Dame Donna Langley

Dame Donna Langley0:01

BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, Podcasts.

Presenter0:04

Hello, I'm Lauren Laverne and this is the Desert Island Discs podcast. Every week I ask my guests to choose the eight tracks, book and luxury they'd want to take with them if they were castaway to a desert island. And, for rights reasons, the music is shorter than the original broadcast. I hope you enjoy listening.

Presenter0:45

My castaway this week is Dame Donna Langley, Chairman and Chief Content Officer for the NBC Universal Studio Group. She's the first British woman in history to run a major studio and is arguably the most powerful woman in Hollywood. Her brief encompasses Universal's film and television studios, and she oversees franchises like Fast and Furious, Despicable Me, and Jurassic World. Under her leadership, the studio has achieved record-breaking revenues and enjoyed some of the most profitable years in its 111-year history. She has earned respect in a fickle industry for her creativeness and championing of emerging talent, as well as successfully wooing the likes of Steven Spielberg and Christopher Nolan. She's also stuck her neck out by backing original content, often where others failed to see the potential. Mama Mia, Get Out, and Straight Out of Compton, the story of the hip-hop group NWA, are just three examples from a very long list. It is a testament to her talents that Ice Cube once declared her the sixth member of the band. Though, to be clear, she's not from Compton, she's actually straight out of the Isle of Wight, growing up on the UK's so-called Sunshine Island. When she was in her early twenties, she decided to go where the weather was even better. LA. She says, I am hyper-competitive with myself. I push myself to beat my time, to be faster, higher, and stronger. Dame Donna Langley, welcome to Desert Island Discs. Thank you so much for having me. Donna, the operation that you run is absolutely vast, but I've so often heard you mention the importance of listening to your gut. Tell me about your decision-making process when you're deciding whether or not to greenlight a film. It starts with.

Presenter2:26

Yeah.

Dame Donna Langley2:26

Whether or not I love it, it's really hard to imagine making a film and going through that process, which can take anything from a year to three years, without absolutely loving it.

Presenter2:38

Oppenheimer, directed by Christopher Nolan and produced by his wife Emma Thomas, came out earlier this year. Now, it's obviously a dark subject. It's three hours long and technically hugely ambitious. What made you say yes? To the film.

Dame Donna Langley2:50

I was looking for people who make films that are undeniably theatrical. You have to see a Christopher Nolan film at the cinema. So I went to Chris and Emma's office in their home and sat by myself and read the script. And I took with me a basket of snacks because I'd heard the script was quite long. So I went loaded up with an iced tea and water. And what struck me about the script was that not only was it an ambitious historical story, but it had a lot of emotional elements to it, like betrayal and love. So it was just a great read.

Presenter3:27

And I wonder about your identity as a Brit and and how that's shaped your career. Has it, do you think?

Presenter3:33

I think it has.

Dame Donna Langley3:33

As yes, certainly in the way that I do my job. I'm very pragmatic and don't sweat the small stuff. You know, I think that's very much a cultural

Dame Donna Langley3:44

Element of my personality. I wonder if it changes peop how people respond to you as well. I think they're intimidated by my accent, so I just milk it for all I can.

Dame Donna Langley3:54

Quite right, too. It's time for your first disc, Donna. What's it gonna be? Disc number one is ABBA. Thank you for the music. So, ABBA was my first love. It was the first album I ever bought with my own money. I had a little, one of those little K-Tel machines. But this song, because I could have chosen any ABBA song, but this song really gets to me even today. There is lyrics in it. Nothing special. In fact, I'm a bit of a bore, but I have a talent, a wonderful thing. In fact, I'm going to start crying as I'm saying the words.

Speaker 14:24

Yeah.

Dame Donna Langley4:26

Those lyrics spoke to me as a little girl. They gave me hope that I could actually turn into something, that I could become something, that my dreams may come true one day. You know, it's a song about recognizing your own talent or having somebody else recognize it for you.

Presenter4:42

I'm nothing special.

Presenter4:44

In fact, I'm a bit of a bore.

