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- [00:02]
A
Support for the show comes from Anthropic, the team behind Claude. There's a certain kind of person who delights in spending hours figuring something out for them. This kind of work isn't a waste of time. It's an irresistible pursuit of the aha moment when everything clicks. And that's exactly the kind of thinking that Claude was designed to do. To skip over the easy answers and dig into the deep stuff. Try Claude for free@claude aifashionneurosis and see why problem solvers choose Claude as their thinking partner. Hi, come in. Welcome to Fashion Neurosis. Riz Ahmed.
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B
Thank you for having me.
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A
Can you tell me what you're wearing today and why you chose these particular clothes?
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B
I'm wearing a leather bomber jacket. I'm wearing kind of a red purpley roll neck black trousers. And I'm wearing my favorite shoes. They're these shoes that are kind of made from Persian rugs. They're recycled. They cut up rugs and make shoes out of them. The reason I'm wearing these clothes, I think, is because I usually have lots of different kinds of things to do over the course of a day. So I'm usually kind of trying to thread a needle between looking smart enough to do some of them but feeling comfortable and casual enough to do other stuff. And to be honest, I wasn't thinking too deeply about what to wear. But now that you're asking me, I feel like it's a pretty fair reflection of kind of my vibe these days. I feel like getting a bit older or look a bit more, you know, presentable and grown up with these kind of roll necks and slightly less hoodies. Although I probably still wear too many hoodies if you ask my wife. And I guess a jacket like this is just my comfort zone. I own a lot of leather bomber jackets and I know, I just was always obsessed with jackets as a teenager. So I've got more jackets than socks, you know, and T shirts to wear them with.
- [02:32]
A
There's nothing like a good jacket because it's such a good edit, isn't it? It's like it puts you together and then the slight disrobing feels safe, I find. Anyway, it's like, okay, I can take it off now and I won't feel so exposed.
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B
Yeah, maybe there's something about it feeling like armor. I always used to look forward to winter because then you can pull out the jackets.
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A
Yeah, yeah.
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B
But also because that's when the Christmas sales were and so we used to go to Bond street and Selfridges. And hit the Christmas sales, me and my friends or my brother and we'd swap all the price tags. That's a brilliant idea. And they weirdly had this policy where you know, we take a 300 pound top and swap it with a 50 pound tag. And the sales, they were all handwritten and go look, this is 50 quid. Which even then that was like you know, trying to get the money together for that 50 quid T shirt or whatever. And they had this weird policy where they were like oh well that is a mistake. But the tags on it like that. So yeah, all right, you can have a 50 quid. That's when we would pay for it. Brilliant. God, that's so. Yeah. I don't know, I feel like Christmas is the. And winter is that time of like I would get all my years clothes from then. Cause it's winter. It would be jackets and. Yeah, I used to look forward to that time always.
- [04:08]
A
It's so much more fun designing a winter collection than a summer because just all that, what's going to look on top. Good on top of this and then on top of that. And it's, it's such a. Yeah, I
- [04:22]
B
guess also like when you get to layer different bits of clothes, it's like you get to layer different parts of your personality. You know if I, if I was just wearing this roll neck that's saying something different I feel to having it with this bomber jacket.
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A
Yeah.
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B
Not that I analyzed it but I'm thinking about it now and I feel like in summer it's more like you got to choose the one thing that you are. And I feel like in when it's a bit more cold and a bit more wet you're allowed to have those layers. Allowed to be more of a Russian doll.
- [04:55]
A
Yeah, it's a really good. Yeah, I'll remember that. That's exactly how I feel about it. You articulated it so well. And you're a multi award winning actor, a writer and a rapper and you care deeply about equality and fairness and people can often find themselves frustrated by not having the language they need and becoming didactic and frustrated. And when did you first know that you had the gift of language at your disposal?
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B
It's funny you should say that because I often feel that I slip into being didactic and I often feel that it's so hard to talk about not just equality or putting the world to rights, but it's hard to almost talk about anything that you're passionate about without seeming too earnest. Do you know what I mean?
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A
Yeah.
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B
And finding the language, finding the right way to communicate, communicate about something so it doesn't go to people's heads, it goes to their hearts is something that I'm constantly searching for, particularly when I'm writing music, writing lyrics and at least I hope I've kind of gone on a bit of a journey there from writing ideas to writing feelings and sounds. But I remember, I remember just being sent out of the classroom a lot for arguing with teachers and kind of getting a sense that actually I'm being thrown out because I've won that argument, you know, or like actually I, I think, I think I got them so they had no last resort left other than to send me out of the classroom or something silly, you know. But I remember thinking I'm kind of beating some grownups in arguments, you know, I probably was a showboating as well. I enjoyed doing that in front of the class. You know, I was very ADD and I found it frustrating just being side the desk. But I think it was something to do with getting in trouble at school. Also made me realize the troublesome parts of me were there was something that I had, you know, so it's weird, I guess in a way like my. For that reason probably my communication or ability to articulate myself has always been tied up in questioning authority. Now that I think about it, you know, discovering my ability to communicate was the same time it was tied up with challenging authority figures. So it's probably why I'm still stuck on that same tip now.
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A
It's so interesting that because language is such a power. And I always remember this one time I had a stepfather who I hated and I'd done something wrong. He caught me hitchhiking.
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B
And where were you hitchhiking to?
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A
I lived in the country, so I'd come back from, got the train and there was no bus. So I was hitching home and suddenly there was. He was there, dragged, you know, and I just went on and on verbally attacking him. I remember I, I caught, I said, you're the essence of hypocrisy. And then he hit me and I thought, great, I've got to him. I mean, that was the only time that happened. But I really, I had that feeling of if you choose your words carefully, they can be effective. I mean, Obviously I was 12 then,
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B
so I was fighting talk from a 12 year old Bella.
