The Real Life Gossip Girl: UNMASKED

22:21And yet, day after day after day, still it comes. I get it though, because again, we're given the illusion of power in this world. That's why there's a celebrity's tweet, because they have this illusion that they have a platform. And you think, I mean, no one's listening to you. They're using their platform, Richard, as I believe. They're using their platform. Yeah, listen, it's... Just sell me your words and be on your way. Yeah, exactly. Something like that. I think it's interesting because it's yet to play out and you would really expect many other people to follow with legal action. It'd be great to find out a little bit more about what Sebastian Bond's doing, maybe just on a beach, but let's find out.

22:53And I'm really interested in the people who basically work for the site for free and provide all of this content all day long. He was making, someone say, maybe half a million a year from this. You know, it's not bad work if you can get it. I bet that's more than his vegan cookbook. I'm almost certain. I now want to buy the vegan cookbook. Do you? Yeah, I just have to have a look at it. Well, because you think he's going to be struggling for money now. No, you're right. Well, maybe I could just anonymously browse it somewhere. Obviously, we should make the note that it has been very, very important in lots of societies to have anonymized accounts.

23:24We get that, you know, Arab Spring and all these things, but that I don't think is a defense of, you know, calling a footwear influencer a bitch. Yeah, I just don't think we can bring the Arab Spring into this particular one. Yeah. Yeah. Listen, we try as we might. But, you know, there is, you know, legally a good reason why some people would have anonymized accounts. This doesn't feel like it. And it's not a massive corporate fraud. It really isn't. There are lots of big, really serious frauds on the public going along, but none of these are it. Influencers are interesting. In We Solve Murders, it's available now.

23:59It's a great summer read. I do murder some influencers. influencers and people like you know whenever i people talk about it they go oh you know god they're a real scourge aren't they these talentless people i make sure in that book as well that i have an influencer who is somebody who would never have got anywhere in the mainstream media and is able to make a living doing something they love because of the world of influencing and i've always i've often thought that there are people who are able to avoid every single gatekeeper existed in the early 90s when i started who were able to talk directly to the public so i i think that the world of influencers has very positive things.

24:32But at the same time, I recognize as well that, listen, there's a grift, but we're grifting for the moment. But it's really not one of the great frauds. It really isn't. Even if, I mean, it really isn't. Yeah. And on that note, let's go and see what's being influenced in the break, shall we, Richard? That's clever. Clever link.

24:52This episode is brought to you by Sky Cinema, the ultimate destination for movie lovers to enjoy the latest blockbusters with Paramount Plus included at no extra cost. Now, Onora, this year's Best Picture winner at the Oscars, has just landed on Sky Cinema. If you haven't seen it, it follows a Brooklyn dancer, a Russian oligarch family and a Cold War with the in-laws. It's sharp, it's stylish, with five Oscars to prove it. Add Twisters and Wild Robot to the mix and Sky Cinema doesn't just offer films, it premieres them straight to your living room. Paramount Plus, as Marina said, included with your subscription at no extra cost, bringing you blockbuster movies, new originals and hit shows.

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26:51Hello to our lovely Restless Entertainment listeners. This is me, Marina Hyde. And me, Richard Osmond. Hello, everybody. Now, our two-part deep dive into the chaotic production of Jaws, the first blockbuster, has been a smash hit, a bit like the film itself, and that has been a huge hit with our club members. Yeah, the response has been incredible. Thank you all so much. Deep dive is an unfortunate thing to say in relation to Jaws, but I know what you mean. It's great to be able to do these deep dives entertainment stories that are off the beaten track. We don't have to do topical stuff. We can tell like amazing stories about amazing movies, amazing albums, amazing characters, amazing stories from the past of showbiz.

27:26Entertainment history, really. Yeah, it's like the rest is history, but you know, you get to talk about Noel Edmonds. Okay, so here is the thing. Just like Universal, who are desperate to get their money back with a nationwide release of Jaws, we want all our listeners to experience what our club members have been raving about. Hold on a second. Are you saying what I think you're saying, which is for a limited time, you can access our JAWS series absolutely free just by visiting therestlesentertainment.com. That is exactly what I'm saying. You have got to be kidding me. It is the perfect way to discover why our bonus content is so special and why club membership is absolutely worth it.