Presenter4:50

If I tell a joke

Presenter4:52

Probably heard it before.

Presenter4:58

But I have a talent, a wonderful thing Cause everyone listens when I start to sing I'm so grateful and proud

Speaker 25:02

Yeah.

Presenter5:09

Uh

Speaker 25:09

Uh

Presenter5:09

Uh

Speaker 25:09

Uh

Presenter5:11

All I want It's to sing it up.

Speaker 25:13

Yeah.

Presenter5:14

Abba, and thank you for the music. Donna Langley, you were born in London in nineteen sixty eight, and your family moved to the Isle of Wight when you were about seven. You say about your mother, Anne, that she was creative. She also had a political conscience. What do you remember about that side of her?

Dame Donna Langley5:30

I remember her taking me to a slaughterhouse when I was quite young. I became vegetarian when I was four. I think you did too. I was. Although, no trip to the slaughterhouse. That's quite a bit. I think that was unnecessary. But I just remember my mom always instilling in me this sense of.

Speaker 15:42

That's going to be a

Dame Donna Langley5:51

social awareness, that the world was a bigger place than the one just where we were living and to be mindful of our impact on the world. She was very focused on

Speaker 15:52

So

Dame Donna Langley6:04

the environment even back then in the seventies and I was out on the streets of the Isle of Wight with a little collection tin often raising money for Greenpeace and things like that. So

Speaker 16:05

Leave him back.

Presenter6:15

And you became uh so vegetarian when you were four, so that would have been seventies quite early then.

Dame Donna Langley6:19

Yes, yes, when it was not popular. Yeah, how did that work? It was a nightmare. Doing home economics and trying to make a Swiss roll with whole wheat flour and brown sugar was virtually impossible.

Presenter6:30

I mean, where did you get the stuff? My parents used to have to go to like the one hippie shop in our region in in Newcastle to get organic potatoes. Oh, my mum owned the hippie shop.

Dame Donna Langley6:37

My mom.

Dame Donna Langley6:39

Yeah.

Dame Donna Langley6:40

It started as a market stall and then became two shops. Yes. In the window we had a basket of recycled toilet paper. So it was recycled paper made into toilet paper, but I was the laughing stock at school because they said our family used recycled toilet paper.

Presenter6:40

Yeah.

Speaker 16:45

Okay.

Presenter6:58

Oh, gosh. Okay. Uh your dad, Donna John, he was an engineer. He designed radar systems for the Civil Aviation Authority, and while you were growing up he would work in London during the week and then come home to the family at weekends. I think because the Isle of Wight was so special to your parents, wasn't it?

Dame Donna Langley7:15

Yeah, this was definitely lost on me as a kid that for 10 years my dad commuted and he was gone Monday to Friday. And my parents have a wonderful relationship. They're very close. And so it was a real sacrifice for them to do that. I think they

Speaker 17:29

Yeah.

Dame Donna Langley7:31

fell in love with the Isle of Wight. My dad worked there on the radar system down there when they first got married and it was their happy place very much. And I think they wanted to

Dame Donna Langley7:41

raise their children in an environment where we could be free, we could roam around, the schools were great. Did you develop a love of nature, a love of being outdoors?

Dame Donna Langley7:50

Very much so. I did. I mean, I have an absolute love of the ocean, of the sea. It is a very grounding.

Dame Donna Langley7:59

Feeling or sense I get when I think about it, and I think I carry that with me. What was it like off-season when things were a lot quieter and?

Presenter8:01

And I think

Speaker 18:01

Yeah.

Dame Donna Langley8:06

The weather wasn't so good. It was so depressing. I have memories of wandering along the ocean front, just hoping and dreaming that the foreign exchange students from Sweden would show back up and come back and visit, and we'd have to wait. So the winters were actually very long. It would be a lot of time spent yearning and hoping and wishing.

Dame Donna Langley8:26

For the summer.

Presenter8:27

So yearning and hoping. I mean, were you also hankering for adventure, dreaming of a bigger world? Always.