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A
But you've talked about what you call your obsessive perfectionism. And I wondered what was the first instance of that that you can remember?
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B
You know, I'm going To mention something that's just come into my mind that it's probably not. Maybe not sound directly related, but when I look back, I realize it is that you probably think now would say, oh, you know, I would keep redrafting my homework until it was there, or keep redrafting my lyrics until it, you know, I was happy with them or would keep my room very tidy. Elements of those things up, some of them are true. The thing I'm actually going to say is I used to have a twitch as a kid. I used to have a very elaborate kind of series of tics that I would perform. It was almost like a pattern.
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A
Yeah.
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B
From like my fingers to my face to my stomach muscles and my toes.
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A
Oh, wow.
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B
It was like, you know, sometimes you see kids or you see. And you're like, something's going on there. Like they. And maybe it was just my brain chemistry. Maybe it was an Add D thing. Maybe it was some elements of OCD as well. I can be a bit of a neat freak. I don't know. But in a way, I kept doing that same pattern in a kind of slightly obsessive way. Not constantly, but throughout my day, because I had this almost feeling that I haven't. I haven't done it right. Such a weird thing to say, isn't it? But it's like I would keep retracing this kind of physical pattern in my body again and again, kind of searching for this feeling of having nailed it. Yeah, it's slightly bizarre, I know, but when I look back at that, I think there's a kind of weird obsessive perfectionism that underpinned that. But of course, underneath all of that, probably an overwhelmed kid just dealing with complex feelings and brain chemistry and stuff. And, you know, a lot of kids have tics and these patterns and adults as well, for that reason. So. Yeah, I wasn't expecting to say that, but I guess that's the magic of being lying here on a couch. And it almost feels like therapy. Wasn't expecting to talk about that.
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A
It's so interesting that because it's like a. I'm. I'm interested in the physical side of resetting oneself more after, like, so much mental exploration.
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B
Yeah.
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A
And some. And it's like a. A kind of reassuring of your neural system. And I notice it so much now. So what you're saying really resonates. I can see how, especially as a young. As a sort of young. A child, that it's like a kind of reassurance in. In a way. Is that what it Felt like, yeah,
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B
it's coming back to a home base. But you're right, it's also resetting. It's like, how do I deal with these overwhelming feelings in my body?
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A
Yeah.
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B
And later on, the way I would deal with them was through performance.
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A
Yeah.
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B
You know, whether that was in the classroom performing the Troublemaker to get thrown out, or whether it was on stage to get a round of applause and feel that wave of kind of validation, feeling like a kind of reset or a safe place or, you know, writing lyrics and performing them particularly. I used to like drum and bass and jungle, and I used to promote club nights that were mainly jungle and drum and bass. And just because of how fast the tempo is, like 180 beats per minute. And it's allowed me to put all of that into intense kind of. I was almost, like, vibrating with, like, energy that was just spilling over, and that became my. My outlet for it. So I feel like, in a way, performance is still a way for me to physically reset and. And soothe. Particularly if you think about acting, it's a kind of. Almost a spiritual reset. Not to be too pretentious about it, but you're kind of leaving or I'm not going to be me to be someone else. Of course, the way you get there is always to lean into yourself and the truth of your experience and find those overlaps between you and the character. But there's something resetting and. And physically soothing about performance for me. For that reason, you know, to this day, I think the moment. The moment where I am the most completely at peace in Zen are directly after I come off stage. When I finish a gig and I come off stage performing my music, I feel so blissed out and calm and almost empty. So reset in a way. I could, like, happily sit on a chair and just stare at a wall for like, half an hour. You know, I just feel like the energy has moved through me completely. So there is something like a physical reset.
- [14:23]
A
Yeah. Like you're in the eye of the storm and it's all. You're just grounded in the middle because you've. You've also talked about code switching include including the clothes you wore. And I wonder what the first time you deliberately dressed to switch and what you wore.
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B
That would happen a lot, you know, at school, because I went to a private school that was about an hour away from where I grew up, and it was a very different kind of social setting and different places, you know, and from my own neighborhood. And there was this thing in particular. I'll give you an extreme example, we used to have these parties called Daytimers. So South Asian, Indian, Pakistani, Bangladeshi kids, often with traditional parents, they, and in particular for girls, weren't allowed out at night or there was like a conservative kind of expectations around, you know, dating and that kind of stuff. So as teenagers in the 90s, we would have our club nights in the daytime when you're supposed to be at school so your parents wouldn't discover it. And they were called daytimers. And when, when they were daytimers, you know, I would literally have that change of clothes. So I had my school uniform. And the interesting thing about the uniform is my, the tie. The house that I belong to like, you know, like Gryffindor or whatever, slither it. The house that I belonged to was named Clive after Clive of India, the guy who colonized India. So I'd be like representing Clive House in sports and debates and no one gave it a second thought, you know. So I went from wearing this explicitly colonial kind of tie and suit to have the change of clothes in my bag and to go to the daytimers. And for me that was green and white Reebok classics usually because there was a reference to like Pakistani heritage in the green and white. The way that a lot of the Sikh kids and boys wore orange and black, for example. There was like a whole kind of subculture and code to these things around identity, off key print, Moschino, you know, or usually fake or V2 Versace, usually fake from Wembley Market or something that I'd got. And I used to kind of just really. Yeah, it was a full blown costume change. And with it my, the way I spoke would change who I am would, would change. So in a way it was kind of where I, how I started acting, you know, before ever being in a school play. It was just the total change in Persona.
