Boycotting Festivals & Forgiving Will Smith

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1:25Hello and welcome to another edition of The Rest is Entertainment with me Marina Hyde. And me Richard Osmond. Hi Marina. Hello Richard, how are you? Yes, I'm not too bad. Since we last spoke, you've been to New York for a week and you're only just back and I've recorded 30 episodes of House of Games. So if either of us falls asleep... Or any of the listeners. I am jet lagged. You are games lagged, I think is the official term. Oh my god, I am House of Games lagged. I don't know what time it is. Is it a Tuesday? Is it a Wednesday? Are you Sonia? Well, I think I know now I'm one of the guests. Okay, so this week, what are we going to talk about?

1:54We're talking about redemption. We're talking about Will Smith's movie, Bad Boys 4. Bad Boys Ride or Die, to give it his official title. I'm so sorry, Will. We're talking about whether he has re-entered the acceptable pantheon. We're talking about Bailey Gifford. There's an awful lot of book festivals which have had to cut their ties with an investment company called Bailey Gifford because of a campaign. So there's huge problems in the book festival industry. we'll talk about that. We're also going to talk about political TV debates. Maybe you've seen a couple of them now and there's more to come.

2:29So we'll talk about the format, how people behave within those and what you might expect in the coming ones if you can better tune in. Yeah and as a TV producer I'm going to talk about who I would consider to be a good booking from the people we've seen. Let us begin with Bad Boys. Bad Boys Ride or Die, the fourth installment in the Bad Boys franchise, which honestly, I'm shocked. The first one was in 1995. It was a really long time ago, Bad Boys. Yeah. It has been a box office smash. Finally. Finally, after a really bad, disappointing May for tentpole movies. Tentpoles, by the way, which you probably all already know, are the big, big movies designed to hold up the rest of the schedule.

3:07Now, Bad Boys, for reasons, was not regarded as a tentpole. In fact, people were very unsure how it would do because as we all know, Will Smith slapped Chris Rock at the Oscars. It was a slap heard around the world. And it was unclear really whether someone who, despite going on to win an Oscar later that evening, we're going to talk about how the whole thing has unfolded. Talk about redemption. That was quick. That was quick. This was by no means guaranteed. It's a real surprise to some people that this movie's done so well. And it's done so much better than a lot of things that were expected to do far bigger business.

3:38So we're not really talking about business this week. We're talking really about the route that his publicist has crafted back from that moment can i just mention as a sidebar though having talked about the movie opening do you know i was in new york last week of as we've discussed in the bronx there is now only one movie theater no way in total nearly one and a half million people live in the bronx wow i was going to watch it before we went to the yankees game and i was thinking maybe i'll catch it up there and there is only one movie theater in the bronx That's crazy. This publicist, is that a publicist who stuck with Will all the way through?

4:14Yes. Now, we saw her on the night. Well, we didn't see her, but she was there on the night. Meredith O'Sullivan Wasson. Wow. All right, Meredith. Remember where he was sitting? Names much. Yeah. He was sitting within slapping distance, clearly, of the stage. Yeah. So everyone in that theatre after the incident happened, first of all, you know, why was it such a horrible moment? Obviously, it's an unbelievably weird and ridiculous thing to do. after all these years. He was finally going to break his best Oscar drought and he was going to win it. But I think part of it is it's so complete, the destruction of everything, because I know I talk about persona a lot, but we like to think of our leading actors, not our character actors, but as versions of the characters they play.

4:55We want them sort of to come bring that same persona out every time. And Will Smith's persona was that he was breezy, he was charming, you know, he refused to swear in any of his rap songs. Yeah, to me, he's like a kind of a fresh prince. Yeah. And I suppose the other thing you'd think is in the more serious end of the roles he played, obviously there's a continuum of that kind of persona, is that he was very disciplined. So he gets on stage and says, get my wife's name out of your fucking mouth. You're swearing now. Okay. And it's like the sort of live abortion of all of it. But then this publicist, all the way through in every commercial break after this had happened, could be seen by everyone else in the theatre going up and having sort of a huddle with him.