Dame Donna Langley8:33

It really was or

Presenter8:35

Yeah.

Dame Donna Langley8:35

Yeah.

Dame Donna Langley8:35

Uh

Presenter8:36

Wait to leave.

Presenter8:37

It's time for some more music. Your second choice today. What is it and why have you chosen it?

Presenter8:42

It's

Dame Donna Langley8:42

Zorba the Greek and I've chosen it because this song really reminds me of my parents. They were not big into music as we were growing up and this was one of I think two records that we had in our house and so before I had money to buy my own records this would be one that I would play and it occurs to me that this song is something that I think about when making films. Great filmmakers do this brilliantly is that they start off low and small and then they build it and build it and build it and this song really does that too. I used to dance around my living room to it.

Presenter9:50

Zova the Greek, composed and performed by Mikis Theodorakis.

Presenter9:54

Donna Langley, you'd known from an early age, I think, that you were adopted as a baby. Can you remember when your parents told you and what you felt about it?

Presenter10:02

Uh

Dame Donna Langley10:02

There was never a time where they sat me down and told me I was adopted. It was always part of the conversation. And I think partially because I look nothing like my family. They're blonde hair and blue eyed, and I'm the opposite of that.

Dame Donna Langley10:15

But I think really because they made that decision to be very open about it. And so it was never a thing. It was not a big deal for me. I felt.

Dame Donna Langley10:26

Part of the family, and if anything, it made me feel a little bit special.

Dame Donna Langley10:32

What did you know about your birth parents? I don't know very much about them actually. My father was Egyptian, my mother was English, and I think they were college students. Back then, adoptions were closed, and so I don't have very much information about either of them.

Speaker 110:42

Yeah.

Dame Donna Langley10:46

And so I got to imagine that my father was Omar Sharif.

Dame Donna Langley10:51

And I've always had in my heart a lot of respect for my birth mother because I imagine that back then it wasn't easy as a young woman to go nine months of pregnancy and have a baby and have to give it up for adoption. So I I thank her.

Presenter11:07

Obviously, you know, very happy with your family that you grew up with. But did you ever want to find out more? Were you curious as a kid, or did you ever consider digging into it as you got older?

Dame Donna Langley11:17

I had moments where I would wonder and I would think about it, but never enough, quite frankly, to spur me to go through the process. I it just felt horribly disruptive.

Speaker 111:27

Yeah.

Dame Donna Langley11:28

I'm quite fatalistic, and so I thought, well, I'm I am where I'm supposed to be, I'm with the people I'm supposed to be with, and that's enough for me. Do you think that that's partly where?

Presenter11:34

Uh

Presenter11:38

where your resilience and independence comes from.

Dame Donna Langley11:41

I think there's a fearlessness there for sure. Absolutely. And I have a trust and a faith in myself and in the universe really to s I think sometimes make me okay with taking some risks.

Dame Donna Langley11:55

Poor

Presenter11:55

Right, it's time for some more music. Donna Langley, your third tri But he's

Dame Donna Langley11:58

Today What's it gonna be?

Dame Donna Langley12:00

It's the aria that I heard in the film D.A. I saw the film Diva.

Dame Donna Langley12:05

When I was in Paris. And I used to go to Paris with a friend of mine when I was

Dame Donna Langley12:10

eighteen nineteen.

Dame Donna Langley12:12

And this film had a very big impact on me. It was the first time, I think, for me, I saw a foreign film in the movie theater, and it was subtitled. And this song really struck me as what music could do in film. And it certainly didn't occur to me at that moment that I would then go and pursue a career in film, but looking back on it, it was a very pivotal and seminal moment for me.

Presenter13:39

Eben Neandro Lontana from Catalani's La Valley, performed by Wilhelmina Fernandez from the soundtrack to the film Diva.

Presenter13:48

Dame Donna Langley, the Isle of Wight wouldn't have been specially diverse back in the seventies. How aware were you of that growing up and did it ever cause problems for you at school?

Dame Donna Langley13:57

I did run into some bullying from time to time. People just didn't understand me and didn't really like my features. They made them uncomfortable. Curly hair and darker skin.