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A
Yeah.
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B
From home to school to hanging out with mates. But I think a lot of people have a version of that because did
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A
you try to stand out or blend in as your code?
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B
It's a weird, It's a funny thing, you know, is as much as I wanted to kind of be a part of a tribe, I also wanted to stand out within that tribe, you know. So part of me was wanted acceptance and to fit in, but part of me also always resisted that. I kind of think now that's kind of, that's still true, you know, the insider, outsider thing for a lot of creative people, for a lot of artists, it's. I think it's an important place to be because I think you Want to blend in enough to have access, to have a window into worlds and new experiences, but you want to have one foot outside it enough to be able to see it.
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A
Yeah.
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B
To be able to look at it, to draw from it, to write about it. And so I think that insider, outsider thing is something that I still cling to in a way. Like I'm. I'm. I've always been slightly allergic to, like, totally being in, like, any kind of scene, you know.
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A
Yeah.
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B
And yet I've always looked in slightly from the outside going, oh, I wanna. I want a clear tribe. Yeah, yeah. That contradiction between wanting to be on the inside and outside, I think that's always stayed with me.
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A
Yeah. It's a good description. So I was thinking about back in the days of punk, which I caught the end of, and I wanted to be part of. But being part of meant distinguishing yourself within that too. So you couldn't just dress like someone else or you'd be looked down on with. You know, everyone was so judgmental and quite critical, but it was kind of, if you could bear it, it was quite good training.
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B
What's so amazing about that movement? Right. It's like the tribe is being as individual as possible
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A
without being a twat somehow, which is obviously fine line. Yeah. Yeah. Support for the show comes from Anthropic, the team behind Claude. We've all become so accustomed to getting instant answers to any question that crosses minds, which is understandable. We've all had access to search engines for decades now, but often search engines will trade depth for expediency, and the answers you're given can be incomplete or compromised by advertisers. That's what sets Claude apart. Claude isn't interested in giving you quick and easy answers. When you ask it a question, it's prepared to get into the why with you, to dig deeper, deeper and follow you down rabbit holes. What's more is that Claude can also support you with the kind of admin tasks that are tedious to complete on your own, which is how I prefer to use Claude. It helps me with things like cleaning up a cluttered inbox or summarizing meeting notes or synthesizing a plan of action when I want to get started on a new project. In that way, Claude is more like an ally than a simple search engine. Try Claude for free at Claude AI fashionneurosis and see why problem solvers choose Claude as their thinking partner. And do you remember the first piece of clothing that you longed for as a child and felt that somehow longed for Change things.
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B
And I ended up getting. Or that I didn't get doesn't.
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A
I mean in an ideal world you'd get it, but often one wouldn't.
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B
But you know, a jacket, again, leather jacket that meant everything to me was one that I had made in Pakistan. Didn't visit Pakistan a lot growing up. You know, went a handful of times. But I think when I was about. When I was 18, I think it may have been even the time of the matrix coming out. 2000, something like that. 2001 went to the leather market in Karachi and I had a leather jacket made up from scratch. Kind of a one piece almost with no join in it. Collarless kurta style collar, shirvani style collar, three quarter length leather trench coat. It's very matrix, isn't it? And I just wore that just, oh my God, I wore the shit out of that jacket. It was kind of like in a way trying to bring it all together, just becoming an adult. And it was like, this is like a kurta, it's like a shirvani. It's the Matrix. It's like this leather jacket. It's a bit like cooler gangster thought. And I remember I would wear my. The thing I would always wear it with at my club nights that I started promoting around then was a white berry. Oh, women's berry. That's so cool. And then a kurta like, you know, like a kurta top that I cut with scissors and dyed. And then jeans. Back then it was all boot cut jeans with Nike air bursts. And that was just like my thing. I was like, this is me, this is my character. This is the thing I'm gonna be when I perform. This is like, it's this exact mix, you know. And I think that jacket was just kind of like the. My arm, I was on my superhero cape when I was performing. It was like, I loved that jacket. I don't know where the hell is
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A
and where did the beret come from?
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B
Because that beret came from a friend of mine. She, I think she wore it to one of my nights and I was like, I love this beret. And like, I think jokingly when I was on the mic, I took it off her head and put it on. And then she was like, it looks good and you should keep it.
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A
That's so.
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B
Kept it for way too long. My white beret as well. Inside, just battered sweat, grunge from raving
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A
and yeah, it's incredible how much, you know, how symbolic it is because anyone who wears a beret, they immediately look like you Know, kind of cool, intellectual, actually.
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B
No, it's not. It's not a beret. I guess you could call it a flat cap. It was more like a kangal flat cap. Yeah, but I don't know what the. It was a mixed signal I was giving off, for sure. But maybe that was a point. Maybe it was simple as that. Yeah, I saw.
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A
I was watching this documentary about Francis Ford Coppola the other day, and he was so beautifully dressed, and in one of. One of the days, his look, he had a kind of pale, like an ivory colored suit with a black beret on. I just thought I've. It was so elegant and stylish and so, you know, this sort of allusion to, you know, Jean Paul Sartre and beatniks and stuff. God, it was strong. It was really good.
