Very few artists win the Turner Prize. Very few filmmakers win an Oscar. Only one person has won both. That person is Sir Steve McQueen, the acclaimed director of Hunger, Shame, 12 Years a Slave, and Widows. With each film, Steve McQueen expanded the scope of his fierce, unflinching gaze – from Irish republicanism, to the Slave Trade in the Deep South – but for his most recent project, he turned that gaze inwards, to the world that he knows most intimately. Small Axe is a love letter to his parents' Windrush Generation, who lit London ablaze with music, politics, and culture, on their arrival from the West Indies. It is the project that Steve McQueen has been circling around and sizing up for much of his life, but only recently felt able to take on.In the first episode of the new season of Changes, you'll hear a maverick artist unleash the energy and intellect that has become his trademark on a wide array of subjects: the school system; privilege; cinema; Grenfell. This is a conversation about the need for all-encompassing, systemic change – as well as the profound, personal change that comes with setting your own blueprint for success in a landscape hostile to your every creative breath. It's a conversation that will leave you dizzy, angry, and, inevitably, inspired. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Annie Macmanus returns with another crop of fascinating guests, from all walks of life, for conversation about the changes that define us.Changes, series four – launching September 13th. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

It’s the final part of the Mother Mother Mini-Series, and it’s a big one. Ciaran Thapar has written an explosive, game-changing study of youth violence in London: Cut Short. It’s based on his years of experience as a youth worker in the borough of Lambeth, where he has helped bridge the divide between distinct communities that share the same streets but live entirely parallel experiences. In that work, Ciaran has observed the realities of endemic poverty, racism, and knife crime that plague young men growing up in the city, but Cut Short is more than a survey of those brutal circumstances; it’s a blueprint for change – both individual and institutional – and a clarion call for engagement, activism, and empathy. It is also, fundamentally, a book that paints a vivid picture of the volatile transition from boyhood to manhood – and in this way, it mirrors some of the themes of Mother Mother, which zooms in on TJ’s experience of becoming a man in difficult circumstances. It's that shared perspective that provides the foundation for a far-ranging and inspiring conversation about youth, community, and monumental change.You can buy Cut Short here: https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/316/316628/cut-short/9780241434987.htmlAnd tickets for Changes LIVE at the Roundhouse’s Last Word Festival can be purchased here: https://www.roundhouse.org.uk/whats-on/2021/the-last-word-2021/changes-with-annie-macmanus/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Part three of the Mother Mother Mini-Series is all about living with grief – something Nikesh Shukla gets to terms with in his memoir, Brown Baby. Nikesh has written novels for adults and children, and he curated the acclaimed essay collection, The Good Immigrant, but this is the first time he’s delved so deep into his own life for material. It’s a gorgeous, vulnerable book, about the dual experience of becoming a father and losing a mother, and the ways those two events became tangled up in Nikesh’s mind. That theme, of the way grief can alter your perspective, and colour each waking moment, plays a central role in Annie’s novel, Mother Mother, and there is plenty of discussion here about the devastation of losing someone dear to you. But this is also a conversation about finding joy amongst the rubble, and creating a world full of wonder and beauty for those who remain to move through.You can buy Nikesh’s memoir here: https://www.panmacmillan.com/authors/nikesh-shukla/brown-baby/9781529032918 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In the second part of the Mother Mother Mini-Series, Annie speaks to journalist, and now best-selling author, Sophie Heawood about her memoir, The Hungover Games. It’s an outrageously funny book about something that didn’t feel particularly funny at the time: Sophie was in her mid-30s, living in LA, covering showbiz for the UK press, and quite happily swerving most of the responsibilities that come with adulthood. Then, a doctor told her she’d never conceive a child – at which point she immediately, unexpectedly, did exactly that, with a man who had no interest in being a father. Like Mother Mother, this is a story that hinges on the seismic shock of an unplanned pregnancy, and both books explore all the ways that motherhood recalibrates your perspective. This is a conversation about all the things that people get wrong about single motherhood. It’s about finding the courage to tell a story you’ve been sizing up for years and years. It’s about taking ownership of your own narrative, your own body, and your own future – and kindly requesting all those who have a problem with that to jog on.You can buy The Hungover Games here: https://www.foyles.co.uk/all?term=9781787330511 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

For the first part of the Mother Mother Mini-Series, Annie speaks to Francisco Garcia about the Missing Persons Crisis. When he was seven years old, Francisco's father walked out of his life, and entered into the messy hinterland of the missing. Now, as a journalist, Francisco has become fascinated with the wide spectrum of experience that gets bundled into the term 'missing person', and he takes that fascination, as well as his own curiosity about what became of his father, as the basis for his first book, If You Were There. Like Mother Mother, it's a story that interrogates the motivations that might cause a person to leave, as well as the impact on those left behind – all of which serves as the foundation for a fascinating conversation about a world too often misunderstood.Francisco's book is available here: https://harpercollins.co.uk/products/if-you-were-there-missing-people-and-the-marks-they-leave-behind-francisco-garcia?variant=32674626535502 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