Dame Donna Langley14:11

But I was always surrounded by great friends, and they would stick up for me, and we'd have a good laugh about it always. And I rarely fought back, but would always stand strong. And so it was a great life lesson. So, what form did it take? You said you didn't fight back. Was it physical?

Dame Donna Langley14:29

Could be, absolutely. Yes, I was pushed and roughed up up a bit. Somebody spat in my face and oh, it was really quite strange. But you know, my mum was also a great support here too. She would just give me great advice and a way to think about it and a philosophy that still holds true to this day.

Presenter14:46

What did she say?

Dame Donna Langley14:47

She would just say, You just have to think about what they're going through. They obviously are afraid because you're different.

Dame Donna Langley14:54

And it's great that you're different. And so they were great words of wisdom and great words of advice, and I carry them with me to this day.

Presenter15:02

You went to Sixth Form College in Kent, where your grandparents lived, and then after that you moved to London with your best friend Tanya. Did the two of you have jobs? What was the plan? What were you getting up to?

Dame Donna Langley15:12

We worked in a health club, a private health club in Belsize Park Gardens, and we were very cheeky and filled with Moxie. I think that was where I began to realize that I wanted to push myself to have a big adventure.

Presenter15:28

And what about going to the cinema? Had that played a part in your life when you were growing up? Did you have a a local cinema nearby that you could go to? We really.

Dame Donna Langley15:34

Didn't on the Isle of Wight. There was one, and we would get the big films there, but I didn't develop a love of cinema until about this time in my life.

Presenter15:43

I think there was one experience you had watching the film A Dry White Season.

Dame Donna Langley15:47

Yeah, it was very important to me, and I began to percolate this idea of storytelling.

Presenter15:47

That was very important.

Dame Donna Langley15:55

And this medium of cinema

Dame Donna Langley15:59

Doing something that was really impactful and really powerful, and then sort of linking that back to my childhood and the social, I don't want to call it activism because that's not what it was, but just the social awareness and social consciousness. And that film really did speak to me. It's about apartheid. It is about apartheid, yes. And I actually got to meet Yuzan Palsy.

Presenter16:12

Yeah.

Presenter16:15

It's about

Presenter16:16

Daily.

Dame Donna Langley16:21

who was receiving an award by the Academy, so I got to meet her last year.

Presenter16:24

So you met the director? I did. What did you say?

Dame Donna Langley16:26

What did you say? I told her the story. I told her that I was standing there in large part due to her film.

Dame Donna Langley16:33

I don't think she could I don't think she believed me.

Presenter16:38

It's time for some more music, Dame Donnellangley, your fourth selection today. What have you chosen and why are you taking it to your desert island?

Dame Donna Langley16:45

So I'm choosing This Is the Day by The The The So this was a song that was very much the soundtrack of my life in those days and living in Hampstead. The world was my oyster. I thought I was capable of doing anything and I think we met then had dinner with the manager of The Tha and I thought, oh gosh, I've made it. And I just love the song. Every time I hear it, I get so happy and it takes me right back to that time living in that flat in Hampstead.

Speaker 117:13

You pull back your head and s and the sun burns into your eyes

Speaker 117:20

You watch a plane flying across the clear blue

Speaker 217:27

This is a baby.

Speaker 217:29

You're like who showed it, J

Speaker 217:34

They say to me

Speaker 217:36

When things fall into play

Presenter17:41

The there and this is the day is just the sound of possibility, isn't it, Donna Langley? So in 1991, you and Tanny decided to have an adventure and go to Los Angeles for the summer. What was the plan?

Presenter17:53

That was the plan.

Dame Donna Langley17:55

We were going that was the extent of the plan. Well, we worked the entire summer.

Presenter17:55

We were going to extend it.

