At least five cancer patients have died after NHS doctors failed to get them the life-saving emergency medication they needed.
Another three were admitted to intensive care after they were unable to get a drug called rasburicase, which treats a condition called tumour lysis syndrome (TLS), that can develop as a complication of cancer treatments, such as chemotherapy, hormone treatment and immunotherapies.
The condition causes cancer cells to break down and release their contents into the blood, which can lead to severe electrolyte and chemical imbalances that can damage organs, such as the kidneys and heart.
High-risk patients, such as those with blood cancer, can be given rasburicase during or before cancer treatment to help the kidneys remove these harmful substances.
But an NHS review found that drug shortages and a lack of awareness from doctors that the medication must be given quickly has, fuelled delays that put patients at risk.
According to a national patient safety alert published on Thursday, there were 82 safety incidents linked to delays or omissions for patients needing the medication in 2021, and a further 41 incidents in 2024.
These included a patient who had lymphoma and deteriorating kidney function, who was not prescribed rasburicase when they were admitted to hospital, and who had a cardiac arrest and died the next day.
The review found 123 safety incidents linked to patients not getting rasburicase and 14 delays in giving the drug may have contributed to the death or significant deterioration in health of patients.
The alert said reasons for medication delays or omissions included:
a lack of clarity over the dose and monitoring requirements for the medication
a lack of awareness by clinicians of the need to give the medication quickly
a lack of stock or because staff were unaware that the medication needs to be stored in the fridge
Hospitals have been told to update their guidance for clinicians by March next year to ensure every patient with blood cancer has a risk assessment for TLS, and if appropriate, is prescribed the medication.
It said that routine use of the medication should be limited to clinical staff who have the knowledge and training to initiate the treatment and can escalate concerns over delays.
It added that hospitals must ensure there is sufficient stock of rasburicase available to ensure completion of the treatment course.
CEOs from Europe’s automotive supply industry met today with President Ursula von der Leyen in the framework of the Strategic Dialogue, launched eight months ago to address the mounting crisis in a sector vital to the European economy. Suppliers stressed that only a technology-neutral approach can provide the certainty and flexibility needed to overcome the current structural challenges.
“Today, we continued the dialogue that began in spring. There is agreement that we must work together to make the transformation succeed. And it is a significant task— not only to deploy charging infrastructure and frameworks for electrification, but also to ensure that the right policies are in place. There is also not much time, and we need to reach effective solutions in the coming months,” said Matthias Zink, CLEPA President. “We must keep ambitious climate goals but build the path together. A substantial and timely revision of the CO₂ regulation, true openness to all climate-neutral technologies—including a freeze of the utility factor for plug-in hybrids—and decisive steps toward a realistic regulatory framework that supports a role for hybrids, range extenders, hydrogen, renewable fuels are essential. Focusing solely on electric-only solutions risks sidelining the diverse, climate-neutral technology portfolio where Europe already leads globally.
He added: “To safeguard Europe’s industrial future, the EU must also urgently address how to keep manufacturing, R&D and know-how in Europe, maintaining local content in our vehicles and securing critical capacities across the entire supply chain, not just in batteries, semiconductors and software. At the same time, long-term solutions are needed to tackle structural challenges, such as high energy costs and red tape.”
According to recent figures, automotive suppliers face a 15–35% cost disadvantage compared to global competitors, driven by high energy and labour costs, regulatory burdens, and fragmented EU frameworks. Companies are also experiencing severe job losses — more than 54,000 job losses were announced in 2024, with a further 22,000 already foreseen this year, as factory closures and stalled investments take their toll.”
A next meeting of the Strategic Dialogue is expected by December.
Islamabad [Pakistan], September 12 (ANI): The Islamabad High Court on Thursday accepted a petition seeking an early hearing on the suspension of sentences for former Prime Minister Imran Khan and his wife, Bushra Bibi, in a £190 million corruption case, and directed federal agencies to submit fresh reports on all cases registered against him, Dawn reported.
A division bench comprising Chief Justice Sardar Mohammad Sarfaraz Dogar and Justice Mohammad Azam Khan approved the plea for an expedited hearing on the couple’s sentence suspension applications.