To mark the release of Annie's debut novel, Mother Mother, Changes returns with a special mini-series. Four conversations. Four authors. A whole heap of change.Launching June 7th. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We end the series with a wild and raucous cautionary tale of change. Shaun Attwood’s life is something you would expect to see in a film. He grew up in a small northern town and went on to become a stockbroker millionaire in Arizona. He then became a kingpin in drug smuggling, bringing up to £4 million of ecstasy into America. Eventually this lifestyle caught up with him and led to a SWAT team knocking his door down in 2002. He faced a 200 year sentence and after a legal battle and serving two years in the notorious Maricopa County Jail he was sentenced to 9 ½ years. He served almost 6 years in total, the final years in the Arizona Department of Corrections, before being deported to the UK. After submerging himself in thousands of books in prison including psychology and philosophy, Shaun changed his perspective and is now an author, speaker and activist about the war on drugs sharing his experience, issues affecting prisoners rights and the consequences he faced by getting involved in drugs and crime. Shaun’s story is like nothing you’ve ever heard before. You can find all the details of Shaun’s books, podcast and you tube channel here:https://shaunattwood.com/Shaun Attwood on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/derickatt/featured Warning: This episode references drug abuse and addiction throughout with references to sexual abuse, violence and suicide.  Should you be affected by any of the issues raised in this episode, in the UK, The Samaritans can be reached on 116 123. You can also contact Mind on 0300 123 3393 or head to mind.org.uk. In the US, the National Suicide Prevention Hotline is 1-800-273-8255. In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is on 13 11 14. Hotlines in other countries can be found here; http://www.suicide.org/international-suicide-hotlines.html Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In 2020, the world changed in ways none of us could ever have imagined. Dr Steven Taylor is the author of The Psychology of Pandemics, the first-ever comprehensive analysis of this subject which he published before Covid 19 broke out. Since then, the coronavirus pandemic has so far resulted in over 2.7 million deaths worldwide, with over 126,500 deaths in the UK alone. As the vaccination program beds in and the rules start to fall away, Annie wanted to bring you a conversation that could act as a useful tool in helping us to move forwards out of Covid 19 in the healthiest way possible.  Enter Dr Steven Taylor - an award winning Professor and Clinical Psychologist in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of British Columbia. Steven is an expert at human behaviour in pandemics and in this conversation Annie quizzes him about Covid 19 in relation to pandemics of the past, and how this one has compared - have we learnt anything? We discuss patterns in behaviour when it comes to freedoms being curtailed, the psychology of our journey and how the pandemic has changed us from panic buying to lockdown loneliness, resulting societal changes in terms of relationships, birth rates and wearing masks and what really affects how well people cope. We are introduced to new phrases like ‘anchoring bias’, where we predict our future based on how we’re feeling now and ‘post traumatic growth’, the idea that you go through an ordeal, a trauma or a pandemic, and you don't just bounce back to where you were, but you actually grow as a human being.  This is essential listening, reflecting on the biggest change the world has seen in a long time.  Warning: This episode discusses the effects of the coronavirus pandemic. Should you be affected by any of the issues raised in this episode, in the UK, The Samaritans can be reached on 116 123. You can also contact Mind on 0300 123 3393 or head to mind.org.uk. In the US, the National Suicide Prevention Hotline is 1-800-273-8255. In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is on 13 11 14. Hotlines in other countries can be found here http://www.suicide.org/international-suicide-hotlines.html Dr Steven Taylor's book can be found here:https://www.amazon.com/Psychology-Pandemics-Steven-Taylor/dp/1527539598You can find our more about his work here:https://www.drsteventaylor.com/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Get ready because this week’s guest is best selling author, glamour model and TV personality, Katie Price and there’s no holds barred! Katie has experienced huge changes in her life (she has six autobiographies to show for it), not least was her recent stay at the Priory, which she explains has transformed her. Ever since she first appeared in the Sun in 1996, Katie’s life has constantly been in the press. She’s appeared on I’m a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here where she met Peter Andre who she then married, released an album, starred in a string of her own reality television series, been a panelist on the talk show Loose Women, a period in her life which she talks about here, and in 2015 she won Celebrity Big Brother. Katie has been married three times - to Peter Andre, Alex Reid and her last husband Kieran Hayler who she divorced for cheating with their nanny (having already had an affair with her best friend)! She is now in a happy relationship with former love island contestant Carl Woods. Katie is mum to five children Harvey, Junior, Princess, Jett, and Bunny who are also in the public eye and she is now pregnant with her sixth child! She also lobbies for change as a result of her disabled son Harvey being subjected to online abuse. Katie has been encouraging people to sign her petition which aimed to remove anonymity online and make trolling illegal. Since recording the petition has been debated in parliament and you can read the Government's response here. https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/575833 Here Katie talks Annie through a plethora of shocking events and dramas from her childhood to now when she is full of life and happier than ever.  You can follow Katie on instagram and twitter @katieprice Warning: This episode discusses rape, drugs and mental illness including references to suicide and depression. Should you be affected by any of the issues raised in this episode, in the UK, The Samaritans can be reached on 116 123. You can also contact Mind on 0300 123 3393 or head to mind.org.uk.In the US, the National Suicide Prevention Hotline is 1-800-273-8255. In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is on 13 11 14. Hotlines in other countries can be found http://www.suicide.org/international-suicide-hotlines.html Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.