Presenter17:57

Planned

Dame Donna Langley18:00

And we got very lucky with the exchange rate and showed up in Los Angeles with our bags and a wad of cash to go and buy a VW bug. And the thing that

Speaker 118:07

To go and buy

Dame Donna Langley18:10

I fell in love with the possibility and the attitude of people. I left London, and lots of people questioned why we were going to Los Angeles, what were we going to do there. People said, you'll never make it. It's a very difficult place to navigate. And of course, that spurred me on to prove everybody wrong. And we met people in those early days who, rather than saying all of that, would ask, what do you want to do? How can we help?

Dame Donna Langley18:37

And I thought at that time, you know what, I'm in the right place. This is a community for me. And I'm just going to see what I...

Presenter18:46

I can make of it.

Dame Donna Langley18:46

Yeah.

Presenter18:47

So obviously once you were there you had to make ends meet. And I know that you got a job at a nightclub on Sunset Boulevard called The Roxbury. You were its VIP hostess. What did that involve?

Dame Donna Langley18:57

That involved taking people to their tables. And at that time, it was really the only place to be in Los Angeles. And so everybody used to come in. Stevie Wonder,

Dame Donna Langley19:10

All the actors, uh there was a period of time that Madonna came with Sean Penn, directors, uh just really the who's who of Hollywood.

Presenter19:20

While you were working at the club, you interned for a producer and then worked as an assistant at the production studio New Line Cinema. In two thousand one, Donna, you joined Universal Studios as Senior Vice President of Production. Now that was a big step, especially for someone who didn't have a long track record in the business. Did you have any moments of self doubt?

Dame Donna Langley19:39

I thought, oh gosh, at some point, yeah, someone's gonna find out that the gig is gonna be up, you know, that I don't have any qualifications. And it wasn't until

Dame Donna Langley19:49

I don't know, probably 10 years ago that I looked around and said, oh, hold on a minute. I actually do know what I'm doing.

Presenter19:54

And what propelled you b until you got there? I mean, ha what were you.

Dame Donna Langley19:57

I think just the sense of

Dame Donna Langley20:01

wanting to get it done and prove to myself that I could do it and I could outwork and outpace anyone. Yeah, I think I was just uh and probably a big dose of fear. Gets you out of bed in the morning.

Presenter20:16

Gets me out of bed in the morning.

Dame Donna Langley20:17

Right.

Presenter20:17

It certainly does the adrenaline. It always does the trick. One of the first films that you supported was Straight Out of Compton about the hip hop band NWA. It came out in twenty fifteen. Why were you so determined to get that film made?

Dame Donna Langley20:19

Just a trick.

Presenter20:30

I thought that it was

Dame Donna Langley20:32

A bigger story than people expected, even though it was about.

Dame Donna Langley20:39

gangster rap in a very specific moment in time.

Dame Donna Langley20:43

It was also about young people taking on the system.

Presenter20:47

How easy was it to convince people that it was a great idea?

Dame Donna Langley20:50

It wasn't easy. There were a couple of fights along the way on that one. So, even with your own team? With my own team. Okay. Yes, there were a couple of people on my team. How do you navigate that?

Presenter20:54

Even with your own team. With my own team.

Dame Donna Langley21:00

As a leader, at the end of the day, the buck stops with me, right? So really what people are looking for is, okay, this is my opinion, but what happens if it goes horribly wrong? And I was willing to stand up in front of this one.

Presenter21:12

Yeah. We're going to go to the music, Dame Donna Langley. Your fifth choice today, if you would. What are we going to hear next and why?

Dame Donna Langley21:18

We are going to hear It Was a Good Day by Ice Cube. This song makes me think of blue skies and palm trees, all of those iconic things you think about when you think about Los Angeles.

Presenter21:30

Had to stop at a red light looking in my mirror, not a jacker in sight. And everything is alright. I got a beat from Kim, and she could do it all night. Called up the homies, and I'm asking y'all, which part are y'all playing basketball? Get me on the court, and I'm troubled. Last week, messed around and got

Speaker 221:51

Got a triple double, freaking brothers every way like MJ. I can't believe today was a good day.

Presenter22:00

It was a good day, Ice Cube. Donna Langley, how did you adapt to the cut and thrust of working in Hollywood, I wonder? Historically, even today, it's not known for a culture of kindness.

