Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Castaway
1 appearance
Retail visual merchandiser famous for theatrical window displays at Harrods and Harvey Nichols, and a Christmas charity display that saved money.
On the island
Eight records
I brought this in when I gave birth to my son. And I brought this album in and played it constantly. And I think these are one of the tracks that he came into the world to.
I just have this music and being pushed round the garden with the go kart and all of us in the garden and the dog and Mungo Jerry in the summertime.
Casta divaFavourite
Jo and I have a very special time where once a year we go to the opera. And this piece of music from Norma, the aria from Norma, just reminds me of Jo and I sitting so still together, which was so unusual when you look back at our childhood and listening to this wonderful piece of music.
I remember the day that this album came home, Marvin Gaye's What's Going On?
Watford College. Me and my brother Lawrence dressing up. We'd heard on the John Peel the Cure were playing, and we went down to see them and just one of the greatest bands of all time. So this one's for you, Lawrence.
it's Sunhouse Crazy at the Weekend, and it's just probably one of my favorite albums of all time.
I just love Pedro Amoldoval's films, and this piece of music is from the film Talk to Her, and when I heard it and saw this was about the bullfighter and this wonderful nurse who sits next to her bed to make her better after she's had a terrible accident, it just brings back just all the wonderful emotion that Imoldeval's films are about.
I'm just a radio head fan and my daughter Verity's a radio head fan with me too and we put this on in the car and we just sing to it together and it's just fantastic. And there's part of this that makes me think a bit of the fashion industry, the fake plastic trees, with all these wonderfully fake plastic faces and fake plastic people.
In conversation
Presenter asks
1:07How do you feel when you're sitting in the driving seat?
Funnily enough, as I get older, I'm more confident. It's not a control thing. I genuinely don't think it is a control thing. It just feels natural and it feels warm and I enjoy it. But I like other people in the car with me.
Presenter asks
2:02Do you think you're a bit terrifying?
I don't know. I I should imagine sometimes I come across like that, but I think the people who know me know that I'm completely not at all that. Truthfully, not that at all. I mean, I think the thing about women in business is one always has to try and put the terrifying if you're you know, you're confident. If you're a man in business, you're seen as kind of wonderfully ball-breaking and go-ahead. And if you're a woman in business, you're seen as slightly terrifying and ice maiden-ish, but it's not true.
Presenter asks
9:54Can you take me through what happened [when your mother contracted meningitis]?
Very quick. I mean, I came home from school and my brother Michael said, Oh, mum's in bed. I never kn knew my mother being that oh, she she's not well. And um I went up to see her and I said, Mummy, I'm going to go out to the shops. I'll get you some lemonade, you know? And she said, What's lemonade? and I remember thinking Oh. Oh my God. Um but she ended up being rushed into hospital five days later and then went into a coma and died a week after that.
The keepsakes
The book
Rumi
My favourite, I think, would be the poet Rumi. I would have the works of Rumi, who is this Persian poet and philosopher. All these hundreds of years later, I read his stuff and I think, God, you had the world sus, didn't you? That will sustain you.
The luxury
A set of custom fragrances from all the people I love
I would love to have a bottle, and I know a great perfumer who'll do it for me, a set of different fragrances that he could create from all the people I love. And I'll just smell them away on that island.
Presenter asks
13:32How long was it before your father then left the home?
Yeah, he um about a year. He met some woman and became like this ridiculous kind of love sick puppy and um. Married her. Which we all thought at some point, oh, you know, good for dad, you know, that's great. But he then married her and went to live with her, and then we maintained the family home. So he left us in the family home, because by which time my elder siblings were, you know, in their twenties and they would come back and I we would be self sufficient in the family home.
Presenter asks
15:00When you look back at that situation now as a mother yourself, [how do you feel about your father leaving]?
I I actually look back now and I look at my children who, you know, not far off, you know, not far off. Lawren Mila will be the same age as Lawrence was, my younger brother, and I just think, how could anyone have done this? I just really think, how could anyone have done this? We still talk about it today, not often, but my brothers and I and my sister and will say he just had really taken leave of his senses, we think. I really genuinely think he was so traumatised by the death of my mother that he just was seeking any type of personal happiness.
Presenter asks
31:03How did your teenagers deal with [your same-sex relationship]?
Oh, you're just embarrassing, Mummy. Don't mention that. So I'm just a bit of an embarrassment. ... Look, when they tell me, you know, don't turn up in those purple Proudhon shoes, Mummy, when you come to watch me play lacrosse, you know I'm an embarrassment anyway. But yeah, of course it's you know, there were times that they thought, ooh, but they have a great home life and we have a great life together.
“I think the thing about women in business is one always has to try and put the terrifying if you're you know, you're confident. If you're a man in business, you're seen as kind of wonderfully ball-breaking and go-ahead. And if you're a woman in business, you're seen as slightly terrifying and ice maiden-ish, but it's not true.”
“I actually look back now and I look at my children who, you know, not far off, you know, not far off. Lawren Mila will be the same age as Lawrence was, my younger brother, and I just think, how could anyone have done this? I just really think, how could anyone have done this?”
“I picked Mila up in my arms and I walked over to her and I said, It's Mary. And said Mary, how are you? And I said, I'm fantastic. This is my son, Milo. And my daughter Verity's outside with my husband. And life's been great, really great. I just hope yours has been the same. And with that I walked, I left a trolley, I walked out the door. And I just burst into tears outside and sobbed and sobbed. But I let it go. It had gone.”