Barrister Salman Safdar, counsel for Imran, told the court that the petitions had not been scheduled despite five fixed dates due to repeated delays by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB).
“Sometimes the Bureau does not appoint a prosecutor and sometimes it seeks more time,” the barrister said.
He stressed that while neither Imran nor his wife had ever sought relief on medical grounds, Bibi is currently unwell. Noting that the couple had been acquitted or granted bail in all other cases, he requested the applications be decided without delay “to meet the requirements of justice,” Dawn reported.
Chief Justice Dogar said the court had already directed the office to fix the case and assured that a report would be called. The bench then ordered that the suspension petitions be scheduled for an early hearing.
In a separate proceeding, Justice Mohammad Azam Khan heard petitions filed by Imran seeking a complete list of all cases against him.
Barrister Salman informed the court that 127 cases had been filed against his client over the last two years but clarity was needed on their status. He requested the formation of a larger bench, citing precedents in politically sensitive cases.
“NAB and Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) continue to issue notices even after this petition was filed two years ago. Instead of any improvement, the number of cases has increased,” he argued, calling the actions “politically motivated” and unconstitutional, Dawn reported.
NAB’s Special Prosecutor Rafay Maqsood opposed the request for a larger bench, contending there was “no basis” for such an order because the bureau maintains a complete record and can provide it to the court.
Justice Azam Khan said a decision on forming a larger bench would be made after authorities submit their reports. He directed NAB, the FIA, and the police to file fresh reports on all pending cases against Khan and adjourned the matter indefinitely. (ANI)
(This content is sourced from a syndicated feed and is published as received. The Tribune assumes no responsibility or liability for its accuracy, completeness, or content.)
A major study has investigated the relationship between walking and the risk of developing chronic lower back problems. The findings could save the healthcare system significant amounts of money while also alleviating many people’s back pain – if we just follow the simple advice provided.
The results are clear: People who walk a lot have less back pain than people who do not walk much – and the volume is what matters most, not the intensity.. It is better to walk a lot than to walk fast.
“People who walk more than 100 minutes every day have a 23 per cent lower risk of lower back problems than those who walk 78 minutes or less,” said Rayane Haddadj.
He is a PhD candidate at the Department of Public Health and Nursing at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), and is part of a research group that specifically studies musculoskeletal disorders.
The results of the new study were published in the JAMA Network Open journal. The article has already received a lot of attention.
Even leisurely strolls are beneficial
It probably comes as no surprise that physical activity is good for your back, but until now we have not actually known whether the amount of low-intensity walking we do also helps.
“Intensity also plays a role in the risk of long-term back problems, but not as much as the daily amount of walking,” emphasized Haddadj.
A total of 11,194 people participated in the study, which is part of the Trøndelag Health Study (The HUNT Study). What makes this study unique is that the volume and intensity of daily walking were measured using two sensors that participants wore on their thigh and back for up to a week.
The results may be important in relation to preventing chronic back problems. Until now, there has been little research on the prevention of these types of musculoskeletal problems. It is well known that physical activity can prevent a wide range of illnesses and ailments. This study is important because it confirms that physical activity, and especially daily walking, can help prevent long-term lower back problems.
Back pain is a very common ailment
“The findings highlight the importance of finding time to be physically active – to prevent both chronic back problems and a number of other diseases. Over time, this could lead to major savings for society,” said Paul Jarle Mork, a professor at NTNU’s Department of Public Health and Nursing.
Back and neck problems cost society several billion kroner every year. Musculoskeletal disorders are likely the largest expense within the Norwegian healthcare system.
Back pain is one of the most common health problems in Norway. Depending on what you include, between 60 and 80 per cent of us will experience back problems at some point in our lives. At any given time, around one in five Norwegians has back trouble.
The causes are many and complex, but the solution might be as simple as putting on your shoes and going for a walk – each and every day.
