‘In some cases, it may look like retribution,’ Susie Wiles says in a wide-ranging interview with Vanity Fair
Wiles also said she had told Donald Trump that his second term was not supposed to be a retribution tour.
“We have a loose agreement that the score settling will end before the first 90 days are over,” she said in an interview in March.
I mean, people could think it does look vindictive. I can’t tell you why you shouldn’t think that.
I don’t think he [Trump] wakes up thinking about retribution. But when there’s an opportunity, he will go for it.
Some clinical psychologist that knows one million times more than I do will dispute what I’m going to say. But high-functioning alcoholics or alcoholics in general, their personalities are exaggerated when they drink. And so I’m a little bit of an expert in big personalities.
The BBC has vowed to defend itself against the $10bn lawsuit that the US president, Donald Trump, filed against it. Trump alleges the broadcaster “intentionally, maliciously and deceptively” edited the 6 January speech he gave before the attack on the US Capitol. On Tuesday, a BBC spokesperson said: “As we have made clear previously, we will be defending this case. We are not going to make further comment on ongoing legal proceedings.”
Lucy Hough speaks to the head of national news, Archie Bland
Legislation clears upper house after Tories and cross-benchers drop opposition to lifting compensation cap
Lisa Nandy, the culture secretary, has published a green paper on BBC charter renewal. It includes a consultation on options for the future.
On funding, the document says the government has an “open mind” on how the licence fee system may be reformed to stop fewer households paying every year. It suggests there might be a new type of licence fee for people who say they don’t watch BBC TV, but who do use the BBC’s website, or BBC Sounds.
In addition to BBC saving and efficiency programmes, we also want to explore wider reforms that could help address the funding challenges the BBC faces. We have not ruled out keeping the current licence fee in place with its current structure. However, given the sustainability challenges it is facing, we are also reviewing the scope of services for which the licence fee is required and considering differential rates for specific types of users, to make it more sustainable for the long-term, along with increasing commercial revenue to ease the burden on the public. This would aim to reverse the trend of fewer households paying every year and declining overall income, which risks the BBC declining if it is not addressed. Any reform of the licence fee must be proportionate and reflect the cost-of-living burden on the public.
As the licence fee is a tried and tested public funding model, we are not considering replacing it with alternative forms of public funding, such as a new tax on households, funding through general taxation, or introducing a levy on the revenues of streaming services to fund the BBC …
My aims for the charter review are clear. The BBC must remain fiercely independent, accountable and be able to command public trust. It must reflect the whole of the UK, remain an engine for economic growth and be funded in a way that is sustainable and fair for audiences.
Soutar finally holds nerve to win match at 16th attempt
Chris Dobey shrugged off an early scare to reach the second round of the World Darts Championship with a 3-1 win over China’s Zong Xiaochen at Alexandra Palace.
Dobey, who reached the semi-final last year, was not expected to be troubled by his opponent but a spate of missed early doubles threatened to cost the eighth seed. After winning the opening set, Dobey’s repeated failure to find double top allowed his opponent to level at 1-1 and briefly threaten what would have been a momentous upset.
Another day, another Reform UK press conference: this time the deputy leader’s turn to apologise for his Send remarks
Call it a Christmas miracle. For this was the day when Richard Tice sent in his application to become a fully paid-up member of Woke. The day the Reform deputy leader tried to break free from his role as the perennial sidekick. An insignificant blot on the Nigel Farage landscape. When he tried to show he was able to think his own thoughts. Be his own man. Release the closet liberal inside. No longer have to apologise for his existence at the posh dinners he enjoys so much.
Yet Dicky will always be Dicky. Unable to escape The Unbearable Lightness of His Being. When he looks in the mirror, even he has to agree there is less than meets the eye. So it was inevitable he crashed and burned as usual. There are just too many contradictions that he can’t reconcile. A lifetime of trying to be loved has left him unsure of who he really is. A neurotic narcissist with a large ego and next to no self-worth.
Writers cited Machado’s support for Trump’s pressure campaign against Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro
At least three writers have withdrawn from next month’s Hay festival in Cartagena, Colombia, in protest at an invitation extended to the Venezuelan opposition leader and Nobel laureate María Corina Machado.