5:38And every publicist you will talk to will say, thank God that is not my client. It's essentially exactly what Rishi Sunak's publicist was doing the day after D-Day. Yeah. It's that level of terror. What on earth? Crucially, neither his agent nor his publicist got rid of him. but it was a moment of shell shock I also think what was quite funny that night was that the rest of the audience how they behave when they don't have their publicist with them to tell them what to do because don't forget he gave some ridiculous speech when he won the Oscar in which he didn't apologize to Chris Rock and everybody stood up and gave him a standing ovation it's like guys this is by the way just to let you know this is gonna look really bad tomorrow it's tricky if you are an A-lister because your instinct of course is when someone else wins an Oscar you've been taught over the years the thing not to do is be angry yeah not to do is stay sat down and look like you're cross and so that's the only thing that's been drummed into them over hundreds of years so suddenly Will Smith's up they go hold on when someone hits someone I have to look cross oh when someone wins an Oscar I have to look happy and it just couldn't compute I'm going to go happy I'm going to choose happy because actually I look better happy also a two hour redemption arc story is the other thing they've only been in those sort of things so they know that act three is redemption so they think I've been sitting here about two hours now and he seems to be saying sorry so I guess this is the moment where we all just say Yes, amazing.

6:57Congratulations. The apology should be very, very quick in these situations. I'm sort of talking now through the publicist's tool, but apology should be very quick. His was not really quick enough. His publicist said to him, don't go to the Vanity Fair party, which is the famous big party after Oscars. He went to the Vanity Fair party. Oh no, he was dancing to getting jiggy with it with his Oscar. And it's like, again, this is going to look very bad tomorrow. For me, honestly, the one good thing about if I was Will Smith there would be thinking, oh great, I don't have to go to the party. Yeah, exactly.

7:26Just go home and have it. Anyway, they get through the immediate period of it. He's banned by the Academy and also says, I've resigned from the Academy. And everyone tries to make it better. But the period of silence follows. Then what happens is that later that year, a movie comes out, but they already had it in the can before, which is a slave movie called Emancipation. And he does one interview, I think, with The Daily Show, which was presented, I think, by Trevor Noah at the time. It's quite difficult doing an interview because you know you're going to be asked about the thing. Yeah, except again, it's very Rishi.

7:58Now, the wife, who is obviously Jada, who is obviously involved in all of this, the next sort of big thing to happen in the redemption arc, which I think this is a bit of a misstep for me, she says in 2023, oh, by the way, we've been separated since 2016. There are a whole load of plot lines as to why this thing happened. A lot of people, and I must say that, of course, the Smiths deny it, think that there's some sort of coercion angle and that because she gave him a really dirty look that he's really under her thumb. This was, for me, a bit of a deviation from the old Redemption arc because it just makes you think, yeah, these guys are weird, aren't they?

8:30I mean, we like kooky people, but this is weird, you know. Yes, be kooky. Be kooky, be unusual. Like if you're our neighbours, they are a lot of fun. Not, oh my God, our neighbours are an absolute bin fire. They literally set the bins on fire the last recycling day. So at this point, Netflix said that they were going to pause a movie they had with Will Smith and they would wait to see what Sony did with Bad Boys. But anyway, Sony do go ahead with bad boys. But I should say that King Richard, by the way, the movie where he played Richard Williams, Venus and Serena's father, was a flop. Remember, the money is always, sadly, when we talk about Hollywood, that as long as he keeps making money for them, as has happened this most recent weekend, it will be all right.

9:09So we don't hear from him again for a while. But then there's this thing, which I think we talked about before on the podcast, called the Red Sea Film Festival, which is in Saudi Arabia. and Will Smith got paid about a million dollars to go to the Red Sea Film Festival. That's essentially like the movie star version of being paid to go on Celebrity Big Brother. Yeah, but much easier. And paid a million and he had to have an interview but with a very sort of tame Saudi journalist. I think I would be tame. Oh, I'd be super tame. I don't want to leave in several body bags. So he did this interview in which he was asked all the questions.

9:42You mentioned legends who still love you. There was a quote. Quincy Jones has always made himself available. He wants me to win as a human. He has devoted me as a human, not just as an artist. And then you have to sort of create a... I don't want to say be humble because I don't think he's humble. You have to create a sort of simulacrum of humility. So he said, I love puzzles. I love problems. Yeah, I started making my own problems. Life was going too well. So you said essentially the slap was like a Sudoku? Yeah, or like when Dave Stewart had his appendix taken out. He had that thing, paradise syndrome, you know.