Auburn Hills, Michigan, September 12, 2025 – BorgWarner has been included on TIME’s World’s Best Companies 2025 list. This prestigious award is presented in collaboration with Statista, a leading international provider of market and consumer data and rankings. The award list was announced on September 10th, 2025, and can be viewed on TIME.com.
“We are honored to be recognized by TIME as one of the World’s Best Companies. This achievement is a direct reflection of our incredible employees around the globe whose dedication, innovation and passion drive our success,” said Joseph Fadool, President and CEO, BorgWarner. “At BorgWarner, we are committed to delivering value to all our stakeholders while advancing our vision of a cleaner, more energy-efficient world.”
TIME and Statista identified the World’s Best Companies 2025 through a comprehensive analysis of three primary dimensions: employee satisfaction, revenue growth and sustainability transparency (ESG). Each dimension was scored and weighted equally with a maximum of 100 points, and the 1,000 highest scoring companies were included on the list. The three dimensions were specifically:
Employee satisfaction: Over 200,000 employees were surveyed around the world. The survey included direct and indirect recommendations of companies as well as evaluations of employers across the dimensions of image, atmosphere, working conditions, salary, workplace and equality by verified employees.
Revenue growth: In order to be considered, companies needed to generate a revenue of at least USD $100 million in 2024 and demonstrate positive revenue growth between in the last three years.
Sustainability transparency (ESG): Standardized KPIs from Statista’s sustainability database and targeted data research, including (E) 2023 carbon emissions intensity and reduction rate compared to 2021 and Carbon Disclosure Project score, (S) the share of women on the board of directors and the existence of a human rights policy, and (G) whether a company had a Corporate Social Responsibility report adhering to the Global Reporting Initiative guidelines and a compliance or anti-corruption guideline.
The fierce debate over whether Homo sapiens was the first species to bury its dead is far from over.
After a decade of back-and-forth with skeptics, paleoanthropologist Lee Berger and his team are not going to let their hypothesis die: that a small-brained species called Homo naledi was culturally burying their dead long before modern humans were.
Their latest peer-reviewed paper presents a reexamination of a contentious hominin ‘burial ground’, addressing previous criticisms to argue once again that the ‘cradle of humankind’ in South Africa is home to some of the earliest evidence of funerary practices.
Related: Did This Ancient Species Really Bury Its Dead Before Modern Humans?
The team lays out why they think this is the simplest explanation for how the bones of numerous H. naledi ended up deep in a cave system near Johannesburg.
These hominins lived more than 240,000 years ago, while early Homo sapiens and our Neanderthal cousins are only thought to have begun burying their dead some 120,000 years ago.
The claim that H. naledi had cultural burial practices more than 120,000 years before our own kind is a monumental one, so it’s natural that other scientists want the evidence to be ironclad.
A facial reconstruction of Homo naledi. (Cicero Moraes/Arc-Team et al.)
The hypothesis was first put forward by Berger and his team in 2015, when they announced that they had found the fossilized remains of at least 15 individuals of a previously unknown hominin, deep underground in a cave in South Africa.
Carvings on the walls and charcoal fragments had the scientists thinking this was an intentional burial site. But evidence was circumstantial at best, and it caused an eruption of debate over what defined a cultural burial, and how best to prove the existence of one.
In 2023, Berger and his colleagues published a series of preprints on their latest excavations. Still, many scientists were unconvinced, arguing that the charcoal wasn’t properly dated, that the burial pits weren’t clearly defined, and that the engravings on the wall may not even be human-made.
A painstaking review of the preprint papers, published in 2024, added that Berger’s and his team’s analysis fell far short of providing sufficient evidence that H. naledi had deliberate funerary practices.
Not to be discouraged, Berger and his team persisted, responding to the revisions.
Their latest publication explains that in at least three locations, the bodies were encased in sediment shortly after they arrived in the cave system. This refutes the idea that the bodies fell into the cave and were gradually covered by sediment.
Hundreds of H. naledi fossils were found deep within the Rising Star cave system. (Berger et al., eLife, 2015)
“The work we report here illustrates that neither gravity and resulting sediment slumping, nor downslope movement of bodies on a talus, nor slow, gradual sedimentation, nor any other ‘natural’ process previously hypothesized can account for the position and context of the H. naledi features,” the authors write.
