Hello, everyone.
I'm Hugh Bonneville.
And I'm Lashana Lynch.
Lashana, you're such a great action star.
I've always wondered, how do you do that thing where you punch
someone really hard?
Oh, it's easy.
I just do this.
Oh, I think he meant how do you pretend to do it?
Oh...
Let's start the show!
APPLAUSE
Oh!
I ran from there to here.
Hello, everybody!
Good evening.
You're all so welcome to the show.
What a week it's been.
It was the Tory conference,
ladies and gentlemen.
And that was as exciting as it sounds.
Here is the reaction to
Health Secretary Theresa Coffey giving her speech.
Riveting!
Coffee was supposed to keep you awake.
Here's Prime Minister Liz Truss leaving Number Ten
to go to Birmingham.
No, my mistake.
She's doing a U-turn.
That's her going back in again.
Here's Liz with Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng at the conference.
Get a room, you two.
Just gazing lovingly into his ears.
"Oh, look, I can see daylight."
Liz gave her speech to the conference on Wednesday.
That's this year's slogan, of course, "Getting Britain moving."
Sounds more like a slogan for a laxative, doesn't it?
Liz really had to deliver in that speech, and to be fair
to her, she gave it 110%,
which coincidentally, is the new mortgage rate.
Yeah, it is.
Hey, let's get some guests on!
Later we'll have music and chat, UK Eurovision star Sam Ryder is here!
First, he's the double BAFTA-winning grime artist and TV
Chef, it's Big Zuu!
Oh, ho, ho, ho, ho, ho!
Yes, it is.
Hello, sir.
Lovely to see, you have a seat do.
She's gone from Captain Marvel to James Bond to the acclaimed
new action epic, The Woman King.
It's Lashana Lynch!
Woo!
Hello, oh, my God.
Lashana Lynch, everybody!
She's the Olivier Award-winning actor, Oscar-nominated star
of Phantom Thread and the sitcom Mum.
It's her first time,
welcome to the great Lesley Manville!
Woo!
Hello.
We're hugging.
OK.
Have a seat.
And what can I say about
this man that he hasn't written about himself in his new book?
He's the star of Downton Abbey, Notting Hill and Paddington.
The one, the only, Hugh Bonneville, everybody!
Oh, the energy!
Lovely to see you, have a seat, do.
Oh!
Welcome, all.
More stars than there are in heaven.
All right, Big Zuu?
How you doing, you OK?
Yeah, I'm really good.
Really good.
I mean, it's an anorak, but it's nice.
It's a nice one.
It's high quality.
Look at the shoes, the shoes are big and that.
I don't really have big shoes but today
I went for the platforms.
Buzz Lightyear ting.
Beautiful, and it's a first time
welcome to Lesley Manville and thank you so much for doing
this, because you have literally come straight from set.
Yes,
an hour and a half ago I was Princess Margaret in Wiltshire.
Oh, great.
Yes.
And that's not an act that I do.
I mean, I don't go around being Princess Margaret.
Yeah, children's parties.
Yes, I was bona fide being her.
This is The Crown.
So do you see her out, if you know what I mean?
Yes, I do.
Oh, yeah, yeah.
The older Margaret.
So I will bid her farewell.
We all will.
Yes.
When's that happening, by the way?
When will The Crown be on the telly?
Well, season five, which we shot last year, starts
on November the ninth.
Oh, OK!
But welcome back to Lashana.
And now you were here last time for Bond, obviously.
And this week is a big week for Bond.
It's the 60th anniversary of the first movie.
So have you been involved in any of that?
Oh, yeah.
We had a Sound of Bond concert on Tuesday, which was amazing.
Oh, there I am.
There you are.
Oh, yeah.
Woo!
It was fab.
I mean, they told me Shirley Bassey was performing.
I was like, Oh, she'll close the show.
As soon as the show started,
it was Shirley Bassey out, straight like this.
She was in gold, yeah, fabulous.
It was amazing,
it was amazing.
Of course, I have to say, Lashana not the only
Bond star on the sofa.
Do you know this?
No, I don't.
I'm ready.
You.
Bonneville.
Which one were you in?
Well, it was glamorously called when I first read the script
or the scenes,
Bond 18, and it turned out to be called Tomorrow Never Dies.
Wow.
I think we've got a picture of you in Tomorrow Never Dies.
There we go. Yes.
Pillsbury Dough Man, really.
Tomorrow Never Stops Eating.
That's uncalled for!
No, you look so lovely now!
We can laugh at this now.
HE LAUGHS EXAGGERATEDLY
What, do you remember your lines?
I had one.
I had one, I had two, but one got cut.
You might have to help me.
"Sir, AWACS report two waves of land based MiG 21 inbound.
"They should be on our screens in two minutes."
Very good.
Yeah!
Were you at the Sound of Bond concert?
No.
Strangely, I wasn't invited.
And a first time welcome to Big Zuu.
