Full Disclosure with James O'Brien

Beloved TV doctor, children’s author and NHS paediatrician Dr Ranj Singh tells James O’Brien the extraordinary story behind the smile - from the collapse of the life he thought he was supposed to want, to the painful process of working out who he really was.

He speaks candidly about growing up in a traditional Indian family, the pressure to follow a respectable path, and the emotional cost of spending years trying to fit expectations. He recalls his sexuality being “outed” to his parents before he was ready, the heartbreak and confusion that followed, and the therapy that helped him understand his identity and start living more truthfully.

They also explore his career in medicine, his decision to step back after decades in the NHS, and the creative life he has built beyond the hospital ward. From children’s television to musical theatre, Dr Ranj reflects on chasing joy, embracing vulnerability, and why his real job - in whatever form it takes - is simply to make people feel better.

Find out more about Dr Ranj’s Human Body Encyclopedia here

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As the magnetic frontman of James, Tim Booth has spent more than four decades turning raw emotion into some of Britain’s most loved music - from Sit Down and Laid to a run of acclaimed new records.

Tim joins James O’Brien to trace the unlikely journey that led him to the band: a difficult childhood, the brutality of boarding school, a life-changing Patti Smith album and a chance encounter with three teenage musicians in a Manchester bar. Within days, he was on stage; before long, James were building a devoted following through their fiercely independent, improvisational live shows.

He reflects on the extraordinary communal power of Sit Down, the band’s relationship with The Smiths and Factory Records, and the pressures that eventually drove him to leave. Tim also discusses James’s reunion, their distinctive songwriting process and the creative restlessness that continues to push the band into new territory.

Along the way, he speaks candidly about illness, dance, meditation and altered states - and the belief that a great gig can become a shared act of transcendence. With a new album in progress and documentary ‘James: Getting Away With It’ charting James’s four-decade story, this is an intimate, funny and deeply moving conversation about survival, creativity and staying open to the unknown.

Find out more about James’ tour dates and ‘James: Getting Away With It’ documentary here

Full Disclosure is a Global Production

Listen or watch every Friday on Global Player, YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts.

From growing up on a Gloucester council estate to becoming one of Britain’s best-known culinary success stories, Tom Kerridge has built a career defined by resilience, risk and an enduring belief in people.

Tom joins James O’Brien to discuss his unlikely path into hospitality, from washing up in country house hotels to the intensity of London’s leading kitchens and the creation of The Hand and Flowers - the UK’s first pub to hold two Michelin stars. He reflects on the energy of professional kitchens, the mentors who shaped him, and why he believes being a chef is “nothing to do with food”.

They also explore his growing role as an advocate for hospitality, the pressure of running businesses and supporting hundreds of staff, and his engagement with politics and VAT reform. Tom discusses his television career, his latest series Tom Kerridge Cooks Italy, and why success means seeing the people around him thrive.

Tom first appeared on Full Disclosure remotely in 2020, during the Covid period. Returning to the studio, he and James pick up the conversation for a candid, funny and deeply personal look at family, ambition, food and finding purpose through connection.

Watch Tom Kerridge Cooks Italy here

Full Disclosure is a Global Production

Listen or watch every Friday on Global Player, YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts.

What makes someone run towards places most people are desperate to escape?

Long before Ravi Singh became one of Britain’s most remarkable humanitarian figures, he was a child caught between worlds: born in Singapore, raised in a Punjabi village, and brought to Britain at 11, where he encountered racism, loss and dislocation almost as soon as he arrived. Years later, he would go on to found Khalsa Aid, the international relief organisation known for delivering aid in some of the most dangerous and devastated places on earth.

In this episode of Full Disclosure, James O’Brien sits down with Ravi to trace the experiences that shaped his lifelong commitment to service - from a childhood marked by community, faith and hardship, to the moment he realised that compassion could become a form of action in the face of injustice.

Ravi reflects on growing up in a village shared by Sikh, Muslim and Hindu families, losing his father at a young age, and arriving in Britain unable to speak English, where he was confronted almost immediately by racism and exclusion. He describes the values instilled by his mother, the discipline and belonging he found in the Air Cadets, and the personal and political awakening that followed news of atrocities in Punjab.

They discuss faith, identity and activism; the Sikh principles of seva and Sarbat Da Bhala; the founding of Khalsa Aid during the Kosovo crisis; and what it means to deliver practical help in places devastated by war, displacement and disaster - from Iraq and Syria to Somerset and Slough.

Passionate, reflective and deeply moving, this is a conversation about loss, service, solidarity and the moral courage required to see other people’s suffering as your own.

Find out more about Khalsa Aid here

Full Disclosure is a Global Production

Listen or watch every Friday on Global Player, YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts.

Full Disclosure is taking a short break, but we’ll be back very soon with brand new episodes.

Until then, why not dip back into the archive! There are some brilliant episodes to catch up on, including conversations with Jonathan Pryce, Billy Idol, Grace Dent, Sadiq Khan, Dawn French, Irvine Welsh, Hugh Laurie, Jon Ronson, David Harewood and Brian Cox. And that’s only scratching the surface!

