29.07.

23
‘TOO MANY WATCHES. TOO MANY CARS. AND DIAMONDS.
AND CLOTHES. AND BRANDS. AND PRIVATE JETS.
FOOTBALL CAN BE DANGEROUS’
Arsenal’s Jorginho on the perils of being a Premier League player

I HATED MY
HUSBAND
Inside a toxic 45 BEST
marriage SUMMER PUBS
 29.07.23
26 8

5 Caitlin Moran Flavoured crisps are wrong. There. I’ve said it. 7 Spinal column: Melanie Reid I’ve booked my first flight
in a decade. 8 How M&S got its mojo back Sales are up and women are wearing the high street brand again. Jane Mulkerrins
meets the fashion director behind the unlikely turnaround. 14 Cover story ‘Success can be dangerous for a footballer’ The
Arsenal and Italy midfielder Jorginho on surviving the Premier League. Interview by Damian Whitworth. 20 My toxic
marriage When the comedian Fielding Edlow realised her husband was gaslighting her, she took revenge. 26 Bridget
Phillipson How childhood poverty shaped the shadow education secretary’s political views. 29 Eat! Easy summer
entertaining. 38 The undercover extremist What Julia Ebner has learnt from infiltrating far-right groups and conspiracy
theorists. 46 The new (relaxed) dinner party rules No 1: don’t call it a dinner party. By Shane Watson. 51 The 45 best summer
pubs As chosen by local chefs. 58 Beta male: Ben Machell Never mind a Harley; it’s a camper van I want. Giles Coren is away

FAB FIVE: RUBBER SHOES

COVER: ROBERT WILSON. ALL CLOTHES, DOLCEGABBANA.COM.

CHOSEN BY GEORGINA ROBERTS

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EDITOR NICOLA JEAL DEPUTY EDITOR LOUISE FRANCE ART DIRECTOR CHRIS HITCHCOCK ASSOCIATE EDITOR JANE MULKERRINS ASSISTANT EDITOR TONY TURNBULL
FEATURES EDITOR MONIQUE RIVALLAND CHIEF SUB-EDITOR AMANDA LINFOOT DEPUTY ART DIRECTOR JO PLENT DEPUTY CHIEF SUB-EDITOR CHRIS RILEY PICTURE EDITOR ANNA BASSETT
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The Times Magazine 3

 CAITLIN MORAN
Who knew my views on crisps would be more
controversial than my book about men?
A
few weeks ago, I went
on Claudia Winkleman’s
Radio 2 show to talk
about my “controversial”
book, What About Men?.
But I rapidly became
embroiled in a new
controversy that threw
supposedly contentious issues such as
gender roles, men’s mental health and the
dearth of a modern, progressive men’s
movement into sharp relief.
Despite never having, as far as I know,
presented Newsnight, five minutes in,
Winkleman came at me like Emily Maitlis
on Prince Andrew by tossing me a
genuine hot potato, although, given the
topic, it was a potato that had once been
hot but was now cold, sliced and crunchy,
in a foil bag. That topic? Crisps.
“Caitlin, apparently you don’t like
a flavoured crisp,” she said, seemingly
innocently. We had just come out of a
Bruno Mars song. The mood was upbeat.
Classic daytime Radio 2.
What can one do in such a situation
but speak straight from the heart?
“No, Claudia. I do not,” I said simply.
“My beliefs are thus. If you’re eating a
flavoured crisp – I’m thinking beef and
onion, prawn cocktail, roast chicken
– you’re not really eating a crisp at all.
Those are just some kind of mad, futuristic
meal substitute, the kind of Willy Wonka-
style ‘lunch in a pill’ deal we were
promised as children. If your body craves
beef and onion, you should eat beef and
onion and not be grifted a potato instead.
Nutritional science is being hoodwinked.”
Winkleman, although a professional
to the bone, seemed shocked.
“But what… But what about salt and
vinegar?” she asked. BBC broadcasting
‘Ready salted is the
regulations mean all on-air talent must
seem impartial at all times, but it seemed
one and only true
clear, to me at least, that she was speaking
from considerable personal bias. This was
crisp,’ I told Claudia
a BBC talent with a lot of salt and vinegar
in her closet. Possibly literally.
Winkleman. And
“Well, that’s just a portion of chips for
people unable – or perhaps too lazy – to
then the phone
go and get an actual portion of chips,”
I replied. “And it feeds into what I see
lines opened…
as quite a sinister corporate movement,
similar to Big Pharma, but which I call Big
Farmer. Because it’s mainly cash-strapped
ROBERT WILSON
potato farmers inventing all these new,
unnatural, dinner-proxy flavoured crisps.”
Winkleman was becoming agitated.
It was clear my views were disrupting
the mainstream media narrative. “So what,
in your view, should a crisp be?” she asked,
faux casually.
“It’s obvious,” I said. “Ready salted.
That’s the one and only true crisp.”
Winkleman was stunned into silence,
so I seized my chance to Woodward and
Bernstein the whole thing.
“If you’re eating a crisp, you’ve
undeniably signed up to a wholly potato-
based experience,” I explained. “Not even
the most woke person in the world – not
even Meghan Markle – would deny that
a crisp is centrally and fundamentally
potato-identified. Therefore, unless it
simply tastes of potato and nothing else,
you’re eating a lie. Human beings’ brains
aren’t designed for a potato to taste of
sticky barbecue ribs. How are we supposed
to comprehend such a mouth falsehood?
At that point, we’re mere monkeys
trapped in the Matrix. We don’t do it with
any other foodstuff, do we? We don’t
deep-fry carrots and then make them taste
of spaghetti bolognese. If you want roast
turkey with Paxo sage and onion stuffing,
aka Walkers’ deeply sinister Merry
Crispmas, then have the courage of your
convictions and eat some roast turkey
with Paxo sage and onion stuffing. The
only ‘Merry Crispmas’ my faith recognises
is ready salted.”
“You say you don’t believe in flavours,
but ready salted is a flavour too,”
Winkleman cried. Pathetically.
“Salt is a condiment,” I said, knowing
I had her on the ropes. I admit I let out
a triumphant, “Ha!
“All the salt is doing is enhancing the
potato,” I continued. “Ready salted is the
crisp of someone who is leaning into the
potato snack experience. They are being
fully present and mindful about the thing
they are drunkenly shoving into their
mouth at 1am.”
I could see that things had perhaps
become too febrile.
“Look,” I said, mollifying my position.
“I am, in the end, speaking from a position
of love. I adore potatoes. I am a potato
ally. All I’m saying is let potatoes be
potatoes. And my hunch is a lot of other
people feel this way too but have just been
too scared to speak out. I’m simply trying
to start a conversation.”
Anyway, they then opened up the
phone lines and 90 per cent of listeners
vehemently disagreed with me, so next
week I’m going back to talking about men.
It’s far less controversial. n
The Times Magazine 5
 SPINAL COLUMN
MELANIE REID
You need a rocket
up your bum,
I told myself. So
to visit Doug I’m
flying for the first
time in ten years
F
or the most part I manage
to avoid envy of my
able-bodied friends. But the
thing that does get me a bit,
that makes me fleetingly
ache, is when they jump in
cars, or on trains, and shoot
off to visit their children in
new homes and new job locations.
Frankly I’d give my right arm – only
I couldn’t, could I, because I need it too
much – to be able to do that. You want my
definition of the ultimate fomo? It’s not
being there to see the flat my son and his
girlfriend bought late last year, to have
helped them move in, paint walls, tackle
the neglected garden.
It’s even just the ability to be useful.
To be the gofer for the workers and dash
off to the suppliers when they run out
of something. That’s what I miss, dammit
– scurrying up and down the aisles of
B&Q looking for grouting and screws and
Ronseal to finish the job.
Of course, because Doug and Louisa
are real darlings, they send me loads of
before and after shots of what they’re
doing, and he flies home often, sacrificing
his days off. But you know – fellow parents,
you know – it’s never the same as seeing
someone in their home environment,
soaking in their sense of design and taste.
Orientating them in their world so that
TOM JACKSON
when you think of them, and talk on the
phone, you can imagine where they are.
Anyway, what I’ve learnt about
paralysis is that stasis of body morphs into
stasis of place. When it’s so much easier not
to leave home, you end up never leaving
home. Mel, you need a rocket up your bum,
I told myself a couple of months ago. You
have to go and see the flat. You have to
visit them. It’s up to you to make it happen.
Well, me plus an army of helpers.
I gritted my teeth and swung into what,
quite honestly, has been like preparing a
military campaign. Napoleon did not
travel alone. A weekend in September is
identified, to suit Doug’s shifts and so too
the holidays of the prof, my lifelong mate
in London, who always gets volunteered
for botty washing and dressing.
The next bit of the jigsaw is travel.
I floated the idea lightly among my friends
in Scotland. Anyone want to go to London,
Saturday to Tuesday? Visit a show? See
your child or your aunt for a couple of
days? But the younger women are at work
and the retired ones have charity and
grandchild commitments.
Initially I thought I would drive down
by myself. I could reach Oxford on a tank
of diesel, pick up my other stalwart buddy,
the emphysemic pit pony, and she could
refuel me and accompany me into London.
But the prospect of driving to Oxford
on my own was iffy. Irritatingly so.
Able-bodied, I wouldn’t think twice. Even
disabled, I knew the initial nerves would
settle a mile down the road. The odds of
everything going perfectly were very high.
But I’m always aware I lack a margin of
error: if something went wrong it would
inconvenience everyone massively and I’d
be hugely irresponsible to have attempted
it. Besides, driving is long and tiring.
So I decided to be brave and fly
– something I haven’t done for more
than a decade because of bad experiences.
It means I’ll go in a manual wheelchair,
not the power one, and that’ll be a whole
lot easier for manhandling into flats
and taxis. The wonderful couple of mates
who’ve helped us on previous trips
volunteered to fill the role of special forces,
escorting me down and back on the plane.
(They have a child down there too.) Dave,
who hates London, will mind home and
dog. Thus all the ducks lined up.
And boy oh boy, have I been on a crash
course in interacting with modern life.
Things have travelled fast since I last flew.
I ventured with trepidation onto the
easyJet website and managed – fingers
crossed – to book the correct flights for the
three of us. I think my requirement for bells
and whistles special assistance is logged.
I must learn to trust online booking. The
Premier Inn is nailed. I’m even researching
the hire of a wheelchair stair climber, so
I can get up to the flat without calling out
a host of Doug’s strong friends. Yep, Mel’s
army is assembled, ready to move. n
@Mel_ReidTimes
Melanie Reid is tetraplegic after breaking
her neck and back in a riding accident
in April 2010
The Times Magazine 7
 MISSION IMPOSSIBLE:
THE WOMAN MAKING M&S COOL

Never say never! Maddy Evans, a former Topshop fashion director, is bringing the
failing brand back to life. Jane Mulkerrins – a recent convert – finds out how
PORTRAIT Tom Jackson
 Bikini top, £19.50, bottoms,
£15, sarong, £19.50, hat, £15,
sunglasses, £15, sandals, £25,
all marksandspencer.com.
Opposite: Maddy Evans,
50, at Marks & Spencer’s
headquarters in London
 W
hen Maddy Evans joined
Marks & Spencer as head
of buying in December
2019, the perception of
the British retail institution
was – at least as far as
womenswear was
concerned – bleak and
beleaguered. “It was not
considered stylish, not
considered modern and certainly not
relevant to most women,” Evans says.
Sales had slumped to near-historic lows
– in September that year, after a 17 per
cent fall in profits and shares plummeting
by 40 per cent, M&S was demoted from
the FTSE 100 for the first time – and
stores were being closed across the
country. Even the chief executive at the
time, Steve Rowe, admitted that M&S,
while still a popular destination for
knickers, posh biscuits and picnic supplies,
had a reputation for “frumpiness”.
“Clothing is not where I wanted it to
be,” he said. “My No 1 priority is to get
under the bonnet of the clothing business.”
To see actual bonnets in store,
alongside the flesh-coloured girdles and
matronly frocks, would not have come as
a huge surprise.
Today, almost four years into Evans’s
tenure – she was promoted to the position
of womenswear director last August – the
brand’s fortunes are finally beginning to
look brighter.
In late May, M&S revealed that sales
of “clothing and home” rose by 11.5 per
cent to £3.72 billion in the year to April 1,
helped by a 40 per cent rise in sales of
both casual dresses and its higher-end
Autograph range. Almost one in every five
pairs of jeans bought by women last year
was by M&S, making its denim more
popular than any other UK retailer’s.
But while it has managed to clamber
from a mid-table position hovering
between seventh and ninth in the UK
womenswear market to No 3, behind only
Zara and Next, public perceptions may be
tougher to turn around.
I meet Evans, 50, at the M&S HQ in
Paddington Basin, central London, where
womenswear occupies one of the ten
sprawling floors of open-plan space, home
to print rooms, fit rooms, design rooms,
styling rooms and trend labs, plus endless
moodboards and oceans of fabric swatches
in stripes, spots, florals and animal prints.
It’s a cavalcade of colour and pattern.
Evans, by contrast, is in a sleek, pared-
back cream silk shirt and navy trousers,
completely – and unintentionally – head
to toe M&S (including underwear). “I
didn’t plan that, I promise,” she says.
M&S is, in many ways, little different
from other British institutions such as the
TOM JACKSON
BBC, British Airways or the England
football team. While womenswear was
ailing when she arrived, there was also,
10 The Times Magazine
Maddy Evans
She has found the magic price point for a
dress: £39.50, what you’d pay for a pub lunch
she says, “huge loyalty to the M&S
business and a real desire for it to do
well”. Friends, family and business
contacts would, she says, ask her, “ ‘Can
you just make it work? Can you make
product that I want to wear?’ There’s
tremendous goodwill, but they are also
our harshest critics.”
Her first task was to figure out who the
M&S customer is – and who they want it
to be. Evans invokes the term “modern
mainstream”, a woman, she says, “who is
not at the bleeding edge of fashion, but
does she want to be considered modern?
Yes. Does she feel like she’s relevant in
terms of what she’s got on and what her
friends might be wearing as well? And
does the product need to give her
confidence and feel stylish? Absolutely.”
M&S and Evans “don’t put an age on
it”, but “we do skew older”, she admits.
And while she feels they are catering well
to the 55-plus bracket, “The opportunity
is definitely in that 35 to 50 market.”
The brand has gained 3 per cent of the
market share in that age group, but, “It’s
going to take some time for [the younger
woman] to realise that we’ve got product
that’s right for her. So there’s a piece to do
on the product itself. And then there’s a
piece to do in terms of the perception.”
Dresses have been key in changing
those perceptions, Evans says. Along with
sellout collaborations with brands such
as Ghost, M&S has overhauled its own
design process and crucially its mindset.
In the design room, she told her
teams, “We’re not designing for your
grandmother. We’re designing for all of
us. Everybody in the room should want
to wear this dress.” They looked closely
at fabrics and fits, tried clothes on real
women instead of mannequins and
ditched stuffy, outdated design elements
such as darts around the bust. Jeans have
been similarly overhauled. “Fashion fit”
ranges, including “Mom”, “Boyfriend” and
wide-leg jeans, have been introduced.
Evans was anxious not to put off that
loyal M&S base, the customers who come
in year after year for a new pair of
jeggings or the brand’s classic button-up
cardigans. “I was mindful of the loyalty
that the customers have to this business,”
she says. “And there was no way in hell
I wanted to alienate them. They need to
come on this journey with us.”
She had to swallow “bravery pills”, she
says, “to push the boundaries on style a
little more than maybe the business had
felt comfortable with previously”, but
without pushing it so far that it didn’t
work. “We have tried to drive [for] that
sweet spot: mainstream, broad church.”
I do not generally like to think of
myself as “mainstream”, but I do fall
squarely into Evans’s target base. I am 45,
I love fashion… and I’m an M&S devotee.
This summer, even though I’m “not
really shopping right now” (cost of living
crisis + mortgage terrors = cold sweats),
I have been unable to resist a bright
orange puff-sleeved mididress, plus the
same one in white (if it works, buy it in
every colour), as well as an off-the-
shoulder Bardot midaxi dress in a big, bold
black and white print. I have also (after
spotting them on the editor of Sunday
Times Style) snagged a pair of the super-
flattering, wide-leg, high-waisted jeans
and, for good measure, the Sienna
straight-leg version too.
There’s a green bomber jacket that I’m
resisting (but only because I already own

