Full Disclosure with James O'Brien

By LBC

News & Politics Society & Culture

What's Full Disclosure with James O'Brien about?

Award-winning LBC presenter and best-selling author James O’Brien hosts a series of compelling conversations with fascinating people. These are revealing interviews with people who rarely give in-depth interviews, be it from politics, entertainment or news. Subscribe to get a new episode every Friday.

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Sir Tony Robinson

01.26.2023

Blackadder legend Tony Robinson talks to James about the state of British politics, the power of meditation and the return of Time Team.

Full Disclosure with James O'Brien episodes:

01.26.2023 Sir Tony Robinson Blackadder legend Tony Robinson talks to James about the state of British politics, the power of meditation and the return of Time Team.
01.19.2023 Matthew Collins Content warning: this episode contains descriptions of racial violence, racial slurs and suicidal feelings. By the time Matthew Collins was 15 years old, he was enthralled by the far-right and had joined the National Front. But after one particularly violent ...
01.12.2023 George Takei The internment of Japanese Americans across the U.S. during World War II is not an obvious subject on which to develop a musical, however it is exactly what George Takei, Star Trek legend and social media icon has done. Now ...
01.05.2023 Tracy Brabin Back in the day when she was best known as Tricia Armstrong in Coronation Street, Tracy Brabin did not shy away from national politics, appearing in Labour campaigns and using her stardom to generate interest in the political project. But ...
12.22.2022 Alan Johnson From union General Secretary, to Home Secretary to award-winning writer. By his own admission, Alan Johnson has lived a charmed life. He speaks to James about his tricky early years and political heroes. His book, One of Our Ministers is ...
12.15.2022 Lisa Nandy A quick glance at Lisa Nandy's family tree shows that politics runs through her veins, but when she first arrived in the House of Commons it wasn't an easy transition. She speaks to James about her life growing up in ...
12.08.2022 Maria Ressa Nobel Peace Prize winner Maria Ressa's pursuit of the truth has landed her in trouble with the most powerful man in her motherland: President Duterte of the Philippines. Ressa has racked up over 100 hours of potential prison time and ...
12.01.2022 Dr Gabor Maté Dr Gabor Maté is one of the world's most revered physicians, specialising in addiciton, trauma, ADHD, stress and childhood development. As a young person, strangers would stop him in the street to remark upon his frightened-looking demeanour. Dr Maté believes ...
11.24.2022 Brian Cox He’s most famous for his role in HBO’s Succession, playing Logan Roy, the ruthless, capitalist, pater familias at the top of media conglomerate, Waystar Royco. But the actor Brian Cox has lived on both ends of the wealth gap and ...
11.17.2022 Derren Brown Ever since he arrived on our screens in the early noughties, illusionist Derren Brown’s dramatic television stunts routinely generated controversy, with complaints originating from sources as diverse as the GMB union, church groups and on one occasion, the police. But ...
11.10.2022 Martin Kemp How does a shy little boy go on to perform to arenas brimming with thousands of screaming fans? Martin Kemp of Spandau Ballet fame speaks to James about how his life was transformed by a local drama school teacher and ...
11.07.2022 Introducing: Sweeney Talks Hey listener, we’ve got a new LBC podcast that we think you’d like called Sweeney Talks with old-school reporter, John Sweeney. John is trouble. He's taken on Vladimir Putin, challenged Donald Trump, and after months of uncovering hard truths in ...
11.03.2022 Adrian Chiles Adrian Chiles has graced our television screens for over two decades. On this episode of Full Disclosure he discusses the pressures of being in the public eye, his Brummie background and his difficulties with alcohol. His latest book, The Good ...
10.27.2022 Noel Fitzpatrick Noel Fitzpatrick is the face of Channel 4's hugely popular factual series, The Supervet. As well as a being a vet Noel has worked as an actor, appearing in Heartbeat and The Bill in the early 2000s. He speaks to ...
10.20.2022 Sara Pascoe Since she was 14 years old Sara Pascoe knew she wanted to be famous. Her passion for performing was realised after being sent to drama classes as punishment for a chaotic house party Sara hosted. The multi award-winning comedian's brand ...