10:17Only celebrities get it. I think he didn't need his appendix out. And he had it taken out because everything was sort of too perfect. So he could feel something. Yeah, maybe. I mean, I don't want to speculate on it. But it's called paradise syndrome. So anyway, he says, I don't need others to applaud me for me to stay focused on my mission. I want you to feel good. And at the same time, I am deeply human. And I am in the process of perfecting my virtue. I love the way celebrities talk. It's just fantastic. He's in the process of perfecting his virtue. Yeah. If he was on any American interviewer, by the way, they'd be like, sorry, I don't know what that means.

10:48The audience, someone in the audience, you know, what do you want to do next? And someone in the audience shouted out, a movie with Denzel. And he said, yeah, a movie with Denzel in Saudi. So, yeah, I know. So he's talking about having a mission, blah, blah, blah. All of that is water testing. Yes. So if that goes wrong in Saudi Arabia, if he can't make it there, then maybe he can't make it anywhere. This is his kind of town. But his publicist is thinking, he sort of got away with that. Obviously, we have the internet, so we all know what he said, and it's reported in all the trade papers. And is his publicist still behind all of this?

11:19So his publicist is all the same campaign. They're building the path back. So they're in tandem, the two of them here. Yeah. Then he performed Men in Black at Coachella. So what he's really saying, I know, he really is that bad, that festival. I sound like the most cursed place on earth. Anyway, so what he's saying is, I'm still the same guy. I'm still the same guy. So in a weird way, bad boys, ride or die is the crucial bit because that persona thing. Yeah, colon, ride or die. Yeah, colon, ride or die. In this movie, he has to become an outsider again. Him and Martin Lawrence are outsiders again, almost outlaws.

11:53Oh, that's clever. Yeah, and they have to work out what really matters and to kind of make their way back. So in a funny kind of way, he can say, I'm still playing that guy. And in case you didn't get it, he says things like, my fans are ride or die. and then the Sony My fans are ride or die Yeah, they're my ride or dies Is that two people? Yeah Which one are you? Are you ride or you die? Sony Chief Tom Rothman is a real life ride or die he says He was messing with me when nobody was messing with me That's my dude Yeah, he's so corporate He is so corporate Sony Chief Tom Rothman is my ride or die He was messing with me I don't think what head of the studio messes with one I just had to do my acknowledgements for the new novel and I mentioned and they're absolute heads of Penguin Random House.

12:38They're lovely. But now I wish I'd said they're my ride or die. Yeah, you should say these are my ride or die. Well, it's all right. You've got something in the can for next time. And his other upcoming projects are hilarious. He is trekking to the North Pole for Disney. Is he? Yeah, for a document. Okay. I mean, yeah. But, you know, again, this is a form of persona thing. I am doing an almost literal penance. I'm making some kind of pilgrimage. What can't be fixed? This is what's worth talking about. because I've made it sound like, yeah, they've plotted, and they have done well here. You can never say in any trailer, Academy Award winner Will Smith, because every one time Tacey says a word thing, oh, yeah, that was the thing we slapped Chris Rock.

13:17So sadly, you lose that. The weirdness is out now, but it didn't harm Tom Cruise that much when we found out that Tom Cruise was mega, mega weird. Although that same management company, that same sort of publicist, they also represent Higher Ground, Obama's production company. He's always really wanted to play Obama. I feel like that's still not going to happen. That may not happen. That may not happen. Another part of that persona, probably the final part I'm going to mention, which was very successful in his biggest movies, is that he was a guy who kind of got knocked down in this game. Even the knockout, yeah.

13:55But he was able to deal with setbacks. You know, if you look at things like, I don't know, the pursuit of happiness. and so he can still retain that little bit of it to say, even though the setback was entirely, rather than, oh, I'm the last person who survived an apocalypse. Yeah, you created the apocalypse, okay? So, yeah, well done for surviving yourself. If we could sum it up, I would sum it up by saying, Faisal Smith, this is a story all about how my life got flipped, turned upside down. Am I right? I mean, it was that the clues were all there from the beginning. You see, well, then there you go.

14:24It sort of still fits, albeit in a kind of wonky and weird way. Now, my part in the Chris Rock debacle, my major, I was saying, go on, Will. He's got your wife's name in his mouth. No, when I was, I went on Graham Norton. And on Graham Norton, you never know who else is going to be on. So you're sort of sitting there going, I wonder who's going to be on. And then literally the day before, they go, oh, Will Smith is on. And you're like, oh, Will Smith. So this is pre-slap. Yeah. Okay, so he was. One of the biggest tells in the world. Untouchable. Yeah. And then right at the last minute, you find out where you're seated.