First time welcome to a double BAFTA winner.
Oh, yeah!
APPLAUSE
You took your mum, right?
I took my mum to the BAFTAs.
She enjoyed it,
she was on the stage when I was winning.
But also you did an appeal to the audience?
Yeah, I kind of basically said if any men in the room want
to date my mum, make sure...
You know what I'm saying,
my mum's a good looking lady.
She's single.
Yeah, but make sure the bag is correct.
Make sure you got money.
Ain't playing no games on there.
Did it work?
She took a picture with some famous people,
met some famous people.
I've got a picture of her with, I think,
is this Charles Venn?
Yeah. They're looking good together.
I'm not going to lie.
She's gorgeous.
She's beautiful, but he's...
He's a beautiful man.
I feel like he might cheat, you know what I'm saying?
He's really lovely.
And also, I'm sorry,
you know, we was nominated for the same BAFTA.
I know.
I'm sorry.
You've won a lot, you know? So it's my time to...
It's like having Ant and Dec on.
I fought this booking. I want you to know.
Right, Hugh Bonneville brings
us his new memoir.
It's called Playing Under the Piano: From Downton
to Darkest Peru.
It's out on the 13th of October.
I love this pose, Hugh.
Maybe I could recreate it.
Oh, look, I've got the same suit on.
It is the same suit. Yes, it is.
Were they going to superimpose a piano for you to lean on?
What is that?
They forgot the piano.
Couldn't afford the piano.
Now, you know, before I read this book, I didn't know much
about you, but from the title Playing Under the Piano,
I was getting quite a posh childhood.
Well, actually, the reference is to actually under a...
Yes, it's not a grand piano, may I add.
No, it's from the kindergarten.
And I can remember playing under a little upright piano and not
coming out to do the little bit of performing in front of the class
that I was being asked to because I was a bit scared.
And so there's a sort of, I don't know if Lesley
and other performers
feel this, but, you know, sometimes you sort of have this tension
between wanting to go out and show off and actually thinking,
it's all silly, I shouldn't do it.
And yet you fought that feeling.
I fought that feeling.
Somehow I suppressed it.
So here we are.
But you have been working successfully, making a living
in the business.
So I think from the outside looking in, people thought Downton
was your big break.
But did that feel like a big break to you?
Well, a different gear, certainly.
I mean, the number of people who came up and said, "You must
have been so relieved when Downton came along."
I had been working for 25 plus years before that and very happily so.
But it was, it was obviously a completely strange gear shift
when we did Series one.
No-one was particularly interested or, you know, people thought
that the costume drama was dead and suddenly, poof, it exploded
and became, rolled out around the world and seemed
to have an effect in every country it went to.
It was very, very peculiar and wonderful at the same time.
But it was, it was a significant difference.
I mean, without Downton, I wouldn't have met a,
you know, a little bear.
Paddington Bear. Paddington.
I mean, and...
APPLAUSE
And in the book you talk about how they had to change
the rating for the movie because it was supposed to be kind
of a U for universal.
And it wasn't that in the end.
Well, yes.
Apparently there were two principal reasons.
One is that you, when Paddington is eating his sandwich in the sentry
box and another sentry comes along to senior officer, comes
along to sort of change the guard and says, "Get out of here."
Apparently you might be able to hear the word,
"Get out of here, bloody bears."
The word bloody might have emerged from the mumbling,
but the other was that when I dressed up as a cleaner,
that it was a bit provocative.
Well, you put, you kindly put a picture in your book
of you dressed up as the cleaner.
And I see what they mean. I mean, this is pretty phwoar!
Can you get a close up of that? I mean, check that out.
Calm down, everyone.
He's right here.
Love that that got it a PG-13.
Those legs.
Talking of classic children's characters,
Matilda, Matilda the Musical is now a movie.
And Lashana Lynch, you're in it.
You were at the premiere.
Was it this week, the premiere?
Yeah, yeah.
So who do you, who do you give us?
Miss Honey.
There you are. There you are.
So a lovely role, you get to act, you get to sing.
But a lot of children, I imagine.
Yeah, about 200 children.
LESLEY GASPS
Lesley gasping with horror!
We survived.
It was, it was fine.
I mean, there's the main cast,
and then there's a, you know, an ensemble of dancers
who are all fantastic.
And they worked so hard to get this choreography on point.
You know, they're a lively lot and it was a lively time.
I'm reading, "No.
This is awful, terrible."
But now, the reason that Lesley mighty have gasped at the idea
of working with so many children is one of your very first jobs
wasn't as an actor, it was a presenter.
Yes, I was 17 and I was presenting,
it was when ITV was all broken up into regions,
and this was Westwood Television, which sort of covered Devon
and Cornwall and a few other places.
The programme was called Young Eyes and it was like a Blue Peter type
programme, but we had to film it as if it was live,
even though it wasn't live, because they quite literally
didn't have an editing machine.
Oh.
At Westwood Television.
