Classicist and TV presenter Mary Beard, 67, on popcorn with Emma Thompson, Gogglebox fame and giving up the day job.
Inside Culture is in its fifth series. What do you love about it?
It really hits the big issues but — and I apologise to my BBC friends — in a way that isn’t posh or privileged. Like when we look at crying, for example — you can go very highfalutin if you think about all the ways we’re supposed to cry in front of works of art or music.
But you can also say, we all go to the movies, it’s dark and we cry even though it’s sentimental schmaltz like The Sound Of Music, which I always cry at. I’m very proud we can flit between the obvious bits of modern popular culture but also the more difficult bits about power and grief.
Who were you most excited by in this series?
Everybody is dead exciting but I’m never going to forget going to the cinema with Emma Thompson and sitting with my bowl of popcorn talking about movies that make us cry.
That’s a moment to die for, isn’t it? It was so interesting talking to her about how it was filming those iconic moments in Love Actually.
Hillary Clinton is in this series and the last…
Hillary has been a great friend of the programme, partly because I think she’s keen to participate in a programme that brings questions about women, power and to a popular audience. She’s very game. It’s humbling. I’m very grateful to her.
Do we need more women in positions of power?
Of course. Although we shouldn’t think if only women were in control we wouldn’t be having a war and everything would be fine. There is a sense that we’re still missing out on women’s talents, perspectives and humour. Sadly, we don’t know if Hillary would have been a good president or a bad one.
Why don’t we ever learn from history?
Because history always changes. People always want to find an episode in the past that helps us and I’m afraid we always have to work it out again for ourselves.
History doesn’t give you an answer. It doesn’t say, ‘Oh, I know what I’d do in Ukraine.’ What it does is it helps you think more reflectively about yourself and see that other people have been in similar situations.
Do you get frustrated with period dramas for not portraying things accurately?
No, I love them. I have to say, I’m a very austere upholder of accuracy — but it can be overrated. I want people to get interested in the past and that’s not just a question of whether the view is right or wrong. I’m going to be the first person to sit here and say that film is hopeless.
But I also love Gladiator. It got loads of people interested in classical antiquity in a way that was good. If all historians do is sit and say ‘that bit wasn’t right’, we’re lost. You have to engage with people.
Do you get recognised a lot?
I do in slightly niche markets. If I go to the British Museum, I tend to get recognised. There are other places you can walk down the street and nobody recognises you.
Sometimes incognito is great but it’s wonderfully cheering when people come up and say, ‘I read the book, it was really interesting.’ That’s absolutely heart-warming. I’m 67. I never thought that would happen to me.
Was TV always part of the plan?
No, never. It happened by accident and against my better judgement. Some people hate me, some don’t. But one of the things I’ve learned from telly is that university teachers are quite good at putting things over.
People think of them as these rarefied old people but we’re quite good at selling our subject.
You’ve been called the world’s most famous classicist…
My husband, who was also a classicist, would say that it’s not like the world’s most famous politician. But if I’ve done something that helps the ancient world get better known and shown it’s not just about the boring old past for a load of nerds, I’m pleased.
You got a lot of people talking on Gogglebox!
I have to say I don’t often feel ‘Oh, my God, that is wonderful.’ But being on Gogglebox was one of the highlights of my life.
It doesn’t usually have documentaries on it about art and the idea that you can put an Ancient Roman sculpture on a documentary, a man f***ing a goat, which gets on Gogglebox and people say, ‘Oh, blimey,’ then we’re doing something right.
I thought the people on Gogglebox were quite good about it, and at taking me down a peg or two. It was brilliant and shows there are things about the Ancient Roman world that can still matter.
What else do you have going on this year?
I’m going to be retiring from my day job [professor of classics at Cambridge University] in September. So I’m going to have a little bit more time to do other things I want to do, on TV if they’ll have me.
I think retirement’s good to let other people get a look in. But I’m not going to be in the garden very much this year.
Inside Culture with Mary Beard is on BBC2 tonight and on iPlayer.
