Will Poulter on OCD and intrusive thoughts: “It’s never easy but it gets easier!”

Coping with mental health conditions is never easy, but it does get easier; that’s what actor Will Poulter has learnt through his own experiences with OCD, anxiety, and intrusive thoughts. In this chat with Fearne, Will explains how OCD has manifested for him ever since he was a young kid. He also talks through why finding reasons to be grateful for the lessons mental health conditions have taught you can be helpful. If you’re honest with yourself... would you give yourself or others more grace if they had to take time off work because they’d broken their leg, as opposed to because their mental health was poor? Fearne and Will unpack that one, as well as discussing the importance of personalisation in looking after our brains. The same medication, meditation practice, or diet, is going to affect us all differently. Plus, do you constantly worry that you’ve said the wrong thing and pissed someone off? Fearne and Will have been there and offer their advice for overcoming that spiral... You can see Will in UK cinemas in Death of a Unicorn from April 4th, and Warfare from April 18th. If you liked this episode of Happy Place, you might also like: Joanna Lumley https://pod.fo/e/1612d1 Mel Robbins https://pod.fo/e/eedb2 Tuppence Middleton https://pod.fo/e/11128e Jordan Stephens https://pod.fo/e/136bdc Chiwetel Ejiofor https://pod.fo/e/2add68 Child on the line is a three-part documentary podcast series celebrating the Volunteer Counsellors of Childline, and the brave children & young people who contact the helpline service. Listen here: https://www.childonthelinepodcast.com/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy https://acast.com/privacy for more information.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 2:04Speaker 04

  One of the cruelest things about OCD is that often those intrusive thoughts and the worst thing you can imagine is the worst thing you can imagine and is something that your OCD has created precisely because it's the antithesis of how you actually feel.

• 2:19Fearne Cotton?

  What is the dish that you are now serving up as like your showpiece when people come over?

• 2:24Speaker 04

  Oh my gosh, you know, I have-

• 2:25Fearne Cotton?

  Is it quite wanky?

• 2:26Speaker 04

  It's-

• 2:27Fearne Cotton?

  Is it like a miso glazed aubergine or something?

• 2:31Speaker 04

  Seventeen different elements.

• 2:32Fearne Cotton?

  With tahini and yeah.

• 2:33Speaker 04

  No, it's, it's-

• 2:34Fearne Cotton?

  Okay.

• 2:35Speaker 04

  And the message was, we like you more as other people and actually here are more opportunities to be other people and that elicits, at least at the time, kind of a better response than the one I was getting just as myself, whatever that was.

• 2:52Fearne Cotton?

  Really happy to see you today.

• 2:53Speaker 04

  Thank you, thanks for having me on.

• 2:54Fearne Cotton?

  You were ill last week but you're okay now?

• 2:56Speaker 04

  I was ill last week and I'm definitely a lot better now, yeah.

• 2:59Fearne Cotton?

  Was it also your birthday last week?

• 3:00Speaker 04

  It was, it was, I'm thirty-two.

• 3:03Fearne Cotton?

  Thirty-two, how are you feeling about thirty-two?

• 3:05Speaker 04

  How am I feeling about thirty-two? It's funny, I, I for the longest time couldn't see past thirty in my imagination, I couldn't see a version of myself beyond thirty, I don't really know why, I think it's because I didn't know what it looked like or I, for whatever reason, I couldn't imagine myself in my thirties, but actually you couldn't pay me to go back to being in my twenties again, I'm like loving being in my thirties, yeah.

• 3:30Fearne Cotton?

  I feel like that about my thirties though, now in my forties, I'm like, you could not pay me to go back to my thirties, no way.

• 3:35Speaker 04

  I'm sort of hoping that that's how I'm gonna feel.

• 3:37Fearne Cotton?

  Oh, it just keeps getting better?

• 3:38Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah, that's what I'm hearing.

• 3:40Fearne Cotton?

  So, so now you're in the bit you can imagine, thirty-two, what is that like? Great?

• 3:44Speaker 04

  What is that like? Yeah, I'm really, I'm really enjoying it, I feel like in your twenties you learn a lot, right? Or at least that's how you should process the mistakes you make, all the things you go through and, no, I'm enjoying it and, and, and actually holding to that idea that it does get better and better and, you know, just in, on the kind of self-development journey, you know, just trying to make good choices and take care of yourself and be good to other people and, you know, that be the kind of, yeah, the, the guiding force, I guess.

• 4:15Fearne Cotton?

  And also at work, I think that changes, doesn't it? Like you, your confidence builds and your skill set broadened, I mean, you've been working for a very long time already, but everything- Gets better, I think, in terms of you feeling more comfy in your skin. I'm imagining your job is very performative and you've got to have that level of self-awareness to know what you're doing and how you're doing it. And you get comfier in your skin, would you say?

• 4:37Speaker 04

  I, I think so, yeah. I've, I've definitely had to work on that. Particularly because at a young age, when, you know, like a lot of people, and I think it's almost just part and parcel of growing up, right? And, and early self-development, I was really insecure and, and not remotely comfortable with my own skin. And I very quickly found a profession, like at the age of like thirteen, that basically rewarded me for being other people. And so that was quite interesting, where I found a job that I was also, that also happened to be my hobby. And so my greatest passion suddenly intersected with a profession. And the message was, we like you more as other people. And actually here are more opportunities to be other people.

• 5:20Speaker 04

  And that elicits, at least at the time, kind of a better response than the one I was getting just as myself, whatever that was. So I don't think I really kind of properly reckoned with who I was in between characters, without that sounding really like pretentious or sort of, um, uh, risk of being a bit wanky. But like, I, I don't think I really properly reckoned with who I was. And really engaged in like self-acceptance until I was in my like mid twenties. I kind of looked around and took stock of how I was living. And I was like, I'm putting more into the characters that I'm playing than I am actually like taking care of who I am in between the roles.

• 6:03Speaker 04

  So I'm really grateful that I did that work in my like mid to late twenties. So that now in my thirties, in theory, I'm a bit more secure in myself. And I'm better able to discern between like when I'm playing my characters and when I'm me, if that makes sense.

• 6:19Fearne Cotton?

  Well, I think that's actually jolly early for you to have done that, because I feel like I'm only doing that now in my mid forties, and I'm not exaggerating. I think. I mean, my job is obviously slightly different, but an exaggerated version of my personality was celebrated. And then you go, oh, actually, just, I'm quite bo- I'm just like a boring person with like, what have I got to offer? So then you you just become the heightened version of yourself, even outside of work, in your social setting. And that's confusing when, and I think it takes guts to actually strip all that back and go, I'm just gonna be me. Which on any given day might be really up for a laugh and a bit extroverted, or might be really quiet and a bit kind of,

• 7:04Fearne Cotton?

  you know, not bothered about engaging in the conversation going on around me and feeling okay with that. I I think I'm still quite uncomfortable with that a lot of the time.

• 7:12Speaker 04

  Yeah, and I think like the work's like never done, right?

• 7:15Fearne Cotton?

  Never.

• 7:16Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 7:16Fearne Cotton?

  That's the hard, that's the bad news.

• 7:18Speaker 04

  The hard reality.

• 7:19Fearne Cotton?

  We do this until we die.

• 7:20Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah, exactly, yeah, yeah, and it and it does get better.