10.13.2022 Amanda Owen aka The Yorkshire Shepherdess At one of the highest and most remote locations in England sits Swaledale hill farm where Amanda Owen tends to her thousand sheep and nine children. Despite having no agricultural blood, she has become the most famous farmer in the ...
10.06.2022 David Dimbleby Moments of high drama in Britain's recent history are punctuated by the voice of one man. For nearly half a century, broadcaster David Dimbleby has led us through the shifting sands of general elections, referendums and royal deaths. He speaks ...
09.29.2022 Andy Burnham Dubbed 'King of the North' at the height of the pandemic, the Mayor of Greater Manchester, Andy Burnham speaks to James about why he sees the country of his birth as containing 'two Englands'. After growing up in a catholic ...
09.22.2022 Ian McEwan When he graduated with a master's degree from the University of East Anglia, Ian McEwan did his level best not to have a job. He is now recognised as one of the finest British writers of his generation. Born in ...
09.15.2022 Emily Maitlis When Emily Maitlis started reporting from Hong Kong as a young journalist, by her own admission, she wasn't very good. Since then she has interviewed some of the most powerful people in the world and her 2019 interview with Prince ...
08.25.2022 John Cleese John Cleese is one of Britain's most celebrated cultural icons. The actor, comedian, screenwriter and producer is best known for Monty Python and for playing Basil in Fawlty Towers, co-written with his first wife, Connie Booth. With a career spanning ...
08.18.2022 Michael Rosen Some of us manage to embody a youthful playfulness throughout our lives and the writer, broadcaster and academic, Michael Rosen is probably one of the best examples. He is one of Britain's best-known and most-loved authors, continuing to write books ...
08.11.2022 Figen Murray For 23 years Figen Murray worked as a counsellor helping people to get back on track so that they could lead happier, healthier lives. But on the 22nd of May 2017 her life as she new it changed forever. Figen's ...
08.04.2022 Professor Brian Cox In what would turn out to be the first of many media interviews, Brian Cox hopped off the plane from Geneva and found himself on Jeremy Paxman’s sofa arguing the case for the Large Hadron Collider against the UK’s most ...
07.29.2022 Mick Lynch Mick Lynch has been hitting the headlines from the picket throughout the summer and makes batting off stereotypical lines of questioning from the right-wing media commentariat look like a blood sport. One interviewer accused him of seeing himself as an ...
07.07.2022 Miriam Margolyes Miriam has worked with some of the best in the business and in some great films such as the 1990s film Romeo and Juliet. Many of you of course will know her as Professor Sprout in the Harry Potter films. ...
06.30.2022 Chris Bryant He’s best known for his forensic select committee cross examination of cabinet ministers but the Labour MP for Rhondda lived multiple lives before reaching parliament in 2001. Originally a member of the Conservative Association at Oxford, Chris Bryant went on ...
06.28.2022 Coming Soon : The Followers Hey James O'Brien listeners, here’s a brand new podcast we think you’d like, called The Followers. Shelagh Fogarty began her LBC career as a guest presenter in 2014, and her balanced and calm presenting style soon earned her a permanent ...
06.23.2022 Chris Patten In 1997 Chris Patten walked away as the final British governor of Hong Kong in a symbol of Britain's continual imperial decline. Having taken the blame for Margaret Thatcher's hated poll tax, he was ousted as the Conservative MP for ...
06.16.2022 Wes Streeting When he was elected as the MP for Ilford North in 2015, Wes Streeting achieved the biggest swing towards Labour from the Conservatives in the general election. Despite growing up in relative poverty and having family members in prison, Streeting ...
06.09.2022 Simon Callow Known best for playing Gareth in Four Weddings and a Funeral, Simon Callow is a critically acclaimed actor, writer and director. Raised by a host of eccentric and strong-minded women, he eventually found his feet at the National Theatre at ...
05.26.2022 Robert Lindsay He’s known mostly to his younger fans for playing Ben Harper in the decade-long running sitcom, My Family and to an older audience as the eponymous Marxist in Citizen Smith. In this episode of Full Disclosure James is joined by ...
05.19.2022 The Secret Barrister An unusual episode of Full Disclosure: one in which the identity of our guest is not revealed. No name, no gender, no details about where they grew up or went to school. The Secret Barrister is a criminal lawyer, best-selling ...