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B
You know, it's interesting, when I'm filming, I like to not have to think at all about what I'm wearing. I never, like, put on an outfit to go and shoot, in fact, for years, for probably way too long. Sounds gross. I just wore the same exact tracksuit throughout the whole of shooting. The night of which was like eight months. Every single day, I would get up and put on that tracksuit and go to hair and makeup in that and then get into my costume. I kind of wanted to erase the idea of me putting on any other identity or any kind of. Yeah, that I wasn't putting any creative energy into creating a Rizz Persona that day. That. That was just. It's total afterthought and all my energies going into the other thing. And it's still a bit like that. Yeah. I am the guy who turns up in the exact same thing for, like, two months, and people are like, I hope he washes that. I say that. I do.
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A
But loads of men, though, have the same clothes, like tons of pairs of the same gene and the same shirt.
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B
I don't. I wish I could hype for hygiene reasons. I wish I could tell you they're all different versions the same thing. It's literally the same thing. Yeah.
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A
That's sweet. And what was the first thing you wore to be consciously attractive to somebody.
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B
That's funny. I just must have been going on a date when I was like a teenager or something, and we didn't have. I basically shoplifted this jumper from Selfridges. This DNG roll neck, like a thick woolen. It was beautiful. And it said, importantly for me back then, Dolce and Gabbana along the bottom. So it was there. You knew that it was that but it was kind of subtle and. And I knew I had this. You know, I was. I was going to meet this girl and I, yeah, went. I nicked it, basically. And. And I wore that. We went to the cinema, you know, so it was like. Probably didn't see it. Didn't appreciate that it was branded either. But I remember that, and I remember that actually feeling quite like armor, you know, it wasn't like a thin roll neck like this. It was quite. You know, it's kind of thick and. Yeah, I wore that for. I loved that. Sorry. Dng.
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A
Because you. When you collected your Oscar for your short film the Long Goodbye, you wore the color burgundy, and I wondered. And actually today your roll neck is sort of a burgundy color, and I wondered whether you have any associations to that color.
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B
Yeah, I don't know if it's a genuine association or if it's something that I kind of picked just to have a favorite color, but growing up, my big brother's favorite color was blue, so I automatically thought mine has to be red. And I guess I just, like, cultivated that idea to the point where now I kind of feel like, yeah, that's a thing for me. But maybe as I'm getting a bit older and I'm mellowing out, color I really love wearing is pink. I really love pink. And I feel like when I wear red, it's expressing red energy. So I don't have. Do. I feel like I can sit back a bit more, maybe if I'm wearing red, whereas if I'm wearing green or beige, I probably feel like I have to sit forwards a bit more with my energy, be a bit more forthright. I don't know. I'm just kind of riffing in real time. But there is an element of that. Like, the clothes are doing the work for you. You know, it's like if you're wearing a crazy outfit, you can, like, stand quietly in a corner of the room. It's that kind of feeling.
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A
Yeah. That's so interesting. Yeah. Gosh. And. Yeah, because I was wondering. When I was a child, I lived in Morocco, and I. I really wanted my mum to wear a veil like all the other mums.
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B
A veil is in a niqab or just a hijab, a full imbaloco.
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A
The women used to wear a jalaba with a veil across their nose so you could just see their eyes.
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B
Wow. Okay. And you wanted your mom to wear that?
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A
I wanted my mom to wear that. And I wondered, how do you feel about the different dress codes for Muslim Women.
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B
What I love is that there's a range of choices for people to be able to make. You know, I mean, my wife has written about this and it's really, you know, for someone like me to just listen and understand the range of views and opinions. I think the most important thing is that as we're discussing on this podcast, what we wear is so much of our choice. Right. And I'm a big supporter of people dressing however they choose to, you know, how much of themselves they're covering up or not. I don't think that's anyone else's business, really. Personally.
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A
Yeah. No, I suppose from living there and experiencing that, I. I agree completely. You know, it's very different being told how you have to dress to choosing how you want to dress.
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B
Yeah.
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A
And you've talked about the random selection searches at airports when you were returning home from winning the Silver bear for your role in the Michael Winterbottom film the Road to Guantanamo. And you were detained and you were verbally aggressed and denied access to a phone. And I wondered, how do you deal with deliberate provocation?
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B
You know, it's interesting. Deliberate provocation is literally. It's someone trying to bait you into a reaction, isn't it? It's such a fine line, I think, between standing your ground and reacting. You know, reaction, I think, is, in a way, your agency's been taken from you.
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A
Yeah.
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B
You know, someone else has set the terms of the interaction. We just react. And if someone's deliberately provoking you, then it's even more true. Right. Got what they wanted. And my dad always has this philosophy. There's a Farsi saying which is java bejahelah khamoshist. Which is the best response to ignorance is silence. And I'd like to get to that level of Zen and mellowness. Put it in God's hands. I'm not coming down to that level, but sometimes I feel like that turning that ends up being turned the other cheek in a way that is also unhelpful. So I know. How do you respond rather than react? To be honest, I don't know. It's still something I'm working out in day to day interactions, even, you know, we all get rubbed up the wrong way or triggered by all kinds of things and trying to honor that feeling without letting that feeling take over you. Yeah, I think it's a lifelong journey. I've got zero advice for people on that. I'm just trying to work that out for myself.
- [32:59]
A
I think even, you know, delineating, responding and Reacting is half the battle because suddenly you retain your agency by remembering that you can respond rather than react. And then that's already such a. I mean, that's something. Something to come from rather than losing it, which is so demoralizing as well. But it's. Yeah, it's a really good. It's great. It's a great thing to remember that. Because you described what you called three necklaces of stereotyping and breaking out from that. And working with Chris Morris on Four Lions seemed an unlikely route to mainstream. But he heard your song Post 911 Blues, which is such a witty song. And what are the three necklaces?
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B
I'm actually not sure exactly what they are. So what was this that I say.