The main reason cited by them is Machado’s support for Donald Trump’s four-month pressure campaign against Venezuela’s dictator Nicolás Maduro and her comments in favour of a potential US military intervention in the Caribbean country.
British Indian Ocean Territory commissioner’s appeal against decision last year rejected by judges in London
Appeal court judges have backed a decision that dozens of asylum seekers were unlawfully detained on one of the world’s most remote islands, rejecting an appeal on Tuesday by the commissioner for the territory.
Exactly a year ago, on 16 December 2024, a judge ruled that Tamils who arrived on the island of Diego Garcia, a UK and US military base, after a shipwreck while they were trying to reach Canada to seek asylum, were unlawfully detained there for three years in conditions described as “hell on Earth”.
Producer Stephen Woolley pays tribute to Figgis, who has died aged 77, a brilliant professional whose ‘molotov cocktail personality’ enabled her work in British and Hollywood cinema
I first encountered Susie Figgis over 40 years ago when I interviewed her for The Company of Wolves, my debut movie production with Neil Jordan. We met at my then-cinema the Scala – it was a busy, noisy office but a sunny day, so we went up to the roof. Susie, who was already something of a legend having cast Stephen Frears’ Bloody Kids, Laura Mulvey’s avant garde films and Ben Kingsley in Gandhi, unleashed a volcanic eruption of unbridled enthusiasm for Angela Carter and Neil’s script. The collection of explosive expletives and voluble “darlings” almost blasted me to the King’s Cross streets below.
So began a professional relationship that spanned more than 23 movies. The task we set her for The Company of Wolves was tricky: to find an actor to play the adolescent Rosaleen. She achieved it through painstaking and meticulous methods (her trademark) over the next few months, exceeding our expectations when she discovered the excellent Sarah Patterson. She then topped that with the suggestion of Angela Lansbury for “Grannie” (who flew from Hollywood to shoot with us and had her character’s head decapitated for her troubles) and a superlative supporting cast of dancers, performance artists and veteran actors for our strange, violent woodland fairytale. Her passion for cinema was infectious: not only for the film-makers, but also the agents and actors who read our scripts. Susie demanded an intelligent and thoughtful response to the screenplays so no simple yes or no would suffice.
Royal Opera House, London Andrei Serban’s 40-year-old production is confidently revived by Jack Furness, while the vocal richness of the Russian soprano as its eponymous heroine takes things to another level
When the Royal Opera’s current run of Turandot ends in February, there will have been no fewer than 22 performances of Puccini’s unfinished final opera on the Covent Garden stage in less than a year. By opera house standards, that’s a remarkably big number, especially for a staging that is now more than 40 years old.
But it’s not hard to see why this Turandot keeps on returning. Puccini’s darkest, most ritualistic and choral opera is a showstopper shot through with musical colour, innovation and interest. In tough economic times for the art form, it offers guaranteed box office, due in no small part to the iconic tenor aria Nessun Dorma. What’s more, Andrei Serban’s 1984 production is a living theatrical classic, in which everything is played out within oppressive sets inhabited by shadowy watchers. It is confidently revived here by Jack Furness, with eye-catching orientalist choreography by Kate Flatt.
Emily Blunt, Josh O’Connor, Colin Firth, Colman Domingo and Eve Hewson head up the director’s latest effort
The first trailer for Steven Spielberg’s mysterious UFO movie has now provided more details on what audiences can expect.
Disclosure Day, written by Jurassic Park’s David Koepp based on a Spielberg story, sees a starry cast deal with the discovery of aliens. “Why would he make such a vast universe yet save it only for us?’” Elizabeth Marvel’s character says at the end of the teaser.
Justice secretary criticised for refusing to meet lawyers who say their clients’ health is ‘rapidly deteriorating’
Palestine Action-affiliated hunger strikers are likely to die without David Lammy’s intervention, lawyers representing the prisoners have said as they criticised the justice secretary for refusing to meet them.
Solicitors wrote to Lammy last Wednesday to request an urgent meeting before their clients’ health deteriorates “beyond any possible recovery”. But a subsequent letter sent on Tuesday said that his reply, received on Monday “does not directly address our request”.
