Category: 5. Entertainment

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Steve Coogan has accused Keir Starmer’s Labour government of a “derogation of all the principles they were supposed to represent” and said they were paving the way for the “racist clowns” of Reform UK.

The actor, comedian and producer said the party he had long supported was now for people “inside the M25” and described the prime minister’s first year in power as underwhelming.

“I knew before the election he was going to be disappointing. He hasn’t disappointed me in how disappointing he’s been,” he said.

Coogan spoke to the Guardian ahead of an address to the annual Co-op Congress in Rochdale, Greater Manchester, where he called for locally led grassroots movements to assemble across Britain and take back control from “multinational institutions and billionaires”.

The Bafta-winning actor, best known for his Alan Partridge persona, has backed Labour in several recent general elections but switched his support last year to the Green party.

Coogan, 59, said he “agreed wholeheartedly” with the statement released by former Labour MP Zarah Sultana on Thursday night, when she announced she was quitting the party to co-lead a left-wing alternative with Jeremy Corbyn.

Sultana said Britain’s two-party system “offers nothing but managed decline and broken promises” and that Labour had “completely failed to improve people’s lives”.

Coogan said: “Everything she said in her statement I agree wholeheartedly. I wish I’d said it myself.” However, he added that he was “reserving judgment” as to whether to support the new party at future elections if they field candidates.

The Philomena star said he did not blame working people for voting for Nigel Farage’s Reform UK.

“The success of Reform, I lay squarely at the feet of the neoliberal consensus, which has let down working people for the last 40 years and they’re fed up,” he said. “It doesn’t matter who they vote for, nothing changes for them.

“Keir Starmer and the Labour government have leant into supporting a broken system. Their modus operandi is to mitigate the worst excesses of a broken system and all that is is managed decline. What they’re doing is putting Band-Aids on the gash in the side of the Titanic.”

In his most strongly worded attack on Labour yet, Coogan described the party’s priorities in the last year as “a derogation of all the principles they were supposed to represent”.

“We have a Labour government and it’s no different from a Conservative government in neglecting ordinary people,” he added.

“I think Labour governs for people inside the M25 – that’s who they’re preoccupied with, and gesture politics. Every decision that comes from central government these days to me looks political and strategic and nothing to do with sincerity or any kind of firmly held ideological belief.”

Without meaningful action to improve the lives of ordinary people, Coogan said, both Labour and the Conservatives would face electoral oblivion.

“They’ll pave the way for the only alternative, which is a racist clown. Reform couldn’t organise a piss up in a brewery but if there’s no alternative you understand why working people will make that choice,” he said.

Coogan spoke in Rochdale’s Grade I-listed town hall, which this weekend is hosting a congress of co-operative movements from across the world to mark this year’s UN-designated International Year of Co-operatives.

The actor is a supporter of Middleton Co-operating, a community-led initiative based in his home town, just outside Manchester, which aims to provide locally run energy, banking, social care, housing and other schemes.

He said the government’s focus on attracting investment to major cities had created a “doughnut of neglect” with poorer communities “ethnically cleansed”.

“You look at Manchester, you look at Liverpool, and you go: ‘Wow, look at these shiny new buildings’ and everything looks clean, there’s no crisp bags flying about in the street,” he said.

“The disenfranchised people who lived there before are not there any more. They’ve been ethnically cleansed. They’ve been booted out to the next poor area. So who’s benefiting?”

Coogan urged Labour to breathe life back into towns by empowering grassroots groups to take over neglected buildings, using compulsory purchase orders for example.

“It’s not just the fact that people are disempowered and feel like they have no autonomy. It’s compounded by the fact that these people, these multinationals, are enabled and supported by the government to keep their foot on the neck of working people,” he said.

It was “perfectly understandable” for working people to vote for Farage’s Reform in large parts of England, where many voters feel disenfranchised, Coogan said.

