I think I like this new, uninhibited little old lady I’ve become
That’s Life! Friends Dame Esther Rantzen and Adrian Mills chat to MARION McMULLEN about working together again on a new podcast
What is it like working with each other again, on new podcast That’s Life After?
Adrian Mills: (Laughs) A complete nightmare, honestly.
Dame Esther Rantzen: The thing about podcasts is that because they are so intimate, and because Adrian and I know each other so well, the reality keeps breaking through the very thin veneer of civilisation that I’ve attempted to impose all these years.
We were just discussing my latest disgrace. I was talking to Chris Evans on Virgin Radio and I was attempting to say the website address for the podcast and got it all wrong and I said ‘Oh, bum’ and there was a bit of a nervous breakdown because it was live.
I said ‘I’m awfully sorry. Am I allowed to say bum on Virgin Radio or is it too pure?’ And Chris said Dame Esther can say what she likes.
It then reminded me of being on breakfast television with the adorable Susanna Reid and her mother. Someone was saying the problem with the new media is it’s all so fast with things like emails, and older people can’t think that fast.
I took that personally and said ‘What’s polite for b ****** s?’ Adrian: We’re waiting for Ofcom to ring her any moment now. If we were in a studio together doing this podcast I would have a taser with me and would be zapping her leg to stop her.
Esther: I don’t think I swear very often.
Age – and I know it from doing That’s Life – disinhibits you, because you think ‘What the heck? I might as well come out with what I really think’.
Adrian: Esther always used to say, talk to people with life experience. They might have a wealth of stories that they have never mentioned to anybody and you find absolute gold nuggets there.
What is it like having guests such as Michael Palin, Joanna Lumley, Anton Du Beke and Barry Humphries on the podcast?
Adrian: What’s good about all these guests, and what’s quite revealing, is, it’s a bit like Esther is an onion and we are slowly peeling back the layers to reveal more and more.
A lot of the guests we have got on have worked with Esther 20, 30 and 40 years ago – (laughs) I’m being generous there – and they know where the bodies are buried.
They have tales to tell that people will go ‘No, I don’t believe it.’ I think it’s revelatory.
It started off as just a bit of banter about people playing the That’s Life theme tune on the radiator and has turned into an exposé.
Have you discovered anything about Esther you did not know?
Adrian: (Laughs) Let’s get on to how Esther likes to celebrate, when it comes to special birthdays, that was the big revelation as far as I’m concerned.
Esther: What you have to understand is that my birthday is in June – the weather is warm.
There’s a soft, warm zephyr breeze, the garden is full of sunshine and, when I was 50, I woke up on my birthday next to my adorable husband Desmond and I saw a large chiffon hat on a chair.
So I stuck it on my head and ran around the garden in the nude.
He came down and saw me fluttering in the all together, in a way I think Anton Du Beke had never seen when I did Strictly.
Desmond went and got my camera and there are photographs. Adrian: I hasten to add this was in the New Forest and not Hampstead.
Esther: I did try and sunbathe nude in Hampstead and only when I got up did I turn round and see the roof terrace was overlooked by a block of flats.
Adrian: I’ve put Esther’s name down for Channel 4’s Naked Attraction. It’s one of those programmes that if I was sat at home with my parents when I was younger there would be this mad scramble to find the remote to switch it off. All my parents did if there were something risqué on was to take my glasses off, so I couldn’t see anything.
Esther: Naked Attraction is very boring if you can’t see it.
Adrian: It wouldn’t work on radio.
Esther: We do the podcast naked, you realise that?
Adrian: I’m only wearing a jumper for this.
Esther: I think I like this new, uninhibited little old lady I have become.
How did you celebrate your 80th birthday last year?
Esther: I did exactly the same thing I did at 50, but with a different hat ... and I took photographs. I have them on the phone; a little selfie.
I was going to have a party, but had to cancel it obviously, but That’s Life went completely mad and I think there were about 60 people, all of us online. That was the inspiration for the podcast because we had such a good time laughing for about three hours. Adrian: We actually made almost a complete episode of That’s Like and everything was done on Zoom.
We had street interviews, talented pets, the whole works. It was a joyous celebration.
That’s Life finished in 1994. But hardly a day goes by without someone saying “Weren’t you on ... Tomorrow’s World?”. No, That’s Life. They remember it fondly. We had an audience of 20 million and they next day people would be saying ‘Did you see that dog that said sausages?’
The reason the podcast is called That’s After Life is we ask all our guests what they think the after life is going to be like and what they will be taking with them.
The replies are very interesting. People can also contact us on the website.