27:59We're going to need a bigger podcast. Join the Restless Entertainment Club today by visiting therestlesentertainment.com. We'll see you there.

28:10Welcome back, everybody. I think time for a bit of joy now. Where were you last night, Marina? Last night, I was outside the London Palladium Theatre where Evita has just opened, but has actually yet to have its formal opening night inside, which stars Rachel Zegler. And you might well have seen, because it's attracted so much coverage, she comes out at the start of the second act onto the balcony at the front of the Palladium and sings Don't Cry For Me, Argentina, to everyone in the street. And there's a camera following her and people in the auditorium are watching from the camera. And this is, anyway, as I say, it's a new production of Evita, the Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice musical.

28:51And it's directed by Jamie Lloyd, who is a sort of very iconoclastic director. He's very interesting. He's a very interesting person. He's trying to make theatre an awful lot more accessible. Yes, he definitely doesn't come from a traditional theatre background at all himself. And he really wants to bring more people into the theatre. And he's experimented with this a little bit before in the Romeo and Juliet. he did, which had Tom Holland in it, Spider-Man. There was some stuff out on the street. They should have called it Spider-Man and Juliet. Yeah, Spider-Man and Juliet. There was stuff on the roof and there were drones filming there.

29:23In his Sunset Boulevard, which has just sort of swept the Tonys, and it's on Broadway now, Joe Gillis, the screenwriter, who's played by William Holden in the movie, it starts outside and there's a steadicam shot of him coming, again, at the start of the second act, coming all the way up the stairs and onto the stage. So he's experimented with this, but this is sort of, I don't want to say final form, because I'm sure it could go many other places, but there's something so perfect about this because of the story matter of Evita, which is, as you know, it's about Eva Peron, who's the... She was Madonna, right?

29:59She was Madonna, basically. Okay, I've got the right story. She's sort of a populist, and she was there, as she said, for the Odeska Misados, the shirtless ones, the people with nothing. And I have to say that I wanted to see, because I've seen, there's been a lot of coverage of this. There's so much to say about this particular story. Because it feels, by the way, could just be a stunt. You think, oh, that sounds clever. And, you know, we're used to celebrities sort of doing things in public and drawing a crowd and that being shared on Instagram. You think, oh, good for you, that sells tickets.

30:29How actually is it as a piece of art? Well, I thought I wanted to go and see it. And I just felt I must. it has obviously it's immediately become an event I absolutely loved it I found it incredibly moving you're waiting there so you're waiting on Argyle Street which is just by Oxford Circus and there's an Aberdeen steakhouse right opposite if you need it if you need it actually looking up at the street there's all these you know all different bits of London are continuing to happen there was a drummer playing there's all the noise of Oxford Street the blue plaque on the house just a couple of long from the theatre is the guy who started Ordnance Survey.

31:07Oh, really? Yeah, really? Yeah, you'd have loved it. You're sitting there waiting and you're looking around. Was that Sebastian Bond? No, it was not Sebastian Bond, no. Anyway, so you're waiting there and there's such an expectation and I don't know, it's not for me to over-editorialise, but it does feel like it's a crowd of people who would not necessarily be in the theatre normally. And, you know, I go to the theatre a lot and I, you know, I sometimes love theatre people and I sometimes hate them, as in the people who go and the type of crowd. And, you know, that's, I'm one of them. So whatever.

31:39I get that. But there were all sorts of different kind of people. Lots of very young people. Everyone's waiting to catch it with their phones. I do slightly feel like, just have the experience. But anyway, I had the experience. I completely loved being a part of it. I completely loved it. I will always remember it. It happened last night at about 9.10. On other nights, it's happened about two minutes past, five minutes past. I don't know. It's the start of the second act. Be there just before nine. She comes out. There's a long retractable arm of a camera that comes right out to capture her. She comes out and obviously she's got her hair, the sort of, you know, platinum blonde now and all these diamonds.

