Standard Issue Podcast

What the hell happened to evenings? If you want to fill the dark hours with some telly, we're here with some suggestions, including Help, Only Murders In the Building, Mr Mayor, Wolfe and The White Lotus. Plus we're chatting about the sudden surplus of Britney Spears documentaries.  Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/standardissuespodcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more...

The use, or rather mis-use, of non-disclosure agreements is rife in all sorts of nefarious dealings. Zelda Perkins, former assistant to Harvey Weinstein and the first to break her NDA with him, and Julie Macfarlane, a law professor who took on the Anglican Church, want to change that and they chat to Mick about their new campaign, Can’t Buy My Silence. Julie also has a book decoding the well-worn...

Actor and writer Sarah Solemani has adapted Jo Bloom's novel Ridley Road into a four-part drama for the BBC, which starts tonight. Hannah chats to Sarah about the ups and downs of adapting someone else's work, fascism, anti-semitism, and Psychoville. Because Psychoville. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/standardissuespodcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information....

Sarah Gavron and Theresa Ikoko's 2019 coming-of-age drama Rocks is our Yosra's homegrown pick for this month's deep delve into our favourite films. It’s the story of Shola, AKA Rocks (Bukky Bakray) – a 15-year-old east Londoner, and force of nature, who returns home from school to find her depressed mum gone, leaving Rocks to look after herself and her little brother – and a first-time watch for M...

Nothing delights comedian Njambi McGrath more than the spice of uneasy laughter. Ahead of the Soho Theatre run of her standup show, Accidental Coconut, she chats to Mickey about mining humour from hardship, her incredible grandmother and her new Radio 4 series Njambi McGrath: Becoming Njambi.  In Jenny Off The Blocks, Jen’s on the Zoom with boxer, model and activist Ramla Ali, who’s recently added...

There's been a lot of life since Wham!, but Pepsi Demacque-Crockett and Shirlie Holliman-Kemp are still mates. So, it's perhaps not surprising that they've written a shared memoir, It's All In Black and White: Wham! Life and Friendship. Hannah's been on the Zoom with the pair of them to talk about playing China in the 1980s, meeting Liza Minelli, fame, family, endometriosis and, of course, the leg...

Since that infamous council meeting went viral earlier this year, Jackie Weaver's life both has and hasn't changed. She chats to Hannah about her new book You Do Have The Authority Here, her new podcast, and good-old local politics. Jen's been on the phone to Kat Lister to talk about being widowed young and why she decided to write about it in her memoir The Elements. Jenny Off The Blocks looks at...

Alma’s Not Normal, Sophie Willan’s new BBC comedy is absolutely worth your time and our Hannah’s been on the phone with the writer and comedian to find out more. They talk about class, addiction, the North and a whole bunch of other topics that everyone’s got an opinion on, but not always first-hand experience. And Sophie tells us about Stories of Care, her project to help care leavers get into th...

Talking about sexual health remains a massive taboo in British society so, as it’s Sexual Health Week, Hannah jumped on the Zoom with Lisa Hallgarten from Brook, the charity pioneering healthy sex and relationships among young people. They chat about sexual health in lockdown, consent, and how to have The Talk with your young people. Jen catches up with para-athlete Libby Clegg to talk about guide...

Susannah Walker and Imogen Clark are the two (excellent) women behind Make Space For Girls, a new charity with Ronseal aims when it comes to parks and other public places. Because – get ready to feign surprise – girls are not taking up the same amount of space in our parks and public places as boys, particularly once they hit their teens. In fact, after the age of just eight years old, girls use p...

It's September and autumn's round the corner, so there's loads of new drama coming our way. This week Hannah and Jen chat about Vigil, Stephen, The White Lotus and Annika. Plus, they finally catch up with the really very good documentary Lorena, and Hannah has some TV-related podcast news. You're welcome. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/standardissuespodcast. Hosted on Acast. See acas...

The last 18 months have taught us a lot, including the value of public art, so Mickey's been on the Zoom with the excellent Gemma Cairney to talk about her new TV show, Landmark, and the search for someone to create a new landmark for Coventry. Jen's been chatting to filmmaker and artist Margaret Salmon about her film Icarus (After Amelia) and the impact of lockdown on women. She also picked this...

Written by a woman, directed by a woman, with a strong female lead and a creative team of loads of women, Camp Siegfried, which opens at The Old Vic on Tuesday 7 September, couldn’t be more up our strasse.  As the world unknowingly sits on the brink of the Second World War, girl meets boy at summer camp Camp Siegfried, exclusively for American youth of German descent. The total head-spin of first...