five bombers and can’t quite justify a
sixth), but, on a wet weekend in Cornwall,
I did treat myself to the khaki rubber
hooded raincoat, a close copy of the (far
more expensive) Rains version. There was
also, less urgently that particular weekend,
a black one-shouldered bikini.
When quizzed about their provenance,
as I have been while wearing all of the
above, plus the dozen or so other M&S
dresses on regular rotation in my
wardrobe, the reaction when I tell people
is one of universal surprise. And not just
about the clothes. “I would never have
put you down as an M&S woman,” said
a friend the other week. She meant it
as a compliment, apparently.
Meanwhile, my click-and-collect habit
for M&S sandals this summer is bordering
on the ridiculous, with a three-strap black
leather pair, a teal two-strap Birkenstock-
style pair and the cerise plastic version,
plus a pair of cream platform mules, sadly
less sturdy on cobbles than I had hoped.
“One thing we should really talk about
more is the consistency of the fit,” Evans
says. And she is right. It might seem like
a small thing, but knowing that I am
always a size 12 in dresses, a 14 in jeans
Swimsuit, £29.50, towel,
£12.50, sunglasses, £15.
Right: dress, £49.50,
sandals, £39.50, all
marksandspencer.com
and a 4 in shoes makes online shopping
an absolute breeze.
There is also, I would add, the element
of idleness, which I have always thought
M&S should fanfare more. I am inherently
lazy, but unfortunately also prone to
clumsiness and spillages. If items need to
be handwashed or dry cleaned, the bottom
of my washing basket will be their forever
home. M&S dresses, by contrast, go in
at 40C and dry hanging up, not even
requiring ironing (I don’t iron). They even
stock washable cashmere. It is a slattern’s
paradise of a store.
Evans, who was brought up in
Pembrokeshire before moving to London
to study textiles at Central Saint Martins,
previously spent more than 20 years
at Topshop, where she became buying
director and then fashion director. She
had joined in her early twenties because,
“I could just tell something was going
on there that was about to change…
There were boundaries that were being
pushed there that I didn’t feel were being
pushed elsewhere.”
She was there for “the Jane
Shepherdson years [the former Topshop
MD, considered the most influential
person on the high street at the time], the
London Fashion Week years [the brand
showed at LFW 2005-2017], the Kate Moss
years [the supermodel designed 14
collections for Topshop from 2007].”
She was also there for “the latter years
with a certain person with whom I ended
up spending way too much time”. The
billionaire businessman Philip Green
bought the Arcadia group, which owned
Topshop, in 2002. “It was tough. It was not
a nice environment to work in,” she says.
In April 2020, Green closed 550
Arcadia stores in the UK, furloughing
14,500 workers – and requesting taxpayers
fund the furlough – before going into
administration in November 2020. By
then, Evans had jumped ship to M&S.
“I could see what was coming for many
years,” she says, blaming mismanagement
and lack of investment and innovation for
the once mighty Topshop’s fall in fortunes.
One important element she brought
with her from Topshop was its legendary
ability to turn around new trends and
have stock in stores on the double,
sometimes taking just a month from
design to checkout.
“One of the first things coming in
here was to reduce that time to market,”
she says.
Previously, that time to market at M&S
was a year, which not only meant it could
not respond to breakthrough trends, but it
also had no idea what was working or not.
“So you’d be booking ahead pretty much
blind into the next season.”
Under Evans, the longest turnaround
time is now 42 weeks, but there are also
much shorter response times, including
20 per cent of stock on a response time
of just 6 weeks.
“You can’t make a padded jacket in six
weeks, but summer dresses you can,” she
says. A dress being designed now can be
available in early September, which
enables M&S to respond to emerging
The Times Magazine 11
 JANE’S BEST BUYS FROM M&S
trends and to, “Test, test, test, see what’s
biting and what’s not and then respond to
it and say, ‘More of those. None of those.’ ”
For example, when M&S introduced
its £35 wide-leg trousers with side stripes
(heavily inspired by Me+Em’s side-stripe
palazzo pants), they were assumed to be
a one-season item.
“But they were a phenomenon,” Evans
says. “And that’s still going.” So M&S
keeps making more of them. “Three years
in, they’ve become a mainstay.”
Since they were launched in 2021,
360,000 pairs have been sold – 120,000
of them so far this year. And yep, I have
a teal pair.
There is, of course, an elephant in the
retail room. Nobody has any money. How
does Evans plan to contend with the cost
of living crisis and its impact on our
TOM JACKSON. STYLING: HANNAH ROGERS. HAIR: JOHN K AT CAROL HAYES MANAGEMENT
shopping habits?
With dresses, she believes she has
discovered the magic price point: £39.50.
On examination of my receipts, all
USING GHD. MAKE-UP: DANI GUINSBERG USING MONIKA BLUNDER BEAUTY
three dresses I have bought this summer
have been £39.50, pretty much the price
of a pub lunch these days.
In addition, Evans says, M&S dresses
are now designed with versatility in mind.
“The idea is you can dress them up for
a wedding or wear your trainers with
them for work.”
I am living proof of this working
effectively. I wore a jewel-green dress from
the M&S beach collection to a ridiculously
smart wedding in Italy, and I suspect my
new black and white Bardot number (also
billed as “beach”) will do similar duty. And
when its well-cut, super-flattering jeans
are £35 a pair, I have zero guilt in buying
multiple pairs. Likewise with M&S’s
From left: dress, spring/summer
2022; dress, spring/summer 2021,
shoes, £49.50; dress, £39.50, shoes,
£49.50, all marksandspencer.com
My click-and-collect
habit for M&S
sandals is bordering
on the ridiculous
sandals, the priciest of which come in at
£35, the cheapest at just £15.
The success of the drive on dresses has
boosted what has historically been a tricky
season for M&S. “We have dropped
market share traditionally in spring/
summer,” Evans says. That’s partly, she
believes, because, “Our customers think
of us in terms of an investment piece,
something that will keep them warm, that
they can wear next year as well.”
It is also, she feels, because women
have perhaps not invested in their summer
wardrobes. “There’s more flesh exposed,
body-confidence issues,” she says. “And
we certainly haven’t invested as much [in
summer collections] in the way some of
our competitors do, so a big objective is
for us to win in that space.”
There is also, I believe, an entrenched
British mindset that separates “holiday
dressing” (sandals, wafty dresses, shorts,
linen, swimwear) from UK mainstay
dressing (pretty much the same in
summer as winter; just ditch the tights and
the cardigan). And who is going to splash
out much on threads they will wear for
only two weeks a year?
A combination of climate change, the
mainstreaming of festivals and festival
dressing and the casualisation of work
wardrobes, however, means that Britons
are now embracing seasonal wardrobes
and are more minded to spend money
on summer clothes.
Evans reports that in the first 12 weeks
of this spring/summer season, “Thankfully
we’ve done really well.” Sales of swimwear
are up 27 per cent on last year and linen
is up 26 per cent. Linen dresses are up a
hefty 56 per cent.
Linen is one of the M&S staples that
Evans and Lisa Illis, her head of design,
saw as having “untapped potential”. Today,
Illis is wearing the bestselling Girlfriend
linen shirt, 160,000 of which have been
sold since January.
“We have a great reputation for linen,”
Evans says, but in previous iterations it
was, “Neat, for the office. We’ve relaxed
that, made it slightly oversized and casual,
so you can wear it at the weekend too.
“We haven’t got it all right yet,” she
stresses.
Illis is keen, she says, “to maintain
momentum and move into new categories.
We’re growing swimwear and doing a lot
on footwear and accessories. We’ve spent
a lot of time thinking about the building
blocks.” And now, she says, “You want
to be as proud of your jewellery or your
straw hat.” M&S jewellery, it is true, has
a long way to go.
Evans, meanwhile, is focused on
drawing in those 35 to 50-year-old
shoppers. “That is all down to being more
stylish, being more relevant for those
customers and then getting their eyes on
[it] to reappraise,” she says.
When, at a wedding, I am asked where
my dress is from, I reply, “M&S,” and
nobody bats an eyelid, then their work
will truly be done. n
The Times Magazine 13
‘I’M NOT A SH0W-OFF GUY’
(Just the one Ferrari)