“Here for the first time, we have considered the hypothesis that Homo naledi was directly involved in the burial process of bodies.”
Earlier this year, co-author and anthropologist John Hawks addressed critics and explained why the team had openly published their results before peer review. As part of eLife’s process, all reviews are made public and transparent, which Hawks sees as a benefit, not a downside.
“I’ve been in paleoanthropology for a long time,” he wrote on his blog. “You can’t do anything interesting without facing some challenging reviews. What we need to support as scientists is for the work to be as transparent as possible, from observation to interpretation. If we can eliminate the culture of fear around releasing new research and data, that would go a long way toward making research more reliable.”
No doubt there will be plenty of responses to their newest argument.
Nima Taleghani seems astonished that I know anything about him. This is the man who plays Mr Farouk, quite beautifully, in the phenomenally successful Netflix series Heartstopper. He’s an established stage actor and has featured in a number of director Jamie Lloyd’s recent blockbuster theatre productions, from memorable turns in Lloyd’s bold new versions of Cyrano de Bergerac and Romeo and Juliet – where Taleghani’s skill as a rap artist helped him shine in the director’s stripped-back, miked-up productions.
This month, Taleghani will be the very first playwright to have a debut play staged on the vast Olivier stage at London’s National Theatre. To top it all off, the production – a ferociously original, rap-infused take on Euripides’ Greek tragedy The Bacchae – will open Indhu Rubasingham’s inaugural season as the National’s new artistic director.
It’s a big deal. Yet as our conversation unfolds in a small side room at the complex, the 32-year-old writer-actor seems remarkably relaxed. There’s something about Taleghani, with his silver chain and twinkling sense of mischief, that seems to exist on the edge of things – a place where all that noise and fuss can’t reach him. “I’m quite a cool cookie really,” he says. “I’m not too tied to the idea that if something good happens, my life is good, and if it doesn’t, my life is bad.”
Ukweli Roach as Dionysus. Photograph: Marc Brenner
Taleghani’s parents emigrated from Iran before he was born. He grew up on Elthorne estate in north London and, in his teens, very nearly got expelled from his comprehensive school. In a lovely quirk of fate, it was Taleghani’s drama teacher (who just happened to be the excellent playwright Vivienne Franzmann) who pulled her student back into the fold with the stern words: “You’re good at this. Take it seriously.” And so he did, focusing on his studies a little bit more and messing around in class just a little bit less. Through it all, Taleghani was always interested in rap and rhyme: rapping “badly” in the playground or on the street corner with his friends.
After some decent GCSE results, Taleghani “hustled and rascalled” his way into sixth form and eventually landed a place studying English literature at Warwick University. He didn’t always feel comfortable at Warwick and turned to spoken word to help him fit in with a literary crowd: “It was my way of introducing myself to this community I wasn’t used to being around. Because I was different from them. And I knew it.”
While studying at Warwick, Taleghani wrote one of his final Shakespeare modules in the form of rap. He was keen to test himself and see if he could do things the “traditional” way – but he also felt there were much more truthful ways to express himself. So Taleghani turned to rap, kickstarting a merging of classical content and contemporary form that has run like an electric thread through his early acting career.
Roach and Reuben Johnson in rehearsals. Photograph: Marc Brenner
After a master’s in English at University College London, there followed a flurry of acting work in the theatre. This included a particularly memorable Slung Low production of The White Whale, staged on a floating platform at Leeds dock. “It was for 500 people a night and it was free,” he says. “It was for the people and to serve the community. That spirit has stayed with me.” The work made a strong impression, but it was Taleghani’s time at Haringey Shed, when he was still at school, that was truly formative. “That was my first experience of theatre: a bunch of underprivileged kids and young people with different types of disabilities. The whole ethos was: what can we do with who we are and what we have? It was really raw and honest.”