• 7:23Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 7:24Speaker 04

  But it doesn't necessarily get, it doesn't necessarily get easy. I think it potentially gets easier as you accrue these, you know, skills and abilities to self-regulate and and take care of yourself and adjust and whatnot. But yeah, it it it never gets easy.

• 7:43Fearne Cotton?

  No. So so when you were playing roles at a really young age, when you were in sort of Rambo, saying you're a tiny kid, what, thirteen, fourteen?

• 7:50Speaker 04

  Yeah, twelve, twelve, thirteen, yeah.

• 7:52Fearne Cotton?

  It how, so you've, so you're already getting that message, okay, this character is getting a great reaction, so this is brilliant. You know, when you then go back to school or are with friends, were you tempted to take a bit of that character with you? Sort of hijack a bit of it for your own life? How did that? Because you're so young, do you even have the awareness to know what's the character and what's you at that point?

• 8:14Speaker 04

  Yeah, it's it's it's funny, because, look, I might have misspoke in a sense, so like, I never really confused who I was with the characters. But one thing was for certain, was that I felt more confidence playing a character than I did being myself. Because being myself just felt like less stable ground, because it it required sort of more consistency. And and and that when, you know, you're hormonal and growing up and struggling with, you know, your your mental health, as I was at that age with several undiagnosed kind of mental health issues.

• 8:52Speaker 04

  I I just I just didn't I just didn't settle into a consistent version of myself. I was so overwhelmed and burdened with what other people thought of me. And then I think finding something that gave me some version of instant gratification. Like I knew when we'd got a take. I knew when performing live, when something, you know, got a laugh and didn't. It it just, there was a, there was a more recognisable feedback loop when I was playing a character or when I was at work. Whereas as a person in between playing those characters and and being at work, I didn't have that gratification. I was constantly living with the uncertainty of, did someone like me or did I say the wrong thing? And and that was a big source of my kind of anxiety for the for the longest time was, am I enough?

• 9:37Speaker 04

  Am I okay? Am I saying the right thing? Do people like me? Have I caused offence? It was like, it really kind of, I I would say, sort of defined pretty much every waking moment of my life for the longest time. Like, whether I've said or done the right thing. Um, and that is with like really wonderful parents and a school that was really supportive of me going away and doing that work. And, you know, a a really like privileged and fortunate start. And I think that that only allows me to kind of empathise with how hard it is for folks who are potentially like much less fortunate than than me in that respect.

• 10:12Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, I mean, it's tricky. The whole, I think this is a really interesting conversation to have because most people listening to this will have been racked with worry that they've said the wrong thing, that they pissed somebody off. I mean, I've wasted whole nights of sleep worrying about one thing I've said that the other person probably didn't even hear.

• 10:29Speaker 04

  Yep.

• 10:29Fearne Cotton?

  And I and I'm literally in a negative loop of panicking. And I would say only in the last six months have I managed to find a level of, it's probably not even peace, but I can live alongside it and not lose sleep. And I feel so good about that.

• 10:45Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 10:45Fearne Cotton?

  One of the things that's really helped is Mel Robbins has got this brilliant, I think she's coming on the podcast soon, has got a brilliant short phrase, which is let them. So if someone's talking shit about you, or if someone is thinking badly of you or whatever, you know, it's obviously out of our control. And having that moment of, you know, having some sort of definition between like, I'm over here doing my thing, didn't mean to cause harm. They're all bitching about me, let them, like, let them, let them, let them. And that has helped so hugely, but I think. Again, it goes, it's just about sort of self-acceptance, self-compassion. Letting yourself feel that discomfort, but not, it's those little loops where you torture yourself for hours and hours and it's, I've been there. It's horrendous. How much do you care what people think of you now?

• 11:31Speaker 04

  Um, I think I'm getting better at sort of conceding to the idea that it is outside of my control. Provided I can stand by how I've conducted myself and, and provided I can feel good about. Um, how I've been towards somebody and how I've impacted them. Um, you know, because sometimes I'm, I'm concerned with like total abandon of how other people think about you. Sometimes for me, I'm still struggling with that idea that it might coincide with not caring about how you behave towards other people. Do you know what I mean? Like that you, you're still obviously responsible for how you are and your actions. Um, but yeah, I, I totally agree with the idea that you, you can't certainly like waste.

• 12:13Speaker 04

  Sleep worrying about someone else's sort of actions towards you. Um, so I'm getting there. You know, I think the biggest challenge for me on the self-development journey has been sort of self-compassion. And, and I even use that over self-love because for the longest time, and I suppose still to a degree, the concept of self-love. And I don't know whether this will strike a chord with anyone listening, but the concept of self-love was always something I really struggled with. Because I couldn't unmoor the concept of self-love from like something that felt um, kind of. Um, self-indulgent or um, like selfish or um, even like a little bit narcissistic at times. And that's not what I feel today, I think.

• 12:58Fearne Cotton?

  Quite a British perspective on it.

• 13:02Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 13:02Fearne Cotton?

  If you really hate yourself, you're, yeah, exactly. Yeah. Who the fuck do you think you are? I love you. It's just very British to really hate yourself.

• 13:09Speaker 04

  Exactly, yeah.

• 13:10Fearne Cotton?

  The Americans have got some things right.

• 13:12Speaker 04

  They've got, listen, and they're far, far more advanced, I think, uh, on.

• 13:16Fearne Cotton?

  In this area.

• 13:16Speaker 04

  In that area, one, one hundred percent. Um, and I think practicing at least self-compassion.

• 13:22Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 13:23Speaker 04

  Um, has been really, really important, you know, I think it's, it's also because some of the like. If I may say the like marketing around self-love just felt a bit like cheesy.

• 13:32Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, I think you can definitely say that.

• 13:35Speaker 04

  Do, do you know what I mean? Like a little bit cheesy and, and also that concept of. You know, starting with yourself in order to better serve other relationships. It just felt counterintuitive for a long time. I was like, if I wanna be, you know, a better servant to my relationships in my life, you know, be it family, be it friends, be it work, whatever it is, the concept of starting with yourself just felt like selfish, but.

• 14:00Fearne Cotton?

  But it works.

• 14:00Speaker 04

  But it it works and that that idea of filling up your cup so that you are able to pour out to other people's cups and and kind of, you know, be dependable as well. Um, I really, I really believe in and look, it's still very much a work in progress, but I'm I'm getting there. And self compassion, I can say all the time. Self love, I don't say as much. Things I spent so much of my time not loving myself.

• 14:24Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, it's hard.

• 14:25Speaker 04

  But yeah, maybe I'll get there, I don't know.

• 14:27Fearne Cotton?

  I just think when when you grow up in this country, it's just really hard. It's just a really hard concept to think, yeah, I really like myself and I'm gonna champion myself. It's because the messaging is not that outside of.

• 14:39Speaker 04

  Right.

• 14:39Fearne Cotton?

  Ourselves. It's it's a really tricky one. I mean, you have been extremely open at talking about your mental health and talking about OCD, generalized anxiety disorder, periods of depression. It's, I would imagine, being in Hollywood, being a big actor, is not conducive to those things evening out down the line or even managing them well. Would you say that's true?