32:15And it is absolutely amazing. First of all, Rachel Zegler. I mean, God, what a trooper, OK? Because she has not, we know she was in the so-called woke snow white. She's had so much online vitriol and, you know, people have got all sorts of views of her. first of all I love him for staging Jamie Lloyd for staging it like this but for her for agreeing to it in this particular year you don't know what you're going to get on the street you do when you've got a nice crowd at the Palladium and I'm sure they've all paid to see you and they want to see you but you don't know what could happen out on the street and I mean to me it's so sort of courageous after the year particularly that that star has had But again people on the street are not anonymised you can see them you can look them in the eyes I mean, they're real human beings right there.

33:01Nobody sang along, which I thought might happen. I didn't know. Maybe they do one other night, so I don't know. So it's Don't Cry For Me Argentina. Don't Cry For Me Argentina, which is the biggest song. Now, she makes it feel, it's incredible. I mean, as I say, it's so in line with the subject matter of the show. She makes it feel like it's all about you. You know, I was millions of people back. There were hundreds and many more than a thousand people. Wow. And it's going to become, I think it's going to get even bigger. because as I say, and there's a reason this is interesting, the musical has not formally opened yet.

33:31What happens with any of these things is that any stage show, as you probably all know, is that things happen in preview and the critics can't come and then there is a formal opening night. Now, that isn't until July the 1st. Okay, so that's the press night and that's when they can all write their reviews. And that's when you may write. There's an embargo, meaning you can't publish anything before a certain time or date. Anyway, so I have to say that there's that, Do you remember, there's a famous, really famous Kenneth Tynan, who was the theatre critic, right back from the 1950s when he saw Look Back in Anger.

34:04And he said, I doubt I could ever love anyone who did not want to see Look Back in Anger. And I have to say, after seeing it myself last night, I don't think I could ever love anyone who didn't think that this was just totally cool and brilliant. Challenge accepted. So now on to the backlash, which is now the frontlash, because there's been so much negativity about this. and I have to say, I'll tell you why. If we try and unpick it, obviously it's the biggest song in Evita. It's the one everybody knows. And people have said, oh, I'm so sorry, the tickets are so expensive. You're telling me that she doesn't sing it to the people you've paid, just to some random people in the street.

34:40All of that negativity has happened and maybe we have some sympathy with that. I have to say that from what I can gather, I have not seen the show inside and if I could, perhaps I wouldn't be allowed to say as a member of the press. But it does appear more than once in the show. Oh, does it? Yeah, there's one on the balcony of the Casa Rosada, which is the Perón residence, and once in her final broadcast. So maybe the people, I don't know, I haven't seen the show, so I don't want to say for definite. But I have seen in comments, newspaper comments, some people saying, oh, no, I went and you get it twice.

35:18But the press reaction in general has come across as so negative. I mean, there are lines in these things. You just think, oh my God, are we still in this era? You know, there's a huge but coming. But in the Times, Mr. Lloyd is to be commended for his innovation. Yeah, but. And it's like, oh my God, do we still talk like this? What happens, of course, when something like this happens is that people scrape the negative reaction off social media. Users are saying, yes. Saying, I loved it. Fans are saying. Fans are saying. People are saying. And I think that a part of that, and I'm wondering whether a part of that is this sequencing.

35:50because I can already see the curtain call for this on TikTok. I can see all sorts of stuff from inside the theatre. And as we know, they get very angry about things being filmed in theatre. Or do they? Lots of the productions now effectively invite influencers in and they let them do things like the curtain call, do whatever. And that, it builds... That infuriates me. I wish there was a site I could slag them off on. Yeah. Well, listen, if I find one, I'll let you know and then you can start a big thread about it. But what we don't have to balance out this supposedly negative reaction of people saying, oh, this is a gimmick, this is a whatever, is an in-the-round review of all of this from someone who's in the theatre because the critics can't publish their reviews till...

