ON AMBITION… With Gillian Anderson and Munroe Bergdorf

Ambition can be a powerful force: it propels us forward, sharpens our focus and pushes us to dream bigger. But it can also whisper that we are only as good as our latest achievement - and these two brilliant former How to Fail guests explore what it really means to live a driven life. Gillian Anderson reflects on her lifelong drive to prove herself, the guilt she feels when stepping back from work and the tension between motherhood and a demanding career. Munroe Bergdorf shares how rejection and gatekeeping in fashion shaped her ambition. Once treated as a token gesture, she has become a leading voice for representation, speaking openly about resilience, self‑worth and creating space for others to follow. An episode about striving and self‑belief – and about whether ambition truly supports us, or whether we end up chasing it at our own expense. Listen to Gillian’s full episode of How to Fail here: swap.fm/l/7NyZMzkfVOpGyDtlB6k0 Listen to Munroe’s full episode of How to Fail here: swap.fm/l/tu153m3gHYreWBZSrcY1 🔗 LINKS + MENTIONS: Elizabeth’s Substack: https://theelizabethday.substack.com/ Join the How To Fail community: https://howtofail.supportingcast.fm/#content 💌 LOVE THIS EPISODE? Subscribe on Spotify, Apple or wherever you get your podcasts Leave a 5⭐ review – it helps more people discover these stories 👋 Follow How To Fail & Elizabeth: Instagram: @howtofailpod @elizabday TikTok: @howtofailpod @elizabday Website: www.elizabethday.org Have a failure you’re trying to work through for Elizabeth to discuss? Click here to get in touch: howtofailpod.com How to Fail is an Elizabeth Day and Sony Music Entertainment Production. Find more great podcasts from Sony Music Entertainment at sonymusic.com/podcasts To bring your brand to life in this podcast, email [email protected] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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

• 0:00Elizabeth Day?

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• 1:31Elizabeth Day?

  Welcome back to How To Fail. This week, we're talking about ambition, the engine that drives us forward, the inner voice that tells us to keep going, and the shadow side that asks whether we've ever done enough. First actor and Emmy winner Gillian Anderson reflects on being a self-confessed workaholic and the belief that she has to earn her place through constant effort.

• 1:53Speaker 02

  Highly relatable. We discuss pleasure as power, the guilt of not working, and how she balances fierce professional drive with parenthood and presence. Then, model and fashion icon Munro Bergdolph shares how her ambition was forged through rejection and gatekeeping in the fashion industry. From being treated as a gimmick to witnessing real change on the runway, she speaks about perseverance, representation, and widening the path for others. This is an episode about striving, self-worth, and it asks whether ambition liberates us or quietly runs the show. First up, let's hear from Gillian Anderson.

• 2:37Speaker 02

  Your final failure is your failure to not work. Are you a workaholic?

• 2:43Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 2:44Speaker 02

  And where do you think that comes from? Why do you feel that you need to work in order to earn your place on this planet?

• 2:52Speaker 03

  I don't quite know, but I do have so, I mean, it's like a Protestant work ethic. I'm not quite sure where it's come from, but what I do know is I feel incredibly lucky on the one hand, I mean, on all hands. I don't mean only, yeah, I'm incredibly lucky, incredibly fortunate, privileged, all of that, to have the choices that I have had, both in my life and my career. And part of it, I think, is showing myself that I deserve it because I'm doing all these things. If all these good things are happening, then I'd better be working for them. You know, it's not coming lightly or it's not frivolous.

• 3:37Speaker 03

  That's another thing, actually, that I wanted to talk about in terms of pleasure, that I'm starting to realise too, is that so much of pleasure is perceived as being frivolous.

• 3:48Speaker 02

  Hmm. Yes, trivial.

• 3:50Speaker 03

  Yeah. And why? Why isn't it as much of a sense of power, you know, to lean into that, to properly embrace pleasure and make space for it and make time for it and give it to oneself?

• 4:06Speaker 03

  As it is the other things that we, and so I'm, I'm, you know, I'm trying to have more of that in my life. But also realising the degree to which so much of what I'm involved in, whether it's, you know, this drink or one of the shows that I work on or et cetera, is about pleasure and the joy and pleasure. Anyway, I digress.

• 4:27Elizabeth Day?

  I think you're so right about pleasure because why can't it be as ennobling, as transformative,

• 4:33Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 4:34Elizabeth Day?

  as suffering or sadness or pain.

• 4:38Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 4:38Elizabeth Day?

  Because it's the same thing, but the different end of the spectrum.

• 4:41Speaker 03

  Yeah, exactly. I mean, actually, I do feel like even though I am a self-described workaholic, I do get pleasure from it. I do, I, I do get pleasure from it. When I'm clear, actually, it turns out when I'm not eating prawn crackers and drinking Coca-Cola, I think quite clearly. And things come to me. I'm in a moment right now where, and I'm sure that a lot of it has to do with my age. And it's none of wanting to leave a mark. It's, it's none of that. It's just, it is feeling like, hang on, I, I've still got some things to do. I've still got, you know, things to do that I didn't even know I wanted to do. And that is, of course, in roles and building a company that I'm building.