• 15:03Speaker 04

  Yeah, I it's it's really interesting. I saw um Jesse Eisenberg uh speak about this brilliantly the other day. Um, and he's got a film called Real Pain, which I don't know if you've seen, but it's fantastic. Him and Kieran Culkin, I watched it just recently and it's amazing. And he says that in many respects, actors are quite literally the worst people you could possibly give sort of fame, public attention, money appraisal to, like, the things that ironically, I think, make a lot of actors sort of um in inverted commas, good at what they do is that they do have these emotional fragilities to them and we do often have, you know, mental health struggles and

• 15:48Speaker 04

  we are able to kind of access very kind of sensitive, raw elements of our um psychological makeup. But those same things are sore points in the public eye or, you know, with too much attention, et cetera. So. It's not to play a tiny violin for actors, I mean, I'm so lucky to do it.

• 16:06Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, but you're a human.

• 16:07Speaker 04

  But, right, right.

• 16:08Fearne Cotton?

  You're a human. I think you have to like, that shit annoys me. It's like, doesn't matter what you fucking do. Do you know what I mean? You're a human.

• 16:13Speaker 04

  Right, right.

• 16:14Fearne Cotton?

  And you've got a brain, and your brain works in mysterious ways.

• 16:16Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 16:16Fearne Cotton?

  And you've got a job that, yeah, it's a great job. Lots of people would love to be an actor, but do, do many people wanna be hounded by the press? And that every move scrutinised and, and everything highlighted under a magnifying glass? I don't think so.

• 16:28Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah, I know.

• 16:29Fearne Cotton?

  It's not, not fun.

• 16:30Speaker 04

  Right, and I still feel that element of, uh, you know, more comfort in, you know, playing a character and presenting that as my work. And then just, you know, stepping back and just kind of being me and being kind of relatively private. Um, and, and even though I feel comfortable in my own skin, or more so than I did in between roles. Um, you know, I'm still private and, and, and I still feel like public attention and, and the things that you mentioned do kind of erode at my wellbeing ultimately.

• 17:04Fearne Cotton?

  I don't think there's a single person that could honestly say that those things don't. They're, they're not natural, you know.

• 17:11Speaker 04

  Exactly.

• 17:11Fearne Cotton?

  It's not natural to have that many people think they know you, because they don't know you. You know, you could even sit here and talk as you are eloquently and honestly, but it, it takes proper friendship and time to get to know someone. But of course, the nature of celebrity is that everybody assumes, oh, I, I, I know exactly who Will is.

• 17:29Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 17:29Fearne Cotton?

  I know exactly the type of guy he is. And, and there's a discomfort in that when you're still trying to figure out who the fuck you are.

• 17:34Speaker 04

  Yeah, it's like, can you tell me then?

• 17:35Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 17:36Speaker 04

  I, I'm still working it out.

• 17:38Fearne Cotton?

  I don't know who I am.

• 17:38Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 17:39Fearne Cotton?

  I've no idea.

• 17:39Speaker 04

  Exactly.

• 17:40Fearne Cotton?

  It's really tricky. I mean, especially from a young age, because that is where you are still forming ideas of what the world is, who you are, how you fit into it. And all of a sudden, you've got everybody telling you how you should be, what you should do, all eyes on you. It's a tricky thing, you know, I, I, I've started on TV at fifteen and I think

• 17:58Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 17:58Fearne Cotton?

  a lot of that period was deeply confusing, slightly arrested my development in some ways.

• 18:04Speaker 04

  Hmm.

• 18:05Fearne Cotton?

  Also, I think people infantilise you and talk to you like you're a kid when you're thirty-two. Because they still think you're twelve in Son of Rambo. And you're like, no, no, I'm, I'm a, I'm a grown human being and I'm an adult with bills to pay or whatever. But people still see you as this kid.

• 18:20Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 18:21Fearne Cotton?

  How, how has that experience been for you?

• 18:23Speaker 04

  It's really interesting. I mean, I, I worked, I would say sparingly during, you know, what you'd sort of consider childhood. You know, I did like. Two, three films and a TV show, max. I've got friends who've been in the industry, you know, since they were ten and worked. I mean, two, three times a year up until they were sort of an adult. And so they can speak to this like a little better than I can. And it's really interesting. I've learnt from their experience in that I think I have a sort of version of this, which is. As a child actor, if you like, on set, you internalize a lot of things that, again, aren't quite natural and you wouldn't. Normally even come into contact with because you are kind of thrust into a relatively adult world.

• 19:07Speaker 04

  And so even in adulthood, I think as an actor, having started so young, sometimes I find myself. Behaving in quite a sort of um. Sometimes maybe overly deferential way, like asking for permission to go to the bathroom and um. Which, which, you know, you still do out of courtesy for the sake of the, you know, job kind of uh and everyone else a- around you and your team. So functioning well, you don't just disappear without explanation, but.

• 19:35Fearne Cotton?

  I'm sure some people do.

• 19:37Speaker 04

  But I think there's still a part of me that sort of feels like I have to. As sort of the child actor, ask the adults if that's okay. And, you know, just sort of the the concept of. Yeah, not standing anywhere you're not supposed to unless there's a mark and um, you know, kind of. Being told when you can eat and when you can't, things like that, that that those have, I think, sometimes in my mind, rightly or wrongly, kind of. Been conflated to this idea that I am still a child in some ways, like I it that that has arrested my development, if you like. And so to your point, you know, starting young, I think in some ways it accelerated my development. I think it allowed me to communicate with. Adults.

• 20:20Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 20:21Speaker 04

  Uh at times, you know, in a way that felt kind of peer to peer and and um matured me. And that idea of just performing under pressure in adult environments was definitely to my benefit in lots of respects. But there are still things now in adulthood where I'm I'm looking for approval sometimes. From people who are the same age as me, or sometimes even maybe have less experience, but I'm kind of. Mentally locked into this idea that I'm still that kid on set and I need the adults sort of say so. But that's that's also an interesting thing that I'm still kind of unpicking.

• 20:53Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, no, I get it. Well, because it sets the tone and it was, you know, it's a huge thing to happen in your childhood to be on a. In a big film, it's a massive thing for you psychologically to get your head around. Do you feel you missed any key milestones in that point of your life, you know, like school proms? Or even in the sense of your behaviour, because you know that all eyes are on you. Even if it's not the press, but you've got maybe your friends or your teachers. You stand out of the crowd, you're not one of the other kids. You're the kid that's in the film all of a sudden and everyone's kind of intrigued as to if it's changed you in any way. Or what's he doing and how's he behaving? Do you think you sort of missed out on any normalcy during that time?

• 21:32Speaker 04

  I'm really lucky because generally speaking, I don't feel that way. I don't feel like I missed out at all and that's thanks to just having a really, really solid core of friends. Who I've known really like my closest group of friends I've sort of known since I was like five, six years old.

• 21:50Speaker 04

  And some of them like seven, eight, but my closest group of friends really I've known for that long. So like, you know, over 20 years, which I'm now trying to de-age myself. Over 25 years.

• 22:03Speaker 04

  So, you know, that's very helpful. My family are amazing and they all work in industries that are far more sort of important than mine. Like they're nearly all in healthcare. And if they don't work in healthcare, they like volunteer and they're all incredibly charitable. And they, they all apply themselves in ways that to my mind have always been, you know, far more important than my kind of like day to day job. So that's given me a sense of context always. And I say that to say that I never came off a film set and sort of felt like, wow, you know, I'm special. Like, you know, because I knew the facts of the matter from, from young, so I'm grateful for that.