“But if any government wants to address that extremism, what they have to do is tackle the root cause,” he added.

“The root cause is poverty and economic decline in the post-industrial landscape, especially in the north. If Labour addressed that problem, Reform would go away – all their support would dissipate.”

On an unseasonably warm day in October 2023, I arrived, ahead of the queues, at London’s Southbank Centre for a conceptual art takeover by the world-famous Marina Abramović Institute.

I had recently read Marina’s memoir Walk Through Walls, which had resonated. So, when I’d seen the event advertised – hours-long performances by artists she’d invited, curated and introduced by Marina – I bought a £60 ticket and waited for my time slot to enter the Queen Elizabeth Hall. I hadn’t seen performance art before, and this was due to include her well-known work The Artist Is Present with an artist sitting, static and silent, in a chair all day, as Marina once did for an accumulated 736 hours and 30 minutes at the Museum of Modern Art. I felt certain that it would affect me, I just wasn’t sure how.

It came at an interesting time in my life. I was raised in a fundamentalist Christian family, the daughter of a priest who was physically abusive. I’d been in therapy for years, but my experiences still affected me and I’d recently cut contact with my father with my family. So, when I entered the first room at the Southbank where Marina was to spoke and introduce around a dozen artists, I was still coming to terms with this new way of dealing with my past.

I was immediately drawn to one of the artists, a man from Myanmar who was to perform the chair piece with a cloth sack over his head. We heard how he’d been part of an organisation in Myanmar that opposed violence and therefore risked death if he was publicly identified. I was moved by what he was risking for his art. I also knew it was a hard piece; Marina wasn’t going to give it to just anyone.

As people moved between performers, I saw him, seated in the atrium, with a large crowd; I waited for a quieter moment to return. When I finally stood before him, I was overcome. I felt an urge to sit down in front of him and didn’t care what others thought. I was compelled to do it for myself. I can’t say how long I sat there, maybe an hour. In that time, I rewrote my definition of “strength”. I used to think my father’s aggression made him strong but now I saw someone using his muscular arms and legs to be still, for peaceful protest. I imagined the loss he must have experienced in war and the mental strength to sit there. I thought of what I’d read in Marina’s book; how pain set in three hours into sitting still.

I cried: the good tears, where you let part of your past go. It felt cleansing. When I left, I felt lighter. I decided that this would be my father figure now: this person who had strength but did not hurt me, who had reasons to be aggressive but did not direct his anger towards a six-year-old whispering in her brother’s ear or disturbing his preaching, as my father had.

It unlocked something in me. It gave me a positive male figure to replace what had gone before and helped me not to hate my father or men. It also unblocked the creativity that had laid dormant within me, an artistic side that had reminded me too much of my father’s similar creative charisma. I started drawing: comic-books and illustrations.

I’m an atheist but I believe there are spiritual moments you can choose to embrace: this, for me, was one. I think of it often. I even have the poster from the takeover in my toilet, serving as a daily reminder. I’m 41 and throughout life I’ve learned to expect the unexpected. Usually, when I go to see art it’s to learn something new, and this was a big one. This changed me as a woman, as a soul, an immigrant, a creative, a child. That man gave himself to us as an artist and I accepted his gift.

Too Much (Netflix, Thursday 10 July) opens with a montage of the kind of woman you could be, if you were a carefree New Yorker who upped sticks and moved to London on a whim. You could be a candlelit period heroine, roaming across the moors, or one of Jack the Ripper’s victims, or you could be a sturdy northern police sergeant, which leads to the slightly strange spectacle of seeing Megan Stalter from Hacks doing a French and Saunders-style parody of what looks a lot like Happy Valley.

The much-hyped new Lena Dunham comedy follows Jess (Stalter), an open-hearted American woman who moves to London to escape a broken heart. There, she falls for a messy indie musician called Felix, whom she meets when he’s playing a gig in a pub. Dunham co-created the series with her husband Luis Felber, and it is loosely based on their real-life romance and marriage.