Jorginho, 31, photographed by Robert Wilson

wearing Dolce & Gabbana. Styling: Hannah Rogers.
Opposite, from left: playing for Arsenal against
Manchester City in February; after Italy’s win
over England in the Euro 2020 final, July 2021
No gambling, no private jets, no debts, no flash
watches. Arsenal and Italy midfielder Jorge Filho,
aka Jorginho, is anything but your average £6 million
a year player. Damian Whitworth meets him
 S
ome historians may regard
counterfactual history as
a fruitless exercise, but let
us indulge ourselves as we
consider one of the most
traumatic evenings in recent
English sporting history. What
if, on the night of the Euro
2020 final between England
and Italy at Wembley, Jorge
Luiz Frello Filho – better known as
Jorginho – had not been on the pitch?
England, I suggest, might have won their
first trophy in almost six decades. “Maybe,”
he says and laughs mischievously.
Today, England’s nemesis is wearing a
Dolce & Gabbana T-shirt, denim shorts
and a puckish smile. He is 5ft 11in and
surprisingly slight, an unlikely destroyer
of dreams. But I have in my hand Uefa’s
technical report on the final. This does
not say that Jorginho was fashioned from
tungsten and fitted with a Rolls-Royce
engine, but that is a reasonable conclusion
to draw from its account of what he did
that night.
We all remember the missed England
penalties in the shoot-out, but Gareth
Southgate’s side would not have been
in that situation if they had successfully
defended their early one-goal lead. The
tireless tiger at the heart of the Italian
fightback was Jorginho, “the absolute leader
on the pitch”, according to the technical
observer. He made 98 passes, more
than the entire England midfield could
manage. He achieved a record number of
interceptions at the tournament and ran
further than any other player. For these
performances, and for his key role in
Chelsea’s triumph in the Champions
PREVIOUS SPREAD: GETTY IMAGES, REX FEATURES. THIS SPREAD: GETTY IMAGES, PA, FACEBOOK/JORGHINOFRELLO, EPA
League, also that season, he was named
by Uefa as the men’s player of the year.
His Italy team-mates call him “Il
Professore” – the professor – because of
his non-stop chatter during games. But
the talking is not restricted to the pitch.
Jorginho speaks four languages and is a
thoughtful, opinionated and unusually
open footballer. When Mikel Arteta,
the Arsenal manger, persuaded him
to leave Chelsea and join him in north
London in January, he was buying a
player with experience, who could show
younger team-mates how to win matches
and avoid losing in life.
Specifically, Jorginho wants to help them
avoid squandering all their money. A player
who came from a humble background in
Brazil and was exploited at the start of
his career in Italy, he has, at 31, become
a mentor to younger footballers trying to
navigate a sport awash with cash. Suddenly
becoming fabulously wealthy as top
players do sounds like a nice problem to
have. But in a world of luxury, temptation
and unscrupulous parasites, it can easily
go very wrong for players who get rich
quick. “It can be dangerous. I’ve seen it a
16 The Times Magazine
lot. Four out of ten professional footballers,
after their career, they are broke,” he says.
A report by Xpro, a charity helping
former footballers, found a few years ago
that 40 per cent of them faced bankruptcy
within five years of retirement. Jorginho
makes it his business to tell younger
players this and interrogates them on their
spending habits. “I get the feeling if they
have support – from family or friends – or
if they are kind of lost. Then I see if there’s
potential for me to help. Sometimes I see
one car one week and, next month, another
car. Then I’m like, ‘Whoa, come on.’
I need to speak with the guy. Too many
watches, too many cars. And diamonds.
And clothes. And brands. And private jets.
And I’m like, ‘It’s a bit too much, isn’t it?’
“I don’t think I’m better than anyone.
I just try to find a space to talk to them.
Usually, I make a joke of things they’re
doing. And then I go serious: ‘What are you
doing? Because this career is going to finish.
Buy a house, invest. You need to put the
money in the right place. You work hard.
You have sacrificed a lot to get to this level.
I get that part. You have to enjoy life, but
always with balance,’ is what I always tell
the boys. Football is what, ten, fifteen
years? Then usually, unfortunately, it’s
hard for us to have another career. If you
don’t invest well you’re not going to have
the same lifestyle. You finish football, you
don’t invest well, and then you just go down
because you’re still living in that style.”
Spending on luxuries is not the only
issue. “Gambling is a big problem because
footballers are competitive. Once you get
into that, it is a very dangerous game.”
Does he ever have a bet? “No, zero.
No gambling at all.” He is saddened by
the case of Ivan Toney, the Brentford and
England striker who has been banned
from football for eight months for betting
on matches. “I just hope he can do well.”
When he was at Chelsea, Jorginho
lived near the training ground in Cobham
and is now renting in north London while
looking to buy a home. He is not wearing
jewellery or even a watch. “No, I’m not
into it. I’m like… [he searches for the
English phrase] really down to earth.”
He spends money on travel and will
stay in nice hotels with his family. “I like
finding new places to go and exploring
and learning about new cultures. But let’s
say, if I’m going from here to Italy, I go on
normal flights. I don’t need a private jet if
the times work.” He doesn’t mind being
bothered by fans at airports – “It’s part of
the job” – but finds it a bit much when
people try to take pictures of him as he’s
putting food in his mouth in restaurants.
Jorginho is not devoid of showmanship.
He is friends with Domenico Dolce and
Stefano Gabbana and is very comfortable
posing in their clothes in this photo studio.
But he is no prima donna. The Times
stylist loves how accommodating he is.
Following Italy’s Euro 2020
final penalty shoot-out win
He is initially coy about what car
he drives. “I don’t like speaking about
it. I’m not a show-off guy.” He looks
uncomfortable. “I bought a Ferrari. But
when I was almost 30. I thought it was the
moment because I had been investing and
thinking of the future. When my mum
came to visit me and I took her for a
ride she started crying and that made
me emotional because my mum worked
a lot when I was young. When my mum
and my dad got divorced, it was a tough
situation. And when I achieve something,
she always goes back to where we started.”
A video of his mum crying when she
saw his name on the back of a shirt in the
Chelsea club shop went viral. “We are very
close. She cried because she thinks about
the whole journey and how far I came.
And that makes her proud. And makes me
feel proud that I’m making my mum, my
dad, my sister proud for what I am trying
to do. I’ve been lucky. I have this structure
around me from my family. I come from
the bottom. My family didn’t have money.”
Jorginho grew up in Imbituba, a port
in southern Brazil. His father was a taxi
driver and his mother was on the verge of
becoming a professional footballer when
she became pregnant with his older sister.
She later worked as a driving instructor and
played football with her son on the beach.
Although his parents separated, they
focused on his footballing potential from
an early age. When he was just five his
father told him how hard it would be. “He
said, ‘It’s not what you see on TV. It’s not
just beautiful stuff. You need to leave your
family when you’re young. People will try
to take you down, to steal money from
you, take advantage of your image. You’re
going to be away from your family, from
 Jorginho and
Bukayo Saka,
Arsenal v Aston
Villa, February
‘MY AGENT RIPPING ME OFF – IN THAT MOMENT,
FOOTBALL FOR ME WAS OVER. I WANTED TO GO HOME’
During his academy days, pictured with his mother
Meeting Pope Francis with the Italy team, 2019
your friends. You’re not going to be around
on Christmas Day or your birthday.”
The young boy insisted to his dad that
he still wanted to be a player. “My sister’s
five years older than me. He said to her,
‘You need to study to take care of the
money and help your brother.’ And,
incredibly, that has happened.”
His sister now helps him with his
finances. He is a founding investor in
Gather, a new investment app that provides
access to portfolios managed by BlackRock,
the world’s biggest asset manager. The
app aims to make investment easier and
is designed to look like a music streaming
service and you can copy other users’
investment choices. He has also invested
in property and is constructing a complex
of 100 flats in Brazil. He has been trying to
persuade his mother to move from Brazil,
but she prefers to stay in their home town.
After he extended the family home, she
found it too big and secretly moved into
a smaller, rented flat.
“So many people count on you. There
is my responsibility for my family, my kids,
my partner and ex-wife. And my mum,
my father, my sister, charities. So many
random requests: someone needs special
help because they can’t afford the hospital
and the family is going to lose a son. That’s
why you need to be really cautious about
what you’re doing and spending.”
The outside world also does not see the
full picture of what it means to be a player,
he says. “It looks easy. People look at us
and have no idea what we’ve been through,
or how much you had to want it. Everyone
sees us with nice cars, and they think
money, going to nice places. But to get
here… Everyone has their histories and I’m
sure no one had an easy one. It is tough.
The dream needs to be big in your head.”
His family were initially reluctant to
let him go, aged 13, to a football academy
three hours from his home. When his
mother visited she was horrified. “It was
a bit dirty. It wasn’t nice. So my mum
said, ‘Now we are leaving. Pack your stuff.’
I was 14 and I looked at her and said,
‘If you force me to go home and I don’t
become a footballer, I’m going to blame
you.’ She left crying. I was following my
dream and saw the opportunity of my life.”
At 15 he moved from the academy to
Italy, where he played in the Verona youth
team. Again, his family were against it and
he can understand why. “I’m a father now
and I think of one of my children going to
the other side of the world with a stranger
[an agent] when I don’t have the money if
something happens to go and get him.”
The living conditions, in a monastery
with good food, were much better than
at the Brazilian school, but he discovered
when he was 17 that he was being ripped
off. He was shy and unworldly and it took
another player to point out that it was
wrong that the agent was only giving
him €20 a week. Thousands of euros had
been withheld from him, he says. “In that
moment, football for me was over. I wanted
to go home.” He rang his parents, but this
time they told him to stay because he was
so close to making it into the first team.
He switched to a new agent with whom
he still works today. The experience was
tough but had a purpose: “For me to learn
a lesson. And I did.” Of the other five boys
who came with him from Brazil to Italy,
one plays in the Italian second division
and another in Malta, but the others did
not make it as pros.
“I think a lot is here,” he says, tapping
his head. “I played with so many talented
boys, more talented than me. But I think
I wanted it more than them. They played
football better than me, believe me. But
when the hard times came, they gave up.”
Jorginho went on to play for Napoli
and then in 2018 moved to Chelsea. He
has Italian and Brazilian citizenship and
an Italian great-grandfather. When the
Italian national team asked him to play for
them, before Brazil approached him, he
agreed. “Italy opened the doors for me. It
helped me to live my dream. When they
called me it was an honour. I’ve been in
Europe half my lifetime and Italy is in my
blood as well. People ask me, ‘Do you feel
more Brazilian or Italian?’ and I feel both.”
For generations of England players
who wonder what it feels like to win a
major tournament, Jorginho explains the
moment of victory vividly. “How can you
put that into words? It’s impossible. So
many emotions. It’s happiness, and you
think how hard you worked to be there.
You feel exhausted but the adrenaline is so
high that you don’t feel tired. Your heart
is running so fast and you think of the
journey again and how satisfied and
grateful you are to be in that position.
Then we flew back to Rome and I saw
the whole city – and videos of the whole
country – just stopped. So many people
were having hard times but everyone was
just so happy. It feels incredible.”
When he picked up that Uefa award
he made a point of thanking “people
who didn’t believe in me”. He was talking
about fans and TV commentators who
sometimes criticised him. “It’s not nice,
of course, because behind the footballer
there is a person. We have emotions. We
have a heart. But the positive side was
that motivated me to work even harder
to prove them wrong. No one should ever
let anyone say you are not good enough.
You just need to want it. I believe that hard
work pays off. Nothing came to my life
just because someone gave it to me.”
The Times Magazine 17

Last year he was one of the faces
of Uefa’s “Real Scars” campaign against
online abuse. In a major upset that year,
Italy had failed to qualify for the World
Cup. Jorginho is Italy’s best penalty taker,
often scoring after making a trademark
jump that confuses goalkeepers. But in the
qualifying campaign he failed to score two
penalties against Switzerland that would
have ensured a place in Qatar.
The online abuse was harsh and
continues to this day, he says. “You think I
want to miss those penalties? Of course not.
They don’t realise that; people just need
someone to blame. That was me. I can take
it. Fortunately, I have the right support.”
The one thing he did wrong in the
Euros final was miss the penultimate
penalty: “I felt I had been struck with a
knife.” Fortunately for him, the Italian
goalkeeper, Gianluigi Donnarumma,
saved Bukayo Saka’s subsequent kick and
Italy won. “I felt he was going to save it.”
Saka is now his Arsenal team-mate and
they’ve talked about the missed spot kicks.
“It is always really painful for him. I’m just
glad he’s scoring now. I’m happy he didn’t
score that one. I’m sorry, B! I love you!”
After the final, Saka, and the takers of
the other missed England penalties, Marcus
Rashford and Jadon Sancho, received a
torrent of online abuse, much of it racist.
“It’s disgusting,” says Jorginho. “I can’t
believe what these guys went through.
I feel so sorry for them. This must change
really quickly because it’s unreal.”
He left Chelsea because “I didn’t feel
part of the project any more”. Arteta had
tried to recruit him twice before and said
the third attempt would be his last. As
a manager he’s “very transparent, very
straightforward”, he says. “He’s teaching
young players about football, but also
about life, about legacy, what you want
to be, what you want to leave behind.”
Jorginho is an eager student. He speaks
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Portuguese, Italian, English and Spanish,
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the last picked up just from listening to
team-mates in the dressing room. He is
currently taking lessons in sign language
so he can communicate with deaf fans.
“I love learning. I can naturally pick up
things if I really want to.”
Ultimately, last season was disappointing
for Arsenal, who looked like they might
win the Premier League but then dropped
vital points and were overtaken by
Manchester City on their way to the treble.
“They are used to winning,” says Jorginho.
Can the likes of Arsenal, owned by
mere billionaires, ever properly compete
with City and its Abu Dhabi petrodollars?
“I don’t think we should focus on what
they have. We should focus on what we
need to do.” What does he make of Erling
Haaland, who scored 52 goals for City
last season? “Ah, he is a big lad! What a
mentality as well. Strong, fast – he’s an
animal. And then you see him off the
18 The Times Magazine
With his partner, Catherine Harding, in Spain in June
pitch and he’s completely different. Such a
nice guy. He’s just incredible. If you love
football, it is just so nice to watch, isn’t it?”
Some diehard Arsenal fans might
be appalled to hear the star of a bitter
rival spoken about so warmly, but I find
Jorginho’s generosity encouraging. In the
Euros final he committed a crunching
tackle on Jack Grealish, for which he was
booked; now he defends him against
critics of his epic bender after City’s treble.
“He worked his whole life for that.
He dreamt about it. And he should not
celebrate? I think he deserves it. He
HE EXPECTS TO STAY IN THE UK. ‘MY PARTNER IS
FROM LONDON. I DON’T THINK I HAVE MUCH CHOICE’
maybe needs to be careful because there
are many phones out there…” In the
summer, Jorginho will have the odd
alcoholic drink, but can’t handle more
than two: “I could not keep up with him.”
We get in a car to go across London to
a meeting with members of Soho Works,
an offshoot of Soho House, the private
members’ club, which has a partnership
with the Gather app. In the car he talks
about some of the greats. He has played
against Lionel Messi – “Pretty impressive,”
he says with twinkly understatement – and
met Diego Maradona when the Argentina
legend visited the Napoli dressing room.
“The changing room was buzzing for
him. We were like kids.” His team-mates
told him it would be uncool to ask for a
selfie, but Jorginho was undeterred. “I was
like, ‘Are you kidding? When am I going
to see him again?’ ” Maradona was happy
to oblige and everyone else joined in.
He tells a funny story about his former
Chelsea team-mate N’Golo Kanté, who
is even more careful with money than
Jorginho, famously driving a Mini, even
after it was smashed in an accident.
Jorginho once sold him a car but was
puzzled, when checking his bank account
some time later, to find the money had
not been paid. Kanté said he’d forgotten.
“You forgot? You drive the car every day,”
Jorginho told him. Kanté asked if he could
wait until he got paid at the end of the
month. “Are you kidding me? Two days,”
he told Kanté, who paid up. “As everyone
knows, he is very tight,” says Jorginho,
laughing. “I love him. He might kill me.”
His girlfriend is Catherine Harding, an
Irish-born singer who appeared on The
Voice in 2020, under the name Cat Cavelli.
They have a son together and she has a
daughter from a previous relationship with
Jude Law. He has a son and daughter with
his ex-wife, Natalia Leteri.
He and Harding met online. “Then
we clicked and fell in love.” He expects to
live in the UK long-term. “My partner is
from London and I don’t think she wants
to live anywhere else. So I don’t think
I have much choice.”
Lateri and his older children live in
Italy. “That’s kind of tough.” But he sees
them regularly and pulls up videos on his
phone of all the children running around
together on the pitch at the Emirates
Stadium after Arsenal’s last home game.
I detect a sentimental side to Jorginho.
His favourite pastime is going to musicals.
“Any time we can, we go, because we love
it. We do a lot of singing at home as well.
I started learning the guitar and can play
a few songs. I want to learn the piano too.”
Visiting family and friends are all taken
to The Lion King, his favourite musical.
This summer he and Harding had a break
in New York and went to see the Broadway
version of Moulin Rouge! so he could see
how it compared with the London version.
It will come as no surprise that he is
meticulous in taking care of himself and
has even installed an oxygen chamber at
home to help with recovery from training
or injuries. He hopes to play in the Euros
next summer and then the World Cup in
2026. “I want to play as long as I can, at
the top level to the end.” He has started
doing his coaching badges, and would
consider becoming a manager one day.
It sounds like the professor will be
around for years to come, preaching
goodwill to all players and fans and quite
possibly shattering English dreams. We
were that close to England winning a
first tournament in my lifetime, I tell
him, holding my thumb and forefinger
two millimetres apart. “I’m so sorry!”
he says, and bursts into that infectious
laugh again. n
Gather is available to download at the
App Store and Google Play. For more
information, visit gatherinvesting.com
 I
hated
my
husband
(and he hated me)
Fielding Edlow with her
husband, Larry Clarke,
in the web series Bitter
Homes and Gardens