• 22:43Speaker 04

  And then, you know, quite honestly, when I came back to school, no one really cared that I'd just been on a film set or whatever else. And, and I didn't either and I was so happy to just get back to it without too much attention placed on that whatsoever. So I've been really lucky in that respect.

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• 24:47Fearne Cotton?

  And at what age do you think you noticed that something didn't feel great mentally?

• 24:54Speaker 04

  Oh my God. Yeah. I mean, from as early as I can remember.

• 24:58Fearne Cotton?

  Really?

• 24:59Speaker 04

  If I'm completely honest, yeah. And I was reflecting on this the other day and, you know, OCD is something I was diagnosed with in my early teens. And when I reflect on it, I think I had, you know, intrusive thoughts, which is sort of one of the kind of subsets of OCD, if you like. And I think I had intrusive thoughts, undiagnosed OCD, when I was aware of my imaginary best friend, for example. You know, it it just it just had a different um and, you know, typically imaginative spin on it for a child.

• 25:37Speaker 04

  Like, I can remember having this kind of voice in my head that told me, you know, if I didn't, you know, walk on certain paving stones on the way up to my, like, mum and dad's house, that, like, something terrible was gonna happen to them.

• 25:49Fearne Cotton?

  I mean, I still have that.

• 25:50Speaker 04

  Right, exactly.

• 25:52Fearne Cotton?

  I I did that on probably on the way in.

• 25:53Speaker 04

  Right.

• 25:54Fearne Cotton?

  That's one I can't let go of. It won't it won't fucking go. I can't do three drains.

• 25:58Speaker 04

  It's wild. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. No, it's.

• 26:00Fearne Cotton?

  Two drains, got to say something really positive about someone. Three drains, I will walk, I will make a scene to get around it. I can't get over that one.

• 26:08Speaker 04

  Across the street.

• 26:08Fearne Cotton?

  Oh, well, I can't go over it. It's ridiculous. I mean, I can go over it, because I'll walk around it, but mentally, I can't go over it.

• 26:13Speaker 04

  Mentally can't go over it. Yeah, it was so interesting. When I was younger, that was just.

• 26:17Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 26:18Speaker 04

  That was just this um this voice in my head, this like figure um that, you know, I I I labelled as this kind of like negative character in my life and only post my diagnosis and actually like well after, you know, knowing that I had OCD, um did I look back on that and go, oh, that's what that was, you know?

• 26:38Fearne Cotton?

  So what what at what point did you think, oh, this isn't, because when you're a kid, whatever you're thinking is just your normal. So you assume maybe everyone thinks like this, or you don't even, you're not even, you don't have the awareness or the detachment to think this is a thought. It's just you walking around. So at what point did you assume this is a problem, actually? This is causing me stress in my life now.

• 27:00Speaker 04

  Well, I was really lucky. I I got access to therapy um in my early teens. I was probably I was probably fourteen. Um. When I first started experiencing kind of obsessive compulsive thoughts and and the ruminations and intrusive thoughts and. You know, until it was diagnosed and until I received that therapy. I just thought I was totally alone with this um condition or or not even condition at that time with this way of thinking. With this sort of um defunct brain, I was so scared and that that's the that's, I think, the scariest thing about. You know, any mental health issues and you can never underestimate how alone um someone can feel in their state.

• 27:44Speaker 04

  You know, even when you're telling someone, you know, oh, I have anxiety too, or I deal with intrusive thoughts, or I have OCD. I know, because I've been there myself, ninety percent of the time, the other person's looking at you going, yeah, but you.

• 27:57Fearne Cotton?

  Not like me.

• 27:58Speaker 04

  But not me, though.

• 27:59Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 27:59Speaker 04

  And i- i- it may be that you are within five metres of someone at any given point who had experiencing the same thing or a version of that thing or. You know, it's really a a quite a sad a a and and potentially quite British expression, but it is also quite true that misery loves company.

• 28:17Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 28:17Speaker 04

  And there's some strange comfort in a way of knowing that other people are struggling too, and that's not because you want other people to be struggling, of course. But it makes you feel less alone and and and there's also comfort in knowing that you can be a support to someone just as they can be a support to you, that there's. Opportunity for mutualistic compassion and and support. And um yeah, I think I took some comfort in knowing that, you know, I'm I'm not alone and I can also recall. You know, and obviously a lot of advances have been made in respect of the mental health conversation and. How openly people talk about mental health. I can remember when I was going through it, and I mean, you know.

• 28:57Speaker 04

  I- into my late teens, maybe even early twenties, when people, when I saw people talking openly about mental health, I sometimes think, oh, don't. Don't publicise that or or don't put that out in the open, like, that's. To speak to your therapist about or or your family and and and of course, it is a subject that you you ideally want to do that with, you know, a therapist. Family members, friends, any, some some, anyone in your private life, but the power in also being open about it publicly. I've learned that I don't think you can underestimate how much that can potentially help someone else.

• 29:30Fearne Cotton?

  It's huge.

• 29:30Speaker 04

  You know, um, and, and so I, I do try and speak about it as openly as possible, as scary as it is sometimes.

• 29:36Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, of course.

• 29:37Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 29:37Fearne Cotton?

  It is. I mean, it's a strange thing to admit all of this stuff, you know, and, and it's a new conversation. It's probably only the last sort of ten, maybe fifteen years that anyone has been very openly talking about this stuff. And it is uncomfortable. I mean, I, I was diagnosed with OCD probably only about two years ago. And I probably only have had it for maybe, it was a bit of a reaction to stuff. So it was maybe seven, eight years. And, and I didn't realise, I didn't know enough about OCD. I just thought it was like you just went around the room tapping things or whatever, you know. A cliche, you've seen it on TV and you think, and I was like, I haven't got OCD. But it's the intrusive thoughts that are so evil and bleak.

• 30:15Fearne Cotton?

  The worst bit about it being that, I know I had no idea that my intrusive thoughts weren't fact. I assumed that if I had this idea, that if I didn't, or it wasn't even if I didn't do a thing, sometimes it would just be. I had this one, I'm not even gonna say it out loud, this one bleak thing that I thought this is the outcome that's gonna happen. And I, it's gonna happen because otherwise why would it keep coming to my head constantly? And it wasn't until a therapist said to me, that's, it's not real. Like, it's that simple. It's not real. That's not going to happen.

• 30:49Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 30:49Fearne Cotton?

  You're just in a loop of that's your go-to worst, worst-case scenario thought. And it was almost hearing that that was enough to go, what? Cause I just assumed that that was the outcome and I'm just waiting for this thing to happen now, for whatever reason. And there's no logic to it, obviously. There's no rhyme or reason. It's just you've landed on that being the worst-case scenario. And it pops into your head, fucking all the time. It's the pits, it's the pits. And like you say, hearing other people say, oh my god, I have, and it's not just an intrusive thought of, oh, I didn't like that thought. It makes you physically like, you wanna shake it off. It's like the worst, most uncomfortable thing ever. And I didn't even know that that was OCD until someone told me like three years ago.

• 31:33Fearne Cotton?

  So we do have to have these chats. We do have to talk about this stuff and. You know, if if two, three people listen to this go, oh, fucking hell, you know, that's actually causing me a lot of stress. I've never told anyone that.

• 31:43Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 31:44Fearne Cotton?

  Or maybe I've got OCD. You know, it's not about going into self diagnosing yourself with everything under the sun, but I think if you can put into context these things and know that they're not real.