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A
I'm quoting back? Something from quite a long time ago you talked about.
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B
I can talk more broadly about stereotypes and stuff. If that's.
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A
Yeah, it was like.
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B
I probably won't. I'll probably fail to remember what you're quoting, to be honest.
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A
You describe these things as Three necklaces as like the first one of being cast as something. A sort of stereotypical cliche of how people think that they can use you as a. As an actor.
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B
Right, right.
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A
You know, working in it as a.
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B
Well, I'll respond maybe a kind of broader level, which is. I feel like no one reads as neutral. Very few people do. Right. Blond hair, blue eyes, beautiful. Has its own baggage. Someone in this body looks like this. It has its own baggage. You, the way you look. Some baggage is a lot heavier and a lot more burdensome than other baggage, 100%. I'm not saying everyone's got across to bear, and it's the same, particularly in our culture. Right. There's a kind of value placed on certain appearances of others, but no one reads as neutral. And I kind of feel like one of the most exciting and important roles of telling stories is to really play with those preconceptions that people come to a story with. You know, if some. If you can flip someone's thinking, you can flip their perspective or their perception from the start of them seeing your story to the end. I think that's what we're here to do, you know, break down those walls and have them see the world differently, ideally see themselves in someone who's nothing like them, you know, and so that's something that I always enjoy doing, whether it's something like Four Lions, where it's like these demonized and completely misguided criminal young men, but also kind of being like dumb and silly and playful.
- [36:31]
A
Yeah.
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B
And you kind of, like, warming to them. That's interesting. Just a flip of perception. Flip of preconceptions. Similarly, with, like, Hamlet, we've got. Now, it's like people have their preconceptions around Shakespeare. It looks a certain way, it feels a certain way. People might have their preconceptions about what a majority, you know, South Asian cast, what kind of film they might make. But to put those two together, say, we're doing Hamlet, we're doing it with this cast. We're doing it in this setting, modern London, doing it as a thriller. You know, these. That's what I just really enjoy. I get a kick out of that. I get a kick out of acknowledging that people come into the room with certain preconceptions, then thinking, all right, great, we've got them already. How can they not see this coming? How can we flip this in some way?
- [37:28]
A
Yeah, because that's what excites me, the Hamlet. I've only seen the trailer because it's not out at this moment in time and it's got so much tension. And I. I read that you. That the director said, I don't like Shakespeare. And he. And he got rid of every scene that didn't feature Hamlet. And. And I remember when I was a teenager thinking, why am I so unable to do anything? I've got Hamlet syndrome, which is where you perpetually. I had this sort of image of him perpetually walking on the. The castellations of his castle, never going one way or the other and sort of being consumed with indecision. And this Hamlet is so tense and seems so pacey, almost like a thriller. And how did you make it so that you're on the edge of your seat watching it?
- [38:28]
B
Yeah, it's interesting. I think a lot of people feel like Shakespeare isn't for them. They feel like it belongs to someone else. Yeah, I always, always say Shakespeare's. And Daddy's been kidnapped. You know, there's a very. By the establishment, by intellectuals. There's a very traditional way of doing it that understandably, a lot of people feel on the outside of.
- [38:48]
A
I have, yeah, felt like that Shakespeare, generally.
- [38:51]
B
Yeah. And so this film that we've made, I think, hopefully blows that open for people, you know, because ultimately these stories stick around. Not because it's just a tradition, because it's on the GCSE syllabus, but because they're really powerful stories. They're drawn from deep, deep myths that don't just belong to Shakespeare. Actually, he didn't make up almost all of his plays. He didn't make up the story. They're drawn from ancient deep myths that belong to all of us. So if the heart of these stories belong to us all, why should the most famous version of them, Shakespeare's, only belong to a small group of people? Why should it be this dusty museum piece and actually a story like Hamlet? I feel it's about right now. We need this story. We need this story because it's an ancient myth at its heart that deals with the situation we're going through right now so we can draw on its wisdom. We can allow it to exorcise what we're feeling. And when I say Hamlet's about right now, I think at its essence, Hamlet is about someone grieving the illusion that the world is a fair place.
- [39:59]
A
Yeah.
- [39:59]
B
God, that's how we're feeling right now.
- [40:01]
A
Yeah.
- [40:01]
B
It's about someone being gaslit about that. It's about someone realizing that they're part of the problem as well.
- [40:08]
A
Yeah.
- [40:08]
B
That's how we all feel. We're waking up to the reality of how screwed up things are. All the pretense has been dropped. The mask has come off. It's all shameless and out in the open.
- [40:17]
A
Yeah.
- [40:18]
B
And actually, people are carrying on like, it's fine, it's normal. And you look in the mirror and you look at your own actions, you're like, I'm just kind of going along with this. That's how Hamlet feels. That's how we all feel right now. So I'm a big believer in kind of almost doing a heist on these crown jewels at the heart of our culture, you know, and taking them and trying to democratize them and present them in a way where everyone can connect to it. Because it's just. It's beautiful, powerful, necessary stuff, you know?
