Latest news with #Blair-Brown
Metro
7 days ago
- Entertainment
- Metro
BBC fans urge people to watch ‘amazing' trans teen drama
To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5 video BBC Three's inspirational new coming-of-age drama, What It Feels Like For A Girl, has seriously impressed viewers. The eight-episode series, set at the turn of the millennium, is based on the acclaimed memoir by author and trans rights campaigner Paris Lees. For those looking for some Y2K nostalgia, this is your easy fix with retro outfits, cultural references and a killer soundtrack to take you right back. Think those hazy Blair-Brown days when shows like Queer As Folk offered snatches of LGBTQ+ visbility for the community and mainstream trans representation was sparse. The synopsis for the East Midlands-based show reads: 'To find yourself, sometimes you need to lose yourself. It's Y2K, and Byron's flirting with discovery and destruction, love and anarchy. ' Played by Ellis Howard, the show follows Byron as they escape into Nottingham's queer underbelly and discover a vibrant found family in friends, Sasha (Hannah Jones) and Lady Die (Laquarn Lewis) aka Fallen Dives in the club scene. The series also stars Calam Lynch, Laura Haddock, Hannah Walters and Michael Socha. It is already being praised by fans on X. 'First 2 episodes boxed off. That was actually very, very good!' Roscoe Barnes wrote. 'I loved the first 2 episodes of the new #LGBTQ series What It Feels Like For A Girl and I can't wait to see how the story develops,' phdev85 shared. 'Only 5 mins into What It Feels Like For A Girl and I feel homesick, it's already bringing back memories as a young Arnold quiche from the early noughties hanging around NG1/AD2 – thank you x' cp83 added. 'The level of talent of Ellis and Jake in this show….wowwwwwww,' yram praised. 'Just started watching today and it's soooo good!!! Jake Dunn you were born to play a villain. The whole cast is amazing too,' dreedreexo said. 'The 'queer as folk' for a new generation,' OliReading dubbed it. The show has also been lauded by critics as a beacon of trans visibility during a time when the marginalised community is under immense scrutiny. 'It's certainly a wild ride- I'll struggle to look at a toilet brush the same way ever again – but if you stay on board until the end, a memorably complex psychological portrait will be your reward,' The Guardian intriguingly teased. The Independent echoed: 'In a world where it is easy to feel pessimistic about the course of progress, What It Feels Like for a Girl presents an engaging – and rational – case for optimism.' 'Make no mistake, What It Feels Like for a Girl is raw and frequently uncomfortable viewing…. Yet the unease is what makes What It Feels Like for a Girl such a visceral, essential watch. We need more TV like it,' PinkNews shared. GQ called it 'gnarly and brutally honest', The Times praised it as 'raw and funny', and the i paper dubbed it an 'absolute riot'. In an interview with Metro, Jones reflected on what it meant to play a trans girl. '[Sasha] was just an unapologetic, gobby trans girl from the north. Fork found in kitchen,' she jokes. 'I had to do this for all the gobby, northern trans girls. She was great to play. More Trending 'Being trans is just a facet of her life; it just so happens that Sasha is trans. Her storyline is not trans trauma, her storyline is not a trans journey… It's her being horrible, being a sex worker, being a sister, being a best friend… 'All of this humanises the trans experience, and we've not had that before, and I think it's really important to do that right now for trans people who are struggling.' Dunn echoed: 'One of the gorgeous things about the show is the specificity of seeing life through Byron's eyes for eight hours, and with that comes really deeply rooted, authored representation of people who exist, who have existed, and who still exist… which I hope provides some solace.' View More » What It Feels Like For a Girl is available to watch on BBC iPlayer. Got a story? If you've got a celebrity story, video or pictures get in touch with the entertainment team by emailing us celebtips@ calling 020 3615 2145 or by visiting our Submit Stuff page – we'd love to hear from you. MORE: Gary Lineker agrees deal with new broadcaster after controversial BBC exit MORE: Call the Midwife rejects claim star was 'disrespected' before shock exit MORE: Race Across The World fans have limited time to apply for BBC series
The Guardian
25-02-2025
- Business
- The Guardian
Starmer can only hope aid grab-raid to lift defence budget wins Trump's favour