Jess decides to reinvent her life following the decline of her relationship with the highly strung Zev (Michael Zegen). Zev has quickly moved on to an influencer, played by Emily Ratajkowski, and Jess records long videos about her feelings, addressed to Zev’s new girlfriend, which she never plans to send … but you can probably guess that they won’t stay private for ever. Following a post-breakup spell amid the matriarchs of her Long Island family home, she  packs her bags and books a room on a British estate. What Jess imagines an estate to be is basically Mr Darcy emerging from the lake at Chatsworth. You can imagine the estate she ends up on when she arrives in London.

This culture-clash, fish-out-of-water strand is not the main point, though it does bubble under throughout. It offers the chance to hear British slang and idioms with new ears: if “getting a bollocking” never sounded strange to you, then it is worth considering that if you have no idea what it means in the first place, it can come across as a little smutty. I wonder if it is also the first time “oi oi saveloy” has made its way on to a Netflix series.

When Jess meets Felix (Will Sharpe, in leather jacket, lipstick and nail polish), her Mr Darcy/Mr Rochester dreams shuffle off in a very different direction. It is clear from the off that they like each other very much, but they don’t have the patience to pretend to be better people, or show each other their best sides. Instead, they come together over their flaws and oddities, finding a way to be together despite their considerable excess baggage. Too Much presents itself as a romcom, at least on the surface – Jess loves Love Actually and Notting Hill, and each of the episodes gets a romcom pun as its title – but in the end, it is an abrasive, complicated, grownup version of romance, rather than any picture-perfect illusion.

The Bear has sparked an ongoing debate about what counts as comedy and what counts as drama, by entering itself into various comedy categories at awards shows, despite being defiantly laugh-free and deeply traumatic in almost every scene. While Too Much isn’t quite on that same level of harrowing, viewers should know in advance that it is not exactly a laugh-a-minute lolfest. Jess must slowly work out how she lost herself in her relationship with Zev, while Felix’s family are an eccentric, unreliable nightmare, and his struggles with sobriety are pressing and ongoing. You begin to hope that it’s only loosely based on real life when it delves into the grotesque, cartoonish awfulness of the English upper classes. Not even the most obnoxious of interlopers deserves to be exposed to a country house horror show in which grown women have nicknames that make them sound like horses.

Too Much is stacked with a stupidly strong cast, who drop in seemingly for fun: Richard E Grant, Stephen Fry, Rita Wilson, Rhea Perlman, Naomi Watts, Andrew Scott, and that really is only scratching the surface. But in the end, despite being dressed up in romcom clothing, Too Much is about broken people finding love, actually, while learning to live with pain. Look out for it in those best comedy categories, 2026.

Actor and comedian Jason Manford warned people from working class backgrounds could be excluded from the arts if grassroots venues were not supported.

The 44-year-old said it was important people from poorer families had relatable role models.

He spoke to BBC Essex after Tiffany Theatre School in Clacton-on-Sea was forced into closure over funding issues.

“We’ll end up in a situation where the only people who are performing as actors, singers, comedians or musicians are people who can afford it,” Manford said.

He launched his award-winning career at a small venue in Chorlton, Manchester in 1999.

Manford said: “The arts are what separates us from the animals, this is the thing that makes us human and it’s important to keep it going.”

Tiffany Theatre School offered degree-level qualifications for up to 20 students over the past 25 years.

Staff and families rallied to raise £30,000 in four weeks to keep the doors open but fell short of the £200,000 needed.

Manford said if more small performing arts schools closed down then it would create a divide.

“The biggest problem is we’ll only hear from people with money and connections,” said the comic, who is performing in Southend-on-Sea on Friday.

“Where is the voice for working-class people, people living below the poverty line?”

He previously said “pure greed” had prevented him making money while performing at the Edinburgh Fringe.

“That becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy and that’s my biggest concern,” Manford added.