- [40:46]
A
Know, it's often said that creative people are not the best at managing business. We may know what we want, but we don't always know how to get it done. This is where I use Claude not to have ideas for me, but to help me navigate the administrative tedium of bringing my ideas to life. My inbox is full of unread emails. This is my system for reminding myself of things left to do. Claud looks at my inbox and my calendar and tells me what needs my attention and what can safely be ignored. Before meetings, Claude reads long email threads so I don't have to pretend I can remember everything. Claude helps me keep track of what I said I'd do, what I've already done and what everyone else has quietly forgotten. And when I'm working on a project. I can give Claude some context, and it helps me sort through my ideas and prioritize the order of things. To me, Claude feels less like a tool and more like an authoritative ally. I can spend more time thinking, listening, and making decisions and less time managing chaos. Try it for yourself at Claude AI slash Fashion Neurosis. Because you. You're a very successful rapper as well as all the other amazing things you do. And you said once how studying Shakespeare at drama school influenced your rap lyricism. And I wondered if you had any couplets that struck you as the perfect
- [42:29]
B
rap lyrics from Shakespeare. Yeah, you know, there's. So I won't say a particular couplet. It's perfect rap. But there's a pair of lines that I love and that always grounds me. At the end of the story of Hamlet, he's been spending this entire play going, what do I do? Do I do this or do I do that? Do I fight back against injustice, even if it might kill me, or do I just go along with it and just suffer all of this? He's really confused and doesn't know what he should do. And by the end of the play, he gets to a place of surrender. He gets to a place of, I think, acceptance, which is the heart of every spiritual tradition. Islam means surrender. Taoism, Tao Te Ching, Wu Wei, swimming with the current. All of the spiritual traditions talk about surrender. And Shakespeare boils it down to these two lines, which is, there's a divinity that shapes our ends. Rough hew them how we will. There's a divinity, some higher power, that shapes our ends. How things shall turn up, turn out in the end. Rough hew them how we will. To rough hew something is to take a piece of whatever and try and hew it, try and carve it. But our carving is always going to be rough. You know, the end, the point of it is going to be out of our hands. And it's something that when I get to, in my head about get too anxious. I'm worried about trying to control outcomes, trying to solve situations that my personal or professional life. There's something very humbling about that. That's.
- [44:25]
A
Yeah.
- [44:26]
B
Just like. And it doesn't mean give up. It means you got to hew them. You got to do the sweaty work of carving these big, chunky pieces of wood. But just know, like, it's not going to turn out how you want. It's kind of out of your hands. I think that's true for every element of life. You know, do the Work have a purpose, but hold that humility of knowing you're not in control.
- [44:52]
A
Yeah.
- [44:52]
B
So those are two lines that I think are beautiful to live by.
- [44:56]
A
Yeah. Really is sort of remembering that the outcome isn't. It doesn't control how you deliver. Freezing is so freeing if you can remember that occasion. Well, for myself, speaking for myself.
- [45:16]
B
But how are you doing or remembering that?
- [45:18]
A
Well, I remind myself a lot, so that really helps, you know.
- [45:26]
B
Do you find that the stuff that you do that's for yourself, rather than what you think people want from you, is usually stuff that connects more?
- [45:40]
A
I think when I really want something, that's when I kind of think, okay, you can put the work in. You can't insist on the outcome because you may have missed something. And then that's. At least it helps me to do the preparation. Right. And then. And then sometimes the outcome isn't how I'd imagined it, but it's good. And that, I find, really gives me confidence in my resolve rather than being too kind of attached to willpower and forcing it. And I suppose as a woman, you have to. You're always negotiating that because people don't expect you to demand and insist. They're immediately kind of less receptive to that. But.
- [46:38]
B
Yeah.
- [46:40]
A
But at the. At the Elle Style Awards, which I. We were both at last year, and you made this incredible speech dedicated to Gaza and also to your wife Fatima, and I wondered how being in love has changed you.
- [47:02]
B
It's a thing of control in a way, isn't it? When it's just you, it's just your life, for better and for worse. Let's have a negotiation. But that's what connection is about. Connection is about teaching you that you don't have control. Energy flows both ways. And I think that's been good for me in all kinds of ways. Everything from, like, you know, the basics of my wife's messy. I'm really tidy. I think it's been good for me to let go of that. I think it's taught me surrender, in a practical sense, in how I conduct my life. Also emotionally, you know, someone else has my heart.
- [47:51]
A
Yeah.
- [47:51]
B
You know, in their hands as well as the other way around. It's made me probably more sensitive, bit more vulnerable, and honestly, just extremely grateful, you know, that there's this person who's willing to go on this journey with me. Mm.
- [48:17]
A
You know, because it seems from the little bits that I've read, that you have a real partnership in your. Both in your romanticism together and also your creative paths that you're so, you just. There's such a sort of joyfulness around you as a couple, like you're these two sparkling people exchanging, you know, heart and mind, and that is so effective. It's so. It really means a lot to see that in people, and it's very encouraging. And you've been photographed by some of the great fashion photographers, including Jurgen Teller. And I wonder which photographer you think makes you look the sexiest.
- [49:08]
B
Huh? I have no idea about that. You know, I can't really look at photos of myself and never think, like, oh, I look great. I, I don't feel that I, I really struggle to look at photos of myself. I don't have the same issue with acting, watching films back or anything like that. Not that I make a habit of it, but if I watch it, you watch it once. I'm not kind of fixating and projecting because things are happening. It's in motion. The story is kind of carrying you along. Photos. I, I would say if I can find a photographer that can make me look sexy, I'll. Yeah, I, I, that makes me feel that I'd be very happy, I guess. There's one photographer, there's one photo of me that I think did capture me in a moment that was very unguarded. And that photo ended up being put in the National Portrait Gallery.
- [50:08]
A
Oh, great.
- [50:09]
B
And that's by Sharif Hamza. And it's interesting. You know, I don't think this necessarily works his way, but he kind of grew up not far away from me. I didn't know him before we met on the shoot, but he kind of got me.
- [50:26]
A
Yeah, yeah.