36:32Are they filming the audience as well, by the way, when they're doing that? Forgive my ignorance of Evita, but is that song sung to a crowd? Yes, it's sung to a crowd. So that's the crowd? It's the balcony scene. It's the balcony of the Casa Rosada and she's singing to the people. and her people I mean that sounds perfect oh my god it's so cool honestly and people the mood was just there was such a mood of expectation it was the hottest day of the year so far and then people at the end people just arrived but they were so silent listening to it when she'd gone back in what was the mood like amongst the crowd oh my gosh I mean people were saying oh I wish I could go and see it by the way it goes without saying he's so clever I mean I might not have gone and seen Avita but I now desperately want to go and see it from the inside It is a huge PR driver.

37:17And we've talked before about things that become a life of their own. They're not a stunt. They become written about on all the news pages. And so every day, hundreds of media outlets are basically, this is being written about in America. I saw it in the Hollywood Report, in New York Times. Everyone's writing about this thing that is happening outside on the balcony of the London Palladium. It's amazing for Rachel Zegler as well, because as you say, the last time she was in the public consciousness was for the Snow White movie. And this immediately puts us somewhere back. We see her singing an incredible thing to an adoring crowd every single night.

37:48I mean, you couldn't have better... As a flawed, slightly impossible woman. Yeah. I mean, it is so, on every level, it's very, very cool. It feels, from Jamie Lloyd's perspective, it feels like something that's utterly in keeping with the mood of the piece, but also an incredible PR coup. And if I was sitting watching that, I mean, you can go and watch Evita however you want with just someone standing there belting that song out, but you can hear that on a CD. but to go to something that has some point of difference, some bit of extraordinary, something that takes what Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice did and puts it in a new context, you know, presents it in a different way.

38:24It feels to me like everybody is winning there. I couldn't agree with you more. I would think, oh, I went to that amazing production where she actually went out onto the street and sang because it's so, as I say, It's not a gimmick given that it so fits with the matter of the piece, as it were. And I would think I was part of that. And yeah, I sat in the auditorium and I watched it on screen. But you can see the people below. I think it's amazing. I would love to say that. And I don't feel like, oh, I would resent that I didn't see the biggest number. And maybe you do. We don't yet know because the critics have not yet been able to write what they see.

39:02So maybe they do do it again later in the second act. Jamie Lloyd has a history of trying to make theatre tickets more accessible and cheaper and bringing different crowds into theatres as well. So his motives are probably not to be questioned in this. He's not just going, I'll get a load of people paying an absolute fortune to come and see this. He's trying to open the stuff out. He's trying to get these things seen and always has done. I think it sounds amazing. You know, if we want people to... theatre audiences who are lucky enough to already be part of the crowd that can pay that much for a ticket.

39:36And there are lots of£20 tickets, I should say, all that, as all productions now try to do. But if we want people to grow up and love theatre in a way that means that theatre can continue, then we just have to find different ways of getting people in. And Andrew Lloyd Webber, who's suddenly having such a sort of moment in lots of different ways, again, and Somerset Boulevard has obviously just swept the Tonys and he's been really interesting, I thought, on the AI bill. But I think one of the things he said, I actually, I wonder whether we're going to be allowed to keep doing this because, which was written up in an incredibly negative way, as he said, you know, Lloyd Webber fears something bad happening, whatever it was.

40:15But actually, it's becoming so big. Just the size of the crowd. Yeah, it's becoming so big that it disperses incredibly quickly. Once it's over, it's over. And you've had this moment. And you're in the middle of London. You can head off somewhere, can't you? I do think the social media stuff is interesting, though, because you can see lots of this stuff. And I know that critics, various critics have said, I spoke to a critic this week who said to me, I would love to be able to write about this show and what actually happens and whether people really think it's amazing, how it works on the stage.