14:55And I was sat next to Will Smith. so I sat next to Will Smith not only that he is not one of those people who just sits there does his bit and you know just kind of leans back he was so engaged with everyone backstage on stage telling stories laughing Chris and Rosie Ramsey were on as well we were all like kids in a sweet shop like we'd tell stories and Will Smith would be like really laughing and we'd go oh my god Will Smith really thinks we're funny and he was very giving in that way and I thought well this is amazing I'm mates with Will Smith now and it was I think two weeks later that he went and slapped Chris Rock I thought well we literally just met, I cannot believe it You bought at the very top of the market there Exactly I hadn't realised it was a doer-upper I thought it was a turnkey Turnkey friendship A turnkey friendship and yeah two weeks later there he went You were having to distance yourself from him Yeah I was going to go listen we were friends for sure we were developing a relationship but I haven't spoken to him in like ten days He's perfecting his virtue.

15:58Yeah. So I had two weeks of being incredibly excited. I had to rap in front of him. Had to? Had to. Yeah, it's strong. I chose to. I did, like, when I was at school in our assembly, I did a rap version of the Nativity. I wrote it and performed it. Yeah. Yeah. And so I told the Graham Norton people that, and they were like, oh, well, we got Will Smith on. And so, yeah, I had to wrap the Christmas nativity in front of Will Smith. Perhaps actually that's what finally flipped him. Yeah. Perhaps he was fine. And then he listened to me talking about my rap version of the nativity. And he went, do you know what?

16:36I've just got to lash out. I can't lash out here. He kept a lid on it for so long. Two weeks later, he's going to blow. Yeah. Honestly, as he was stepping up to Chris Rock, I bet he was thinking about my line about Pontius Pilate being a publisher. because he got crucified by the press, Jesus in My Story. Yes. Oh, did he? Very good. How brilliant. I'm afraid we might have to do a special on it one day. To sum up, I suppose, some things have been lost, but the crucial thing is he's making them lots of money. So that's the thing. If Bad Boys 4 had done 20 million less, it would be a very different story.

17:10So actually, and the reason it's done a lot... Even 20 million less, by the way. I don't think it would be that bad. It cost 100 million. Obviously, the marketing, they've spent a lot on. But it's interesting why it did well. And it's interesting that when someone is disgraced in the public eye, a couple of things happen. He was disgraced, not cancelled. I think that's crucial. He was in a liminal, the liminal area. I think that. And whatever the noise around it is, somewhere in the back of things is what actual people think and what, you know, people who go to movies think. And I think perhaps they didn't think his crime was quite as big as the culture at large.

17:45Maybe, Richard, they can separate the art, bad boys four, ride or die. From the artist, the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. Yeah. Yeah. But the other thing that's interesting when you're talking about his agent and his publicist staying with him, which has obviously been a big deal, is quite often when people are cancelled, certainly in the industry, I'm in television. If the people in the industry think it's a slightly unfair cancellation, then actually their road back is slightly quicker. if there's you know a cancellation and people in the industry go even if someone's not prosecuted or anything and people in the industry go that's about time then that road to redemption is impossible so i suspect if you if the professionals drop you if the professionals just go do you know what this has been you know they're absolutely right we don't like working with this person anyway this is absolute just desserts we are not going to fight for this person whereas perhaps will have people around him where they were going look what he did was terrible we've worked with them a long time we sort of understand where it came from um we love him we respect him and he'll have to sit on the benches for a little while but we'll look after him and support him i think sometimes that's the difference between yes why some people are redeemed because people think they're worth redeeming and why some people aren't redeemed which is people are going good riddance to bad rubbish and with that shall we proceed into a break richard yes we should do can i point out that quincy jones also still turns up for me yeah he likes he was a human as well as a House of Games presenter, author, multi-hyphenate.

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21:09Welcome back. Welcome back. We are going to now talk about book festivals, which are in peril in lots of ways after Bailey Gifford, who's one of their major sponsors, about eight book festivals, also many art galleries, and the biggest non-fiction prize in the UK have either cut ties with the festivals or the festivals have been forced to cut ties. Can you tell us a bit more about why? I don't know how much cut through this has had in other industries, but it's huge in the book world. Now, around the country, we have these book festivals. Cheltenham is a big one. The Hay Festival is a big one.