Yeah.
So I would do these interviews and I was pretty good at it,
Graham, I mean...
All right, back off.
Big Zuu already got the BAFTA.
But one week I got this little boy
who was into speleology, which is cave digging and diving
and all of that stuff.
In the rehearsal, he was fantastic.
They said, it's a seven minute interview.
He was about eight, nine years old.
So then we go live, as it were.
And I ask him all these questions about speleology and do
you do this and do that?
And he just went, yes.
And?
Another question.
No.
You know, it was awful.
I mean, do you ever have that problem?
I do, but happily, I've got some other
children on the couch I can turn to.
I mean, I take my hat off to you because it's not easy, is it?
And I haven't done it again since.
Oh, good. Keep it that way.
But actually, Big Zuu, you've worked with young people.
You did the young chefs, Hungry For It.
Working with ten young upcoming chefs.
OK.
So that's me and Stacey Dooley,
Chef Kay Kay.
We got Stacey.
It was a beautiful show.
The young people are amazing.
I had to get into my Gordon Ramsay bag, but I wasn't swearing at them,
calling them little shits.
I'm actually nurturing the, to become great human beings.
You look easily impressed, Big Zuu.
Burger?!
Eton buns?
And Hugh, the book, lots of, as you would expect,
lots of showbiz stories.
But also it's really lovely about your parents.
Just tell us about your mother.
I'm sure she was always an interesting woman, but later
in life, you discovered she was really interesting.
Well, yeah, because when I was about ten, she went off to do a part-time
job at the Foreign Office where she'd worked when she was much,
much younger, before she had a family.
And we'd, my dad would drop her off at work at this building
in Lambeth, and he'd go off to the hospital.
And sometimes I went with him or whatever.
Then cut to years, years later, when they were both well retired.
And I opened the paper one day and it said MI6 building to be sold.
And I thought, "That's Mum's workplace."
And so I phoned her up and she was in the garden
and she went, "Hello, dear."
And she came in from the gardens and I said, "Did you work for MI6?"
And she said, "Mm."
"Did you?
You were a spy?
Whoa!"
Well, she said, "No, I did some filing," which is what it
turned out she did, but it was quite it was quite sort
of classified filing.
And I only discovered this years later.
And when she passed away, I asked my dad if she'd ever
talked about it.
He said, "No, I had no idea what she ever did because..."
But they allowed you...
Didn't MI6 allow you in and show you all the secret files and things?
Well, they didn't show me secret files, but they did very kindly...
Did they show you secret files?
They did not show me secret files!
Please don't tie me to a chair and ask questions.
They...
No, but they did actually ask me in to do a sort of lunchtime chat.
They were having this sort of sequence of chats,
from outsiders, really, to come in and just natter to
the boys and girls who worked there.
So I just did a talk about, you know, about my life
in the industry and people who'd inspired me along the way
and that sort of thing.
And then I met a man afterwards, he came up to me and he was roughly
a bit younger than me, but he said,
"I worked with your mum."
And that was just astonishing because she was a few years gone
by then, and he said, "We were in our section,"
up in the whatever it was called, P Section or something,
"and we'd hear these footsteps on the corridor coming...
'Quick let's pack, quick, look busy, look busy!' "
And that was the weirdest thing.
I knew what he meant by those footsteps.
I remembered those footsteps and we were connected
by a sort of sound.
Yeah.
And I'd never met this man, but suddenly I felt really
a wonderful sort of connection.
It was amazing.
Oh, well, it is a great read.
It's called Playing Under the Piano, and it is out next Thursday.
Thank you so much.
Thank you.
Very good.
Lesley Manville has such a great feel-good film for us all.
It's called Mrs Harris Goes to Paris.
It's out in cinemas now, and this is already a big hit in America.
Here's a little taste.
I've won, Vi.
I've won!
You want to make nice!
She only gone and won the pools.
What are you going to do?
I'm going to buy a dress.
Something pretty for a leisure dance.
Yeah.
A Christian Dior dress from Paris.
Oh, so lovely.
That's you with Ellen Thomas there.
And I was saying to you backstage, it's like a sort
of adult fairy tale.
How do you describe it to people?
Yeah, I think that's really spot-on.
I've been saying it's like a musical without the music, you know, it's...
It's gorgeous, it feels like the soothing balm
that we all need at the moment.
It's two hours of absolute gorgeous escapism and everyone I know
in my life, as well as the general public, but lots of people I know
in my life who I sort of thought, "Oh, I wonder what they'll make
of this film.
You know, maybe it's a bit too feel-good."
And they've all just said, "I couldn't stop crying."
So people are liking it, which is great.
And basically the plot was in that clip.
Mrs Harris goes to Paris to buy this fabulous dress.
Yeah, the clue's in the title.
Yeah.
The idea of going to Christian Dior and buying this dress.
So it's not just "a dress".
There's so many beautiful clothes in this film.