Dame Donna Langley22:12

No, definitely not. And people do tend to trade on their power and mistake the seat that they're sitting in for actual power. It's not. And so there's a lot of ego, as you can imagine. I'm pretty adept at navigating people's egos and dealing with difficult people.

Speaker 122:30

And ye

Dame Donna Langley22:36

I like to hear and understand where someone's coming from and then appeal to their better nature.

Presenter22:42

You were the chair of Universal for a decade, Donna, but when you first applied for that role in 2009 you didn't get the job. Why do you think you didn't get it back then?

Dame Donna Langley22:52

In two thousand nine, the culture was very different, and we hadn't gone through a Me Too movement, and we hadn't begun talking about a workplace culture and a respectful

Dame Donna Langley23:04

Working environment. And I was working in a very male-dominated.

Dame Donna Langley23:11

environment. And I think I had back some movies that didn't work. One movie in particular called State of Play, which was based on the television programme.

Dame Donna Langley23:22

It's actually a wonderful film, but it just did not connect commercially. And I remember being told that I was too smart for my own good and I was perhaps missing out on other opportunities that might connect to an audience a little better. I was focused on making things that were too cerebral. Too cerebral. Too sophisticated.

Presenter23:40

Do you think there was a a gender dynamic at play, though?

Presenter23:44

I do.

Dame Donna Langley23:45

And things have changed now? I think things have definitely changed for the better. There's always more to do, but we're on the right track.

Presenter23:52

Yeah.

Dame Donna Langley23:53

Yeah.

Presenter23:53

And you had your first child around then, around that time. How much maternity leave were you able to take? I took nine weeks. I was on a

Dame Donna Langley24:00

Plane to New York after nine weeks. Oh, that must have been really tough. It was really horrible. Yes. Having to go through.

Speaker 124:06

Yeah.

Dame Donna Langley24:08

Security with breast milk.

Dame Donna Langley24:12

Did you feel

Presenter24:13

Yeah. Under pressure to to go back.

Dame Donna Langley24:14

Yeah.

Dame Donna Langley24:17

Looking back on that time, it was very stressful. There was a lot of politics going on at the company. We were in.

Dame Donna Langley24:25

I think about to be sold.

Dame Donna Langley24:28

And it was every man for himself.

Dame Donna Langley24:31

So yeah, I think I felt under a ton of pressure to go back.

Dame Donna Langley24:37

It's time for your sixth day.

Presenter24:38

Disc Got

Dame Donna Langley24:38

Don't know what are you

Presenter24:39

be taken to the island next.

Dame Donna Langley24:41

Never Is a Promise by Fiona Apple. It was from the album title. I think it came out in nineteen ninety six. And I'd just broken up with a boyfriend of two years and I was

Dame Donna Langley24:54

Really, at a time where I was beginning to mature, I didn't quite know where my life or my career was going, but I knew I had to make some changes. But before I got to make any changes, I got to wallow in this album. This is a song that really moves me. It's about a broken promise, I think. At least that's what it means to me.

Presenter25:14

You'll never see the courage I know.

Presenter25:23

It's called

Speaker 125:24

Colour's richness won't appear within your view.

Speaker 125:31

I'll never glow

Presenter25:35

Uh

Presenter25:36

Uh

Speaker 125:36

Don't we that

Presenter25:36

You know.

Presenter25:40

Your presence dominates the judgments made on

Presenter25:46

Never is a promise Fiona Apple. Dame Donna Langley, I want to ask you a little bit more about the dark side of Hollywoods. What was your reaction when the full extent of the sexual abuse perpetrated by Harvey Weinstein came to light?

Presenter26:01

It was shocking.

Dame Donna Langley26:01

King.

Dame Donna Langley26:02

Yeah.

Presenter26:02

Yeah.

Dame Donna Langley26:02

I'll never forget where I was when the article broke, the great reporting done by the New York Times. And we knew that Harvey was a bully, but we did not know, as an industry at large, the extent of the abuse.