- [50:27]
B
He understood who I was, where I was coming from. He'd walked a similar tightrope in his life, and he took a photo of me. I think it was for the New York Times magazine. It's like 2019 or 2018, something like this. And I felt like he captured me in a way that was unguided. It was, it was not posing. It was a, it was a genuine feeling. And when I saw it, I don't know if I thought I looked good, but I recognized myself.
- [51:03]
A
Yeah. Yeah.
- [51:04]
B
I thought, like, yeah, that's honest. And. Yeah. And then, yeah, it got kind of got picked up and put. Put in that gallery, which is really nice to be able to. You know,
- [51:22]
A
I go there all the time, actually. And if you fancy someone and you don't like something they're wearing, does it kill your attraction?
- [51:32]
B
I mean, my wife has strong opinions about what I'm wearing and vice versa, but that doesn't mean we listen to each other. I guess there are. Does it kill your attraction? I think so, actually. Yeah, a little bit. It definitely reduces it. I kind of feel like what you wear isn't so much a reflection of who you are, but it's like what your energy is. And I think some outfits are inviting you with their energy or at least saying something with their energy. And some outfits are like, just blocking energy. So I feel like sometimes it's like attractions about energy. You know, if there's just an energy block there, I'm like, I don't know what that signal is saying, you know? But now, to be honest, I'm in a strange situation. My wife wears a lot of my clothes.
- [52:33]
A
Really? Yeah.
- [52:34]
B
She just steals them. And where is that jumper gone? Where are those things going? And she'll wear them a bit oversized.
- [52:43]
A
That's very charming.
- [52:45]
B
It's annoying. She looks better in most of it than I do, especially hats. She can wear any hat and look amazing in it. But my hat's always going missing, man.
- [52:58]
A
You don't have a. Like a pet hate. Like, Nick Cave said he couldn't stand ankle boots. And Susie capitalizes on to get new, exciting.
- [53:09]
B
That's fine.
- [53:10]
A
Footwear.
- [53:13]
B
A pet hate fashion wise or, you know, that I think dungarees.
- [53:19]
A
Oh, yes.
- [53:23]
B
I can't really make sense of them, you know, Sorry.
- [53:29]
A
Okay.
- [53:29]
B
Leaving for Mario and Luigi, that's a safe space for them.
- [53:36]
A
And when you were preparing for your Oscar winning film the Sound of Metal, your character was a recovering addict and you said you went to Narcotics Anonymous and AA meetings. And I wondered if you learned things from the meetings that you still use as a resource, especially to do with handling extreme amounts of feeling.
- [54:00]
B
Yes, 100%. I went there kind of for research, and I kept going for myself. Not because I've ever had a narcotic addiction, but because the spiritual wisdom at those groups is just. Is, I think, true and effective. The two things that stayed with me, one is let go, let God.
- [54:28]
A
Oh, yeah.
- [54:30]
B
Have these. All these sayings. Right. Instead of trying to carry everything, putting it in the hands of some higher power, whatever that means to you. And the other thing was halt, you know, stop. Don't make any rash decisions or respond when you're hungry, angry, lonely, or tired.
- [54:50]
A
Yeah.
- [54:51]
B
You know, and it's useful from a parenting point of view as well. What's going on?
- [55:00]
A
Yeah, that was so interesting. And because have you.
- [55:03]
B
Have you ever taken any wisdom from those spaces or.
- [55:07]
A
Yeah. Any of those. Those things that just, like you were Saying earlier stop you from reacting and help you to respond. Any kind of, any source material for that stuff is I, I'm so interested in. I just.
- [55:31]
B
You seem to be doing a good job, but you seem like very calm.
- [55:35]
A
I'm good at seeming like, oh, really?
- [55:38]
B
Okay.
- [55:39]
A
But because I have like this feel like I have a burning fire of like within. I'm looking for, looking to be reasonable.
- [55:51]
B
But do you wake up like that every day? Do you feel like you've got that thing in you every day? I, I kind of were trying to work out what to do.
- [56:00]
A
Yeah. I'd often wake up with a kind of awful gloom and like re get myself up on a level, so. And then easily, I easily be despairing about how sad I was about how things are, you know, in the world and then find ways with my best friend who taught PPE at, at Oxford, Carmen Abelsey, which is where you. You didn't study at St. Edmunds, but you studied at PP at Oxford. And she. We talk a lot. She lives in Mauritius. And we talk about the beauty alongside which is some kind of poetry or art or any kind of creative energy or something to go alongside the other stuff that helps content, you know, helps you move through life rather than, you know, kind of just dropping out in despair and
- [57:17]
B
version of trying to smell the roses or look for the silver lining.
- [57:21]
A
It's more, it's more like stay that feeling of I, I of impotence, of that there's nothing I can do yet there's always something to be done, even if it's not there. Not a direct route. It's a vicarious way of showing love to people, caring for somebody. And it's like a ripple, you know, and those things I find really important to remember and because you talked about your teacher, your sign language teacher, and I was interested that it's American Sign Language and it has its own accents and everything. But he said this amazing thing I thought he said hearing people are emotionally repressed. And the reason for that is because we hide behind words. I wondered how does that translate for you?
- [58:24]
B
Profoundly true. I think, you know, when I was learning sign language, it became clear that you couldn't hide. The communication is embodied, is in your body. You're communicating with your body in a way that is so connected. And you're listening not with your ears, but energetically. You're taking in someone's entire presence. It's not just about what the words they're saying. And that's true for us hearing people as well. But there's A different level of sensitivity to posture, expression, accent rhythm. When you're kind of listening or being. Putting your attention on someone who's communicating with sign language. Just almost like even without sound, it's like a fuller thing, just energy wise, I don't know. And so I feel like being forced to communicate with your body in that way just connects you to it.