• 31:53Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 31:53Fearne Cotton?

  That is helpful.

• 31:55Speaker 04

  So important.

• 31:56Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 31:56Speaker 04

  The distinction between fact and feeling.

• 31:58Fearne Cotton?

  Christ, it's important.

• 31:59Speaker 04

  Is massive and and you're so right. It's one of the cruelest aspects of OCD is I think it totally distorts that. And I think through repetition, you know, and just the constant rumination, it it blurs that distinction between fact and feeling so much where you start to confuse your feelings for facts and vice versa. And, you know, something I actually saw, and I I want to mention them only because they they, you know, spoke about this openly on a podcast and and I really appreciated it. And I haven't told them personally, but um, Jordan and Harley Rizzle Kicks, I heard them talking, you know, a- as they have done like quite openly about their mental health.

• 32:37Speaker 04

  And something really, really interesting um that I believe um Jordan said about Harley, the two of them spoke about this kind of in tandem. The really fascinating thing about OCD and potentially one of its cruelest things, but hearing this helped me massively. So I hope if anyone else is going through it, they can also take some kind of um comfort in this. One of the cruelest things about OCD is that often those intrusive thoughts and the worst thing you can imagine is the worst thing you can imagine and is something that your OCD has created precisely because it's the antithesis of how you actually feel.

• 33:15Fearne Cotton?

  Hmm.

• 33:16Speaker 04

  And it actually takes what you value most or the version of yourself that you most want to be, your idealistic self, um the way that you wanna conduct yourself, your sort of idealistic behaviour and it creates a kind of subverted version of that whereby it convinces you that the opposite is going to happen or you are going to become the opposite of who you want to be or you are going to behave in a way that is the most abhorrent um way you could possibly imagine behaving or um the most terrible thing, you know, you could think of happening is gonna happen. OCD is so cruel that it'll, it'll do that.

• 33:55Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, we'll jump on that and own it.

• 33:57Speaker 04

  It will, yeah.

• 33:58Fearne Cotton?

  It's the worst. We had Jordan on the podcast and he was so brilliant and talked about everything from addiction to ADHD and everything in between. And again, you know, he's doing brilliant work and you know, talking about all sorts of things, which is, it's so, so important. But I think, yeah, OCD is, is one of those, it's, it's the mental health condition that's still sort of joked about, you know, oh, you're neat and tidy. You've got OCD. It's not quite that, guys.

• 34:19Speaker 04

  I know, yeah.

• 34:21Fearne Cotton?

  And it's really important that we talk about all the different shades of, of how it can manifest. It's not, you know, it might be turning on and off light switches. It might be having to touch everything in a room and, you know, all sorts, but it might also jump onto the worst case scenario and play that image in your head a hell of a lot and it's horrible. Has that ever crossed over into your work? Has it ever impacted you being on set or doing something you really want to do?

• 34:45Speaker 04

  Yeah, you know what? Actually, that's one of the things I'm quite grateful of is that I think as I've taken better care of myself, off set and in between jobs, I think my, my work has gotten easier, like in, in respect of what we said earlier. Like I think it's made life in general a little bit easier, not easy, but easier. And I think I've been able to sort of practise a little bit more emotional regulation and control because,

• 35:17Speaker 04

  you know, the intrusive thoughts often used to come right when the pressure was highest at work. Or I knew, for example, really, really difficult scene, you know, we have to get it in one take. And my intrusive thoughts would be, you're terrible, you can't do this, you're atrocious. It's the end of your career after this take, you're the worst actor ever, da, da, da, you know, whatever it was. And that would obviously get to me. And, and now as I've learnt a few different coping mechanisms and I think through therapy and medication too, I've just got a little bit, uh, just a little bit more of a handle on it. Let's not say that I don't still have, you know, really difficult days. Um, but yeah, the intrusive thoughts often used to rise up at the, you know, the, the.

• 36:02Speaker 04

  Just at the moment when you don't want them, and that is quite often when they present themselves.

• 36:06Fearne Cotton?

  It's the pits. I've so been there, where I'm like, I'm floating out of my body, guys, and I'm about to do a live TV thing, and I'm not even in my skin anymore. I'm up in the corner of the room over there. It's always the worst, worst moment. Has it ever got to the point where you thought, I can't do this anymore, I can't do acting anymore?

• 36:24Speaker 04

  Um, thankfully not, and it's the weird double edged sword, I think I was kind of referring to earlier, of being an actor whereby, in a strange way, the depths that I've sunk to as a result of OCD, anxiety and depression, are the depths that have allowed me to act certain things, perform certain roles, embody certain characters. And it sounds so odd, I mean, I would never wish OCD, depression or anxiety on anyone. But in a weird way, I think my capacity to go to those depths or feel that kind of darkness

• 37:05Speaker 04

  also allows me to appreciate the sunlight and, you know, the lighter moments and, um, you know, feel things in an antithetical way where I'm, where I'm, you know, happier for it too. It's really odd. Um, and, you know, I think maybe that's just a coping mechanism in itself, right? A, a, a choice. Um, a way of identifying a silver lining in it, but I'm oddly thankful for my mental health conditions because it's allowed me to appreciate the moments where I am more happy or more content or just more stable.

• 37:40Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, I think when you, you know, it's a funny thing, isn't it? Because I, I think I used to obsess about reading stories about people that certainly had depression or anxiety and go, oh, and they're not in it now. How, how did they get to the bit where they're not in it? And cling on to that like it was some sort of ascent, rather than it being a big wiggly line, which we all know it is.

• 37:59Speaker 04

  Big wiggly line, big bowl of pasta.

• 38:01Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, exactly. There's like peaks and troughs and there's bits which are really awful. And then you have moments where you're feeling really great again, and that's amazing and to be celebrated. But I think. That's the interesting thing is I used to think that you just would crawl out of it and then you're just like happy forever and everything's great. But actually, if you can learn to lean into those bits where you're not feeling anxious at the moment, I feel I don't have any anxiety at the moment.

• 38:22Speaker 04

  That's great.

• 38:23Fearne Cotton?

  Maybe a combination of, you know, doing therapy, which you feel very lucky to do and a few other things going on. And that's not to say there's zero, but it's a damn sight better than I was, say, seven years ago, where I was just having panic attacks all day long. And I think when you can really appreciate those moments where it's not around.

• 38:40Speaker 04

  Hmm.

• 38:41Fearne Cotton?

  And trust that, you know, you you're in it now and, you know, you and it might last for a while. It's it's so lovely to have that appreciation for just normal, level-headed.

• 38:52Speaker 04

  Right.

• 38:52Fearne Cotton?

  Feeling balanced, grounded life.

• 38:54Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 38:54Fearne Cotton?

  I totally get what you're saying.

• 38:56Speaker 04

  Hmm.

• 38:57Fearne Cotton?

  And also, I totally understand what you're saying about, you know, having that access for for these characters to evolve and to be brought to life, which makes you bloody great actors, because you believe it, you see it. And, you know, we had, um, Chua Tell, Edgar For on the other day. He was so amazing and we had a sort of similar chat about how much you bring of your own personal experience to a character. And he was saying he actually tries to not do that too much, which really surprised me. He doesn't necessarily want to go to those depths or draw on it too hugely.

• 39:29Speaker 04

  Hmm.

• 39:30Fearne Cotton?