Taleghani doesn’t raise his voice at this point – he’s far too relaxed for that – but his eyes gleam brighter still. “Watching that type of theatre always gets me so much more emotional and moved than 99% of supposed ‘theatre’. That type of theatre isn’t honest. It’s mannered. Trained. Sculpted. Whereas with Haringey Shed theatre, I believe it. It moves me more when you don’t hit the note perfectly.”
Taleghani’s very first authored play nearly didn’t happen. During lockdown, a producer asked the actor – a rising star thanks to his sparkling turn in Heartstopper – if he’d ever considered writing for theatre. No, was his quick reply. “I wasn’t really interested. Being a playwright isn’t my thing. You have to care. There has to be a sense of love. Just because there’s an opportunity there, it doesn’t mean you should take it.”
Sharon Small playing Agave and Clare Perkins as Vida in rehearsals. Photograph: Marc Brenner
In fact, Taleghani still seems fairly sceptical about theatre in general. “Cinema’s cool because you can go and have your popcorn and Coke and even if the film isn’t good, you have a good time.” he says. “But if the play’s not good it’s a brutal experience, especially if you feel out of place in those environments. It’s just compounding the tragedy of theatre!”
But the playwriting queries kept coming in from producers aware of Taleghani’s rising profile as an actor and talent with rap and spoken word. So Taleghani decided to take another look at The Bacchae – about Dionysus, the Greek god of theatre, wine and general excess, who travels from Asia to Thebes to prove his godliness – and something finally clicked. ‘“I connected with the idea that a god could be a refugee. What does it say about society’s tendency to other people, that even a god can be an outcast? And what kind of god moves from where they’re revered, to somewhere they’re treated like shit? I found that really moving.”
Taleghani was determined to do something more with Dionysus’s chorus of followers, the Bacchae, who are “basically just backup dancers” in the original. Not so in Taleghani’s version, where each member of the female chorus has a sharply defined reason to leave their country. Their reasons for fleeing read like mini plays in their own right: one woman “chopped the left bollock off a touchy-feely priest”; another escaped a stoning orchestrated by her own brother; and a third sliced her husband’s face off with a razor after he tried to “rob her oesophagus of its oxygen”.
As I sit in on rehearsals on a blazing summer afternoon, Dionysus (Ukweli Roach) is meeting with his band of Bacchae. The very first cue I hear director Rubasingham utter to her huge ensemble cast is: “Can we have a bigger reaction after the word ‘dickhead’?” This is swiftly followed by: “Can we go from, ‘Shut up you shitty little dentist?’” The air crackles with possibility. Everyone in the vast company, including DJ Walde on the decks in one corner and choreographer Kate Prince in the other, seems utterly at ease but excited, too, and buzzing with ideas.
The flashes of dialogue I catch are vivid. Bold. Full of defiance and humour. The writing feels dynamic and instinctive, but Taleghani’s first attempt at playwriting didn’t always come easily. He laughs as he recalls his moments of doubt throughout the drafting process, but there’s vulnerability in there too. “I was getting really frustrated,” he says. “Feeling so stupid. Embarrassed. Ashamed. ‘Who do I think I am? Why am I trying to do this? I’m not the person for the job.’” He lets off another brittle laugh. “If I’d submitted my work and they’d said it was rubbish, I would’ve agreed with them. Of course it is! It’s my first draft and I haven’t even googled how to write a play!”
At one point, deep into the playwriting process, Taleghani quit altogether. But thanks to support from Rubasingham and her team of dramaturgs, as well as a frenzied co-codamol-fuelled redrafting session while recovering from a minor operation at home – the play kept driving forward.
Now, only a year after Taleghani and Rubasingham first met, Bacchae is landing on the Olivier stage with a bang. It comes amid promises of a “new chapter” for the National Theate. Fresh perspectives. An awful lot of press and pressure. Not that Taleghani is taking any notice of all that. “My friends from drama school have much more of a reverence for the National Theatre.” He lets out another cheeky chuckle: “I don’t have that. That heritage hasn’t been passed down to me. It isn’t in my body or my bones. So I can just get to work.”
Bacchae is at the National Theatre: Olivier, London, 13 September to 1 November.
