大象传媒

Writer and broadcaster Jon Ronson was born in Cardiff in 1967. His bestselling books and award-winning programmes tell stories about people on the fringes – from internet trolls to porn stars. His acclaimed podcast and Radio 4 series Things Fell Apart investigated the antecedents of today’s culture wars from sex education and gay liberation to legal abortion and public shaming.

Here’s what we learned from his Desert Island Discs...

1. He was completely bewildered by his first meeting with TV commissioners

“This is an odd story,” says Jon about his very first TV series, The Ronson Mission, broadcast on 大象传媒 Two in 1993. “I had started writing a column in Time Out which was a narrative. I'd go off on a little mini adventure and I'd write about it - so my old college lecturer said: ’I think you could make a TV show. I'll try and set up a meeting with the 大象传媒’.”

“I went into the 大象传媒 and Janet Street Porter was sitting there - the head of youth television at the time - and she went: ‘Yeah, I think it's a fantastic idea,’ and I sat there saying nothing because I actually had no idea what the idea was.”

2. He takes a bold approach to interviews – with nothing to fall back on

“I don't have a list of questions,” Jon explains. “I want to be like a trapeze artist without, the er, the thing, er, the thing that they fall into... the net! Because I think if you don't have a list of questions then you really have to listen. And then if you listen you become a twig in the stream of the conversation and then you can go to other places.”

3. He loves one stage musical above all others

“I’m a huge fan of Cabaret,” says Jon. “It's like my favourite thing. I saw the most recent production in New York five times. I guess being Jewish has got something to do with it. The powers, the authoritarian powers encroaching on people who just want to live free is very, very moving to me."

And he’s chosen a very specific recording of the show’s title song for his desert island:

“In the original Sam Mendes production, Jane Horrocks plays Sally Bowles and the way she sings Cabaret, particularly the last verse - when you think about it, everybody thinks of Liza Minelli's version of Cabaret - but when you think about it, she's just had an abortion, the Nazis are taking over Germany and the way [Jane] just shrieks out Cabaret is like a primal scream from her soul. It just takes the breath out of you.”

[Incidentally, Jane Horrocks’s co-star in that 1993 Donmar Warehouse production, was a recent Desert Island Discs castaway – Alan Cumming, who revealed that he initially turned down the career-defining role of EmCee, because back then he was “just a little snobby dopey boy.” He’s also played the role to great acclaim in New York.]

4. Jon’s school days were often a nightmare

Jon recalls that he frequently faced bullying at school, “really both physical and psychological... all sorts of terrible things like being grabbed and blindfolded, I had my hands tied behind the back and then stripped and thrown into the playground. That was probably the most dramatic. And it was kind of nonstop for about three years.”

“I've always been awkward socially and I think that was clearly something that [the bullies] smelt at the time.”

“It's numbing. I remember thinking OK, I'll put on an imaginary suit of armour and that'll protect me.”

“I'm not naturally a social person. I don't walk into a room and know exactly what to do. I think I'm better at trying to figure out why people behave the way that they do. If I just knew it, I wouldn't have to work so hard to try and figure it out, so I really, really think about these things.”

5. The next stage of his education changed his life – almost instantly

"The minute my mother dropped me off at the halls of residence,” says Jon remembering arriving at the Polytechnic of Central London, “the guy in the next room, Dipan Joshi said, ‘Ah, come out with us’, and that was it.”

“In a click of the fingers, my life just totally changed. I left it all behind. I was where I belonged. It was exciting.”

6. He joined Frank Sidebottom’s band on the strength of a single phone call

“I became the social secretary of my college. I was in the office one day and the phone rang - I was shadowing my predecessor - and this voice said, ‘Frank’s playing at your bar tonight but our keyboard player can't make it. He's got medical issues, and so we're going to have to cancel unless you know a keyboard player?’”

“And I said, ‘I play keyboards’, and he said, ‘Can you play C, F and G?’

“I said ‘Yeah’, and he said, ‘Well, you're in!’ So that's how I ended up quitting college and moving to Manchester and being in Frank Sidebottom’s band.”

Frank Sidebottom was the alter ego of musician and comedian Chris Sievey. Created by Chris in 1984, Frank was a cartoonish character from the village of Timperley near Manchester who wore a sharp suit and sported a large papier- mâché head. He was a cult figure who performed on the comedy circuit and had his own television show, Frank Sidebottom’s Fantastic Shed Show.

7. One songwriter has strongly influenced Jon’s approach to writing and interviewing

“I started listening to him,” says Jon of his hero, “when I was 18 and when I first moved to London. He’s the first singer who I knew who really taught me about nuance, unreliable narrators, ambiguity, maybe what you're hearing isn't what you're actually hearing. And the first time he did that, he told me, when I interviewed him, was with this song.”

“It's a song that isn't really about what you think it's going to be about. I think it's a song about a loveably deluded guy who thinks that if he goes to a restaurant, all the rich people were applaud him, but in fact, they're just exploiting him, and laughing at him and he thinks everybody loves him. But actually they're laughing at him, and so the last line of the song is very plaintive, and bittersweet.”

The song is Simon Smith and the Amazing Dancing Bear by Randy Newman, and it’s Jon’s fifth choice for the island.