Region known as ‘world’s refrigerator’ is heating up as much as four times as quickly as global average, Noaa experts say
The Arctic endured a year of record heat and shrunken sea ice as the world’s northern latitudes continue a rapid shift to becoming rainier and less ice-bound due to the climate crisis, scientists have reported.
From October 2024 to September 2025, temperatures across the entire Arctic region were the hottest in 125 years of modern record keeping, the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa) said, with the last 10 years being the 10 warmest on record in the Arctic.
A breast cancer diagnosis is hard enough – what happens when a mother and daughter go through it at the same time?
Genna Freed should have been in the mood to celebrate. On a cloudy November day in 2022, her mother, Julie Newman, was about to complete her final round of radiation, after being diagnosed with breast cancer in September. The whole family, a close-knit bunch, was gathering with balloons and signs.
But Freed, then a few weeks shy of her 31st birthday, was carrying a secret. Spurred by her mother’s diagnosis, she had her first mammogram a couple days earlier, and it had turned up a suspicious spot. Now she needed a second, diagnostic mammogram, and likely a biopsy. She found herself walking a surreal sort of tightrope, caught between relief that her mother’s treatment was over and fear that she might soon be starting her own.
Amanda Seyfried and Brandon Sklenar co-star as Sweeney’s secretive bosses in an upstate New York mansion, and director Paul Feig ramps up the sexual tension with evident gusto
Director Paul Feig is known for broad comedy; now he cranks up the schlock-serious dial for an outrageously enjoyable – or at any rate enjoyably outrageous – psycho-suspense thriller in the spirit of 90s erotic noir, adapted by screenwriter Rebecca Sonnenshine from the 2022 bestseller by Freida McFadden. We are back in the sleazy, glossy world of Curtis Hanson’s The Hand That Rocks the Cradle or Joe Eszterhas’s Basic Instinct, but skating quite close, though not too close, to satire.
The scene is a bizarrely opulent mansion somewhere in upstate New York, splendidly isolated among a sea of bland suburban housing; it is approached by a drive, once you have got past the electronic gates. And it is down this avenue that Millie (Sydney Sweeney) nervously drives, wearing fake glasses to make herself look more mature, to apply for the job of live-in housemaid to the wealthy couple that lives there; she is hoping her prospective employers will not notice the worrying inconsistencies in her CV. She is greeted with smiley, Stepford-blond blandness by Nina Winchester (Amanda Seyfried), who appears to adore Millie, and explains that the job entails cooking, cleaning and looking after her young daughter, Cece (Indiana Elle).
The 2016 drama, loosely inspired by the father-son relationship, is a gritty drama about addiction that has now become a puzzle piece
Being Charlie, a 2016 movie directed by the late Rob Reiner, stands out from the director’s filmography for a number of reasons. It’s a gritty and grounded addiction movie with a few comic elements, less ebullient than many of the movies Reiner was famous for, as well as the others he was making in the 2010s. It features then-up-and-coming stars, rather than more established figures, and way more sex and nudity than usual. And it’s the only movie co-written by Reiner’s son, Nick, whose experiences formed the basis for the screenplay, and who is now expected to be charged in the murder of both his parents.
Those horrific circumstances transform Being Charlie from one of Reiner’s more interesting late-period efforts into the subject of unavoidable rubbernecking. Here is a film Reiner made in collaboration with his son, in part as an obvious act of hope that the worst of his struggles would prove to be behind him. Real life was not quite so cooperative as the open-ended but vaguely optimistic resolution of a well-intentioned indie drama.
Soho theatre, London The comedian’s compelling show explores gender politics in modern India, singledom and self-improvement
Modesty: “I don’t speak for all women …” Swagger: “… but I do speak for many.” Prashasti Singh’s Divine Feminine shuttles between these poles, now deprecating her own foibles as a thirtysomething unmarried woman in modern India, now running the rule over gender politics in the 21st century. A deft balance is struck, with enough self-mocking silliness to endear herself and keep us entertained, but some arresting thinking too about Singh’s home country and its progress towards female liberation.