40:43But I can't until July the 1st, which is quite a long time away from the time you can see all the social media videos of this, see all the sort of negative reaction to this because the papers haven't necessarily got anything else to write about. see all the in-theatre videos of curtain calls and so on. And it's quite a long lead in time. It's like working for one of those mad defence periodicals where it's got a four-month lead in time. And finally, you'll be able to see the reviews of these on July 1st. I get it. There's lots of good reasons for things being able to exist in preview in the way that they do because things get changed.

41:19And especially with any complicated production, even though this, I think, is quite pared back, you want people to be able to find it completely on stage before you invite the person. But on this, when you're literally wearing your pants outside your trousers, it's quite hard to keep the colour of your pants a secret. Yeah, it is. But if you are passing near Oxford Circus and you're there, as I say, it happened about ten past nine when I saw it, but I think it's happened as close to a couple of minutes after nine. Just go and be part of it. But I find that... It's worth a trip in, isn't it? And as you say, you know, you're done by quarter past nine.

41:58You can go home. And it's the sort of thing that would go out and tour. It's a short-form theatre, Richard. It's a very short-form theatre. Yeah, very short-form theatre. But it is. What an incredible experience seeing a world-class singer singing a world-class song outside a world-class theatre with a thousand other people. And just competing with the sounds of the rickshaws on Oxford Street and the madness of all of it and everyone with their phones, even though it's a period piece and everything. It's all, it's so kind of vital and fun. and I absolutely loved it. I couldn't love anyone who didn't want to see that.

42:27People are going to start dressing up for it, aren't they, at some point? Oh, I hope so. They're all going to turn up as Buenos Aires. Yeah, well, it's a great look. 1950s? Yeah, 50s dress and a load of diamonds. Yes, please. And then, revolution. Well, anyway, I loved it and I strongly recommend anyone who finds it easy to go and see it. Talking of revolution. Oh, talking of it. DAZN, the sports company. D-A-Z-N, you'll have seen it. Why have they done that, Richard? Why have they given their company a name? There are so many videos of them getting sports people to actually say how you say it.

43:03You pronounce it DAZN, even though you spell it DAZN. Yeah, like how many eggs would you like? DAZN. I like things like that, because it makes people feel like they're part of the in-crowd. Don't forget the biggest sportswear brand in the world is either Nike or Nike, and still no one knows. and the next biggest one is either Adidas or Adidas. But they haven't deliberately tried to create this obscurantist name. Yes, but because names have run out. Oh my God, that's an unbelievable take. Sorry, can I just get that once more for the microphone? Names have run out. Names have run out. That's why all companies now have to call themselves, they take all the vowels out of their names or something like that.

43:44Why can't they call themselves Dazone then? Do you think people would think it was Danone? Yogurt. for oil yogurt. I imagine there is a DAZN already, otherwise they probably would have called themselves that. There'll be a DAZN something somewhere. Well, let's go back to the start of them. They began in London in 2016. They're now owned by Len Blavatnik, who bought them, I think, for£25 million. So he's made his money, you know, minerals, petrochemicals, a huge cultural donor and a knight. How often they're related. He runs A24, for example, one of the huge broadcasters that are having an incredible few years?

44:21Well, yes. I mean, I think the people who run A24 run A24. But yes, he's one of those figures. I just think it's easier to run something when there's a billionaire who you've got on speed dial. That's my experience of the business of television. It's handy to have a billionaire owner. It's very much like football, running a studio. If you've got a billionaire owner, everything just goes a little bit easier. Well, speaking of football, the reason we're talking about them is because they currently have the broadcast rights to the Club World Cup, which has taken place in the US now ahead of next summer's World Cup.

44:55If you have vaguely heard of DAZN, it would have been by and large for boxing, mixed martial arts. In other territories, it does all sorts of sports, but it's really concentrated on those. And that's Eddie Hearn has done a big deal with it in Matchroom Sports. But lots of those deals didn't work out. They did, they tried, like lots of these all sorts of startup things that try and get these rights. You know, they're going to show the Premier League in Canada or whatever it is, you know, they're showing things, they tend to be, can we pick up the rights for this out of territory? Even though their core markets are, I think, UK, Germany, Japan, whoever they are.