21:41Edinburgh Festival. They don't make a huge amount of money for anybody. Almost all of them are run as charities. Just quickly, what happens at a book festival? There will be events. Authors will be interviewed on stage. There'll be lots of panel discussions. There will be lots of children's outreach programmes. And obviously the big names, if you go to a book festival, you're going to sell out your whole tent and everyone's going to be dying to get a ticket. It's fairly delightful, is the truth, a book festival. If you've got one in a local town, people really treasure them. As you say, you go along, there's sort of tented villages, there's five or six different venues.

22:15There's almost always outreach programmes where local schools come in in the week before and people come and speak to them. Loads of panels where new authors can come along and talk about stuff. There's signings. There's all sorts going on, outreach, education. And, you know, they're little kind of grenades of empathy, which is sort of dropped in the countryside every now and again. And festivals of ideas, because inevitably you're talking about lots of things that are involved in sort of non-fiction topics, as well as people talking about stuff, you know, just the creative art. Yeah, and there's always some mad thing that you never would have thought of when you go along and see, like, something about the geography of the brain.

22:49And you're like, oh, my God, that's the best hour I spent for people talking about it. So those have always gone on. They need sponsorship, of course, because they do deficit fund. They do make sure they've got outreach. They do make sure that some tickets are cheaper and more available. And as you say, if you're in Rankin and people like that, you go along and do these festivals. One, because they're fun and they're nourishing. But two, because you know that's a good way of that festival making a lot of money. Because they can sell out a big tent for good money and that money then funds everyone else coming to that festival.

23:21So these are wonderful things now. Now, Bailey Gifford is an investment company. There's a pressure group called Fossil Free Books, and they targeted Bailey Gifford, because Bailey Gifford has some investments in fossil fuels. A very small percentage, by the way, compared to most other investment funds. I should say that every person who I spoke to who works in book festivals has loved their partnerships with Bailey Gifford and think they're so engaged. Yeah, Fossil Free Books are saying, well, they do have some money, 2 % of the money that they invest is in fossil fuel companies. so they launched a campaign to boycott Bailey Gifford and to say to authors you must either A boycott these festivals and not turn up or B if you do go there to use it as an opportunity to protest and they also wrote to lots of other authors and said just so you know if you do speak at this festival we can't guarantee there won't be a protest at your event I should say that the things they're against are sorry just to get back to the Omni cause for a second fossil fuels, genocide and colonial violence I mean, you know, saying to a author, are you for or against genocide?

24:26I'm actually, I'm going to break news to you. I'm against it. They are. And they also criticize Bailey Gifford for investing in various companies like NVIDIA, Amazon. NVIDIA make the chips. The chips are the biggest company in the world now. Exactly. Biggest firm in the world. And they say that the Israeli military uses some of these services. Well, I mean, some of these authors, you know, your books are all on Amazon. You're invested in these things. But anyway, fossil fuels, genocide and colonial violence is what they're against. So what happened is, of course, they targeted Bailey Gifford. They targeted these festivals and they said, no, Bailey Gifford must talk to us.

25:04And what Bailey Gifford said was, no, we're going to pull out of every single one of these festivals. And some of the other festivals said, no, we're pulling out of dealing with Bailey Gifford. But they all issued these incredibly regretful statements saying, we don't want to do this. we feel and I have seen a lot of criticism of the festivals for not standing up to these this sort of collective that no one really knows who they are and by the way I haven't heard of any of the people involved in them it's quite difficult if you are trying to say well no authors will come and we're going to collapse with that it's better that we still continue to exist but that's how far they push them to a sort of existential point yes and festivals we should say have already collapsed other ones have gone there was one in Bristol called Ideas there was one in Glasgow, I write.

25:45Yeah, they're all operating on a shoestring. So here's the thing. I'm very comfortable with people campaigning against fossil fuels. Okay, and I think everyone is fairly comfortable with that. What the fossil fuels people were saying was a couple of things. They're saying, the idea of this is, is we're raising the issue. And therefore, Bailey Gifford will have to come and talk to us. And we can talk to them about divesting, which means, you know, taking their money out of fossil fuels. So that was their strategy. The strategy is not, let's collapse these festivals. Their strategy is we need to get the attention of Bailey Gifford.