Presenter26:21

Yeah.

Dame Donna Langley26:21

Why do you think he was able to get away with it for so long?

Dame Donna Langley26:24

Well,

Dame Donna Langley26:26

Back then

Dame Donna Langley26:27

You just didn't really talk about it.

Dame Donna Langley26:30

And I think that he created a system. It was pathological and he was very clever.

Dame Donna Langley26:38

This was decades of behavior going unchecked and abuses of power in a myriad of different ways. And it certainly predates me coming into the industry. I think things did improve. There were more women in positions of power as I was coming up. And I think when you have women in power, it does change the climate and it changes the environment. But it was still, again, somewhat assumed that bad behavior went on. And I mean, I think for myself and my peers, we just knew that it came with the territory. And that's the thing that

Presenter27:13

has really changed today.

Presenter27:14

Donna, last year you said yes to the film She Said. That's based on the story of the two New York Times journalists who broke the story, Jodie Cantor and Megan Toohey. How long did it take you to greenlight that? I read the script.

Dame Donna Langley27:26

The producer sent it to me and I called her immediately and said, We're going to do this. It's a story that can never be forgotten.

Dame Donna Langley27:35

We have to always remember that that was made possible.

Dame Donna Langley27:41

and that something that bad went on for

Dame Donna Langley27:45

a very long time unchecked. And as an industry, we've just got to remember that because it's very easy to move on once you're out of the crisis of the movement and people go on to the next thing and don't want to talk about that anymore. So I wanted it to exist. And as it turns out, it didn't connect with the audience. I think it was a very difficult film to market.

Dame Donna Langley28:10

The film is wonderful. I'm very proud of it and I'm very glad that we made it. I I don't like losing money on on a film at all, but if there was one we were going to lose some money on, that was a worthwhile endeavor.

Presenter28:23

And of course, that's the nature of the industry. There are challenges come along. Hollywood currently experiencing a period of industrial unrest. How do you personally feel about the dispute?

Dame Donna Langley28:33

Well, the strike is very unfortunate because it comes at a time where the industry was just getting its self back on its feet after the pandemic. And to have this kind of disruption and interruption is going to have an impact. I remember the 2008 strike, and it has an impact for a couple of years or even more. It fundamentally changes things. And I'm not sure that everybody quite understands the magnitude of that impact that it might have. Now, of course, everybody wants to feel like they're being paid

Dame Donna Langley29:12

appropriately and equitably.

Presenter29:15

Dame Donna Langley, we've got to make time for the music. It's your seventh choice today, your penultimate disc. What have you got for us next?

Dame Donna Langley29:22

All my friends by L C D Sound System. It makes me think about, you know, friends who I'm with and friends who I wish I was with. It does also remind me of just a really beautiful time at the not at the beginning of my relationship with my husband, but right around the time maybe we had a first son and we were still um

Dame Donna Langley29:41

Irresponsible enough that we would have late-night dinner parties and then have to get up at six in the morning.

Speaker 129:42

Yeah.

Dame Donna Langley29:46

But this was one we were put on and danced to.

Speaker 229:50

Uh

Speaker 229:54

We go back to your house.

Speaker 230:02

You check the charts

Speaker 230:07

And start to figure it out

Presenter30:19

L C D Sound System and all my friends. Donna Langley, you have two sons and you've described being a mother as the missing piece of the puzzle for you. What did you mean by that?

Dame Donna Langley30:29

Well, I think this might go back to being adopted, which is seeing my kids. It's probably very egocentric, but living, breathing things who are biologically related to me, it's a very visceral feeling. But that to the side, being a mother is the most joyful experience. Just watching them develop, watching them turn into these wonderful humans, these young men, and seeing what they're interested in and what moves them and their personalities come to life, it's an incredible feeling.

Presenter31:03

and D still go back to the Isle of Wight from time to time.

Dame Donna Langley31:05

Yes, I was there a few months ago. My sister lives there with my brother in law, and my parents are there. Nothing's changed since I grew up there, so it's just a very heartwarming feeling to go back.