This month it's Hannah's pick and she's taking Yosra and Jen on a coming-of-age road trip of nostalgia with 2000's Almost Famous - and some bold claims she has to make about it, too. They cover the best scenes of the late, great Philip Seymour Hoffman, the wonder of Frances McDormand, the moral conundrum of yesteryear groupies, and what they would - or wouldn't - have done to make it onto Lee Ryan...

It’s once more into the breakup breech for our newlywed Mickey, who this week chats to comedian and fellow podcaster Rosie Wilby about how relationship breakdowns can equal important lessons learned and why lesbians know best when it comes to leaving. Rosie covers all this and more in her book, The Breakup Monologues. Jen’s been on the Zoom with comedian and author Shappi Khorsandi about Emma Hami...

Earlier this month, Team GB finished the Tokyo Olympic games fourth on the medal table with a massive 65 medals, equalling our London 2012 Games haul. That makes us the first country to match its medal or better its tally for two consecutive Games after hosting – hurray! In this week's Chops, Jen chats to the winners of two of those medals, Anna Hopkin, part of the 4x100m mixed medley relay gold-m...

Violence against women and girls is seemingly never out of the news, but certain necessary conversations just aren't being had. Journalist Rachel Thompson wanted to address these grey areas and she talks to Jen about her new book, Rough: How Violence Made Its Way Into The Bedroom, which explores how something comes to be labelled as sexual violence – or indeed not.  Meanwhile, Hannah catches up wi...

You may well have heard the rumours that motherhood can be pretty hard work at times. Guess what... the rumours are true. In this week's Chops, Jen chats to two excellent writers, Saima Mir and Mimi Aye, both contributors to the book, The Best Most Awful Job: Twenty Writers Talk Honestly About Motherhood.  Jen and Saima talk about maternal rage, expectations of motherhood vs reality, and Petit Fil...

It’s an epic challenge for our resident music expert Liz Buckley in this week podzine, as Mick asks her to cram as much info about the incredible Billie Holiday’s jam-packed short life into a 15-minute chat. Start your clocks now... Meanwhile, Jen’s been on the Zoom with journalist and writer Sophie Heawood about her excellent book The Hungover Games, and the trials and tribulations of getting acc...

Actor Pandora Colin is a human joy, so our Mick was delighted to natter with her about, well, all sorts. They chat the continued dearth of decent – decent being the key word – roles for women over 35 and why maybe we’re not grateful just to be thrown a few crumbs, and the not-so-maverick white, male detective, and, given Pandora played Dr Vetrova in 2019’s incredible mini-series Chernobyl, what it...

Women, that's what we like on TV, and this time, we've the full gamut for you. From funny sisters in This Way Up and a hard-pressed working mum in I Am... Victoria to high school girls in Cruel Summer and an icon in Reclaiming Amy. And last, but very much not least, there are feral nuns in Lambs of God. You are welcome. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/standardissuespodcast. Hosted on...

Regrets, we’ve had a few… and it probably does us the power of good to mention them. So says very wise and utterly lovely Amanda Prowse, the international best-selling novelist whose latest book, Waiting To Begin, inspired The Art of Regret – a campaign designed to get women to share their secret regrets and potentially see them turned into city-centre artworks. In this week’s podzine, she tells o...

Is testosterone a feminist issue? Well, after reading Dr Carole Hooven's new book Testosterone: The Story Of The Hormone That Dominates And Divides Us, Hannah totally thinks it is. So, she got on the Zoom with the Harvard evolutionary biologist to chat about what testosterone – or "T" – can teach us about the differences in how boys and girls play, male aggression and DSDs, often erroneously calle...

This month, Mick has Yosra and Jen watching one of her most-loved Christmas films: 1986 musical Little Shop of Horrors, directed by Muppet-master Frank Oz and starring everyone’s favourite Ghostbusters nerd, Rick Moranis. But is it a Christmas film? Well, clearly not. But can Mick convince Jen and Yosra that the songs, the Levi Stubbs-voiced man-eating plant, the bright colours and the pantomime v...

There’s been more than a bit of grief, loss, and mental health problems doing the rounds lately, as we come out the other side of a harrowing 18 months, for many. So Mick caught up with artist The Fandangoe Kid, to talk about her new project Fandangoe Whip, and how she’s opening up conversations via the medium of ice cream – is there any better way? It’s National Allotments Week, so Hannah chats t...