45:27Yeah, exactly. They had done things like Canelo Alvarez. They signed him up for an 11-fight deal, which is$365 million, which is the most money anyone's ever given to an individual athlete for an individual deal. So that stuff, again, as I said before, the sort of thing you can do when you've got a billionaire owner who's happy to, you know, dip in. However, They didn't manage to buy BT Sport, which is one of their plays. They didn't want a Discovery got that. They wanted to. But here's the fascinating thing and why we're talking about DAZN now. Just before Christmas, we got this thing, the Club World Cup, which is, you know, a FIFA thing.

45:59It's the World Cup, but for club teams. Enormous prize money. It's like a billion dollars in prize money. DAZN get the worldwide rights to the Club World Cup. When you say get, is it a little bit like the way people get World Cups now in that in many cases, a lot of people don't actually want this. So DAZN bid for the Club World Cup, bid a billion dollars for the Club World Cup, which is something that, you know, people don't really know. They didn't have a broadcaster. By the way, FIFA didn't have a broadcaster. Exactly. So FIFA can't sell it, can't get a broadcaster involved. You have to kick this off.

46:32You have to get a broadcaster involved. Suddenly DAZN comes in, gives them a billion dollars. You think, oh, that's interesting. I wonder what their business plan is. I wonder why they got the billion. They then say, oh, it's going to be free to air. We're going to provide it free-to-air for everyone. So over here, you'll see it on Channel 5. And in various other territories, it's on places. So you think, okay, you're a company, DAZN. They lose about a billion dollars a year already, DAZN. As you say, they're speculating to accumulate, which is often the case with big media conglomerates. So they're losing about a billion dollars a year.

47:00They spend a billion dollars on this. And a lot of people have said, well, sorry, where's this money coming from? This billion seems to... And they go, oh, no, this is from our reserves. and this is, you know, we're not looking for any extra funding. You know, this is just part of our business plan. And everyone's going, okay, I wonder if an announcement is due. So they do this in December, a billion dollars. In January, a subsidiary of the Saudi Public Investment Fund, which is the Saudi state, they buy a stake in DAZN, less than 5%. We're not sure exactly what it is, but it's certainly less than 5%.

47:32Do you know what they pay for that stake? I don't know why I'm getting the figure of one billion. They pay$1 billion for a stake in DAZN. So this thing which is owned through various Saudi subsidiary companies, which, by the way, you're allowed to launch a Club World Cup. Absolutely nothing wrong with that. Has Saudi teams, which are also under PIF ownership, suddenly now has taken a$1 billion investment in a company who just put a$1 billion investment into their Club World Cup. And then you go, that's why it's free to air everywhere. That's where DAZN got the money from. Listen, as I say, it may just be entirely a coincidence.

48:10But it certainly seems... DAZN's emerging markets executive is a guy called Pete Oliver, who said there was a lot that happened, but these things are not necessarily connected in any way. Pete said a number of other things as well, which I'll come to. There's definitely a world in which they might not be connected. There is definitely that world. I wonder also there's a world where they are connected as well. I mean, listen, I don't love this messenger, but Sepp Blatter said Saudi Arabia has taken control of international football. Sepp Blatter was, of course, the disgraced, as they say, often our former FIFA president.

48:39It's now run by a guy called Gianni Infantino. Friend of Salt Bay. Oh my God, friend of Salt Bay. He was won back from, I think, the oligarchs, the oligarch alley at the Trump inauguration. I remember listening to him. What was he doing there? Yeah, well, this week, and then he was, did you see this week they had Juventus in the Oval Office? Yes. Who literally just stood sort of massed around Trump. They looked very uncomfortable. Yeah. I mean, they literally looked like they were defending a kind of last minute free kick from just outside the area. It was literally, everyone was like this. And then he was saying things like, Like, could a woman be on your team?