And are they re-imaginings of what your dresses would have
been, or are they the actual dresses, or how did it work?
A bit of a mixture, but that period for Dior was iconic.
It was called the New Look, and it was post-war and fabric
was a bit more available.
And so Dior was celebrating that wonderful - if you've got it -
that female shape of the little nipped-in waist and all of that.
It was just...
It's sumptuous.
And have any of the dresses ended up in Chez Manville?
No, but I did get Ada's hat.
Oh.
Which is a bit different.
Thank you very much.
No, I mean, you'd like to think that you can go around
taking those things, but you can't really.
But I did keep...
Ada's got this little felt hat that she wears
in the in the film, so I kept that.
And Lashana, you are fast becoming a sort of fashion icon.
Your red carpet looks are...
They're fabulous.
That's your Bond premiere.
And are you one of those people, do you just rock up and go,
"Yeah, I'll put that on"?
Are you really involved in all these looks?
Oh, no, I'm really intentional.
I wish I could just rock up.
I wish I found it that easy.
But this one in particular, I wanted to have a hand in it,
because it was a special moment for me to celebrate my culture.
So this is the Jamaican flag, basically, yellow, black and green,
and that is our national bird at the back.
So Vivienne Westwood was really happy to be able to collaborate
with me and I was very proud...
Yeah!
I was teasing you about your anorak earlier, but let's have a look
at you on the red carpet at the BAFTAs.
Come on!
It's not the same thing!
We was on the same wave.
Know what I'm saying?
You know what?
I don't really wear suits, I wear Stoney.
Was it new?
Did you buy it for the BAFTAs?
Yeah, come on, it was fresh, man.
OK, OK.
I love it.
I want to do that.
That's how carefree I want to be.
Listen, I was just vibesing, I thought, you know what?
If I can wear Stoney and win two BAFTAs, you could do anything.
Yeah, I'm turning up in a tracksuit next.
Yeah, that's it.
And those are new trainers as well, aren't they?
I'm not here to teach the world style!
Let's cook!
See, I'm a chef.
Anyway, here you are, Lesley Manville,
movie star now, movie star.
And yet, theatre, you love theatre.
I mean, you have dedicated your life to the theatre.
Is that fair to say?
No, it is.
I do honestly, honestly believe it's where I learnt it all,
because on stage, nobody can edit you.
They can't make you look better than you are.
You know, the audience can look wherever they like.
It's not a director's cut with shots and edits.
And so it's very...
And you're on your own, aren't you?
I mean, you have the rehearsals, but night after night after night,
you've got to go out there and be it and sell it.
And it's very exposing.
I saw you years ago.
I saw you in The Cherry Orchard with Dame Judi Dench.
Did you?
With Sam Mendes, the child Sam Mendes directing.
Oh, look at me.
Oh, God, that's depressing.
No - untouched by time.
And Dame Judi Dench, she has a reputation
for being quite naughty.
Naughty?
That woman should be locked up.
I mean, she is...
She's so naughty.
Do you want to know what she did to me?
Yes, I do.
So there's a moment in The Cherry Orchard
where my character was on stage on their own for a short time.
Judi Dench is in the wings, trying to make me laugh,
trying to corpse me.
Which is...try to make me laugh.
And she's...
How can I put this?
She's pretending that she's being...
..pleasured by somebody.
From behind.
I'm sorry.
I'm sorry, Judi, if you're watching, but you shouldn't be so naughty!
So I'm on stage and I can see all this, and I'm desperately
trying not to laugh.
And the important bit of information here is that I'd just had a baby,
so my pelvic floor wasn't quite what it should have been.
Now, I was wearing a long dress, but I laughed...
Judi made me laugh so much that I wet myself.
And it gets worse - because the stage was raked,
which means it's on....
So I...
I watched my piss...
..trickle down!
I don't think I was there that night, no.
Well, if you were in the front row, you'd have seen it go over the edge.
That woman is so naughty.
I mean, you must have stories about her.
Do you work with her?
I've worked with her a few times, and we did a play
at the National Theatre called Entertaining Strangers,
which was an ensemble...
I mean, a promenade production, which meant the audience
was in amongst the actors and vice versa.
And one evening she was in the offstage and she could see
a mutual friend, Howard Davies, a director, sitting amongst
the group of people on this stage.
So she thought, "I know..."
So she scribbled a note and then as she passed by to go and do
the scene with Tim Pigott-Smith, she scribbled down, "Fancy a shag?"
And then...
And as she walked past him, she dropped it in his lap
and carried on, did the scene and feeling very smug
and pleased with herself.
And at the end of the scene, she sort of looked round
and realised it wasn't Howard Davies.
That is so good!
Well, if you're looking for a good time in the cinema,
Mrs Harris Goes to Paris is out now.
Lashana Lynch brings us a very different film.
This is called The Woman King.
It is out now already, been number one at the US box office.
And here is a taste of what to expect.
You are called to join the King's Guard.