05.12.2022 Ed Byrne Irish comedian Ed Byrne was born in County Dublin and attended a school run by the Christian Brothers Catholic order. It was so badly managed that he had to leave. After one year away, he was back again, finding the ...
05.04.2022 Andy Hamilton Hoards of men would troop past Andy Hamilton's window every Saturday on the street he grew up on in Fulham. Minutes away from Stamford Bridge, and despite being by his own admission a 'sickly child', he was eventually allowed to ...
04.28.2022 James Wong For as long as he can remember, James Wong has been obsessed with botany. He shares his small central London flat with 500 houseplants and has incorporated them into coffee tables and TV stands. Having trained at the prestigious Royal ...
04.21.2022 Eddie Marsan Simple lies over complex truths have always troubled the actor, Eddie Marsan. Growing up in London’s East End, Marsan rejected the racists who blamed their problems on other people, questioning everyone but themselves. As a performer, Marsan frequently plays the ...
04.07.2022 Omid Djalili In Central London in the 1970s, a household catering to sick Iranians housed Omid Djalili. Balancing school with his home life proved to be a challenge, and the effects of the noise and the chaos filtered into Djalil’s adulthood. In ...
04.01.2022 Tom Walker aka Jonathan Pie Jonathan Pie is a fictional broadcast reporter created and performed by comedian Tom Walker who is this week’s guest. Walker brought Pie to life in the aftermath of Jeremy Corbyn’s election as Labour leader and the character went viral, racking ...
03.24.2022 Mark Drakeford In this episode of Full Disclosure, James speaks to Mark Drakeford. Born and brought up in West Wales he started off his career as probation officer and youth Justice worker. A professor at both Swansea and Cardiff Universities before moving ...
03.17.2022 Curtis Stigers When he was forced to move 800 miles away from the outskirts of Hollywood to Idaho as a boy, Curtis Stigers was furious. After school he gravitated back towards the centre of things - to New York City, where his ...
03.10.2022 Caroline Criado Perez When she was a teenager, Caroline Criado Perez found feminism embarrassing. But then she read a book which changed her life. It documented how our language is used to make women invisible, and set her on a mission to make ...
03.03.2022 John Simpson He was nearly shot on one of his first jobs as a 25 year old, and throughout his illustrious career, John Simpson has continued to dice with death, reporting from thirty war zones and most recently during the US withdrawal ...
02.24.2022 Keir Starmer The Leader of the Opposition, Sir Keir Starmer has had a meteoric rise from his humble beginnings in a small Surrey town. The Starmer household was a busy three-bed occupied by his parents’ four children and four dogs, and in ...
02.17.2022 Christiane Amanpour Known across the world for fearlessly holding dictators to account, Christiane Amanpour, as a young staffer at CNN found herself kicked off the network after a disastrous first attempt at reporting. The knock-back did not stop her; Amampour went on ...
02.11.2022 Beverley Knight Born to Jamaican parents, Beverley Knight grew up in a dedicated Pentecostal household where church attendance and music performance were inextricably linked and singing was an act of devotion to God. By the time Knight was a young adult she ...
02.03.2022 Adil Ray As the younger son, Adil Ray was given more freedom to pursue his creative instincts than his older, more academic sibling. Before moving into the mainstream, Adil spent his student days in an elderly Jamaican woman’s loft hosting a pirate ...
01.27.2022 Charlotte Church Charlotte Church was catapulted into the spotlight at the age of 11 after singing down the line on television show, This Morning. Within two years Church had performed at Rupert Murdoch’s wedding to Wendi Deng, opened for Shirley Bassey and ...
01.20.2022 Feargal Sharkey When ‘Teenage Kicks’ by The Undertones was released in 1978, legendary DJ John Peel took the unprecedented step of playing it back to back on Radio 1. The lead singer was 20 year old Feargal Sharkey and the band were ...
01.13.2022 Stewart Lee Despite being named by The Times as the best current English-language comedian in the world, Stewart Lee insists that nobody really knows who he is. His absence from the panel show circuit, resistance to social media and use of multiple ...

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