When she rowed constantly with her husband and their

sex life stopped, Fielding Edlow thought it was her fault.
Then a friend said her husband was gaslighting her
– subtly sowing seeds of self-doubt. Her response?
She began doing the same to him. Now she’s turning
their toxic marriage into a one-woman show
 Fielding Edlow
photographed by
Troy Conrad
 I
t was December 2021, and I was
miserable in my marriage. Larry and
I had been married for 13 and a half
years. Unlike most couples who
stayed together for the kid or the
house etc, we stayed together for
the web series. A scrappy web series
called Bitter Homes and Gardens
that I wrote about the unfettered
dysfunction in our marriage, which
made friends and family cringe during
our “live shows” but had garnered some
interest in Hollywood. “Some” being
the operative word. (When our seventh
couples’ therapist responded, “You have
a web series?” and we both went, “Yeah,
have you seen it?” and the therapist went,
“No, but I love Catastrophe,” the sitcom
about a troubled marriage, that was a hard
pill to swallow.)
During our first season, we had a blast.
However, we shot the second season on
a shoestring budget during the height of
the pandemic in our own home (our green
room was our nine-year-old daughter’s
bedroom) and the virulent strains in our
marriage were bubbling to the surface. In
episode six, when we have a truly septic
shouting match in our kitchen, the entire
crew burst into applause and Larry purred
like a Siamese kitten. But when a friend
called me after the episode and said, “You
weren’t acting,” I knew she was right.
I remember calling my best friend,
Olivia, that December when things were
particularly fraught and marinating in my
mental Rolodex of “Larry issues”. I spewed
the usual: he made a movie and didn’t
even put me in it. He wears shorts and a
belt. He walks around the house shouting,
“Stanley Tucci stole my career.” At one
point, we didn’t have sex for more than
five years. And when we finally started
to get back some semblance of a sex life,
I still had to be the one to ask for sex.
I had to be the one to put it in our shared
Apple calendar. (Larry never used the
shared Apple cal. Well, the one time he
used it I got a blurt that said, “Larry
shoots with Meryl.” Because everybody,
including the “cloud”, needed to know
that Larry was going to shoot a few scenes
with Meryl Streep in The Laundromat.)
I continued my barrage… Larry says
I have to be nicer. I AM NICE. I tell him
he’s the greatest actor of his generation.
I call his sister. I listen to his stories about
how it was a “double exercise day” even
though it makes me want to blow my
brains out. And I was nice. I felt like
doe-eyed Ellie Kemper in the scene
from Bridesmaids when she’s unravelling
to Wendi McLendon-Covey about her
withholding husband: “And by the time we
finish cleaning ourselves, he’s too tired and
I pretend I’m tired, but I’m not tired, I’m
TROY CONRAD
not tired… I’m not tired!”
Olivia used a word she had never used
before. Taking a breath she said, “He’s
He said, ‘I never told you this, but your
first solo show was an absolute disaster’
gaslighting you.” Everything changed for
me in that moment. My best friend, who
is also the daughter of a therapist and has
known me since nursery, was never wrong.
Her sentence stopped me. The same way
I had been “stopped” when I was in my
early twenties and my therapist said,
“You’re probably an alcoholic, and
do you want to spend the rest of your
twenties having unprotected sex with
drummers who aren’t even in bands?”
None of my eight couples’ therapists
or any of my irritating sponsors had ever
crystallised it like that. It’s like when an
overeater finally hears, “It’s not the crème
caramel; it’s your mean dad.” Or the
gambler hears, “It’s not the Kentucky
Derby; it’s your bipolar mum.” Or the
alcoholic hears, “It’s not your giving roofies
[doses of Rohypnol] to nine prostitutes;
you’re just a horrible person.” But then
I exclaimed to Olivia, “I think we’re in
some weird co-dependent gaslighting
thing because… I’m doing it now too.”
Gaslighting has become a trendy
buzzword but many people don’t know
exactly what it means. Gaslighting is
defined as psychologically manipulating
a person, usually over an extended period
of time, so that the victim questions the
validity of their own thoughts and reality.
The gaslighter (now both of us) attempts
to sow self-doubt and confusion in their
victim’s mind. Typically, gaslighters are
seeking to gain power over the other
person by distorting reality and forcing
them to question their own judgment.
Gaslighting torpedoes you, suddenly
and inexplicably wide awake, out of bed
at 4.15am. The confusion. Feeling trapped.
A familiar feeling that I had had since
childhood. Maybe that’s why I had once
staged a production of Miss Julie, because
I had always felt like that caged canary.
And Larry and I fell in love doing Miss
Julie. I became enamoured with my leading
man, who every night at the end of the
play would hand me a knife and say, “Now
go jump in the river and kill yourself.”
We did enjoy a pink-cloud honeymoon
period until Larry moved into my single
girl pied-à-terre in West Hollywood after
only eight months. (And for the record,
I never officially invited him to live with
me – the way you’re not supposed to
invite a vampire into your house. I would
just start seeing these bright Tommy
Bahama shirts swinging in my wardrobe.)
I loved seeing him on stage – his
confident, brash, secure self with an
electrifying presence. He could also be
incredibly romantic. A few weeks into
dating he said, “I want to go steady with
you. I want to exchange things that are
meaningful.” So we met for dinner
and I brought my gymnastics medal
– first place on vault – and he gave
me his Irish family crest, which was
three mint leaves. And we both put our
treasures in special places in our bedroom.
(PS: I earned mine.)
But the deterioration of our marriage
really began when I realised I was with
somebody who was so desperate to
be seen that they stopped seeing me.
I remember leaving the house to perform
a third stand-up show that week and
his response was, “Again? You’re doing
another show?” And I would just feel
shut down – how is this person “annoyed”
with me for doing my job? He would tell
me (and anybody who listened) that he
was my biggest supporter, but he would
always put me in a box, saying things
The Times Magazine 23
like, “You’re not a touring comic,” “You
don’t do political stuff,” and so on. I told
him I was happy to punch up jokes for his
movie, but he never took me up on my
offer. He didn’t want my help. He didn’t
really hear me or see me. He was buried
in a phone and I was buried in rage, which
usually ended up in a resentment-laced
sugar cookie spiral.
Our seventh couples’ therapist
was intimidating: the 5ft 11in Dr Alex
Katehakis. Her office was retro chic and
she didn’t believe in small talk. I blurted
out very early on (to try to score points)
that we hadn’t had sex in five years. And
Larry pulled a cushion onto his lap as if
he was gonna give birth to a goose-down
trauma baby. And I’ll never forget the
shock on Alex’s face as she said, “That’s
a really long time.” And then one day,
I don’t know if she was hungry or just so
fed up, but she looked at Larry and said,
“You know, maybe Fielding would be less
of a bitch if you bonked her more.”
Alex never used the word “gaslighting”,
and I could’ve spent all that couples’
therapy money on creating a more
empathetic AI robot who threw me up
against a wall as if we were in outtakes of
Fifty Shades of Grey. Larry gaslighting me
and telling me over and over, “You just
need to be nicer,” was so much worse than
the years-long sex drought.
This was back when the gaslighting
was more one-sided. (Because, believe me,
although eventually it became mutual,
Larry lit the match. It was like the Exxon
Valdez supertanker leaking gallons of
oil in your home but everybody’s like,
“There’s no tanker. You’re crazy.”)
In a terrible fight we once had, Larry
proclaimed, “I never told you this, but
your first solo show was an absolute
disaster.” But he never saw my first solo
show. Or he did see the DVD, but he has
attention deficit disorder, so he just saw
the first 11 minutes. My first solo show was
one of my greatest accomplishments. It
was the very first thing I did where I felt
like a person. And in the middle of that
venomous fight Larry told me, “You never
looked the audience in the eye. You were
completely misdirected.” I don’t even
know if this was gaslighting – maybe it
was just Larry being a total prick.
I have always had a self-sabotage thing
about dressing up. I generally feel as if
I look like I’m running for the city council
in Whoville. But every time I would trot
out a little Marc Jacobs A-line pocket
dress and say to Larry, “How do I look?”
Every time I needed a bit of validation,
he’d say with a deep sigh, “You look really
uncomfortable in that.” And I would
think, I don’t feel uncomfortable. I mean,
I guess I must really look uncomfortable.
Is it everything or just the lower part of
my body? I thought he didn’t want me
in baggy yoga trousers. I don’t know,
maybe I’m a little uncomfortable. I don’t
know any more.
One of the happiest times in our
marriage was when we joined an
Orthodox softball league. I have no idea
who invited us – I’m not Orthodox; I’m
Reform. This was a very determined group
of Jews who would shout deli orders into
their flip phones in the outfield. “Boaz!
Put Obadiah on! We need 20lb of brisket!
No fat, Boaz!” And throughout the whole
season Larry would say to me, “They love
me but they don’t like you, cause they
don’t consider you a Jew. You’re a fake
Jew.” And I’d be like, am I not a real Jew?
I began to question everything in my life.
Was my bat mitzvah not real enough?
What kind of Jew am I? Who am I?
But I have to admit something. At
some point, more or less without realising
it, I started gaslighting Larry. I did it
because deep down I was unconsciously
thinking, this tactic is really effective.
And this is how we became stuck in a
draining, complex, odd (but probably more
common than people realise) co-dependent
gaslighting-based relationship.
It’s like, he’s done about 17 things that
I could literally call a lawyer over, but I’m
staying in the relationship through choice
and going out to dinner and laughing, like,
“Ha ha, this is so fun. I hate my husband.
Pass me the spicy shrimp tempura.”
 So yeah, I started to become gaslight-y
too. I would toss his XL hoodies into the
too hot dryer and when he would try to
squeeze in his big right arm and say, “This
is weird. This doesn’t fit,’’ I’d say, “Maybe
fasting isn’t so great? Maybe just eat less?
And by the way, peanut butter isn’t the
good fat. Everybody knows that.”
I started to relish telling him his stories
at dinner parties didn’t have a beginning,
middle and end, and that people were
squirming and that he was losing them
five and a half words in. This wasn’t true
at all; Larry is an excellent storyteller. But
I enjoyed poking holes in the one thing
he always owned with confidence. And
I watched that confidence erode.
When I gleefully realised how Larry
began to doubt his own storytelling
prowess, I cranked up my own gaslight-y
engine. I launched a low-level cunning
attack around Larry’s insufferable social
media “presence”. I would say, “All my
friends have either unfollowed and/or
blocked you and a few of them are asking
me, ‘Is Larry unwell?’ ” And he would
retort, “I actually use social media as
a way of spreading important breaking
news, unlike your throwback posts with
you doing jelly shots in a neon tankini
in the late Nineties with a glitter filter.”
And I would reply, “All you do is post baby
koalas falling out of pine trees. Why do you
think even your friends aren’t reaching out
I launched a low-level
cunning attack on his
insufferable social
media ‘presence’
for your ‘sad actor’s lunches’ any more?”
And then Larry would retreat even more
behind a screen, burrowing into his
favourite chair, microdosing cereal.
Larry and I had the Divorce
Conversation in January 2022. It
happened at 10.20am on a Tuesday. He
was sitting in his favourite chair slurping
a low-fat ice cream. And he said, “So
what’s going on today?” And I honestly
felt like I wanted to die. And I walked into
the other room, sat on my sofa and he
followed me. And for the first time, I didn’t
freeze. I didn’t need to pray or call my
sponsor… I’m not TIRED, my first solo show
WAS good and it changed my life and I am
a REAL JEW… And so it came out. I said,
“I don’t want to be married.” And he got it.
A week later Larry said, “You know,
you seem a lot lighter.” And I thought
to myself, I am! Maybe because I am no
longer secretly shrinking hoodies. I call
it helpful decluttering.
Have you watched the Oscar-winning
movie Gaslight, starring Ingrid Bergman
and Charles Boyer? It’s based on a play
that the term gaslighting comes from.
I recently watched the movie and
then I had to lie down for a week. At
the end, after Boyer’s Gregory is tied up
in the attic, Bergman’s Paula is finally
vindicated after being manipulated
into thinking she’s a tired, ill, forgetful
kleptomaniac who keeps imagining the
gaslights in the house flicking on and off.
Gregory is carted off by the handsome
detective and we get our happy ending.
(Caveat: watch with a trusted friend and
not a smooth-talking narcissist.)
In August 2022, Larry moved out to his
eclectic bachelor pad a few blocks away.
I’ve never felt better about him. We are
great friends and co-parents. We play
tennis and I have unblocked him on
Instagram. I don’t go through his phone
any more while he’s in the shower. But our
preferred conversation topics have shifted
to news, weather, sport and our scrappy
web series. We still have plans to pitch
it as a half-hour show to Amazon and
Netflix etc, even though he says nobody
can stand us for more than eight and a
half minutes, and I realise at least now he’s
gaslighting both of us and not just me. n
Fielding Edlow will perform Gaslighting Is
My Love Language at Just the Tonic at the
Grassmarket, Edinburgh, from August 3-13
(edinburgh.justthetonic.com)
‘I always felt like an
outsider. My mum was
a single parent. I never
met my dad. We had no
upstairs heating. The
windows were rotten.
Parents didn’t want
their children mixing
with me’

Bridget Phillipson,
39, photographed by
Dan Kennedy. Opposite
(top): Phillipson alongside
Angela Rayner and Rachel
Reeves in February. Story
continues on page 34
IS BRIDGET PHILLIPSON
LABOUR’S RISING STAR?

She refused to serve under Jeremy

Corbyn and is now one of Keir
Starmer’s most trusted allies. The
shadow education secretary talks to
Rachel Sylvester and Alice Thomson
about the challenges she faced
growing up – and why she doesn’t
care when her private school critics
brand her ‘chippy’
Eat!

PU
Easy

LL
OU
summer

T
entertaining

COME
FOR
DRINKS
AND
NIBBLES

CHAMPADE

Choose whichever pink lemonade you

like – cloudy or clear, or rose or
raspberry flavoured.

Fill each flute with pink lemonade

two thirds of the way, then top up the
final third with sparkling wine. Float a
raspberry on top.

TWIST Swap the pink lemonade for

elderflower pressé and spear with a
sprig of thyme instead of the raspberry.
 SALT AND PEPPER FISH FINGERS
Serves 4 | 25 mins

Inspired by the recipe in Nigella’s book Cook, Eat,

Repeat for fish finger bhorta, we agree that the
British freezer classic is ripe for a reinvention.

1. Heat the oven to 200C fan/gas 7 and cook

12 fish fingers for 20 minutes.
2. In a bowl, mix 2 grated garlic cloves, a thumb
of grated ginger, 1 sliced spring onion, ½ tsp salt
and several grinds of black pepper, half a deseeded
and finely chopped red chilli, 1 tbsp vegetable oil
and 1 tsp sherry vinegar. Tip into a large frying pan
and cook over a medium heat for 5 minutes.
3. When the fish fingers are cooked, break them
up with a spatula and add them to the pan to
combine with the aromatics. Serve with steamed
rice and broccoli.

30 The Times Magazine

 EAT! SUMMER PARTY
PISSALADIÈRE CROSTINI
Makes 8 | 20 mins

These pint-sized
pizza-like snacks work well
as a quick canapé.

1. Heat the oven to 170C fan/

gas 5. Melt a knob of butter in
a pan over a low-medium heat.
Finely slice 2 onions and fry
them in the butter, stirring
often, with a pinch of sugar and
a slosh of sherry (optional) for
10 minutes, or until the onions
are translucent.
2. Cut 8 x 1cm slices from
a baguette (staler bread is best)
and place on a baking sheet.
Drain the oil from a 30g tin of
anchovies into a bowl and use
it to lightly brush both sides
of each baguette slice. Bake
in the oven for 10 minutes,
turning halfway through.
When cooked, divide the
onions, anchovies, 8 pitted
black olives and some thyme
leaves between the slices.