No kingdom in all of Africa shares this privilege.
Train hard, fight harder.
We fear no-one.
And we feel no pain.
I offer you a choice.
Fight, or we die.
Wow.
It's so good.
I saw it last night.
It's just terrific.
And it looks like a kind of fantasy film.
But this elite female, these elite female warriors,
they existed in history.
Yeah.
Yeah, the female army from 18th-century Benin, as in our story.
And they're incredible.
We've got Viola Davis, we've got Sheila Atim,
we have Thuso Mbedu, we've got John Boyega,
all coming together to represent this based-on-true-events story.
And it's just an epic drama full of real stunts and real life,
real women, real power, real inspirational,
everything, really, yeah.
For myself included.
Because for most of the film, your character refuses to feel pain.
Yeah, that's based on the real Agojie women as well.
They literally were taught not to feel pain.
Which must be quite hard to pretend, that I'm not going "Ow!"
Look at that clip there.
You see me standing on a rock.
There's about five rocks under my foot there,
which is fantastic.
At one point...
Did they give you a protective thing for the sole of your foot?
No.
No, we were just barefoot, just raw the whole time.
Which was amazing because we were, you know...
We were in at 3am doing stunts in the dark,
taking down men, as you see.
And like I said, 100%...
Are you fighting with a sword?
Yeah, with a machete in my hand.
You got the sword and you're throwing him?
Yeah.
Damn!
And then after I throw him...
After I throw him, I then have to take him down again.
Yeah, yeah, yeah!
Because you've done things like Captain Marvel and, you know,
James Bond and stuff, were you ahead of the game?
Were you head of the class?
No!
I thought I would be.
Oh, really?
I wasn't ready.
I'm not going to fight.
I thought that having done a couple of stunts,
that I'd be able to just go in and just springboard
off experience.
But this was 100% stunts, and Gina Prince-Bythewood was really
determined to have us just come in and she even joined us
for training, which was amazing.
But no, this was throwing men.
This was machete work.
They're really heavy.
This was discovering muscles in your wrist that
you didn't realise you had.
This was working on the thunder...
Big Zuu laughed first.
He was waiting!
I saw your eyes!
Lay it out on here.
It's just, you know, you were just...
The right hand...
Well, I learned about all that.
Lesley Manville...
Oh, yes?
You've done lots and lots of acting.
Have you deliberately chosen every role to avoid stunts?
Have you ever done a stunt?
I light my own cigarettes.
Oh, there you go.
Actually, I do do my own stunts.
When have you done stunts?
No, I haven't done major stunts like that.
But you know, if there's falling...
I was doing some only last week, when I could have had
a stunt double, tumbling and tippling around.
And I didn't.
I did it myself.
Well done, you.
Yes, we're very impressed.
We look forward to Princess Margaret's fight scene in The Crown.
And you've had stunt people in the past, haven't you?
Yes, yes, occasionally.
I can remember one...
I did a film in America called Underclassman,
which didn't trouble the box office, and...
And I can remember getting ready for this big fight
sequence at the end, and they said, "We're going to be
bringing in a stunt guy for the more tricky bits."
"Yeah, fine, fine. When is he coming?"
"Well, he's over there."
I said, "I can't see....
There's a...
There's a really big bloke over there.
I mean, quite...
I mean, there's him."
They said, "Yes."
I went, "What?"
And they said, "Yes, that's your stunt double."
I said, "Do you think I look like him?"
They went, "Yes, you do look like him."
And when I watched the finished film, I literally
couldn't see the join.
Aww!
And big Zuu, you don't do your own...
You don't even drive your own food truck, do you?
Nah, I ain't got a licence still.
It's not my fault - you do this industry stuff,
they get you a lot of cabs, innit?
You know what I'm saying?
Yeah.
Are you learning to drive?
You know what?
We got a rare driving school, I just got seven hours.
No, I haven't done it...
You've bought it?
I've bought the seven hours.
Ah!
That'll do it.
I got automatic licence, I don't want to do manual.
I'm so with you.
I learned to do automatic.
What's the point? Yeah, it's like...
It's like walking across the room to change the channel
after they invented remotes.
Yeah! Great way to put it.
Why would you bother learning how to do that?
Nonsense.
Nonsense!
Now, the BAFTA-winning Big Zuu's Big Eats, three series now,
they're all available on Uktv play.
So just to remind you of what Big Zuu's Big Eats
is like, here it is.
You can't have a roast without carrots, but for Mel,
we're boozing them up.
It's time to take these carrots on a club night.
Start with some shallots
and butter in a pan, slice up multicultural carrots, no
discrimination, and wine.
For Mel B, it's a champagne ting.
Woo!
Get your beautiful batons into the pan.
Give it a chef flick.
You know me, when I go to the club,
my boss the champers, you know my thing.
While the champagne carrots get
all bubbly bubbly in the pan, check on Tubsey.
Add some honey for my honey and
a little bit of cheffiness.