  But I feel like what you're saying is the opposite, like that's helpful. You can dig around in this little pool of shit you've been through and bring it to a character.

• 39:37Speaker 04

  Yeah, a little bit and, you know, rather like every actor's sort of process is different. Like everyone's sort of mental health experience is different, right? I think one of the things that constantly gets overlooked in the subject of physical and mental health, and and the two need to be spoken about as being, um, more intertwined. Because I believe they they are more intertwined than kind of we maybe, you know, talk about. You know, one of the reasons I think it's it's kind of interesting when we talk about dieting or training regimes, um, in the context of physical health.

• 40:14Speaker 04

  There is this kind of one size fits all attitude. And that's really interesting because everyone's digestive system and, you know.

• 40:22Fearne Cotton?

  Yep.

• 40:23Speaker 04

  Microbio and, you know, their.

• 40:26Fearne Cotton?

  Family history.

• 40:27Speaker 04

  Family history, genetic, you know, all of that body type, all that stuff is is so wildly unique that the idea that sort of one size fits all. It just just doesn't make sense to me. And and the same is true when we talk about mental health. I think. Look no further than, you know, a complicated organ for your brain. It's like everyone's neurochemistry is so unique and different. And it's also fascinating to me that I think neuroscientists, and this is some real like back of a napkin math here, but. Neuroscientists sort of sort of openly say that they kind of only really understand thirty percent of the brain.

• 41:02Fearne Cotton?

  Yep.

• 41:02Speaker 04

  It's a little bit like being a geographer and being like, well, yeah, we understand the the green bits, but the blue stuff we're still trying to work out. Like the seventy percent of the world, like the the sea, we don't know what's going on there.

• 41:12Fearne Cotton?

  No.

• 41:12Speaker 04

  But we can tell you what's going on with the green. Like, that's what's going on with our brains. And so. The idea that the same meditation practice or the same medication or the same form of therapy or the same self care regime. Is going to yield the same results for everybody is just is just untrue. So there is an element of trial and error. And and there is um a real degree of sort of finding what works for you. And so bringing it back to the acting conversation, I I know that to be true of of acting. Because I know it to be true of of my, you know, experience with my own mental health and. It's such a intimate relationship with psychology acting. I think that's why I love it.

• 41:54Speaker 04

  And it's a study of human beings and it's a study of the human condition and psychological development. And so for me, I can't really approach it all that differently. And I think I'd be. Lost if I didn't draw on my own personal experiences.

• 42:11Speaker 04

  But also, I would love to be as good as Tua Telashor acting.

• 42:15Fearne Cotton?

  You are.

• 42:16Speaker 04

  Whatever he's doing, whatever he's doing is clearly working and it's fascinating to see different people's approaches.

• 42:21Fearne Cotton?

  It is, because I guess, you know, you don't want to dig around in tricky parts of your own psyche for your job and be left in that state, surely, to go home feeling slightly re-traumatized or like you've taken yourself to a place of deep depression because your character needed it. Do you have anything that then gets you back to, and I'm going home now and I'm going to cook a meal and go to bed like I would normally?

• 42:44Speaker 04

  Yeah, you know, being around like friends and family and reconnecting with people I really love and care about is huge. I think that that's probably a mistake I made previously whereby post a job, I sort of went straight back into chasing the next thing or, I don't know, I, I, I would sometimes just not be as sociable as I ought to have been and I sort of almost forced myself into contact with, with people post jobs because I know how restorative it is. So I, I do that now. It's, it's, it's, you know, company. And I'm really lucky that I have, you know, great people in my life with whom I kind of can talk openly about mental health as well.

• 43:27Speaker 04

  Should anything kind of arise? I mean, I talk about it very regularly.

• 43:30Fearne Cotton?

  Would you on set? Because I think especially with anxiety, if you, if you're feeling certainly panic, the worst thing you can do is just internalize that and not say anything and be in your head going, oh my god, I'm gonna have a panic attack and no one knows, and do I look normal? And you're just, everything is just wildly out of control in your head. But actually, as soon as you, I've had it before and I've said to someone I'm working with, I feel like I'm back to have a panic attack so I'm just gonna step to one side for a minute. And then it goes because you've said it. The worst thing is when it's sort of breeding and percolating in secrecy in your own mind. Would you, would you feel comfy to do that on set to say, I'm just feeling a bit off here, guys, I need a minute?

• 44:07Speaker 04

  Yeah, it's really interesting, isn't it? Because.

• 44:11Speaker 04

  You know, just returning to that idea of the distinction between physical and mental health. And there is, of course, some distinction, but like I say, they're not really spoken about as being as intertwined as I believe they are. If you were physically ill or you had broken your leg, you know, saying that, explaining that, you wouldn't feel nearly as much, you know, discomfort.

• 44:34Fearne Cotton?

  No.

• 44:35Speaker 04

  Or, you know, self doubt as you do if you say, you know, that mentally you're you're struggling with with something. And um, I think that I don't have really any issue when when it comes down to, you know, struggling with my mental health and and saying as much. And in my experience in recent years, I've seen an increasing level of kind of empathy for that. And um, less and less sort of call it uh friction around, you know, that being a problem or or someone sort of making allowances or uh compensations around, you know, not being in a great place mentally.

• 45:14Speaker 04

  I've been really, really actually sort of encouraged by how much empathy there has been within the industry around around, you know, mental health struggles and and recognizing uh mental health as I think we we ought to, with the same level of respect as we have for physical health. Um, so, yeah, I haven't personally um had any kind of too many issues in that regard. That's not to say there isn't still a lot of work to do.

• 45:39Fearne Cotton?

  Well, it's like any workplace, isn't it? There's going to be people that are receptive to that conversation, have things in place, resources and other people that maybe they haven't been personally touched by it. Or they're just not bothered about it and it's a place of work and it's, you know, different, I guess, wherever you go. I read that you um, when you were filming Dopesick.

• 45:57Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 45:58Fearne Cotton?

  That you, that really got you thinking about your mental health in different ways. What what kind of happened during the filming of that? It's such an interesting show and obviously one that. You know, it it the opioid crisis is something that is still a huge problem. You were shooting in Virginia where there is an opioid crisis. And I believe that a lot of the crew members were sort of quite touched by what you were filming. Cause it had obviously touched all of them personally in some way, or you know, by extension, there was someone in their life that had been through it. How did that impact you filming it?

• 46:28Speaker 04

  Yeah, that's a really good question. That that was sort of a perfect storm um for me to kind of have a sort of tough time a bit mentally. Um I think it was like we were, we were shooting while I think certainly in the UK, things were locked down. And really only certain parts of the States were kind of emerging out of a sort of version of lockdown. With still a a a a number of Covid measures kind of being observed. And it was quite an isolating experience. Just for me personally, I was just sort of, I was the only kind of like foreign hire out there shooting at the time. And I just spent like an overwhelming amount of time alone um post lockdown, where I'd been kind of alone for a long period as well.

• 47:11Speaker 04

  And it was odd, I sort of, I feel a sense of survivor's guilt and and and just general guilt in how kind of well I feel like I functioned during lockdown. Like it was quite a, um if I may say, like quite a nice breather for me mentally. And I was in a really kind of like regular routine and save for, you know, the amount of contact that I would have liked to have had with friends and family. I had a really fortunate time of it in lockdown. So I think when I emerged out of that and then found myself in a kind of working environment. Um I think I almost had a delayed reaction to the sort of sense of being institutionalized. That I think a lot of us sort of felt when when we were in lockdown and and and it kind of all hit me at once.