• 5:25Speaker 03

  But it's also just in terms of realising that I do have a few things that I want to share with people.

• 5:31Elizabeth Day?

  And have you ever regretted working too hard or taking on a project?

• 5:39Speaker 03

  There have been a couple of moments when I haven't been able to stop around my kids. You know, that had more to do with not in terms of my work as an actor, but stuff on, on the side or with other projects and stuff where I have felt the guilt of choosing to focus on those things instead of having time with kids. And

• 6:08Speaker 03

  I feel like there's a good balance right now. I feel like when I'm with them, I'm with them. You know, and that has become more and more meaningful to me. It's been really important to me in terms of by acting work to always have them as part of the priority in terms of this is when I'm available. This is when I'm not, et cetera. But this is different. This is in terms of what happens with meetings and with Zooms and all those other things that end up in our day to day, taking, sucking that time. And I've got some pretty strict rules around, around all of that so that my workaholism

• 6:48Speaker 03

  is something that my boys can look at as being beneficial to them because they can see, you know, not just in terms of what I bring home at the end of the day, but in terms of seeing me effectively building things. And they both have an interest in that. And I think it's been really great that they get to see. And I think they would say that too, that to see a mum who is entrepreneurial and making things.

• 7:16Elizabeth Day?

  And they're teenagers, aren't they?

• 7:17Speaker 03

  Yeah, well, two of them are, and then I have one who's, who's, yeah, twenty eight.

• 7:22Elizabeth Day?

  Okay.

• 7:28Elizabeth Day?

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• 8:11Elizabeth Day?

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• 9:30Speaker 04

  I think I'm an extremely ambitious person. I have a drive that I think is my biggest attribute. I've really had to live a life of discipline and a life of tenacity and constant setbacks, constant people that are gatekeeping, people that are withholding and, you know, coming into the fashion industry, nobody wanted to hire me. And it took some of the biggest photographers just taking a chance on me, like Nick Knight, like Rankin, who wanted to work with me when, you know, I was constantly having doors slammed in my face because they were like, why would we work with a trans person?

• 10:13Speaker 04

  Almost. And it's, you know, I know that a lot of black models from the 90s felt the same way as like we're, you know, I watched a documentary the other day where they're like, we're just not hiring black models this season. It's exactly the same. So why would we work with a trans person? There's not that kind of campaign, there's not an LGBT campaign.

• 10:33Speaker 04

  And like now we're seeing that change, we're seeing trans people be in shows and it's not a thing that they're trans. It's just, you know, it is a thing because the visibility is incredible. And, you know, when I see a trans model on a runway, if it's like Alex or if it's Maxim or if it's, oh god, India, or if it's all of these incredible people that are within the industry. That means so much to me, but it is not exploited that they're trans anymore. For so long it was. I have done shoots where my transness has been, you know, almost like a gimmick. And I'm really glad that I've opened doors for so many people. I've been in this industry for almost a decade now.

• 11:15Speaker 04

  But if it wasn't for, you know, hearing the stories of, you know, women like Naomi Campbell and Joan Smalls and Jordan Dunn and Leomi Anderson talking about, you know, being exploited from like the ages of fourteen and being told that there's no black models this season or being on set and not knowing how to do black hair. If it wasn't for those stories and seeing their tenacity and that they could get through it, then I could apply the same kind of work ethic and be like, okay, well, one day there's gonna be more than one trans person on the runway, or there's gonna be eight trans person on the runway. And, you know, I have faith that there's gonna be multiple trans people on runways one day. And then that's gonna filter out as well. And then we're gonna see more trans people

• 12:00Speaker 04

  in all sorts of campaigns. And then the beauty standard is gonna change. And then trans beauty is not gonna be seen as any different from any other beauty, just like black beauty is now getting the respect that it didn't once upon a time. And that's really, you know, what the book is about as well, is that everything does change. And I've really got faith that one day, trans people are gonna be able to navigate society in the same kind of freedom that other people that experience the same kind of oppression in yesteryear did. And we'll just be able to be ourselves without having to constantly be so aware of the fact that we're different.

• 12:39Elizabeth Day?

  You gave me four words. I'm gonna let you off, the final one.

• 12:42Speaker 04

  Oh, I'm sorry. I forgot that I was. Maybe the last one's long-winded.

• 12:48Elizabeth Day?

  It's such a beautiful place to end. And if I can, I would like to give the final word.

• 12:53Speaker 04

  You're like, this is quickfire.

• 12:54Elizabeth Day?

  I think. No, I never wanted to be quickfire with you, honestly. I could do this for hours. But I know you've got a fabulous launch to go to. The final word for me would be powerful. You're so powerful. You're powerful in your truth. You're powerful in your words on the page. You're powerful in person. I am so grateful to you for finding time to do How to Fail. Honestly, it's meant the world to me.