RECIPES
Rhiannon Batten
and Laura Rowe

PHOTOGRAPHS
Clare Winfield

The Times Magazine 31

EAT! SUMMER PARTY
GREEN TARTINES
Serves 4 | 20 mins
Rye bread gives this extra flavour, but sourdough works well.
1. Toast 8 thin slices of rye bread. Top two with a quarter
of a goat’s cheese log (mashed), a drizzle of extra virgin olive
oil, 1 tsp pumpkin seeds, a couple of basil leaves and a twist of
black pepper.
2. On another two slices, spread mashed artichoke hearts
(about half a jar), a couple of rocket leaves and a couple of
shavings of pecorino.
3. On another two, spread 2 tbsp frozen peas (brought up
to room temperature and mashed with salt and pepper),
another quarter of a goat’s cheese log (sliced), a drizzle of
olive oil, black pepper and 2 shredded mint leaves.
4. On the final two slices, spread the same mashed
pea mixture but top with a couple of blanched asparagus tips
and a scattering of chilli flakes.
TWIST
Try mashed avocado with goat’s cheese, radishes and
walnuts. Chickpeas, cucumber and feta, and walnut pesto
would also make great tartine toppings.
32 The Times Magazine
HEAVEN AND EARTH HOT DOGS
Serves 4 | 1 hr 10 mins
A simple dish of mashed potato and apple that is often
served with sausages. Here, it’s reimagined as jacket potato
hot dogs topped with apple-flecked onions.
1. Heat the oven to 180C fan/gas 6. Prick, oil and salt 4 baking
potatoes and cook them in the oven for an hour.
2. Meanwhile, mix together 1 tbsp honey, 1 tsp wholegrain
mustard and ½ tsp apple cider vinegar, then pour over 4 pork
sausages in a roasting tin. Roll the sausages to coat them in
the glaze, then cook in the oven beneath the potatoes for
20-25 minutes, turning and basting them every so often.
3. Melt a large knob of butter in a frying pan, toss in 2 thinly
sliced onions and cook for 15 minutes over a low-medium heat,
stirring regularly. Add 1 grated apple and cook for 5 minutes,
then season with salt, pepper and 1 tbsp thyme leaves.
4. Slice the potatoes lengthways down the middle, slot a
sausage in each one and top with the caramelised onion mix.
Serve with 200g watercress, wilted in a pan with butter, salt
and pepper. n
Extracted from Rustle Up by
Rhiannon Batten and Laura Rowe
(Pavilion Books, £16.99). Buy from
timesbookshop.co.uk or call 020 3176 2935.
Discount for Times+ members
 Bridget Phillipson Continued from page 27

W
hen Bridget Phillipson
was a child she was
shunned and ostracised
in the playground because
she was so poor. “I was
bullied at school,” she tells
us. “Parents didn’t want
their children mixing with
people like me, or coming
to where we lived. As time
wore on, frankly I wouldn’t blame them,
because it wasn’t a great place to be. The
street was on a downward spiral.”
There was, the shadow education
secretary says, an “air of decline” about
her neighbourhood in Washington, a
former mining town between Sunderland
and Newcastle in Tyne and Wear. She
grew up on a terraced street, sandwiched
between a disused railway line and an
industrial wasteland. “It wasn’t a desirable
place to live. People didn’t want to be
there and the houses themselves were
in pretty poor condition,” she says. “We
had no upstairs heating; the windows were
rotten. I would go to bed in the winter
fully clothed. It felt like an area that was
on the slide and increasingly crime was
on the up. Youth unemployment was
incredibly high.” Many of the homes
were boarded up. The only advantage,
she says, was that there were no cars,
because nobody could afford one, so the
kids could play safely on the street.
Phillipson sensed she was living “on the
margins” of society. She became painfully
shy, refusing to even open her mouth
in front of strangers. People would ask
her mother whether she had a speech
impediment. “I always felt a bit of an
outsider because my mum was a single
parent. She brought me up on her own,
and that was quite unusual then,” she says.
“There was always a sense that we were
being judged, that we were a bit different.
We didn’t fully fit in.”
She never knew her father, even
though he was a teacher nearby. “My
OPENING SPREAD: PA. THIS SPREAD: COURTESY OF BRIDGET PHILLIPSON, PA, GETTY IMAGES
plaits, decent clothes, proper shoes,” she
says. “My grandparents would help where
they could. They weren’t big earners
themselves, but they would buy me
school shoes.”
Slowly, things started to improve.
Her mother, Clare, got a job, bought
their house from the council and
Phillipson became a star pupil at her
comprehensive. The children and parents
who had previously spurned her started to
flock around. “It’s funny, as time drew on
and our circumstances improved, and I
ended up doing well at school then going
to Oxford, people’s perceptions shifted,
Phillipson when at school in the Nineties
and they were more than happy for their
kids to spend time with me.”
Now people are queuing up to get to
know Phillipson. If Labour wins power
at the next general election, she will be
one of the most important people in the
cabinet, responsible for running England’s
schools, colleges and universities at a time
when many children are still struggling
to recover from the pandemic. She is one
of Sir Keir Starmer’s most trusted allies
and, at 39, a rising political star.
Yet she still sometimes feels like an
outsider. “I think when you’ve made a
change in your life, when you’ve come
from one kind of background and you
end up in another, who you are and
the values that you hold always remain
with you, even when you’re living a very
With her grandfather, Pierce
middle-class lifestyle,” she says. “I’m very
fortunate and I remind myself every day
just how lucky I am. But I kind of feel and straightforward way we could raise
caught between two worlds. I didn’t always additional revenue to put into state
feel that I fitted in in the community schools”. She rejects the idea that it is a
I was from. And then, when you make tax on aspiration. “Sometimes the nature
that shift, and you’ve been to a university of the discussion suggests that only those
like Oxford and you become a member of who send their children to private school
parliament, you don’t ever fully feel part of are ambitious for them. Actually, the
that world either.” majority of parents who send their
Elected as MP for Houghton and children to state schools are aspirational
Sunderland South in 2010, Phillipson for them too.
refused to serve under Jeremy Corbyn and “In the adverts for private schools,
earlier this year criticised his “staggering you’ll see young people playing sport

dad left when my mum was pregnant so
I never met him. He had no involvement
in my life at all. He gave us absolutely
nothing financially. As I got a older that
made me angry. I couldn’t understand
how an otherwise responsible human
being could fail to take responsibility for
his actions.” She says that her mother and
her grandparents were enough for her.
“I was loved and supported by the family
that mattered.’’ When she heard through
a mutual friend that her father had died,
she says, “I didn’t feel a thing.”
For several years, the family relied
on benefits and Phillipson received free
school meals, but she was always neatly
dressed. “Because we felt that sense of
judgment about what it was to be a single-
parent family, my mum was absolutely
fanatical about making sure I was
well turned out – nicely brushed hair,
lack of self-reflection” over antisemitism.
She has been a loyal member of Starmer’s
top team from the start, first as shadow
chief secretary to the Treasury and,
since 2021, as shadow education secretary.
She inspired the Labour leader’s promise
to tackle the “class ceiling” through
education, including by removing
tax breaks for private schools. The
Independent Schools Council called her
“chippy”, which it intended to be an insult.
“If chippy means that you want the best
for all kids and you want working-class
kids to succeed, then I’ll take that badge
and I’ll wear it with pride,” she says.
Phillipson won’t criticise parents who
pay for their children’s education although
she says she would not do so herself.
But she is unapologetic about Labour’s
plans to impose VAT on private schools,
insisting that “this is a relatively modest
and music, and they’ll talk about the wide
range of opportunities that exist. I can see
why parents look at that and think that
sounds wonderful. I want parents to think
that children will get all of that amazing
experience without having to even
consider a private school.”
In the House of Commons recently, the
education secretary Gillian Keegan, who
left school at 16 to do an apprenticeship,
contrasted her own vocational training
with Phillipson’s Oxford degree, implying
that it made her opponent more privileged.
Phillipson does not want to get drawn
into a battle of the back stories. “The
only competition I’m interested in is
who has got the better ideas at the next
election,” she says.
If Labour gets into government, Starmer
has promised a sweeping review of the
curriculum and assessment system and

34 The Times Magazine

 With Starmer after her
conference speech last year
When she heard from a
friend that her father
had died, she says,
‘I didn’t feel a thing’
Winning Houghton and Sunderland South in 2015
the shadow education secretary confirms
that this will include looking at A-levels
and GCSEs. “If you identify one part of
the system that you want to change, that
then potentially has knock-on consequences
at other points, so the review will have
to take account of assessment right
throughout compulsory education.”
She argues that the curriculum
needs to be updated to make it more
relevant to the modern world and better
prepare children for work. “For me, it’s
about the breadth,” she says. “Sometimes
it becomes this false choice between
you either wanting high academic
standards or wanting schools to have
a really creative curriculum. I think
they work most effectively when they
complement one another.”
Oracy – the ability to speak in public
– is in her view as important as literacy.
“It is about confidence, giving all young
people the chance to express themselves.”
Labour has also pledged to reform
the schools inspectorate, Ofsted. “We’ll
do away with the one-word judgments
that I don’t think capture what works
within a school and move towards
a report card system to give a richer
sense of what’s working well,” Phillipson
says. “I think there’s a real willingness
right across education to look at things
differently and to make education more
central to national life once more… You
had in the early phase of the Conservative
government, from 2010, a secretary of
state in the form of Michael Gove who
had a very clear agenda about what he
wanted to achieve. I disagree with much of
what he did, but there was a real driving
force behind it and it was very important
to the government. Since then, we’ve had
a lot of drift. In a little over a year, we’ve
had five education secretaries.”
The government has recently
announced a clampdown on so-called
“rip-off degrees”. Phillipson rejects the
idea that there are too many students
going to university taking pointless courses.
“I think there is a value that comes
through learning and through study,”
she says. “I don’t think that can be
captured in purely economic terms…
For me, it’s about young people having
a choice about what’s right for them.”
She says there are huge regional
variations in the number of 18-year-olds
going on to university.
“It’s not 50 per cent in Sunderland and
I see no reason why it shouldn’t be. Young
people in Sunderland are not any less
talented than young people anywhere else,
and if they want to go to university, that’s
absolutely what they should do. Education
is worthwhile for the individual, but it’s
good for all of us as a society. I think
universities are a public good and we should
recognise them as such, not just constantly
make them a political battleground.”
She feels the same about whether
children should be allowed to socially
transition to another gender at school.
“For me, the starting point has to be
young people’s wellbeing and I think
we’re losing sight of that. It is becoming
all about disputes between government
ministers, a highly politicised, headline-
grabbing issue, when at the heart of
this, you’re talking about children who
may well be experiencing distress, who
want to be supported.”
So what would the guidance say if
Labour were in power? “I think it’s very
hard to give a blanket answer. It will depend
on the age and maturity of the child.
In most cases, parents will be involved in
these discussions – they will know what
their child is feeling and they will want to
support their child. I think sometimes we
lose sight of that and it becomes a kind of
new culture war frontier.”
Phillipson learnt at an early age that
education was the route to a better future.
Her grandfather, who was a nurse, taught
her algebra.
Her mother signed her up for Saturday
morning drama lessons at the local
community centre. The classes led to
Phillipson being an extra on the children’s
TV programme Byker Grove. She also
learnt to play the violin after scoring
highly on a musical aptitude test.
Bryan Ferry of Roxy Music grew up in
her village and went to the same primary
school. “A love of art and music is not
just for the wealthy,” she says.
When she was in the sixth form,
her school organised a visit to Oxford
University. “The deputy head teacher,
Mr Hurst, who was a very fierce character,
sent a message to me in class and
said he wanted to see me in his office
immediately. He said he’d got the list
of students who’d signed up for this
trip to Oxford and my name wasn’t on
it, and he expected my name to be on
it by the end of the day. The year that
I went to Oxford there were six of us that
went to Oxford or Cambridge from my
state school, which was the best they’d
ever achieved.”
Arriving in the city of dreaming
spires to read history, Phillipson admits
that she initially struggled to fit in.
“I felt I had just as much right to be
there as everybody else. What I found
different was just how middle class it
all was. It was less that it was full of very
rich people, more that it was people from
very comfortable middle-class homes,
who would talk about skiing holidays.
They would ask you which school you
went to and I remember saying, ‘I can
absolutely guarantee that you will have
never heard of my school.’ Not only had
they never heard of the school, they’d
never heard of the town I was from.
There were various kinds of jokes about
it being grim up north, and had electricity
reached the north. It was done in good
humour, but it does make you feel a bit
distinct. It made me more determined
to succeed.”
After university, Phillipson moved
back to Washington, worked for the local
council and bought her first house in the
street where she had grown up. “It’s a nice
place to live now. Across the way the old
wasteland has got flats and houses. There’s
a new-build housing estate under the
old railway line. It’s completely different.”
These days, she splits her time between
London and the constituency with her
husband Lawrence, who works in financial
services, and their two children, who are
11 and 7.
She finds it infuriating that people at
Westminster so often stereotype areas like
hers. “The caricatures around what people
call the red wall and what voters want
in life drive me absolutely mad, because
I think it’s very one-dimensional,” she says.
“It imposes a certain kind of world view
on working-class people that somehow
they don’t want better for their kids, when
actually some of the most aspirational
ambitious people that I’ve ever met are
people who live in council houses like the
one I grew up in. People are complicated
and imposing this very narrow world view
is patronising and disrespectful.”
The Times Magazine 35
 ‘Poverty isn’t just about money.
It’s about the lack of control’
Some on the left romanticise poverty, she suggests.
“People who never experienced that kind of insecurity
don’t always necessarily understand the importance of
people feeling safe in their own community, the impact
that crime has on working-class people. I think what
sometimes also gets lost is that poverty isn’t just about
the absence of money. It’s about the powerlessness, the
lack of control, the lack of choice that you have in your
life, the lack of freedom.”
Her house was repeatedly burgled when she was a
child. “They took anything that was worth any kind of
money.” One time her mother decided to fight back. “My
mum knew who had done it. He had a reputation for
being a very violent and volatile individual but she was
having none of it – she had had enough. She reported it
to the police and as a result we were threatened and had
our windows smashed. He turned up at the door with
STYLING: HANNAH ROGERS. HAIR: PAUL RODGERS AT DAVID ARTISTS USING L’ORÉAL. MAKE-UP: CHRISTINA LOMAS AT DAVID ARTISTS USING ESTÉE LAUDER. PHILLIPSON WEARS

a baseball bat trying to threaten her into retracting her

RED DRESS, ROLAND MOURET (MATCHESFASHION.COM). EARRINGS, MISSOMA.COM. BLACK DRESS, ST JOHN (FENWICK.CO.UK). SHOES, REISS.COM. EARRINGS, MEJURI.COM

statement. We ended up with a police box in the house

because they’d cut our phone lines.” Eventually, though,
her mother won. The burglar ended up going to prison
and the area became much safer.
Few shadow ministers understand the impact of
child poverty better than Phillipson. But she is reluctant
to criticise Starmer’s refusal to overturn the two-child
cap on benefits, which has infuriated many Labour
MPs. “I think the whole social security system that
we’ve ended up with right now isn’t working for the
purposes that it was intended,” she says. “There is a
whole set of massive challenges. Tackling child poverty
will have to be a really key part of that… But we as a
party just can’t make those kinds of detailed, precise
commitments right now.”
Does she think her background makes her a better
politician because she understands the struggles others
face? “I don’t think it necessarily follows that you lack
empathy if you haven’t lived it, and sometimes there
can be a harshness from having lived it, because no one
person’s experience is the same,” she says. “For me, it’s
about not pulling up the ladder behind me, but about
providing opportunities for the people that come next.”
Phillipson finds the prospect that she might become
education secretary “exciting and daunting in equal
measure”, but she is doing everything she can to prepare.
She was the first shadow minister to ask for a briefing
from the Institute for Government on how to run a
Whitehall department. Her priority would be “to break
down barriers to give all young people the chance to get
on. That’s what I came into politics to do.”
She wants all children from backgrounds like hers to
have the chances she did. Looking back on the little girl
in the playground being snubbed for being poor, she says,
“I would tell myself to have a bit more self-belief and
never allow other people to tell you what you shouldn’t
do. And that’s what I’d say to young people today. People
have always got opinions about what you shouldn’t be
doing, but find your own way. Have some self-belief and
don’t let others hold you back.” n