• 47:56Speaker 04

  Um and I had a really, really tough time of it because I think the themes of the show and the nature of the character that I was playing really did actually sort of penetrate the the kind of armour I'd built up or it it managed to sort of get past the um the mechanisms that I'd built and the um the sort of coping skills that I'd learnt up until that point. In respect of playing a character and that being a distinction from who I am.

• 48:25Fearne Cotton?

  Is that because he, you know, he's a, he's a pharmaceutical salesman who was. You know, complicit in in in things that you might not necessarily.

• 48:34Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 48:34Fearne Cotton?

  Agree with, you know, how much does that fuck with your head, knowing that you're. You know, it's a character and you know that you're an actor, but you're still having to deliver these lines and and act out on on things that you wouldn't morally. Necessarily be aligned with.

• 48:47Speaker 04

  Yes, exactly. You know what? I was really annoyed at myself that I that I didn't. I was really angry at myself that I allowed the character and the themes of that to kind of like seep into. Um, my sort of everyday life, or or I allowed a blurring of lines between the character and myself as much as I did because. You know, I thought I'd known better at that point. I thought I'd got past that. Um. As you said, it's it's an up and down squiggly line. It's a bowl of pasta, which is a very strange analogy that I use, but a lot of my analogies are food based. You know, I I'd I'd allowed for this sort of, uh, you know, tangling of wires between who I was and and.

• 49:27Speaker 04

  You know, this this character and I felt really silly and I also felt like, oh, it sounds a bit pretentious coming from an actor, like, oh, I've got lost on the character kind of thing, but. I kind of really did sort of start to really come away at the end of the day, sort of really hating myself and feeling really guilty and. Feeling really ashamed and, um. But I will also say that the compassion and the empathy and the kindness that I experienced from. The show creators and the producers at that time was unbelievable.

• 49:57Fearne Cotton?

  Wow.

• 49:57Speaker 04

  And they were really amazing to me, um, as were my friends and family, um, and, uh. You know, that that's one of the examples I'm I'm talking about where I've been really fortunate. Um, and I I recognize and and you're so right to point out that that is not an industry standard, unfortunately.

• 50:13Fearne Cotton?

  No.

• 50:14Speaker 04

  Um, and it and it obviously ought to be and and hopefully we're moving in that direction, but I was sort of surprised by. Um, how well I was looked after in that moment, because I really was going through it and it was. Kind of becoming an enemy to my progress or my ability to do my job to the best of my abilities.

• 50:31Fearne Cotton?

  I guess also people on that set really cared because they knew they were making something that wasn't just frivolous fun. It was something that was, you know, happening in the moment and it was affecting people that you guys were working with and. It's a duty of care. They've got to get that portrayal across accurately, but also. They don't want to damage someone's mental health in the process, I'm sure. And you know, you just want to work with people that get it and care about. And I'm sure you're, you know, part of your process in choosing what to work on is very much based on. What message you want to put out there and how you want to deliver it.

• 51:04Speaker 04

  Yeah, definitely. Yeah, yeah, exactly. And I think it's, I think one thing I also learned. You know, over the course of my career is like, I'm prepared to say when I don't actually feel mentally well enough to do something. And of course, you know, at times I've been in a very privileged position to be able to turn down work in order to kind of.

• 51:27Speaker 04

  Say like make that sort of adjustment or or kind of enforce that for my for myself. Other times maybe I I haven't, but I try whenever I can afford to, to sort of make sure that I'm not doing something that is. Going to jeopardize my mental wellbeing because that that that has to kind of come first and I haven't always put that first. And then, yeah, the the thing that I care about increasingly is the kind of social application of the work and what the conversation around it is going to be. Or how is that potentially impacting the people that are watching it? And is this going to sort of, you know. Improve someone's sort of life experience, hopefully, or their perspective on something.

• 52:08Speaker 04

  You know, and and that can be as simple as like giving someone a laugh and an escape from a tough time.

• 52:13Fearne Cotton?

  So important.

• 52:14Speaker 04

  Right.

• 52:14Fearne Cotton?

  I rewatched We the Millers the other day and I was, I was howling. I'd actually forgotten how, producer Anushka is obsessed with We the Millers. But I was, I needed a good belly laugh and that that can't be underestimated. Laughing till your ribs hurt is therapy in itself is the best.

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• 54:09Fearne Cotton?

  And then let's talk about The Bear, because this is obviously a show that we all know, you're a huge fan of.

• 54:14Speaker 04

  I am a huge fan of it.

• 54:15Fearne Cotton?

  Extremely excited to be a part of.

• 54:17Speaker 04

  I'm more of a fan than a cast member, if we're honest. I really am. They've let a fanboy.

• 54:23Fearne Cotton?

  But you've got such a great character, heavily tattooed pastry chef.

• 54:26Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 54:27Fearne Cotton?

  Who has these, you know, deep, meaningful conversations whilst making delicate pastries. It's such a combination, but you're just loving filming that.

• 54:34Speaker 04

  I am. I'm really loving it, Fern. Like, I'm so lucky to do that. That was a show that, you know... In in truth, it was a show that I'd been trying to sort of make myself for like ten years. I I've been obsessed with the hospitality industry and have so much reverence for people who work in it and and chefs in particular. And I've been wanting to sort of create something about chefs for a long time and I've sort of half penned very bad scripts and, you know, devised pitches for a a show about this world before and never really got anywhere with it and rightly so, like everything I created was was not very good. I I I'm first to admit that. And then when The Bear came along, I was like, oh, this is this is what I wish I could have made. This is it.

• 55:17Speaker 04

  And so I got the chance to meet Cristor, the creator, and I just said, I would love to have any small role in this if you would have me sort of thing. And didn't really think anything would come of it. I had a a dynamite conversation with Chris and I was like, if nothing else comes of it, I've just connected with a lovely human who's who's so talented and and even more importantly, just a nice guy. And he was kind enough to write me that that role of Chef Luca and it it really was life changing and really life affirming and um. It also underscored, I think, an instinct in me, which is that cooking and um, you know, interactions with food and especially the creation of dishes and sharing it with people is really good for my mental wellbeing.

• 55:58Fearne Cotton?

  So good.

• 55:59Speaker 04

  Yeah, and other people's hopefully, but I don't burn anything too badly.

• 56:02Fearne Cotton?

  Oh, yeah. I know. I'm making a lovely little doll for my parents tonight and I'm already working out what is going in that little fucking doll.

• 56:08Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 56:09Fearne Cotton?

  I cannot wait. The hot of my mum will go, can I help? No, I'm doing it.

• 56:13Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 56:13Fearne Cotton?

  I'm making this with love for you and the intricate process of doing so will make me feel so good. How are your pastry skills before The Bear?

• 56:22Speaker 04

  My pastry skills were like literally zero.

• 56:24Fearne Cotton?

  So how much, you had to go to pastry school? What happened?

• 56:26Speaker 04

  So I was really lucky. I loved cooking and I was like a keen home.

• 56:30Fearne Cotton?

  Pastry's hard.

• 56:31Speaker 04

  Pastry's so fucking hard.

• 56:32Fearne Cotton?