Presenter31:16

I'm afraid all that said, Dame Donalangle, you are off to a new home now. What are your expectations of your desert island?

Dame Donna Langley31:23

Well, my expectations of being on a desert island are that I'm going to be able to rest for a while. I'm really looking forward to that.

Dame Donna Langley31:33

And, you know, just maybe have a really long nap. Oh, yeah, that sounds alright.

Presenter31:37

Are you are you okay with your own company? I mean, you're s surrounded by people and people asking you a million questions a day. How will you get on when all of that buzz and hubbub stops?

Dame Donna Langley31:46

I think I am quite good at being alone. Of course I would miss everybody, but I think I can entertain myself quite easily.

Presenter31:54

Billy.

Presenter31:55

One more track before we send you away to your desert islands. Your eighth choice today. What have you gone for?

Dame Donna Langley32:01

It's Come Home by Anderson Pack featuring Andre 3000. Anderson Pack is a wonderful LA-based artist and he's one of the only artists that we can all agree on to listen to when we're in the car, in the family. So my husband always plays music and I wanted to pick something that reminds me of him, but this also reminds me of him and my children. It also evokes a really beautiful time actually during the pandemic. My sons learned to surf and we would drive along the highway with all the windows open listening to this song, listening to Anderson Pack on our way to the beach, which was such an incredible treat to be able to get out and about somewhere we felt safe and watch my boys learn to surf.

Presenter32:13

When we're in the car, in the family.

Dame Donna Langley32:48

Darling, I have to be moved from afar. The truth is the only thing.

Dame Donna Langley32:56

Worth holding on to anymore

Dame Donna Langley33:01

Untie me, let me loose from the cord I'm so gone, so far, I deserve more.

Dame Donna Langley33:11

Yeah.

Dame Donna Langley33:13

I'm begging you, babe.

Presenter33:16

Come home Anderson Park featuring Andre 3000. So Dame Donna Langley, I'm going to send you away to the island. I'm giving you the Bible, the complete works of Shakespeare, and you can take another book of your choice. What would you like?

Presenter33:29

Love in the t

Dame Donna Langley33:29

Time of Cholera by Gabrielle Garcia Marquez. It's so romantic, but it's also about missing people and yearning and not being with the people you love. So I thought it would be just good to sort of confront some of those feelings through the book. You can also have a luxury item. What would you like?

Dame Donna Langley33:48

Tarot cards. There might be times where I would wonder if I would ever get off the island and so I could consult my tarot cards. And then also tarot cards are quite fun because they're characters and I thought it was a way of being able to make up stories and imagine their lives and who they are and there's infinite possibilities with a box of tarot cards.

Presenter34:11

And f

Dame Donna Langley34:11

Finally

Presenter34:11

Which one track of the eight that you've shared with us today would you rush to save from the waves if you needed to? It would be All My Friends by L C D Sound System.

Presenter34:21

Dame Donna Langley, thank you very much for sharing your desert island discs with us. Thank you so much.

Presenter34:46

Hello, I hope you enjoyed my conversation with Donna. At least she knows all about island life. We've cast away many people from the world of film, including Gorinda Chadda, Steven Spielberg, Steve McQueen, and Oppenheimer director Christopher Nolan. You can find these episodes in our Desert Island Discs programme archive and through BBC Sounds. The studio manager for today's programme was Duncan Hannant, the assistant producer was Natalia Fernandez, and the producer was Paula McGinley. The series editor is John Gowdy. Next time, my guest will be the fashion designer Patrick Grant. I do hope you'll join us.

Speaker 135:32

Hello, I'm Melvin Bragg and I'm back with a new series of BBC Radio 4's In Our Time. We're celebrating our 1000th episode, so there's an extraordinary range of topics for you to get stuck into, from history, science and philosophy, to religion and the arts. This series we're discussing Albert Einstein, Inmar Bergman, Plankton, the Versailles Treaty and much more. In Our Time is like an audio encyclopedia, we're told, and you can hear it all on BBC Sounds. I hope you enjoy it.