I love that.
Little bit of cheffiness!
It's all in the wrist.
That's what you're talking about. Yeah.
The cheffiness. Yeah.
Cooking the carrots.
That's it.
But here's the thing, you know, it started small and now it's grown
and grown, and now it's got this mainstream success.
Do you think you'll end up sort of cooking in like a studio,
like a Saturday Kitchen or...
Oh, no, man.
You know, we had a little breakfast show on ITV.
It went well.
But the whole, like this kind of vibe with the cameras and that, nah,
I just want to chat shit in the van.
We're good, I enjoy coming in the studio.
It's very, it's way more relaxed.
It's no rain, nothing can go wrong.
You know, the van is not going to explode in here.
But I like the rawness of the programme out on the road
and it's me and my brothers just chilling.
But you've been on those shows.
You've been on, was it Sunday Brunch you did?
You did?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I've done Sunday Brunch a couple of times.
Did you cook?
I cooked.
I've cooked a couple of times, yes.
It's gone all right.
It's very nerve-racking cooking live.
You know, when you cook live, there's too many things.
Someone's in your ear talking rubbish and you're
like, bruv, let me just flip the pancake.
And when I did Sunday Brunch last time Michel Roux was there.
Oh, yes.
Big Michel Roux, you know, big boy chef.
Yeah. He cooked me a souffle.
Very dead. Not going to lie.
You can't say that!
Why can't I say that?
Look, I come from rap where there's battle rap, yeah.
I think with chefs, there should be battle chefs.
I want to battle Michel Roux.
Michel Roux, I know you've got a family dynasty.
But I don't care, that souffle was dead.
Big Zuu, how did all of this happen to you?
Because you mentioned rap there.
Like, music was the thing you're supposed to be doing.
How did this come along?
I started cooking when I was like nine, ten.
My mum was pregnant with my little brother because I wanted
to help run the house.
Come on.
Yeah.
And then, being a young, fat man, I stuck with it.
Look at me now!
So all these things come out of it and like acting has come
out of it.
You've done acting now?
Yeah, yeah.
I got a little main lead in a programme called Sneakerhead.
The three actors are going, "This isn't that funny any more."
Yeah, this was hilarious when he was cooking.
But is it EastEnders, you're a huge EastEnders fan.
Yeah, big EastEnders fan.
Have you been on the set?
Yeah, when I was filming the music video in Elstree, my friends
was walking around as they do and they found the door and it opened
and Oh my God, this is the pub.
It was the Queen Vic, but obviously it's not the real one
because it's the TV set.
So we tried to go upstairs and when you realise you can't go
upstairs, you know, this ain't real.
We tried to pull a pint, the pint wasn't going
in and then we walked into another room.
We're like, Oh my God, isn't this like Billy's room or something?
Basically, we realised EastEnders isn't real.
I thought it was a real neighbourhood in BBC,
but it's broken up rooms and stuff.
I don't want to blow your mind, I don't want to blow your mind,
but someone here has starred in EastEnders.
Ooh, what?
Hugh Bonneville.
Yeah.
Who did you, who did you give?
I played a headmaster in one scene with Wendy Richard
in about 1980 something. 1990 something.
Yeah.
No, I think this is when I used to watch
EastEnders.
Here you are.
Tell me this, tell me this.
Did you go into it thinking, maybe the audience will demand
that the headmaster comes back?
Well, no, I actually, I'd met the director for another job
and I said I would give my eye teeth to be in EastEnders.
And he said, well, there's this one tiny scene with Wendy Richard.
And so like you, I turned up at Elstree, I was all excited
and walked across Albert Square and I saw the Queen Vic and somebody
had said, "Oh, they're doing some Queen Vic scenes at the moment."
So I thought, Oh, well, there's the Queen Vic.
I'll just pop in and say hello the on the way
through to the dressing room.
Open the door, scaffolding.
Nothing. Nothing.
Lesley Manville, also soap veteran.
Which one were you in?
Well, when I was about 19, I was in Emmerdale Farm
when it was a twice weekly lunchtime soap and I did it,
I did it for about just under a year.
Who did you play?
Rosemary Kendal.
I think we've got a picture of you.
Oh, my God. Oh!
And that tree is real.
No fakery on Emmerdale Farm.
So at the end of the year, did you, did you have a sticky end?
What happened to you?
I got to snog Fraser Hinds in the cow shed.
That was...
Did that kill you?
It was a case, a bad case of unrequited love
and a cow shitting in the background.
And that was it, I'd gone.
Yeah, I'm out of here.
And you might be thinking Lashana Lynch.
She's too classy.
She's never been on a soap.
But kind of, you were in,
was it The Bill you were in?
Yeah, my first job.
Oh, my first double episode.
Oh, they were the best.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
What was your storyline?
I was kidnapped by a gang of people and had to be,
like, handed over as, like, a package between two gangs.
I think we've got a picture of you in The Bill.
Here you are.