Before Keir Starmer's meeting with Donald Trump on Thursday, the prime minister thought it necessary to offer the president a gift. Britain's defence spending will increase by 0.17 percentage points to 2.5% of GDP by April 2027, he told MPs in a hastily arranged Commons statement. The money, he added, would be taken directly from the overseas aid budget, whose level will be cut by nearly half to 0.3%. The last measure is a remarkable turn for a Labour government. Uncomfortably, it comes at a time when Donald Trump wants to shut down perhaps the entire $40bn US aid budget – and at a stroke eliminates a signature commitment from the Blair-Brown years. It was back in 2004, when Tony Blair was prime minister, that Labour first committed to increasing aid spending to 0.7% of GDP. The figure was eventually achieved under David Cameron in 2013, though it was cut to 0.5% in the response of the pandemic. Now is to be slashed again under Labour, amid a soft Trumpian observation by the prime minister to MPs that 'in recent years, the development budget was redirected towards asylum', though this may prove to be the hardest part of the aid budget to squeeze. Cutting aid was 'not an announcement I am happy to make', Starmer emphasised, though the manoeuvre was probably deemed to be the easiest way to promise an immediate cash injection into defence without raising more politically troubling questions over tax and borrowing. This year, 2024-25, the UK will spend £66.3bn on defence, according to the Ministry of Defence. According to estimates produced by the Institute for Fiscal Studies thinktank, by 2027 the shift in spending to 2.5% of GDP would amount to a straight switch of £5.3bn from the aid budget to defence. Starmer, however, told MPs the increase would amount to £13.4bn extra for defence, slightly confusing the number crunchers at the thinktank. No document was released by Labour with details of the spending commitment – a notable contrast to last April when the then prime minister, Rishi Sunak, set out defence budgets year on year until 2030 as an election loomed. Another clue, perhaps, the decision was taken quickly. 'Our best guess,' wrote Ben Zaranko of the IFS, 'is that it's the extra spending relative to a world where defence spending stayed flat in cash terms. That is, we'll be spending £13.4bn more in 2027-28 than if the defence budget were frozen between now and then.' It was in other words, a figure that can best be described as exaggerated, or as Zaranko put it: 'It's not a nonsense number. But …' Subsequent briefings showed that the IFS's hunch was correct. The defence budget is expected to be £79.7bn in 2027-28 on current Treasury forecasts, defence sources indicated, £13.4bn more than the year's £66.3bn. Nevertheless, even at the more accurate lower figure, an extra £5.3bn for defence in real terms should be a significant amount. But while overseas aid programmes may have to be axed, it is not obvious what extra capability in defence it will buy. Starmer did not have any suggestions for MPs, deferring that to the continuing strategic defence review, which will now merge into a national security strategy and finish by June. Defence, meanwhile, continues to struggle with overspending and unrealistic ambition. Service heads have been privately warning for months that political commitments, including Labour's Nato-first strategy plus the multi-country Aukus nuclear-powered submarine programme and the Gcap combat air initiatives, cannot be afforded. There is a £16.9bn deficit of unfunded commitments in the MoD's 10-year equipment plan, and defence insiders warn of a £3bn shortfall on next year's budget. Sign up to First Edition Our morning email breaks down the key stories of the day, telling you what's happening and why it matters after newsletter promotion Nevertheless, though the prime minister's announcement was budgetary, the realities of the moment are immediate and political. Starmer needs Trump's help. A fissure has opened up between the US and Europe at bewildering speed this month, with Trump seemingly intent on imposing a peace on Ukraine in a private dialogue with Russian president Vladimir Putin and insisting that European militaries police whatever agreement he tries to come up with. Though Britain and France have indicated they are willing to help lead the creation of a multinational 'reassurance force' to protect Ukraine's critical infrastructure – if that is what emerges from the US-Russia talks – Starmer says it is not viable without the backstop of US air power, held in reserve to strike out if Russia were to try to attack Ukraine and its peacekeepers again. It is a moment where Britain wants and needs transatlantic support. Though there was no immediate comment from Trump, who has endlessly called for European nations to increase their defence budgets, his secretary of defence, Pete Hegseth, was upbeat after he was briefed on the news. 'A strong step from an enduring partner,' the Pentagon chief said, and with so much at stake in Ukraine, the hope now is that goodwill from the notorious unpredictable White House can last the week.