That’s the subject under interrogation here, albeit refracted through the confusions and contradictions of a woman who grew up wishing to be a man. Few of the female role models on offer in India seemed terribly inspiring – and the one that did, a high-achieving distant relative, undercut her inspo standing with a very unsisterly warning against spinsterdom. No wonder our host swings wildly between pride in her independence well into middle age, anxiety that her descent into “crazy lady” status may soon be irreversible – and therapy sessions advising she reframe her sadness as a colourful personality trait.
The proposal, supported by Kate Mosse and Philip Pullman, aims to make public library membership a national birthright
Richard Osman, Kate Mosse and Sir Philip Pullman are among authors calling for all babies to automatically receive a library card at birth. The proposal, put forward by the thinktank Cultural Policy Unit (CPU), aims to make public library membership a national birthright and encourage a culture of reading and learning in the early stages of childhood through a National Library Card.
“The idea behind a National Library Card is very simple,” Alison Cole, director at the CPU, said. “Access to knowledge and culture should be a birthright, not a postcode lottery. By giving every child an automatic library card from birth, together with a programme of activities and engagement, we make libraries part of the fabric of everyday life.”
Fewer companies operating in Europe will be made to carry out due diligence on the societal harms they cause, in what green groups have called a “betrayal” of communities affected by corporate abuse.
The gutting of the EU’s sustainability reporting and due diligence rules, which was greenlit by MEPs on Tuesday, slashes the number of companies covered by laws to protect human and ecological rights, and removes provisions to harmonise access to justice across member states.
News of Ahmed al-Ahmed’s selfless act quickly reached al-Nayrab, where locals say it proves religion or birthplace no barrier to heroism
A man who risked his life to wrestle a gun from a shooter in the Bondi beach terror attack on Sunday has become a hero in his home town in Syria.
Video of Ahmed al-Ahmed’s selfless act quickly reached his birthplace of al-Nayrab, a small town in the countryside of Idlib, north-west Syria. Ahmed, a 44-year-old father of two children, left the village to emigrate to Australia in 2007. He initially worked in construction, but soon opened a fruit and vegetable shop in Sydney.
District attorney’s office has until Wednesday to file charges against Nick Reiner following deaths of his parents
Los Angeles investigators are expected on Tuesday to lay out their case against Nick Reiner, who was arrested on suspicion of murdering his parents, the actor-director Rob Reiner and his wife, Michele Singer Reiner.
Detectives from the Los Angeles police department’s (LAPD) homicide division took Nick, 32, into custody on Sunday night, hours after his parents were found dead in their Brentwood home, the department announced on Monday.
Beyond Wham! and Elton, Guardian writers from across the generations select the songs that conjure the personal magic and memories of the season
I’m always fascinated by the ways in which my generation manage to participate in the circulation of music. Amateur TikTok edits resurrect forgotten gems and turn obscure starlets into sensations; home producers fabricate entire albums if their favourite rapper doesn’t release enough. Such is the case with Doom Xmas, the brainchild of Grammy-winning Spanish producer Cookin’ Soul, which refashions the work of late cult rapper MF Doom into Christmas music. There are filthy Grinch soundtrack flips, hectic Latin Christmas skits and a chopped-and-screwed Nat King Cole that’ll change the way you hear The Christmas Song.
Equinor accused of ‘extensive and long-term pollution’ caused by years of inadequate maintenance
Norway’s national oil company, Equinor, is facing a £53m penalty for oil spills and gas leaks at the oil-rich Scandinavian state’s only refinery, which officials said were the result of years of inadequate maintenance.
Norway’s economic crime agency, Økokrim, said it had taken action against Equinor over “extensive and long-term pollution” at the refinery in Mongstad, on Norway’s North Sea coast.
Dispute related to contract before exit for Real Madrid
Court sided with player amid accusations of betrayal
A Paris labour court has ruled Paris Saint-Germain must pay more than €60m (£52.7m) to Kylian Mbappé in a dispute over unpaid wages and bonuses linked to the end of his contract before his 2024 move to Real Madrid.
Lawyers argued last month before the Conseil de prud’hommes. The court sided with the player amid accusations of betrayal and harassment surrounding the breakdown of their relationship. PSG had been seeking €440m from Mbappé, citing damages and a “loss of opportunity” after he left on a free transfer. It is understood PSG are likely to appeal.
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