“The full circle is, who are our kids looking up to to say, ‘That person’s like me – maybe I could do that’?”

The Office for Students has been contacted for comment.

Mr Blue Sky: The Story of Jeff Lynne and ELO

9.05pm, BBC Two

Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr and Eric Idle are some of the heavyweight names who help tell the story of Jeff Lynne – along with the man himself. The multimillion-selling artist gives his candid account from his LA studio, where he recalls his days from growing up in 60s Birmingham to finding fame with ELO, and recording music with the likes of Bob Dylan, Roy Orbison and George Harrison. Hollie Richardson

George Gallaccio Remembers: Miss Marple

8pm, BBC Four

Joan Hickson brought Agatha Christie’s iconic sleuth to life in the 80s, with a series beloved by fans for being true to the novels. The producer George Gallaccio reflects on its success, then introduces a few classic episodes. HR

ELO at the BBC

8.05pm, BBC Two

To warm up for Jeff Lynne’s feature documentary, here are some special archive performances of ELO’s best hits, which will no doubt feature Don’t Bring Me Down and Sweet Talkin’ Woman. And it really is a night for the superfans, as the band’s 2014 Hyde Park set and 2015 BBC Radio Theatre concert also air later in the evening. HR

Love Island: Unseen Bits

9pm, ITV2

A decade on, Love Island isn’t the TV behemoth it once was. Still, season 12 has delivered a few novelties – among them, the show’s first American contestant, Toni, and, er, a conspiracy theory that fellow islander Yasmin is an AI bot. As per, Iain Stirling rounds up the week’s best offcuts. Hannah J Davies

Suspicion

10.45pm, ITV1

A stodgy thriller about innocent – or are they?! – Britons caught up in a high-powered US kidnapping case continues, and the cops’ focus is on thwarted bride Natalie (Georgina Campbell), who does have something to hide. But what exactly is it, and is it relevant to the abduction? Finding out is a slow slog. Jack Seale

In the Arena: Serena Williams

12.35am, BBC One

She’s among the greatest athletes in history but that doesn’t mean Serena Williams never encounters failure. As this documentary series reaches 2012, she’s licking her wounds after a shock early tournament exit and bringing on new coach Patrick Mouratoglou to revitalise her game. Ellen E Jones

Film choice

King Richard, 10:20pm, BBC One

Until the end of time, King Richard is destined to be known as Will Smith’s meltdown film – he won an Oscar for his performance, directly between slapping Chris Rock and being banned from the Oscars for a decade – which is a shame, because it deserves to stand on its own merits. A biopic of Richard Williams, the man who drove his daughters Venus and Serena to become the world’s best tennis players, the film enjoys a rocketship trajectory that starts in the backstreets of Compton and ends at the top of the world. And, yes, even with all his baggage, Smith gives a career-best performance. Stuart Heritage

Live sport

Cycling: Tour de France, 11.45am, ITV1 The first stage of the race: a 184.9km route around Lille.

Tennis: Wimbledon 2025, 12.20pm, BBC One Day six, with matches in the third round of the men’s and ladies’ singles.

Racing: Sandown, 1.30pm, ITV1 A meeting headlined by the Coral-Eclipse Stakes.

Test Cricket: England v India, 4pm, Sky Sports Main Event Day four of the second Test in the five-match series.

International Rugby Union: Argentina v England, 8.30pm, Sky Sports Main Event The first Test in the two-match series in La Plata.

Who: Mr Alvin Tan, 53, chief executive of the Singapore Chinese Cultural Centre (SCCC). The former deputy chief executive for policy and community at the National Heritage Board took over the helm of SCCC in June 2024.

One of his goals at SCCC is to strengthen support for local Chinese arts and cultural groups, hence the ongoing inaugural Chinese Opera Festival 2025. The festival, which is on till July 26, showcases works by five Singapore opera troupes, each representing a different dialect.