Rachel Sylvester and Alice Thomson talk to

Bridget Phillipson for their podcast What
I Wish I’d Known, available now. Listen
via the Times Radio app or wherever you
get your podcasts
 I’m Alex, an incel.
I’m a single, woman-hating,
unemployed male loner.
I spend hours online with
like-minded men who share
their rape fantasies
and violent thoughts

MY UNDERCOVER LIFE
AS AN EXTREMISM EXPERT
What makes the academic Julia Ebner, right, lurk
on the dark web as an angry far-right misogynist
– despite the risk to her mental health and the
danger of being uncovered? Sean O’Neill finds out
 Julia Ebner, 32,
photographed
by Robert Wilson
 J
ulia Ebner is slim, pale,
brown-eyed, bookish, softly
spoken, with a formidable
intelligence and a gentle
handshake – precisely not
the sort of person you expect
to find hanging out with
packs of male supremacists
venting their hatred of
women and fantasies of
misogynist violence.
Yet this is where Ebner spends her
days (and, I suspect, too many late
nights): lurking in unpleasant corners
of the internet pretending to be Alex
Williamson, an “unhappily single”,
unemployed, white American male
in his late twenties who is “fed up
with feminism”.
Williamson is her incel – involuntary
celibate – avatar and his online world is
“a really toxic space”, Ebner says. A place
where, on average, someone shares a rape
fantasy every 29 minutes. “More than
many of the groups I infiltrate, incels talk
a lot about wanting to use violence. It’s a
very violence-condoning atmosphere.”
For the best part of a decade, Ebner
has been studying extremism and
watching its terrifying, multifaceted,
high-speed spread from the far-flung
fringes of the web to the front line of
political and social discourse. This shift
is the subject of her new book, Going
Mainstream, and you don’t have to look
far to see evidence of her thesis.
There is the MP Andrew Bridgen,
who on Twitter has described the Covid
vaccination campaign as “the biggest
crime against humanity since the
Holocaust”. In the Devon town of
Totnes, once a byword for liberal hippy
progressives, a fervent anti-vaccine
movement has embraced a wealth
of conspiracies.
PREVIOUS SPREAD: STYLING, HANNAH ROGERS. HAIR: NORIMITSU GOTO AT DAVID ARTISTS USING GHD.
Teachers report how rape apologism
and words like “feminazi” have crossed
from the “manosphere” – the network
of online men’s communities – to the
MAKE-UP: JULIE JACOBS AT DAVID ARTISTS USING SUQQU. THIS SPREAD: GETTY IMAGES
playground, thanks in part to the influence
of Andrew Tate (currently awaiting trial in
Romania for human trafficking and rape).
“My research tells me that the coming
decade will bring one major threat: the
mainstreaming of extreme ideas,” Ebner
says. She conducts that research by
immersing herself in the world of the
“crazy and not so crazy”, from white
supremacists to QAnon adherents,
climate-change deniers to rabid anti-
vaxers and pro-Putin conspiracists.
In this world, talk of the racist “great
replacement” theory rubs shoulders with
age-old antisemitic myths and the ever
present belief that they, whoever they
may be, are stealing our freedoms.
Ebner encounters the devoted, the
dangerous and the deranged (including
a few who believe the royal family are
40 The Times Magazine
cunningly disguised reptiles who drink
the blood of babies to stay young).
Most people who believe one
conspiracy theory are all too willing
to adopt another one, two or three,
embracing a fusion of delusions.
“It’s a salad-bar ideology,” Ebner says.
“You cherry-pick certain elements because
you can curate your own content on
platforms like Telegram. Some people
might be part of a misogynist group but
also of a radical pro-Putin or an anti-
vaccine group. We’ve seen satanist ideas
mixed with misogynist ideas or a blending
of white nationalist and neofascist ideas.”
In one closed forum, a subscriber
worries about whether he can be
vaccinated against Covid and still
be a white nationalist.
“Psychologists talk about a conspiracy
mentality, but it’s also about populations
becoming more susceptible during times
of crisis. When the stress levels increase,
when personal situations become more
challenging, then people are much more
open to believing conspiracy theories.”
Ebner’s immersion in these subcultures
is physical as well as digital. She has
inveigled herself into clandestine meetings
in London of a far-right group called
‘THE COMING DECADE WILL BRING ONE MAJOR
CRISIS: THE MAINSTREAMING OF EXTREME IDEAS’
Generation Identity, attended neo-Nazi
gatherings in Germany and mingled at
anti-vaccine rallies.
Right now, it is the almost exclusively
online world of incels that disturbs her
sleep the most. Paradoxically, the incel
movement was started by a woman in the
Nineties with the “very innocent purpose
of wanting to connect people who felt
lonely, who couldn’t find a romantic or
sexual partner”.
Today it has “tens of thousands” of
followers in easy-to-access online groups
and forums, but has morphed into a
community of angry men fired up with
misogyny, a burning hatred of feminism
and an unhealthy dose of self-loathing.
“We’ve seen terrorist threats inspired
by the incel ideology, by what incels
would call the ‘black pill’ ideology
– basically having given up all hope
in humanity and all hope of finding a
romantic partner, and blaming that very
often on women or feminists or even just
liberal policies,” Ebner explains.
“It’s actually surprising we haven’t seen
more incel attacks and I know this is
something the security services are very
concerned about.”
At the age of 32, Ebner is a sought-after
international adviser on extremisms of all
Jake Davison killed five people in Plymouth in 2021
kinds. A senior research fellow at the
Institute for Strategic Dialogue, she
writes books, lectures students and
advises the United Nations, the World
Bank and Nato.
More discreetly, she speaks with
intelligence services and policymakers.
Her age is a marked advantage in a world
heavily populated by men in bad suits who
“might not even know how TikTok works”.
A spell as a children’s television actor
helped Ebner, who grew up in Austria,
to develop her research abilities. As she
explains, “I’ve been chasing extremist
groups to get to the inside and to observe
them from the inside because that’s
usually how you get most information.”
Getting inside an extremist group
“takes some acting skills” and Ebner
had earned money for her studies by
playing the part of a villainous bicycle
thief called Lady Lila in an Austrian
children’s TV show, Tom Turbo.
She arrived in London nine years ago
to complete a joint degree with Peking
University and the London School of
Economics, after which her first job was
with an anti-extremism think tank. The
attack on the Bataclan theatre in Paris in
2015 cemented her interest.
“I started when Islamic State was
beginning to recruit foreign fighters from
Europe and launching its first terrorist
attacks in the UK and in Europe. The
Bataclan was a turning point personally,
because that’s when I decided to devote
my life to studying extremism. I had
friends who were caught up in the area.
I remember being so scared that night,
because no one was sure what was
going to happen.
“It was a point where I thought
it’s really important to understand
better what drives people towards
 QAnon follower Jake Angeli at a pro-Trump rally
extremism and terrorism on a
psychological level. I wanted to do
something to prevent attacks.”
Around the time Ebner was beginning
her research into extremism and
terrorism, I was extricating myself from
that world, having spent the years since
9/11 following the subjects as a crime and
security journalist.
We compare notes and agree that
what is striking is the radical change in
the nature of extremism over the past
decade and the speed of its evolution.
In the years following 9/11, the
bogeymen in the UK were the hook-
handed cleric Abu Hamza, who turned
a mosque in north London into an
al-Qaeda indoctrination centre, and the
so-called Tottenham Ayatollah, Omar
Bakri Mohammed. Young men inspired
by these two “clerics” carried out attacks
like the 7/7 suicide bombings, which killed
52 people in London in 2005.
Extremism was already shifting
shape. In 2013, a senior counterterrorism
official told me the threat that worried
him most was the rise of the violent far
right. I wasn’t sure I believed him. Then,
three years later, in the middle of the
bitterly divisive Brexit referendum
campaign, a lone right-wing terrorist
armed with a homemade weapon shot
dead the Labour MP Jo Cox in Birstall,
West Yorkshire.
It was one of the events that made
Ebner realise “how big the backlash was
from far-right extremist groups who tried
to mobilise off the back of terrible terrorist
incidents, to spread hate against Muslims
and against minority communities”.
Her first book, Rage, looked at the
vicious circle in which Islamist and far-
right extremists fed off each other. The
second, Going Dark, concentrated on her
undercover activities. Her latest work
spells out the scale, speed and fluid nature
of the new extremisms.
Back in 2010, there was disbelief in
security circles when a young student
radicalised online in her bedroom stabbed
the MP Stephen Timms at a constituency
English Defence League founder Tommy Robinson, 2019
Anti-vaccine Freedom Rally, December 2021
surgery. There is no such disbelief today,
Ebner tells me. “It used to be unusual
that someone would be radicalised in
weeks. Now it’s the norm.”
This tidal wave of extremism is carried
along by the sense of permanent crisis
– Brexit dislocation, the rollercoaster
Trump presidency, the Covid pandemic,
the Ukraine war and the cost of living
emergency – combined with a host of
new mass communication technologies.
“I would say now that what is new
is that we’re facing this combination
of new technologies that we’ve never
had before – social media, but also
the AI-based technologies – while also
experiencing a series of crises on a global
scale. That has really caused a lot of
people to have very deep frustrations with
politics and with any kind of established
institutions, including the media and
even the sciences.”
‘MORE THAN MANY
OF THE HATE GROUPS,
INCELS TALK A LOT
ABOUT WANTING TO
USE VIOLENCE’
The Covid lockdowns appear to
have been a major driving force in the
growth of the male supremacy and incel
movements, driving lonely people to spend
more and more time in the online world.
The incel phenomenon was almost
unknown in Britain until two years ago,
when 22-year-old Jake Davison went
on a killing spree, shooting dead his
mother and four other people, including
a three-year-old girl, in Plymouth, before
killing himself.
Davison spent hours online absorbing
incel and nihilistic black-pill ideas.
He subscribed to incel material and
posted hostile comments about his
mother, who had challenged his diatribes
against women.
Ebner says, “A lot of people came
to incel platforms during Covid times,
during the lockdowns, when it was
really hard to meet people. That was
unfortunately an accelerator. We saw
the volume in the content and in the
accounts on incel forums go up sharply
during lockdowns.”
In her double life as Alex Williamson,
Ebner tells me she has met many young
men like the Plymouth killer who are
caught up in a spiral of low self-esteem
and rage.
She describes men so depressed and
hopeless that they talk of suicide. In
one forum, someone called Allan types,
“I really feel like I should just kill myself.
One of my biggest fantasies in life is
killing myself and then watching my
family as a ghost and being vindicated by
the fact that my death meant absolutely
nothing to them.”
In incel terminology, Allan had
become someone who wanted to LDAR
(lay down and rot). Troubled by what
she was reading, Ebner tried to think of
something to cheer Allan up, but before
she could type a word other users stepped
in with suicide instruction manuals.
It is, she says, a real challenge to
stay in her undercover persona and not
intervene either to try to stop a suicide
The Times Magazine 41

HER FACE IS TOO WELL KNOWN NOW. ‘I HAVE HAD
SERIOUS DEATH THREATS AND SEXUAL THREATS’
or help someone who is being sucked
into conspiracy extremism.
“Sometimes you are looking at really
young people, even minors, and I can
see them being radicalised step by step.
One of the biggest challenges for me
is you can’t intervene if you’re doing
undercover research, because that would
blow the cover.”
The incel world is, she senses, “divided
into two parts. One is leaning towards
self-harm and suicide, but the other part
of it is more prone to violence against
others or hatred for others who are
perceived as an enemy.
“That dynamic is, from a research
perspective, interesting to watch – how
this self-hatred and loneliness and deep
frustration is turned into hatred for others,
and into something potentially quite
dangerous for terrorist attacks.”
This pivot point between violent words
and deeds is where Ebner applies her
sharpest focus. She has been analysing the
psychology of terrorist “manifestos” for
her recently completed Oxford PhD to
better understand the minds of the killers.
“I’m basically developing a formula of
different psychological factors that always
come together when people actually turn
to violence, when they translate their
extremist ideas into action, or when they
translate the words into action.
“One of the biggest problems right
now in the online space for security and
intelligence services is that there are so
many threats and you never know which
one you have to take seriously. There are
many empty threats, and that’s what I’m
really interested in – what is the difference
between someone trolling and someone
potentially committing a terrorist act?”
Before the Christchurch mosque
attacks of 2019, when a white supremacist
gunman attempted to make his killing of
51 people resemble a video game, Ebner
struggled to make intelligence and security
officials grasp the reality of the developing
extremist threat emerging in gaming and
other online cultures.
“No one was really taking it seriously.
The view was they might be really
politically incorrect, but no one truly
believed that they might be dangerous.
There was certainly a time lag in the
security services world catching up with
these dynamics.”
The longer we talk, the more I find
myself wondering – almost worrying
– what all this exposure to violence and
hate does to Ebner’s mental health. She
is reticent about discussing her personal
and family life and explains some of the
strict security precautions she has been
advised to follow.
She concedes that it is probably
time for her to stop going undercover
in the real world. Her face is too
well known, especially among white
supremacist groups. “I don’t think you
can do undercover investigations offline
for ever,” she says.
The first hate campaign against her
began in 2017 after she wrote a newspaper
article alleging links between Tommy
Robinson, the English Defence League
founder, and US white supremacists.
Robinson came to her office at the
Quilliam think tank, where Ebner was
working, and demanded an apology. When
she refused, Quilliam dismissed her. But it
was the relentless storm of online threats
she faced that caused most distress.
“Although it’s online, it feels very
real. It reaches you wherever you are
and that can cause sleepless nights and
really make you paranoid. After the
Tommy Robinson incident, I had to
move house and I had just lost my job,
so I was literally without anything. I have
had serious death threats and sexual
threats online.
“But it’s also personally challenging
going into the incel forums and violent
misogynist channels. That touches my
own identity as a woman. I think that
has a really big psychological impact.”
Every so often, Ebner attempts a “social
media detox” for a few days, because she
knows it “can be quite dangerous to get
too far into the rabbit hole”.
She is also afflicted, however, by a dark
strain of Fomo – a fear that by shutting
the laptop and muting the haters and the
plotters, she will miss a threat to herself or
the signs of a terror attack.
“I want to know if there are explicit
threats. It’s very hard just to ignore that.
Often the advice you get is just pay no
attention to it or block these people, but it’s
potentially a real threat, both online to my
reputation and offline in physical terms.
“I do take breaks, but I don’t want
to miss something either. If there’s an
attack being plotted, or if there is a new
campaign that’s being announced, I want
to know about it, because that’s the whole
point of being undercover or being on the
inside of a movement.”
Is it worth it? The stress, the
uncertainty, the lingering fear?
“I’ve asked myself that a few times.
I think in the end it’s a price that a lot of
people have to pay in different professions
– being exposed to threats, being exposed
to hate campaigns. It’s the same for
politicians, activists, journalists, even
for researchers or artists.”
Mental resilience has proved essential
for her work, but Ebner also likes to work
on physical defence. She has trained in
martial arts – including the krav maga
techniques developed for the Israeli
Defence Forces – and taken boxing and
fencing classes.
“A lot of that is about the perception
of personal safety,” she says. “A lot of
it is of course in my head – if I feel safe
or if I feel like I can defend myself, that
makes a huge difference. Because a lot
of campaigns really tried to intimidate
and I think the antidote to that is to
feel safe. And for me that meant, for
example, doing a kung-fu camp in a
Shaolin temple in China and learning
self-defence.”
Ebner is more fearful of the current
sustained assault on the evidence-based
thinking that has made the world
relatively secure for a long time. She
writes in her book of how, during the
pandemic, more and more people started
to believe that Bill Gates and health
organisations were waging a chemical
war against all of us.
Those who deal in facts and evidence
are “up against unparalleled levels
of fantasy, paranoia and outright lies.
The key conflict of our time increasingly
seems to be between crazy and not
so crazy.”
Are things really that bad, I ask.
Maybe she spends too much time on
the crazy side?
The battle between the crazies and the
not so crazies is at a crucial stage, Ebner
thinks, and it is imperative those on the
side of facts challenge and debate and
educate and inform. “The numbers of
people who believe in QAnon-related
ideas is really scary. None of these
conspiracy myths is grounded in
evidence or science.
“There’s also a rising level of distrust
in the sciences. We could potentially
see a reversal of everything we achieved
in the Renaissance of going from mythos
to logos – myth to logic. We are seeing
a return to not using evidence-based
scientific frameworks but going the other
way, towards using more myth-based
thinking and ideas that are no longer
based on scientific evidence.
“The most disturbing question we have
to face is whether we could potentially be
entering a new form of the Middle Ages
– the digital Middle Ages.” n
Going Mainstream: How Extremists Are
Taking Over by Julia Ebner (Ithaka, £22).
To order a copy go to timesbookshop.co.uk.
Free UK standard P&P on orders over £25.
Special discount for Times+ members
The Times Magazine 43
 WHO ATE ALL
THE TWIGLETS?