49:10They're like, I didn't sign up for this. The weirdest thing was, there was nine of them standing up and one of them was lying down on the floor.

49:19And Infantino was there sort of smiling over all of it. But I do think in general, it's interesting, just before we get back onto DAZN, but people do say everything out loud now in football, which for a long time, you know, FIFA would say, I'm trying to grow this ball, I'm trying to do whatever. We're just interested in people being able to watch this or anything. For a while, you know, people talked about the footballers' products and content, and that seemed dreadful. Now, I think it's beyond parasitic. It's like what I'm using football to do. It's honestly just a random plot device, completely.

49:52Companies want the ability to reach consumers and get their data because everybody wants to be a tech company. And these people just want to be a tech company. They want the tech company, and crucially, they want the tech mummy. So football is just like some random MacGuffin, some thing that they can use in order to extract those things from people. The history of the last 15 years or so in the media has been you want to be valued as a tech company rather than a media company because your multiple of your earnings is hugely enhanced if you're a tech play rather than a legacy media play. And DAZN certainly feel like they have an air of tech play about them.

50:29But again, it sort of doesn't matter what you are if you have PIF, the Saudi government behind you, one way or another, because you can deficit fund absolutely everything. Another deal DAZN have just done, again, unrelated, is LiveGolf, which again has been Saudi-backed for many, many years, has always struggled to find broadcasters. That's one of the key things. It has now found a winning production partner in that by the name of DAZN. So they are now selling those rights to 200 territories. So, you know, Live Golf is also going to go through DAZN. Club World Cup is going to go through DAZN. Blavatnik says he wants this to be the Netflix of sport, which is interesting in itself because, you know, we still can't rule out the fact that Netflix is going to want to be the Netflix of sport.

51:14They always did what was called sport-adjacent content. As we've said, they've now done an NFL game. They've now done, well, they did a sort of stunt fight, but they're going to do lots of other stuff. So every time they say we're not interested in getting into sports, they weren't interested in a whole lot of things. but it's interesting that someone is trying to be that global sports platform yeah it is and it's i like the fact that it's a british company i like that that's a that's a nice one i bet it's a lot of fun to work there i imagine being high up at the zone and having been a high up at the zone ever since it started is probably quite a fun ride but as you say what it really does is it shows very nakedly what the uh leavers of power are doing at the moment in the media and with their money and if you do have a billion dollars to launch a tournament if you and I wanted to launch a club world cup nothing's stopping us we could go and see uh what there is now uh if we decided five years ago to do that we would be about a billion dollars short of being able to do it and the zone have found a way to not be a billion dollars short and the Saudis have found a way to um you know get a production partner and as you say FIFA, DAZN, PIF everyone seems happy.

52:24Well I mean lots of football fans aren't that happy and that's obviously the crucial point but But it's... I mean, I'll say this. I mean, I've been around a long time and I've never known a time where football fans were happy. I agree. Ever. Another interesting sidebar to this, well, it's not even a sidebar really, is that, so it's been showing on Channel 5, these games, in the same way that Channel 4 this week have been showing the England under-21 team, that these games are getting somewhere around 600, 700, 800 ,000. Now, five years ago, that would have been a disaster for any terrestrial channel.

52:59Which is why football was always on Sky Sports and these things where if you get those numbers, you're absolutely delighted because it's an audience who are paying you and an audience you can really, really focus your advertising on. But the world of terrestrial TV now is of such that if Channel 4 can get$7.5 million for two hours and if Channel 5 can get$700 ,000 for four hours, then that's a good return on their investment for them. especially as their investment in this case the Club World Cup is very very small so there is a world now where there are huge amounts more markets for sport because something that can get you half a million is valuable in virtually every country whereas it wouldn't have been 10 years ago it would have been meaningless you'd have had to go to a paper or cluster if you can stick Lift Golf on Channel 5 across the weekend and Channel 5 are getting 8 hours of coverage each day very, very heavily deficit-funded and are able to get three, four hundred thousand people to watch that, then that's working for absolutely everyone in a way that it wouldn't have done.