The line between Steve Coogan and Alan Partridge is a blurry one. The love of cars. The clothes. They’ve both done their own live arena tours. They even share a face. But if you ever needed proof that they’re not actually the same, it’s the fact that when I meet him for breakfast at his London hotel, he’s not at the buffet with an oversized plate, the staff aren’t giggling at him, and we’re not in a Travel Tavern.
We’re here to talk about his new show, How Are You? It’s Alan (Partridge). It’s the latest instalment in the wider Partridge universe in which he presents digital radio, writes books, successfully podcasts, goes on tour, and made his BBC comeback on magazine programme This Time. (The character is now co-written with the Gibbons brothers, rather than Armando Iannucci and Peter Baynham.)
This time round we meet an altogether happier, wiser Partridge 3.0. He’s no longer in the public eye, but “finds a steady stream of Norfolk-based corporate work just as fulfilling. On the face of it, my life is great,” we learn. “I’ve got a large house,” – he lives in the oasthouse from his podcast – “my partner Katrina [played brilliantly by Katherine Kelly] is one of the fittest women over 40 in Norfolk.”
Norfolk legend … Steve Coogan as Alan Partridge. Photograph: Rob Baker Ashton/BBC/Baby Cow
The show is a documentary, self-funded by Pear Tree Factual Productions, as he explores the topic of mental health: something else that Partridge is dealing with personally. He presents to camera. He conducts vox pops, hosts focus groups and interviews local experts. There are infographics. There’s behind-the-scenes stuff with (yes!) Lynn. He attempts to reconcile with Sidekick Simon (Tim Key), who has had enough of Partridge’s constant criticism, in the name of mental health. He visits a book club and takes to the air wearing a jet pack. Forget Partridge 3.0. This is Partridge 4.0 and a half.
Given the theme of the new show, what I really want to get to grips with is Coogan’s inner Partridge. I’ve come armed with therapy-style questions. My thinking is: if I don’t have Coogan in tears with repressed emotion by the end of the interview, I haven’t done my job properly.
Things start well when Coogan’s press woman (who disappointingly looks nothing like Lynn) introduces me with a mention of the Guardian’s recent autumn TV preview, which (correctly) claims Partridge to be “the greatest comedy character ever produced by the UK.”
“No pressure then,” smiles Coogan.
“Alan’s definitely more popular than me. That’s a given,” he says when I ask if he’s jealous of Partridge’s universal appeal. “He also wants to be liked by as many people as possible. I don’t care about that. I want enough people to like me so that I’m allowed to exist.
“As you get older, I do feel like I don’t have to be to everyone’s taste. I’m OK with some people finding me irritating. When something has really gotten under my skin, rather than get broadsided for it, I’ll have Alan be the champion of the thing I loathe, but in a funny way. You can’t just have a big psychological wank. That’s not entertainment. But it’s a good starting point.”
What advice would Coogan give Partridge on this chapter of his life?
“I would say: ‘Don’t try and be something you’re not. You’re never going to host Newsnight. Lean into what you’ve got.’”
What would Alan say to the seven-year-old Alan Partridge – and what would Coogan say to his younger self?
“[Alan would say:] It’s going to be OK. They will all be proved wrong. You will win.”
And Coogan? “It’s not a million miles away. I did have an odd childhood,” he continues. “I was quite sociable and popular, but lazy. I’m an autodidact. What drives me is the class thing. I have deep-seeded class issues, but I don’t mind, because they’re part of the engine. I used to have low expectations of myself. I’d get from one place to another place career-wise, then think: ‘I wonder if I can get over here?’ There’s been times when I’ve turned down quick money. I’ve never done any panel shows. I watch Would I Lie to You? with my mum and think it’s really funny, but I don’t want to go on it. I don’t have the personality …”
Why doesn’t he think he has a personality?
“I’ve got a personality. But I’m not a personality. I have to talk about this shit to get people to watch it,” he says, of days when he’s forced to meet the press. “Sometimes people, like you, ask me questions I haven’t thought about before, and that gets folded back into my work, because I’ll think: ‘Oh yeah, that’s why I do that …’”
A good match? Katherine Kelly as Katrina with Coogan in How Are You? It’s Alan (Partridge). Photograph: Matt Frost/BBC/Baby Cow
Questions like what?