THE
NEW
DINNER
PARTY
RULES
When domestic goddess Nigella Lawson
announces that she no longer does fancy
entertaining, you know something
has changed. So trophy cooking is out;
decent snacks are in. But what else do
you need to know before you invite
people over? Shane Watson explains
HOW TO RUIN
YOUR OWN
DINNER PARTY
◆ Get weepy drunk.
◆ Space the guests as
if it’s still lockdown.
◆ Insist on calling it a
“dinner party” (sends
chills down the spine of
anyone born after 1967).
 N
igella has declared the dinner
party is dead. She is still
entertaining, just in a looser,
more relaxed, come-as-you-
are-and-there-won’t-be-a-
starter sort of way, and she
is ahead of the curve, as ever.
Having had dinner at Nigella’s
house some years back, I can
confirm this is not just some
throwaway line designed to make “Nigella
says” headlines. Nigella is, indeed, a zero-
fuss, minimum-effort, roast-chicken-and-
salad sort of dinner-party giver. We
definitely did not have a starter. There
may have been Twiglets. There were
baked potatoes. And this was long before
lockdown messed with our ability to host
gatherings larger than four and everyone
became lazy about effort-making generally.
No doubt Nigella has waited until now
to reveal her pared-back style because
she knows the rest of the world has finally
caught up with her; it is not only safe for
a celebrated cook to admit they wouldn’t
dream of rustling up mini cheese soufflés,
it is modern. It is the way we live now:
have a few friends over, don’t make a fuss,
roll out some staggeringly simple grub.
So, here are the new dinner party rules.
Some things to consider
Should we even call them dinner parties?
Do you say to your friends, “I’m having
a dinner party on Thursday. Would you
like to come?” Or do you say, “Can you
come to supper with the Whatsits?”
The very words “dinner party” send
chills down the spines of busy modern
people, suggesting as they do something
structured and long and probably
requiring conversation. For now we’ll call
it a dinner party, but since the institution
has moved on, it might be better to
rename it something such as “supper”.
PREVIOUS SPREAD: MATTHEW SHAVE/BLAUBLUT EDITION. THIS SPREAD: GETTY IMAGES, REX FEATURES
Sit me next to two strangers
No, please don’t. Of course it is fine to
have one of those parties made up entirely
of people who have never met, but no one
will have any fun and it will have the
atmosphere of a team-bonding awayday
when they throw all the departments
together and make them invent a logo.
What you want with a grown-up dinner
party is either 70 per cent people who
know each other and 30 per cent
interesting visitors, or 100 per cent people
who know each other, some not that well.
Starter or no starter?
You may have a starter – there is no law
against it – but the new feeling is that
people at dinner parties a) don’t want to
eat that much, and b) (mainly) don’t want
to be seated at a table for hours on end
(see Timings). The more modern option
is Nigella’s Twiglet approach: nibbles and
maybe a plate of crab on bits of toast
48 The Times Magazine
or something you can scoff while sitting
on the sofa.
It could be a barbecue
Sparking up the barbecue automatically
makes your dinner party 25 per cent more
relaxed and casual, even if the cook is
emanating stress and unable to focus
on his guests until he’s burnt everything.
Note: now that we are all older, it is no
longer cute to be clueless about your
barbecue and involve everyone in fanning
and water sprinkling and temperature
testing. If you are going to do it, own it.
Size
Is it just us or is everything better smaller
these days?
Food do’s
Cheese please. A big doorstop side by side
with a medium-soft one and a little goat
– not weird cheeses soaked in walnut oil
and rolled in hay. Cheese does cost a
fortune but it looks nice, gives people an
excuse to switch to red wine and makes
everyone feel French in a good way.
Food don’ts
Only the other day, the interior designer
Nicky Haslam was complaining that
people have started serving fancy
HOW TO KILL
A DINNER PARTY
◆ Eat nothing.
◆ Yawn regularly.
◆ Break the porcelain
bowl that was dug up
at the Battle of Crécy.
If you’re going to barbecue, own it
Nigella likes nibbles, not starters
restaurant-style food at dinner parties in
the country, drizzling balsamic on ricotta
and garnishing with pomegranate seeds,
when everybody knows the country is the
place for fish pie, stew or a haunch of
venison. Likewise, no one in Chipping
Offshot wants to see a plate of seared
scallops when they could be having
asparagus in season. Strawberries are
sufficient for pudding in summer and
cheese should ideally be local. What goes
for the country goes for town too. The
less fancy, the better, and your first course
should probably be eaten with fingers.
Timings
It is very important to give people time
to talk to a few guests other than the
two they are going to be locked down
with for the night. Eating too early makes
everyone feel short-changed. Eating too
late makes everyone feel either plastered
or stuffed with crisps. Midweek it is
only polite to make sure your guests
can comfortably leave by 11pm. No one
cares at the weekend.
How to kill a dinner party stone dead
◆ Run out of booze.
◆ Run out of food.
◆ Invite a lot of people who are
exhausted/not sure why they are
there/legendarily antisocial.
◆ Fail to fill up people’s glasses on
arrival and regularly thereafter.
◆ Feed people too early (see Timings).
◆ Give no thought whatsoever to the
seating plan, so that the two people who
see each other at work every day end up
sitting next to each other and the couple
who are sort of breaking up.
◆ Have a first course that requires
individually battering and flash-frying
lots of small things at the last minute.
◆ Tell everyone you were expecting the
Whatsits but they weren’t able to come,
and make it seem as if the whole point
of the night is ruined.
◆ Have the lights turned up to pore-
revealing max.

◆ Be spaced around the table as if during
Covid lockdowns.
◆ Get weeping drunk (applies only
to the hosts).
◆ Break the porcelain bowl that was dug
up at the Battle of Crécy (guests only).
◆ Intersperse your guests with your
5 children under 18.
◆ Don’t have the heating on (in winter).
SOME THINGS THAT ARE NOT REALLY OK
Guests
◆ Not eating anything.
◆ Tasting the sauce and then wandering
off to help yourself to some improving
ingredients, for example sugar/a squeeze
of lemon.
◆ Leaving a lot of food on your plate
without a good explanation (“I accidentally
had two doughnuts on the way here”).
◆ Saying, “This is actually very nice.” The
fact that dinner-party food has become
simpler and more rustic means that, if
anything, the cook is in need of more
reassurance/compliments.
◆ Bursting into tears during a heated
debate.
◆ Shouting, “I am speaking!” during a
heated debate, or any behaviour that
makes people feel as if they have
wandered into Question Time.
◆ Spilling your wine and not leaping up
to sort it out.
◆ Yawning and/or looking at your watch.
◆ Taking a call that lasts more than a
couple of minutes without explanation
(“Our alarm is going off”).
◆ Banging on about your children, dog
(sometimes guilty), mortgage repayments.
Hosts
◆ The cook going on and on (very
much a thing in our house) about the
food, wondering if we think it’s a bit
overcooked… Too much garlic… A bit
underdone… Probably shouldn’t have used
so much chilli. What do you think?
◆ The cook going on and on (not a thing
in our house) about this being from the
garden, from the farm just next door,
Mark made the membrillo with our own
quinces etc. A bit of this is fine, but know
when to stop.
◆ Accepting your guest’s very nice bottle
of barolo, putting it to one side and
pouring a glass of wine that makes their
throat close on contact and they happen
to know cost £5.99 in Tesco.
◆ Asking people to switch places,
spontaneously.
◆ Going to bed – unless it’s well past 3am
and one of the guests has refused to leave.
What not to do before a dinner party
◆ Go back and buy the extra thing. At the
last minute you think, this looks so flimsy.
Only one thing of olives. Should have got
the truffle crisps, not the cheap ones. Back
in the car. Maybe some flat peaches.
WHAT NOT TO SAY
◆ “Oh, you do it wit
h parmesan.”
◆ “Oh, I thought we
’d be
eating outside.”
◆ “Oh, we had this
last time.”
◆ “Oh, you’ve dresse
d up!”
◆ “Do you have any
thing
without egg?”
◆ “Sorry we’re ban
g on time. We’ve
got a very early start tom
orrow.”
WHAT TO SAY
◆ “I’ve put some champagn
e
in the fridge.”
◆ “Great jeans!”
◆ “I’ll car ve.”
◆ “I’ll sit next to Do
dgy Dan.”
◆ “I’ve washed up.”
◆ Redecorate. This can happen for similar
reasons. You may look around your house
a few days before the dinner party and
conclude that it is not an environment
that says “effortlessly stylish regular
entertainer”, so you rush out and buy
senselessly expensive cushions, a new
lampshade, a decorative bowl and a
cripplingly expensive linen tablecloth.
On the night, no one will notice these
tweaks, Ian will spill a lot of red wine on
the tablecloth and you will experience bad
post-dinner party regret.
◆ Panic because you wanted the Whatsits
and the Really Funs and now only the
Whatsits can come. You can do your head
in trying to get the perfect line-up.
◆ Buy a dress. No one else is wearing a
dress to your dinner party unless it is a
very low-key, nice-to-travel-in sort of dress.
◆ Keep updating your guests as to who
will be there on the night. This will make
them jumpy. What people want in a host
is someone who appears to be extremely
relaxed and not bothered so long as you
are there.
◆ Tell everyone exactly who is coming
unless it would be weird not to. As in,
“It’s all your ushers and their wives,”
or “everyone who went on that holiday
in 1990”.
◆ Have a massive argument.
◆ Have a large sharpener. Can misfire.
◆ Add more salt to the sauce and ruin it.
◆ Start looking for some earrings you
haven’t seen for a bit and become fixated.
What you don’t need to worry about
◆ Tablescaping. Utter madness unless for
a wedding or big party. You will need
candles. Maybe low-lying flowers.
◆ Music. Either have it or don’t. Don’t roll
your eyes every time he puts on something
(very much a thing in our house) and hiss,
“Not this! We’re not in Starbucks,” or,
“Really? I thought they were banned.”
◆ Glasses. Gone are the days when you
needed lovely wafer-thin crystal. You want
dishwasher and drunk-friendly glass.
◆ Keeping things hot. Not necessary.
Stone cold is not great but tepid is all
the rage.
◆ What to wear. Scrub up a bit is the
dinner-party dress code these days.
◆ No-go topics. No such thing unless,
obviously, Brexit.
What you need to worry about
◆ Vegetarians.
◆ Vegans.
◆ Non-drinkers (expect more than
tap water).
◆ The quality of the wine. Food matters
a bit, but not as much.
◆ The width of the table. The narrower,
the more options.
◆ The dog getting up on the side
somehow and heading off with the sirloin.
◆ Not having enough chairs.
New pressures
◆ It is summer. Everyone wants to eat
outside. This will significantly add to the
faff involved but may be worth it.
◆ It is summer. People are mad for rosé
and now insist on it being so pale it could
be white.
◆ Seasonal eating. A few years ago no one
knew when the asparagus season was and
now you are supposed to.
◆ Cheese biscuits. You can go too fancy
and nutty, but the days of the crumbly
Jacob’s cracker are over. You are judged
on your biscuits.
◆ Fresh ingredients. You might be able
to get away with bagged salad, but only
as a filler.
◆ Sourdough. Forget ciabatta. This is now
the bread of dinner parties.
◆ Cheese. Grade up from Comté. It is
the show-off course for people who aren’t
really cooking.
◆ Mint tea. Are you making it with fresh
mint or with a Twinings bag? Never used
to be a consideration. It is now. n
POST-DINNER
PARTY REGRET
Things (almost)
everybody thinks
after a dinner party
◆ Why did I bring up the Thin
g?
◆ We forgot the chocolates.
◆ Jim was very quiet. Do you
think
he wasn’t getting on with Jill?
◆ I definitely overcooked it.
◆ We should have eaten outs
ide.
◆ We need a bigger table.
◆ Let’s never invite those
people again.
◆ Next time, let’s just do Twi
glets.
The Times Magazine 49
 THE 45 BEST
SUMMER PUBS
Hannah Evans ask local chefs to reveal their favourite spots
CORNWALL
Chosen by Dan Cox, owner of Crocadon
farm-restaurant, near Saltash
1A proper
Rod & Line, Tideford
Cornish pub with no frills and a
lively atmosphere. It’s absolutely tiny but
has so much character. It’s my favourite
place to go for a big helping of crab or
lobster, with a massive portion of chips on
the side (rodandlinetideford.co.uk).
2 The Eel’s Foot Inn, Eastbridge
The Standard Inn, Portscatho
Opened earlier this year by Simon
Stallard, the chef behind the Hidden Hut,
this spot serves a great Sunday lunch and
has a lot of lovely walks surrounding it
(standardinn.co.uk).
SUFFOLK
Chosen by George Pell, owner of the
Suffolk, Aldeburgh
3
The White Hart Inn, Aldeburgh
Dan Brand runs a brilliant pub on the
high street in Aldeburgh. This really is the
bar from the sitcom Cheers, packed with
DANNY NORTH, ALAMY
regulars, dogs and lads from the boatyard.
No food or children inside means it’s
strictly for drinking. The garden is given
over to families who can enjoy pizzas from
a stone oven, or they allow BYO fish and
chips from the neighbouring takeaway
(whitehartaldeburgh.co.uk).
4 6
The Easton White Horse, Easton
Vernon Blackmore is the godfather of
Suffolk hospitality. This is one of the best-
looking boozers around, with a fantastic
rambling garden. Superb food and well
worth the walk from nearby Farmstead
Lodges (eastonwhitehorse.co.uk).
5A massive
beer garden full of fun. They
always have something delicious produced
from the outdoor kitchen. There’s a play
area for the kids, and loads of pétanque
tracks for the grown-ups pretending to be
on holiday in France. It’s also the finishing
8 There is a pretty terrace for sunny days
point for a walk around the Minsmere
bird reserve (theeelsfootinn.co.uk).
The Sorrel Horse, Shottisham
Run by the couple behind Smashing
Wines, a supplier of awesome plonk, this
pub on the green champions regional
seafood and is a great suntrap on a
summer’s eve (thesorrelhorse.co.uk).
SOMERSET
Chosen by Merlin Labron-Johnson,
head chef at Osip and the Old
Pharmacy, Bruton
7
Seymour Arms, Frome
This is my happy place in Somerset.
There’s no bar, just a glass hatch where
you can order a pint of non-branded local
cider straight from a barrel. It is not
fizzy, costs £2.50 and knocks you sideways
if you drink more than one (30 Friary
Close, Witham Friary, Frome).
8
The Three Horseshoes, Batcombe
A perfect pub in the most gorgeous little
village. The menu is overseen by the
wonderful Margot Henderson and
everything is reassuringly no-nonsense
– try the homemade pork scratchings.
(thethreehorseshoesbatcombe.co.uk).
The Times Magazine 51