  I've tried to make croissants. It's near impossible. It's the layering of the butter is insane.

• 56:37Speaker 04

  Fucking nightmare.

• 56:37Fearne Cotton?

  It's a nightmare.

• 56:38Speaker 04

  Once and they were sort of vaguely passable, but like if you saw them in a shop window, you'd be like, oh, Jesus, what happened there? Like they were, yeah, yeah, they were, they were edible is all I mean. Yeah, it's the laminating process. And basically doing it in a in the in the. The room has to be the right temperature.

• 56:56Fearne Cotton?

  I didn't know this. This is a tip I need.

• 56:58Speaker 04

  Oh, yeah.

• 56:59Fearne Cotton?

  What temperature are we talking?

• 57:00Speaker 04

  Well, I wish I knew.

• 57:01Fearne Cotton?

  Okay.

• 57:02Speaker 04

  You only have to look at my crosshairs and know I didn't get the temperature right. But like, yeah, the butter melting out in between the sheets of pastry is a fucking nightmare. Yeah, absolute shit show.

• 57:11Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 57:11Speaker 04

  Um, it's, it's, it's objectively one of the hardest things to do.

• 57:15Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 57:15Speaker 04

  When I, when I read the part, I was so excited. I'd never seen my name written in a script before. So what I mean to say is normally, you know, it says the character name and then you're in the email that you got, you know, it says, I'll take a look at this character for the purpose of auditioning or meeting, whatever else.

• 57:30Fearne Cotton?

  For you.

• 57:31Speaker 04

  And it said Will Poulter next to the character and I was like, fucking hell, that's my name. I was so excited. And then it said pastry chef and I thought, oh, fuck. You know, I could just about maybe fake it with some training as a, as a, you know, chef who focused on savoury, but pastry, I knew nothing about. And actually it was great because it put me outside of my comfort zone. And um, I got straight into training and I got really lucky. I got to work with Courtney Storer, who's our unbelievable sort of producer. She's head of all the kind of food stuff on the show. Um, and she herself is a chef, an amazing chef, I should add. And um, a lot of the stories are actually inspired by her experience as well. So started working with Courtney immediately.

• 58:11Speaker 04

  Um, and as a, as a result of working uh, on the show, I've got to work at amazing restaurants, Black Axe Mangal in London. Um, St John, Trullo, um, from the lovely Connor Gad. Um, I got to work with Dave Barron at Pajolin in Santa Monica and his new restaurant, Celine, um, in Santa Monica. And it's just, they've just been like dream experiences. I've been so lucky.

• 58:33Fearne Cotton?

  So what is, so from all of those amazing restaurants, what is the dish that you are now serving up as like your showpiece when people come over?

• 58:40Speaker 04

  Oh my gosh. You know, I, I have.

• 58:43Fearne Cotton?

  Is it quite wanky?

• 58:43Speaker 04

  It's.

• 58:45Fearne Cotton?

  Is it like a miso glazed aubergine or something?

• 58:48Speaker 04

  Seventeen different elements. No, it's, it's. It's not, do you know what's really, I'll tell you what's really like embarrassing is for all the things I've learned and had to like make for the show or in preparation or dishes I've helped out on et cetera, et cetera, at these restaurants like my favorite thing to bake is cookies.

• 59:06Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 59:06Speaker 04

  Like so simple.

• 59:08Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 59:08Speaker 04

  I've become quite obsessive about them and my favorite thing, cookies and brownies is something that are like are so easy, but they're also like so shareable.

• 59:18Fearne Cotton?

  Universally loved.

• 59:19Speaker 04

  Yeah, exactly. And at the end of the day, people like wanna eat that shit. So.

• 59:22Fearne Cotton?

  They do.

• 59:23Speaker 04

  If I'm being completely honest, it's as simple as like cookies and brownies that I'm making the most uh these days, but I'm really excited to uh, yeah, to get back into my, to get back into my cooking this, this year, do, do even more of it. I, I, I love it and you know, I, I think one of the things I've realized through the show as well is there's a massive parallel between acting and cooking in the sense that what you're doing is you're emotionally transferring something and, and you know, in a, in a character and a performance, I think you are trying to emotionally affect someone and appeal to their senses and cooking is exactly the same. You are putting, you know, emotion into, you know, something you're creating.

• 1:00:04Speaker 04

  You're often playing on people's memory and, and appealing to their sense of nostalgia. And you're also adding senses to the experience, like smell and taste. So in a way like cooking is almost a kind of more complete version of what I think acting is, you know, in respect of appealing to people's senses and, and trying to give them a kind of transformative experience and um.

• 1:00:28Fearne Cotton?

  Is what you're saying, you're giving up acting to start a restaurant?

• 1:00:30Speaker 04

  I'm not nearly good enough, arguably to do either, but I, I, I, if I wasn't an actor, I would love to be a chef. I don't know quite honestly whether I have the resilience because one thing that has not lost on me through my dipping in and out of kitchens is just how hard it is.

• 1:00:46Fearne Cotton?

  The hours.

• 1:00:47Speaker 04

  How many hours.

• 1:00:48Fearne Cotton?

  Hours.

• 1:00:49Speaker 04

  You know, for for much less pay than actors get, you know, relatively speaking, um in in a lot of cases. And um yeah, the hours are really, really intense and and often it's without thanks. You know, it's without sort of acknowledgement, it's behind closed doors. And that's another reason why I think um, you know, people in the hospitality industry work so hard, you know, in in the name of service, you know, without any expectation to get anything back. And I I really respect that too.

• 1:01:17Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, keep making those brownies, I'd say, just just for fun. It's just good, good for the head.

• 1:01:21Speaker 04

  It's good, exactly.

• 1:01:23Fearne Cotton?

  We're gonna finish by asking you, where is your happy place, Will?

• 1:01:27Speaker 04

  Where is my happy place? Um, my happy place is in my mum and dad's kitchen. Um, yeah, I think so, you know, I I'm I've been trying to recreate and I hope to recreate the feeling in my kitchen, um, that has always been in my mum and dad's kitchen.

• 1:01:45Fearne Cotton?

  What's the magic there? What's the what's the little thing that's?

• 1:01:48Speaker 04

  My mum's food is a big, yeah, and my dad won't be offended by that. It's not that he doesn't contribute contribute to the magic at all, but uh you know, he'll agree that in in large part, it's it's down to my mum's food, which has always kind of brought my family together. Um, regardless of what we've all been going through, I think food and specifically the food that she's created has kind of nourished us all from both a physical and mental place. And so I've taken great inspiration from that. I think it's why um, I'm in love with cooking and I'm in love with food and, you know, really, you know, my involvement in the bear, it it feels so kind of special and personal. Um, that's all really in large part thanks to my mum and the sense of kind of community.

• 1:02:31Speaker 04

  And how much our family's kind of benefited from from her cooking in their kitchen, so.

• 1:02:35Fearne Cotton?

  Oh, your lovely mum.

• 1:02:36Speaker 04

  Uh, my my mum's a legend. She's head chef, so.

• 1:02:39Fearne Cotton?

  Love that. Yes, chef.

• 1:02:40Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah, yes, chef to mum, exactly.

• 1:02:42Fearne Cotton?

  Oh, well, it's been such a treat talking to you.

• 1:02:45Speaker 04

  Thank you, fine. Thanks for having me on. I'm such a fan of the podcast.

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