. He has overturned miscarriages of justice, fought for civil liberties, and for change. He helped to free the Guildford Four and the Birmingham Six. He defended the Orgreave miners, fought for the family of Stephen Lawrence. And he represented victims’ families at inquiries into the...

Sir Chris Bryant was born in Cardiff, and lived in Spain as a child, before returning to the UK. After reading English at Oxford, he studied Theology and was ordained in the Church of England.  He then spent time in Latin America, and worked as a curate, before deciding to leave the church and move into politics. Chris was elected MP for Rhondda in 2001 and he’s held this seat for Labour ever...

Stephen Davis is an investigative journalist and author, who has worked around the world, on newspaper stories and documentaries. He’s also a podcaster, whose most recent series investigates the sinking of the passenger ferry Estonia. It is Europe’s worst shipping disaster - since the Titanic - and a gripping tale of tragedy, smuggling, and spies. But this interview will focus on the fate of Briti...

Professor Rose Anne Kenny is an expert in ageing who has over 35 years of clinical and research experience. She’s a Professor of Medical Gerontology at Trinity College, Dublin, and the Director of Mercer's Institute for Successful Ageing , at St. James's Hospital. Rose Anne is also the brains behind TILDA - a groundbreaking research study into ageing in Ireland - which has followed eight and...

Jess McDonald was one of the first recruits on The Metropolitan Police’s Direct Entry Detective Scheme. Launched in 2017, to address a shortage of detectives, this scheme was not without its critics. Successful applicants had a direct route into a career as a detective, without first undertaking a role in uniform policing.  When Jess first pitched an idea for a book, she wanted to bridge the...

The Nottingham-born comedian Matt Forde has been fascinated by politics ever since he was 9 years old. Raised by his mum, without much money, Matt experienced life: “at the sharp end of every political decision taken by the government.” He studied politics at university and, after working for a few MPs, he became a regional organiser for the Labour Party. But by 2010, Matt had left party politics...

Mick Lynch is the General Secretary of Britain's largest specialist transport trade union, the RMT . In May 2022, the RMT announced that its members had voted overwhelmingly in favour of strikes, in a dispute over pay, jobs and conditions.  At the time, they said it was the biggest endorsement of industrial action, by railway workers, since privatisation. But the dispute remains unresolved. A...

South Londoner Candice Carty-Williams has gone from publishing house marketing executive, to literary sensation - and now, she's taking on TV. Queenie , her 2019 debut, was a best-seller. Critics and readers loved it and Candice won several awards, including book of the year at the Nibbie’s. Fast forward to 2023 and Candice is the creative force behind two big series: Champion , a BBC drama which...

The poet and writer Sir Ben Okri was born in Nigeria and spent some of his childhood in London, before moving with his family to Lagos, on the eve of the Nigerian Civil War. This experience had a defining impact on Ben, who has said that he is “crammed full” of the painful things that he witnessed. In 1978, Ben returned to London to study but he really came to write. By 21 he had published his fir...

The voice of broadcaster and writer Anita Anand will be familiar to many. Her career began while she was still at university, in the newsroom of satellite channel Zee. Anita was then snapped up by Radio 5 Live and she has since presented many news and current affairs programmes on the BBC. In 2012, Anita became the host of Any Answers on Radio 4, where she also hosts The Reith Lectures . A few yea...

The award-winning screenwriter and playwright, Jack Thorne, joins Jon to discuss his work, passions, activism and politics. They discuss Jack's new TV show, Best Interests , (starring Sharon Horgan and Michael Sheen) and why it was so tough to write this story. At the age of 42, Jack was diagnosed with autism, something he is still processing. He talks openly about this and how it has affected him...

Journalist, broadcaster and best-selling author, Tim Marshall, joins Jon to talk about the power and politics of the new space race. Tim's new book - The Future Of Geography - looks at how the developments in space will change our world forever. The new space race is on, with China, USA and Russia leading the charge and many more vying for pre-eminence. But with eighty countries now in space, in s...

The Reverend Richard Coles left two major institutions within the same year; The BBC and The Church, but he cannot and will not sit still. Richard joins Jon to discuss his fascinating life and career, the power of prayer and what the future holds for him without a dog collar... Jon and Richard share their love and nostalgia for choral music, as well as looking at religion's place in society in 202...

David Harewood is an actor, director, author and activist. He was born in Birmingham, trained at RADA, and made a name for himself on the stage, with big roles that included Othello and Martin Luther King. Most recently, he played the right-wing commentator William Buckley Jr. in Best Of Enemies. A fantastic production that is currently screening in cinemas, thanks to National Theatre Live . His d...

Dame Joan Bakewell is a broadcaster, journalist, author and Labour Party peer. Her broadcasting career spans six decades and she was given a Lifetime Achievement Award by the Royal Television Society in 2016, and a BAFTA fellowship in 2019. At the age of 90, she is still presenting TV programmes (most recently Landscape Artist Of The Year), sitting in the House Of Lords and is the President of Bir...