9 The Prickly Pear, Bruton
This is a fun place. It’s a pub that has
an excellent drinks selection, which is
unusual for this area. There is live
music on the weekends and Mexican-
influenced plates, which you can
wash down with top mezcal and tequila
(prickly-pear.com).
10 The Sheppey Inn, near Wells
A Somerset classic. There’s always an
eclectic crowd thanks to its proximity
to Glastonbury. Marvellous selection
of local cider and frequent live gigs
(thesheppey.co.uk).
11 The Talbot Inn, Mells
Established in 1480, this is a local
favourite. Situated in picturesque Mells,
it ticks all the boxes of a cute village
pub and also does a great Sunday lunch
(talbotinn.com).
KENT
Chosen by Kristie and Brad Lomas,
owners of Boys Hall, Ashford
12
The Coastguard,
St Margarets Bay, Dover
The closest British pub to France, with
a big outdoor barbecue and terrace
and the most incredible views over the
Channel (thecoastguard.co.uk).
13 18 The Golden Lion, Pembrokeshire
This has been our go-to pub in Newport
13
The Tiger Inn, Stowting
Kent’s pub of the year in 2022, with
quirky interiors, tasty food and stunning
countryside views from the terrace
(tigerinn.co.uk).
14
The Dog at Wingham, Canterbury
This place has a wonderful conservatory
that is ideal for enjoying a slice of summer
even if the British weather is predictably
KEY AND QUILL, STEPH HARRIS
unpredictable (thedog.co.uk).
15
Bridge Arms, near Canterbury
A popular choice for food lovers and
a good spot for special occasions.
Not to mention the huge beer garden
(bridgearms.co.uk).
52 The Times Magazine
WALES
Chosen by Jackson Tucker Lynch, head
chef at the Albion, Cardigan
16
The Pentre Arms, Llangrannog
This is tucked away in a coastal village
and gets endless sunsets. A classic boozer
(pentrearms.co.uk).
17
The Felin Fach Griffin, Brecon
A fantastic spot for lunch. This cosy pub
has a charming yet sleepy vibe and serves
classic Welsh dishes. Staff are very friendly
(felinfachgriffin.co.uk).
for years – strong service, quality food
and a special atmosphere (goldenlion
pembrokeshire.co.uk).
19 The Glengower, Aberystwyth
Beautiful place with stunning views.
If you’re staying, go for a seaside room.
They make their own cider and ales,
which are delicious (glengower.co.uk).
DEVON AND DORSET
Chosen by Hugo and Olive Guest,
owners of Glebe House, Devon
20
The Anchor Inn, Seatown, Dorset
A lovely little pub serving fresh seafood
alongside some of the best views
of the Jurassic coast (theanchorinn
seatown.co.uk).
21
The Pigs Nose Inn,
East Prawle, Devon
Packed with character in a beautiful
village. We enjoy a pint and live music
here after a long coastal walk from
Start Point (pigsnoseinn.co.uk).
22
The Kingfisher, Colyton, Devon
A favourite with locals, this pub has its
own fishing boats and serves amazing
27
seafood. A lovely atmosphere in the heart
of Colyton (colyton.co.uk).
23
The Fountain Head,
Branscombe, Devon
A great watering hole along our favourite
coastal walk from Beer to Branscombe.
It has a very cosy feel with inglenook
fireplaces and a wide choice of ales
(fountainheadinn.com).
24
The Hour Glass Inn,
Exeter, Devon
Best gastro pub in Exeter, with a serious
food offering from David Knapman,
an extremely talented chef who honed
his skills in some of the best restaurants
in the world. Simple food elevated to
the sublime (hourglassexeter.co.uk).
NORFOLK
Chosen by Norfolk-born Tom Aikens,
chef-owner of Muse in Belgravia,
London
25
The Victoria, Holkham
Perfect after a walk on nearby Holkham
beach, where Gwyneth Paltrow filmed
Shakespeare in Love. The Victoria is
located in its own magnificent grounds,
and the menu features meat and
produce from the estate and coastline
(holkham.co.uk/the-victoria).
26
Socius, Burnham Market
This place has a Michelin star and uses
locally sourced ingredients that change
to reflect the seasons and all the fabulous
produce that Norfolk has to offer
(sociusnorfolk.co.uk).
27
The Gunton Arms, Thorpe Market
A one-of-a-kind hideaway on a
tranquil estate where I have walked
our dog, Dottie. It has a relaxed vibe
with hearty, meat-based cooking
(theguntonarms.co.uk).
42
YORKSHIRE
Chosen by Andrew Pern, chef at York
Minster Refectory, York
28
The Pipe and Glass, South Dalton
Kate and James Mackenzie’s fabulous
village pub on the edge of the Yorkshire
Wolds serves proper portions of
Michelin-starred pub grub made with local
ingredients, from Filey Bay sea trout to
lamb from the Dales (pipeandglass.co.uk).
29
The Royal Hotel, Runswick Bay
A hidden North Yorkshire gem, it’s
the place to pop into for a pint on the
way home after a day on the beach.
The view is top class (runswickbay.com/
the-royal).
30 The Forresters Arms, Kilburn
This is at the foot of Sutton Bank and
the White Horse and next to the
HQ of the world-famous Mouseman
furniture company, whose handiwork
adorns many village pubs in the area
(forresterskilburn.co.uk).
31 The Angel at Hetton, Skipton
Set in the Yorkshire Dales, this is a haven
for gourmets with Michelin-starred food.
Very much a restaurant in a pub but
worth the journey (angelhetton.co.uk).
34
CUMBRIA AND THE
LAKE DISTRICT
Chosen by Ollie Bridgwater,
executive chef at Source at Gilpin
Hotel in Windermere
32
Blacksmiths Arms,
Broughton-in-Furness
A little old-school gem. There are amazing
walks around here that can start at the
pub, finish at the pub, stop at the pub
halfway round, or all three. The outdoor
area is a great spot for a relaxing pint over
the weekend (theblacksmithsarms.com).
33
The Brown Horse Inn,
near Windermere
A friendly family-run pub and restaurant
with charming staff, top grub, a brilliant
selection of drinks and a decent wine list.
Has the feel of a proper pub with plenty
of outside seating and a restaurant to the
side (thebrownhorseinn.co.uk).
34 The Dog & Gun Inn, Skelton
Wonderful gastropub with well-executed
pub food well worthy of its Michelin star.
The dishes are refined, approachable and
nicely set out, with a reasonably priced
tasting menu (dogandgunskelton.co.uk).
THE COTSWOLDS
Chosen by Charlie Hibbert, chef-director
of Ox Barn at Thyme and the Swan
at Southrop
35
The Victoria Inn, Eastleach
Apart from ours at the Swan (of course),
the Vic has the best terrace in the
country, with a hilltop view of the village.
It serves really good pub food and is
run by the charming Tom Gabbitas
(thevictoriainneastleach.co.uk).
36
The Bell Inn, Langford
I eat here often. They do a cracking pizza
but also scrumptious pub classics, and
there’s always a jolly atmosphere and a
fistful of locals. It has a terrace, and inside
is lovely and snug (thebelllangford.com).
37 The New Inn, Coln St Aldwyns
We feel blessed to have this place on
our doorstep. The big burgers and fried
chicken are my go-to. Always reliable,
always friendly. Their terrace is as pretty
as a picture (thenewinncoln.co.uk).
38 The Sherborne Arms, Northleach
Run by the same team as the Bell Inn and
a favourite of Times restaurant critic Giles
Coren (thesherbornenorthleach.com).
SCOTLAND
Chosen by Lloyd Morse, chef and
co-owner of the Palmerston, Edinburgh
39 The Taybank, Perthshire
One of Scotland’s best-loved pubs, with
a beautiful riverside garden. There’s a
restaurant and apartments, and they grow
all their own veg (thetaybank.co.uk).
40
Kinneuchar Inn, Fife
One of my favourite pubs in the world.
It dates back to the 17th century. It’s also
a nice drive from Edinburgh for a day
out (kinneucharinn.com).
41
Kay’s Bar, Edinburgh
This is the epitome of a neighbourhood
pub. It’s tiny. Dogs are very welcome.
They pour an excellent pint of Guinness
and have plenty of whiskies (kaysbar.uk).
42
The Old Forge, Inverie
In one of the remotest parts of the UK,
this is only accessible by boat or on foot.
The pub is community owned, like much
of the Knoydart peninsula. It re-opens
soon after renovations (theoldforge.co.uk).
EAST SUSSEX
Chosen by Brendan Eades, head chef at
Tillingham vineyard, Rye
43
The White Dog Inn, Ewhurst Green
A real Sussex pub with local ales. From
the beer garden you can watch hot-air
balloons being launched in the valley
(thewhitedogewhurst.co.uk).
44
The Cove, Fairlight
Banging pub reincarnated by a young
couple who relocated from London a few
years back. The courtyard is the perfect
suntrap for a glass of wine or cold pint
after an afternoon dip at Pett Level
(thecovefairlight.co.uk).
45
The Plough, near Rye
Great food, great beer, great garden.
A lovely countryside pub with beautiful
views (theploughrye.co.uk). n
Giles Coren returns next week
The Times Magazine 53
 Beta male
Ben Machell
‘Some men hit I want to buy a camper van. It’s awful.
Pathetic. The worst thing that has ever
their forties and happened to me. Each night, I fall asleep
dreaming that I am curled up inside one.
Each morning, I wake and it takes a few
it’s all illicit sex moments to realise that I am in a proper
bed rather than one made out of car seats.
and drugs. I think My heart sinks, so I reach for my phone
and start looking at used camper vans
nonstop about I can’t really afford yet yearn to possess.
I scroll through the photos of awkward
camper vans’ pop-top roofs and cramped fold-out tables
and stupid little gas hobs that you couldn’t
boil an egg on and soon my mouth is
sandpaper-dry with desire. I pass the rest
of the day in a state of restless agitation,
stalking my home like a caged tiger, albeit
a tiger who knows more than it probably
should about chemical toilets. I start to
resent the house I share with my family,
with its plumbing and radiators and space.
I wish it had a 2-litre engine. I wish it had
a steering wheel.
I had always hoped that, when it came,
my crisis would be more dramatic and
ideally ultra-low emission zone compliant.
Some men hit their forties and it’s all illicit
sex and class A drugs. I just think nonstop
about camper vans. So now I am trapped
in an endless dialogue with myself. Why
this sudden obsession? Where did it come
from? And, most importantly, should I
buy one? I don’t know. There are so many
good reasons not to, but there are also so
many devastating counterarguments.
For example…
You cannot afford one. But can you put
a price on freedom? Can you put a price
on memories? This is the poison I am
methodically dripping into my girlfriend’s
ear each day. And anyway, genuinely,
there are deals out there. There is one van
I have my eye on that admittedly looks
like it has been dragged from the bottom
of a lake with the decade-old remains of
the previous family still sloshing about
inside, but you never know. They might
take a cash offer.
It is bad for the environment. It is a van,
not an Airbus A380. If Greta Thunberg
wants to kneecap me just for doing a few
nights in the Lakes, she is welcome to
try. But how is she going to get there?
On a bike? I will be long gone by the time
she arrives. My kids will be upset that we
are driving a diesel vehicle, yes, but they
KATIE WILSON
are also relatively credulous, so I will
just explain to them that the best way
to ensure the world achieves net zero
© Times Media Limited, 2023. Published and licensed by Times Media Limited, 1 London Bridge Street, London SE1 9GF (020 7782 5000). Printed by Walstead Bicester Ltd, Oxfordshire. Not to be sold separately.
58 The Times Magazine *
is to use up the planet’s remaining fossil
fuel resources as quickly as possible. And
that by driving a 3.5 tonne van up steep
country roads, we are absolutely helping
on that front.
You don’t know anything about how
motor vehicles work, you’re generally
bad at driving and it would inevitably
break down and you would feel stressed
and embarrassed. This is a deliberate
mischaracterisation. I actually had a job
in haulage, remember?
You were a “driver’s mate” for one
summer when you were 20 – you literally
just had to sit in the lorry and make sure
the guy at the wheel stayed awake. OK,
yeah. Fair enough. What else?
You will have to spend more time on
holiday in the UK. That’s fine. I think
the UK is good and I like the idea of
getting to know the old girl better. There
are so many places I have never been.
Blackburn. Shrewsbury. King’s Lynn.
Northampton. With a camper van and a
bit of spontaneity, these distant Shangri-
Las can be mine to explore.
Aha! Gotcha! “Spontaneity”. You are
the least spontaneous person in history.
You make Treebeard from The Lord
of the Rings seem like he needs to be
on Ritalin. You think fire alarms are
advisory. Your family are going to have
“Hmmm, probably better not” carved
on your headstone. Yes, I know. And it
shames me, but I am only 41. Maybe I still
have time to change. Maybe this is part
of what is driving this whole weird van
obsession. A chance to recast myself as
a carefree, get-up-and-go (to Blackburn)
guy before I calcify completely.
It will be really cramped. I don’t care.
I actually want to spend time in close
proximity to my son and daughter
while they are still too young to escape
and/or hire lawyers. Even more than
the spontaneity thing, I think this is the
root of my camper van obsession. Two
weeks ago, my kids were babies. Now,
somehow, they are proper people. Soon
they won’t even be children. I think,
deep down, I want somehow to keep
their world and – by extension – them
small, turning them into little bonsai
people by means of a camper van. They
may end up seeing it as more of a prisoner
transport vehicle. In fact, I know they
would, but in the meantime, who knows?
It could be a laugh. n
Robert Crampton is away