Ahead of their new film and TV podcast, radio’s odd couple take questions from actors, directors and Observer readers about optimism, the films they disagree on – and biscuits
Mark Kermode (film critic) and Simon Mayo (audio host) appear simultaneously on video link in appropriately themed rooms. Mayo’s is his spare bedroom, which boasts some excellent wallpaper featuring graphic versions of 7in singles. “Every single record label and band and identifying mark has been removed,” he notes. “But if you’re a veteran like I am, you can spot a Fontana single or a CPS or Epic…” Kermode is in a teeny room in a house he moved into only yesterday. Unsurprisingly, his is not a fabulous backdrop (unpacked boxes and what looks like a bunk bed) but somehow, he’s managed to make his computer camera reveal him in moody black and white. “Oh God, how did I do that? I can’t switch it off now,” he says. “Very Bait,” comments Mayo, dryly.
Teasing and bickering with a film (and, often, music) theme is what Kermode and Mayo do, and have done since the 1990s, when Kermode first appeared in a film review slot on Mayo’s Radio 1 morning show. When Mayo decamped, first to 5 Live and then to Radio 2, their on-air relationship continued as Kermode and Mayo’s Film Review, a two-hour 5 Live Friday afternoon radio show and podcast. Even after Mayo’s rather tetchy 2018 departure from Radio 2 (he was put into a difficult co-hosting position with Jo Whiley; he left after six months), Kermode and Mayo’s Film Review remained exactly where it was, providing informed, jolly, “what to go and see this weekend” entertainment. Or “wittertainment”, as the show’s fans have it.