“Well, the direct parallel about what Alan and I would say to our younger selves. It makes me think of the sixth-form common room. Maybe this is [a bit] Alan Partridge, I don’t know. Forty years ago, I remember thinking: ‘I could be part of the next generation of comedy. Why don’t I do whatever it is you’re supposed to do and see if that happens? And if it doesn’t, at least I know I tried.’”
If Alan was on the therapy couch, what would he be trying to get to the nub of?
“I think he would masquerade as emotionally open. But all the things he would confess to would be completely risk free. He’d be posturing. His vulnerability isn’t real vulnerability. It’s affected.”
I crank it up. A therapist might say: “Steve, you are using Alan as an avatar. What’s the story you’re not telling yourself?”
“I’m reasonably happy as me,” says Coogan. “I look around and think I have lots to be grateful for, so that keeps me grounded. I do accept that Alan is an unfiltered, unmitigated, unedited version of me. What’s the story I’m not telling myself? It might be that I don’t really want to fully understand the dysfunctions of my personality. All I know is it works when I shovel it into this avatar, so why mess with it?”
Everybody wears masks, I point out, it’s just that Coogan wears one so publicly.
“I am self-aware in a way that Alan isn’t,” he says. “Sometimes when I’m speaking to well-educated southerners, my northern accent will fade away. When I’m talking to horny-handed sons of toil from up north, it suddenly comes back. It’s either rank hypocrisy or it’s empathy. I prefer the latter.”
Does that apply to subject matter too?
“My daughter, Clare, says: ‘You’ve got to stop talking about your midlife crisis. You are way past that.’ Alan is lockstep with whatever will give him the least grief. He’s quite Starmer-esque in that respect. I get angry and sanctimonious. I get incensed and descend into slagging people off. I don’t trust myself in that regard. There’s a catharsis in doing Alan. Some of his world view I fundamentally disagree with. But there will be something that I’ll be glad to put the Alan wig on so I can say it out loud.”
‘There’s a catharsis in doing Alan’ … Coogan with Felicity Montagu as Lynn in How Are You? It’s Alan (Partridge). Photograph: How Are You? It’s Alan (Partridge)./BBC/Baby Cow
Does he ever see himself as a fictional character? For example, Lorraine Kelly successfully claimed for tax reasons that she appears as “a chatty personality”?
“Really? Wow!” This is news to Coogan. “I say things as Alan that are not true, like he had a fight in a car park with Noel Edmonds. The BBC lawyers say: ‘That’s slander.’ How am I slandering someone by saying they had a fight in a car park with a fictional character?”
How long before the circles of the Venn diagram of Coogan/Partridge overlap completely?
“Maybe they’ll eclipse before passing over each other.” He tells a story of arriving in his trailer to find a blue, checked Aubin and Wills shirt to wear while playing Partridge – which was identical to the one he was already wearing. “I did take mine off and put the other one on, even though there was no one to witness me. There was a time when I was writing with Armando and Pete when I’d say something as myself, and they’d just write it down as Partridge and it would irritate me. Now the Gibbons do it all the time. As you get older, you realise it’s all gravy.”
What life lessons has Partridge taught Coogan?
“To be kinder to people.”
I glance at the clock: we’re coming up to 45 minutes, which seems like a good cut-off point for a pseudo therapy session. One last question. Will Coogan mind that, when he dies, his obituary will probably say: “best known for playing Alan Partridge?”
“It would be nice if they filled in some of the other details,” he laughs. “I remember, as a child, watching Fawlty Towers. It would fill the house with laughter for half an hour, we’d switch off the TV, have a cup of tea and dissect it, to make sure it was imprinted on your memory. It was an event. I remember thinking: how amazing it would be to create something like that. I did that with Alan Partridge. If that’s what I’m remembered for, that’s fine with me.”
How Are You? It’s Alan (Partridge) is on BBC One and iPlayer in October.