There she is.
Oh, my gosh.
I had hair.
Yeah.
Was this pre kidnap or post kidnap?
This was the handover.
I mean, he was just about to hand me over to, like, a really bad
boyfriend of mine.
And was it one of those things, were you thinking again,
will the audience demand I return?
Can I be a regular?
Yes, I was... They need me now.
Let's find out what happened to the other gang
for the next six years.
And it never happened.
And Big Zuu, tell me, like all this success,
what does it mean to you?
Because your speech at the BAFTAs was so lovely talking
about what it might mean to people seeing you on TV.
Yeah, it was...
It was a surreal moment because I felt like I got
to represent my whole community, people that look like me.
And for me now, working in television, it's important to see
people like myself on screen, but I think it's also about working
behind the screen.
So, you know, I started working in production,
got my own production company, and then start trying
making telly so we can start putting people in the right positions
to actually represent us on-screen and behind the screen, you know?
Well done, that man. Very good.
All series of Big Zuu's Big Eats are available on Uktv play.
And once again, Lashana Lynch's film The Woman King is in cinemas now.
Go see that.
All right.
Yeah.
It's time for music.
This British singer songwriter has had an incredible year swapping
Tik Tok for Eurovision.
He scored the UK's best result in over 20 years.
Here, performing his latest
single, Somebody,
it is Sam Ryder!
# Do, do-do, do-do
# Do-do-do-do-do, do-do-do-do
# Do, do-do, do-do
# Do-do-do-do-do, do-do-do-do
# You bring me summer every weekend
# Like a rooftop in LA
# When it heats up in the evenin'
# You cool me off like lemonade
# So don't go changin' like the seasons
# Cos you're perfect in every way
# Baby, you got a love that's worth bleedin'
# If you go runnin', I lead, you can't blame
# You can wake me up
# You're the caffeine in my coffee cup
# And like a shootin' star, you light me up
# Oh, hey, you made it
# Cos we all need somebody
# Even lonely h?arts need somebody
# So before this love leaves your body
# Give it away
# So if you've got somebody
# Let 'em know that they got somebody
# Little love never hurt nobody, hey
# So you use your light and shine it like crazy
# We got one life, let's make it amazin'
# I love you, baby, no, that ain't changin'
# You got, you got somebody who loves ya
# Do, do-do, do-do
# Do-do-do-do-do, do-do-do-do
# Do, do-do, do-do
# Do-do-do-do-do, do-do-do-do
# Baby, you and me, we got chemistry
# Call it alchemy, call it what you want
# I don't know what I believe in!?
# Oh, what a time to be livin' and breathin'
# And I got a feelin' that we're here for the same thing
# Wake me up
# You're the caffeine in my coffee cup
# And like a shootin' star, you light me up
# Oh, hey, you made it
# Cos we all need somebody
# Even lonely hearts need somebody
# So before this love leaves your body
# Give it away, yeah
# So if you've got somebody
# Let 'em know that they got somebody
# Little love never hurt nobody, nobody
# So you use your light and shine it like crazy
# We got one life, let's make it amazin'
# I love you, baby, no, that ain't changin'
# You got, you got somebody who loves ya
# You got, you got somebody who love-
# You got, you got somebody who loves ya
# Wake me up somebody who loves ya
# You're the caffeine in my coffee cup
# And like a shootin' star, you light me up
# Ain't it amazing?
# You're amazing
# Cos we all need somebody
# Even lonely hearts need somebody
# So before this love leaves your body
# Give it away
# So if you've got somebody
# Let 'em know that they got somebody
# Little love never hurt nobody, nobody
# So you use your light and shine it like crazy
# We got one life, let's make it amazin'
# I love you, baby, no, that ain't changin'
# You got, you got somebody who loves ya
# You got, you got somebody who loves ya.
APPLAUSE
Whoa!
Wowzer!
Sam Ryder, everybody!
Thank you so much.
Have a seat, Hugh, Lashana, Lesley, Zuu.
Thank you so much for that.
The voice, the voice, the voice.
Amazing voice.
Amazing.
Appreciate that.
Really, really good.
And that track, here's exciting, off of the upcoming album.
Yes, it's Nothing but Space, Man.
On the 18th November, available to pre-order now.
And this is all new tracks.
Yep, and that is definitely a fake
because it doesn't exist yet.
There's no vinyl inside it.
Not meant to give that away.
I'm taking home... I'm taking that home to play it.
Yeah, but it looks like that!
I didn't have one yet.
I'm surprised, that's the first I've ever seen of it.
It looked like that.
It looks something very like that.
Yeah, yeah.
So normally you would have been on the show before Eurovision,
but we weren't on.
So congratulations, because you've taken the curse
off it, you know?
Yeah!
You've made it cool again.
But you, you know, you live in the world.
I do.
You know, whatever about the space.
You're here,
so you knew the vibe of the UK in Eurovision.
So what was going through your mind when they said, do you want
to do it?