- [59:31]
A
Yeah.
- [59:32]
B
Connects you to other people's bodies. It's, in a way, it's a more honest, pure, embodied signal. I found, like, I remember the first one of the first times I was really fluent enough in sign language to speak about my own life. And then talking about my character, actually my character's life, I noticed I was crying before I could stop it, or I was quite confused by it because I think verbally I could have and would have just very easily run through, like, oh, I think this happened and this happened this. And something about putting it directly in your. In your body and being so expressive and connected. It was really moving for me. And, you know, I think deaf community taught me more about listening than anyone.
- [60:30]
A
Amazing. Do you think it's like removing this filter that is. You think and then you decide what's going to come out. Not having that is you have to speak with so many different parts of yourself. I could only imagine.
- [60:48]
B
Yeah, I think so. I think there's that line in Hamlet. Words, words, words.
- [60:54]
A
Yeah, yeah.
- [60:55]
B
And it's usually performed in a way where the word words loses its meaning, just becomes sounds. Words, words, words, words, words. You know, it's like, what is that? We can say anything. And Hamlet spends so much of the play at that point kind of just playing with words. It's like no one is saying what they mean. No one is saying the actual thing, which for him is, this guy murdered my dad. You're all in on it and we're not talking about it. No one's saying the thing. That's true. Although they feel so then what meaning do words have? And he's just doing kind of like verbal acrobatics with it and just throwing them around and saying, oh, it's because I'm crazy. I lost my mind, you know. But I think so. I think there's something in that. I don't know. I even, like, as a fan of music, I used to really idolize rappers that were all about kind of the technical side of multi syllable wordplay. And now I'm much more drawn to the honesty of the feeling, you know, and how connected it just feels to them and me emotionally.
- [62:12]
A
Yeah, I love krs. One, he's so full of wisdom and so. He's so witty and so light and so intense with it. I. I just love listening to his sermons. He's the best. And your new Amazon series, Bait is set in Wembley and follows a struggling actor. And it's incredibly funny, but for the audience, there's this very poignant identification with the character who's courageous and occasionally betrays his real values. And how important is humor as a vehicle to make people think more deeply about their own prejudice and discrimination?
- [63:01]
B
I think the amazing thing about humor is it makes people feel more deeply rather than think more deeply, that you bypass the brain, you can go straight to the body again, like what we were saying, you know, I'm a big fan of comedy, stand up comedy, you know, I keep threatening to try it one day somewhere where no one can see. Don't worry, wouldn't do that to you guys. But I feel really good. The idea of, I don't know, just, you know, it's like, it's almost like hiccups, isn't it? Or like a burp when you make someone laugh, it's almost involuntary. They don't have time to. Well, do I agree with this? How do I feel like, can I relate to this person? If it's funny, it's funny. It's physical. It's like horror in that sense as well. Something so visceral about it, something so pure about it. So I think in a way it's like a really primal way of communicating and storytelling to, you know, through humor. And some of my favorite films that aren't comedies, they're full of humor. I think a film like Goodfellas, it's really dark, it's really hilarious. Usually right next to each other, you know, or something's hilarious because of how dark it is. It's dark because of how funny they find that. That thing. So, yeah, I'm a big fan. My first rap song was a. Was a comedy rap song. You know, it was like a kind of a joke rap song almost. You probably call it like a meme rap song now. So I've always been a fan of how you can use it to just cut through, you know.
- [64:52]
A
Yeah, it's very. I suppose it gets. It's another removal of a filter like it. People forget about their sort of opinions and suddenly realize, oh, God, you know, I really care about this. And I had no idea a lot of. Did you see that series called Reservation Dogs?
- [65:14]
B
I haven't, but I've heard it's amazing.
- [65:16]
A
So good.
- [65:17]
B
Yeah.
- [65:18]
A
And it is a dark comedy, but, yeah, all the sort of politics of it is the backdrop, and you learn so much about that from following these lives and, you know, the ups and downs in. In the way that your character does in Bait, which is. Oh, it's one of the best things I've seen for years. I love it. I was just. I can't.
- [65:42]
B
You saw it. Yeah, I've seen. So thank God I managed to get
- [65:46]
A
sent some of the episodes, so I'm glad. I loved it. Absolutely. Just can't wait.
- [65:52]
B
It's really fun to be able to share different side as well.
- [65:56]
A
Mm.
- [65:56]
B
It's so something that I love doing and comedy and. But also a different. So much of the show is about taking off the mask.
- [66:04]
A
Yeah.
- [66:04]
B
Both for the character who feels he has to always keep up appearances, even though underneath it he's a mess. And for me as well, it's about taking off the mask and showing a more messy, vulnerable side of who I am or what interests me. So, yeah, I'm really excited to show it to people, but I always also feel a little bit vulnerable about it. But I guess you. You should, you know, if you're sharing something personal.
- [66:29]
A
Yeah. I think if you didn't, it wouldn't be good. And it's so good. It's just totally wonderful.
- [66:36]
B
Oh, I'm glad you liked it.
- [66:37]
A
Yeah. Well, thank you so much, Riz Ahmed, for being on Fashion Neurosis.
- [66:42]
B
Thank you for having me. This is so comfortable.
- [67:03]
A
Thanks again to Anthropic, the team behind Claude for supporting this show. Claude is the AI for people who want a thinking partner, people who aren't satisfied with good enough, but instead want to understand the why of the thing more than just getting a simple answer. If that sounds like you, you can try Claude for free at Claude AI fashionneurosis.