54:04And so I think there was a moment, maybe last weekend, where Channel 5 was showing a Club World Cup game. Auckland City FC were playing Bayern Munich. This was the 10-0? Yeah. They were an Auckland team, a New Zealand team. They were, yeah. But they're getting like 10 million to take part in the Club World Cup. So, you know, and they get to play against Bayern Munich. So I think they're okay. So that was on Channel 5. The England Under-21 match was on Channel 4 and Soccer Aid was on ITV. And I think on BBC2, there was the World Athletics. And you think, okay, I know sometimes people complain there's too much sport on TV, but that's four of the five terrestrial channels all showing quite long form sports.

54:43They also complain there's not enough sport on terrestrials. So there we go. But it feels like maybe there's going to be more of that to come. More wall-to-wall sport on television, deficit funded by various regimes. Well, we'll be talking a lot about that in the run-up to the World Cup next and all the sports broadcasting things about that. I see people already calling for people to boycott it. The next World Cup? Yeah. Is it America, the next one? Yes. Yes, next year. Oh, that's fun. So, yeah, that's why. I'm at an age now where I've lost, I've lost track of World Cups. If you told me when I was 16, 20, 24, that there'd be a time where I would have forgotten who won the last World Cup, I'd have thought you had lost your mind because I could have told you every result, every player, where every player played for at their clubs, every single thing that ever happened, every goal that was ever scored, where the player then went afterwards.

55:29And now I'm like, I don't remember who won the last one. It's because you're old. There's been so many of them. Yeah. Now, any recommendations this week? Yes, I'm reading a book that I'm absolutely loving, which has just come out, I think, last Thursday, which is Barry Diller, the legendary television film executive, media executive, really. And he's written a memoir and it's called Who Knew? He is a brilliant writer. It's really well done. It's a great tour through his time in show business and deal making, really. I mean, it's really, it's fascinating. I mean, he tries to work it, but it's also hugely actually about his kind of repressed sexuality when he was younger.

56:13Then the fact he completely falls in love with Dianne von Furstenberg, which is a turn up for the books. And anyway, it's brilliant. It's really well done. And it's a great showbiz deal-making memoir, and I'm loving it. So Barry Diller. Who knew? Who knew? I saw a clip of him, and I can't remember what his answer was, but someone was asking what was the most coke-addled production he ever set foot on. And he said Popeye, the live-action Popeye. Ooh, with Robin Williams. Yeah. That feels like a bonus episode waiting to happen. Gosh, I need to look further into that. But anyway, I haven't got to that bit in the book.

56:47But what about you? I will recommend the second series of The Gold, which you can see on iPlayer. The first series I loved, which was about the Brink Smack robbery, written by the brilliant Neil Forsyth, I think is one of our greatest writers. The first half deals with the stuff we know about Kenneth Noy and John Palmer and essentially half of The Brink Smack Gold. But the other half of The Brink Smack Gold has never been found. and so Neil Forsyth has sort of written there's bits of fact in there but there's like composite characters bit of fantasia about what might have happened to the other half it's really good it's so good he's such a great writer and the performances are absolutely terrific if you haven't seen the first series really really recommend that if you did watch the first one and haven't yet caught up on the second one strongly recommend it it's a real romp yeah I would say did I tell you about my cabbie the other day whose dad was one of the great train robbers really no you didn't he's the one that got away oh really yeah yeah yeah that was interesting how fast listen we do not have time we do not have time for all Barry Diller's clone dogs I'm Barry Diller's clone dogs I'm sure I'm sure at some other point that will that will come up but Danny if you're listening thank you so much for all the insight Q &A on Thursday Q &A on Thursday we have a Q &A on Thursday and for our members bonus episode on Friday we're going to talk about our summer reads our recommendations for summer reads mine and my actual summer reads so I'm going to tell you 20 minutes of recommendations about stuff you can take on holiday with you.

58:11Nothing more complicated than that, but loads and loads of great books to talk about. See you on Thursday. See you on Thursday.

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