Were you really gung ho?
Well, I've always been a fan of it.
So to be asked to do something that you like in the first place,
to not do it seems a little bit, I don't know, the wrong energy.
Just because you're scared of coming last or something
shouldn't stop you from...
Maybe it should.
I love that you said a thing.
You said a lovely thing about loving music more than fearing
the competition or something.
Yeah, my enthusiasm is greater
than my fear for something like that, like,
I love Eurovision.
It's bonkers, it's wonderful,
and it brings us all together in a world
that all too often pulls us apart, right?
And to say, no, I don't want to do it because I'm scared
of the outcome.
Like, you're not really a fan of Eurovision, in that case,
because it's not about where you come.
Yeah, well, honestly, I think you've changed
everything, really.
You did an amazing job.
You changed everything.
But now here's the thing.
Of course, Eurovision is going to be here,
so will you be playing a part in the show in Liverpool?
I don't know. I haven't got a clue.
You have to.
I want to be there because it's going
to be just incredible, I think.
So, I don't know,
I might be giving out tickets at the door, at the till.
No, no, no.
But we have to check your availability for Eurovision
because you're on tour.
Yes, yeah.
Heading out in March.
That's shortly after the record comes out.
And it's going to be like the biggest
tour we've ever done.
So this is the amazing thing, right?
Like, Eurovision, you have no idea what it's going to do, but the doors
and opportunities it's opened...
The other week, I was playing with Queen -
they're my absolute heroes.
I can't explain what they mean to me as a singer or probably all of us -
Queen and bands like that, they're like, just,
they bring us all so much joy.
So, like...yeah.
I meant to say to you earler, Zuu, have you stopped music now,
for the TV and the cooking?
No, no, no.
I'm still recording.
Oh, OK.
Yeah, I know, I know.
Everyone's on me, everyone's on me.
They're like, Zuu, why are you not trying to write?
Why are you just trying to cook chicken?
But I'll be back!
Yeah, I can sing like Sam as well.
Now let me sing a ballad!
No, I'll chill, I'll chill, I'll chill.
Duet, duet!
That's what we want in our future.
Soon come, soon come.
Yeah.
Big Zuu and Sam Ryder.
You have great facial expressions when you sing, you do that...
It's because the suit is tight.
And thin as well.
You wear it well, sir.
You wear it well.
Thank you so much for that performance.
Good luck with the album.
Good luck with the tour.
Sam Ryder, everybody.
Right, that's really it.
Before we go, just time for a visit to the Big Red Chair.
Who do we find in it tonight?
Hello! Hello.
Hi, what's your name?
Sarah.
Sarah, hello, Sarah.
And whereabouts are you from, Sarah?
Near Market Harborough.
Leicestershire.
Oh, you know, Market harborough.
Near Market Harborough.
Market Harborough adjacent.
Are you just out in the country, in a little village or something?
Yeah, in a little village.
In a little village.
It will remain nameless.
OK.
I tried.
You did!
Do you work for MI6?
All right, Sarah.
Off you go with your story.
I used to work for the Foreign Office.
What the...!
Anyway!
I was at the British Embassy in Montevideo, Uruguay,
and one of my jobs, I had to cover for the accountant one time,
and I had to go to the bank and cash some cheques and get some money.
And while I was in there, two armed robbers came in and bundled us
all into the corner.
There was a lot of crying.
Not me, but a lot of people were crying and upset
and I was trying to sort of help people around and do
my consular thing.
And eventually the robbers found what they needed and ran off.
The police came and it took forever and ever to answer
all their questions.
Meanwhile, eventually I got out and I was like, "Oh!"
And I was a little bit nervous and a bit sort of shaken myself.
And I thought, "Well, you know, I've done my bit.
The ambassador will be so proud of me," you know,
"I've helped all these people, there'll be a cup of tea,
maybe there might even be a gong, you know,
an MBE, who knows?"
You know.
Anyway, I got back to the embassy - shut, everybody gone home.
I found out the next day our driver had messaged and said,
"She's held up at the bank, she won't be back early,
so you might as well all go home."
So I was like, "I WAS held up at the bank!
You know, properly held up!"
No tea, no nothing.
You deserve to walk.
Well done.
A bank robbery!
I mean, that is a better class of story than we're used to.
I mean, normally there's some dog poo involved or something.
All right.
That really is all we've got time for.
If you'd like to have a go in that red chair
and tell your story, you can -
just contact us via this very website.
Please say a huge thank you to all of our guests tonight.
Sam Ryder!
Big Zuu!
Lashana Lynch!
Lesley Manville!
And Hugh Bonneville!
Join me next week with singer Self-Esteem,
Hollywood star Elizabeth Banks,
boss of British Vogue Edward Enninful,
Oscar-nominated Kate Hudson,
and Irish legends Brendan Gleeson and Colin Farrell.
I'll see you then!
Goodnight, everybody, bye-bye!