Full Disclosure is a Global Production

Listen or watch every Friday on Global Player, YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts.

Baroness Beeban Kidron has lived several lives in one. Award winning filmmaker, Hollywood director, crossbench peer and one of the earliest and most persistent critics of Big Tech, she has spent years sounding the alarm about the digital world long before the rest of us caught up.

In this episode of Full Disclosure, James O’Brien sits down with Beeban to trace the path from a radical North London childhood to the House of Lords, via Greenham Common, Hollywood and a career spent telling stories about power, exclusion and who gets heard. She reflects on the childhood operation that left her unable to speak, the camera that gave her purpose and the instinct that has driven everything since, from filmmaking to political campaigning.

Beeban explains why the arrival of smartphones felt like a turning point, how her documentary work with teenagers exposed the hidden costs of life online and why she believes the harms caused by tech are not accidental but built into the system. She speaks about lobbying, political failure and the transfer of power, money and control from public life into private hands.

It is a fiercely intelligent, deeply personal and often incendiary conversation about technology, democracy and what it will take to fight back.

Find out more about Users: How Big Tech Took Control and How to Fight Back by Beeban Kidron here

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Cressida Cowell is on of the most beloved children's authors, selling millions and millions of books worldwide, including 'How to train your dragon' which is now a global film franchise too.

In this episode of Full Disclosure with James O'Brien, Cressida tells us about her loving childhood with summers spent on Little Colonsay in the Inner Hebridies - a small, inhabited island that her environmentalist dad bought. From boarding school to sixth form, she charts back through her love or reading and illustrating to the struggles, and sometimes lack of, that she faced to become a successful author.

A self-proclaimed misfit at school who struggle with concentration and organisation, Cressida tells james how she felt powerless as a child and loved reading stories with strong female heroes - something she strives for in her writing.

But school never held her back, and with some good fortune of meeting the right people at the right time, Cressida discusses how she got her big break, 'How To Train Your Dragon' didn't become an instant hit, but a cult one and how Hiccup came to be.

Find out more about Cressida Cowell and her new book How To Train Your Dragon School: Fight of the Flamestrike here.

Full Disclosure is a Global Production

Listen or watch every Friday on Global Player, YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts.

After Andy Burnham's landslide win against Nigel Farage's Reform party in Makerfield, we thought you'd love to hear his interview with James O'Brien again, first released in 2022

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 Labour family in Aintree, Burnham went on to study at Cambridge but did not fit in. He tells James why.

This episode includes discussion of sensitive topics, including addiction, that some listeners may find distressing. Please take care while listening, and feel free to pause or step away if you need to.

DJ Fat Tony has spent a lifetime turning chaos into charisma. Long before he became one of the most recognisable figures in British nightlife, he was a kid from Battersea learning, far too young, how to protect himself, how to perform, and how to survive. His childhood wasn’t without love or colour - he speaks warmly about his glamorous, indulgent mother, his complex but protective father, and the freedom and style that shaped him - but it was also marked by abuse, secrecy and the sense that he had to grow up far too quickly.

In this episode of Full Disclosure, James O’Brien sits down with DJ Fat Tony to trace the path from those early years to the centre of London’s club culture. Tony reflects on sneaking into nightlife as a teenager, finding his people on the King’s Road, and building a reputation not through technical brilliance but through instinct, energy and an unerring ear for what moved people.

He speaks candidly about trauma, addiction, identity and the masks he wore to stay in control, as well as the extraordinary highs of a life lived at full volume - from the golden age of clubbing to the friendships, fame and excess that came with it. Tony opens up about recovery, honesty and the hard work of building a life that no longer depends on performance or escape.

It’s a funny, moving and often startling conversation about survival, reinvention and what it means to finally feel at home in yourself.

Find out more about Recover Me by DJ Fat Tony here

Additional support:

If you've been affected by anything you've heard in this episode, please take a moment to read the resources listed: We Are With You, Change Grow Live, Turning Point

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Nina Conti has built a career out of saying the unsayable, turning ventriloquism, improvisation and audience interaction into something far stranger, deeper and more daring than anyone expected. From early struggles with shyness and self-doubt to creating a completely original form of performance, Nina’s work has always lived somewhere between chaos and control, invention and instinct.

In this episode of Full Disclosure, James O’Brien sits down with Nina to explore the unusual path that led her from an acting dynasty and an uneasy start in the profession to becoming one of the most distinctive live performers in Britain.

Nina reflects on growing up in the shadow of famous parents, her complicated relationship with acting, and the influence of the late Ken Campbell, whose mentorship helped unlock the ventriloquism that would ultimately become her artistic home. She explains how improvisation, risk and an appetite for the unexpected shaped her work, and why putting words into other people’s mouths became the key to finding her own voice.

They also discuss performance, shyness, subversion, film-making and the strange alchemy of making something feel alive in the moment. Along the way, Nina reveals how a career that could easily have taken a more conventional route was instead built on accidents, instincts and a willingness to follow the more interesting door.

Find out more about Nina Conti’s live shows here

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