Episode 214

The seemingly inexorable march of Jacob Rees-Mogg, double-breasted pyjamas and all, right up Downing Street to No 10 is a wonder to behold. Often mocked as the Hon Member for the 19th century, Rees-Mogg is rapidly showing he's no mere figure of fun but the most likely person in Britain to be our next prime minister. Caroline Frost is an author and specialist in the crossover between celebrity and politics, as well as the chair of the Broadcasting Press Guild, so we invited her onto the sofa to examine this unexpected phenomenon.

Who killed British cinema? Until 1970 Britain had the second biggest film industry in the world. Studios such as Rank, Associated British Picture Corporation, British Lion and Anglo-Amalgamated made and released a film almost every week of the year. Tens of thousands of British people worked in the nation’s films. Today we have not a single British movie studio and 98 percent of the films in our cinemas are made by foreign entities. Every major European country has an indigenous movie culture – so what happened to ours? Our guests Vinod Mahindru, a Birmingham film director, and Jonathan Gems, a playwright and screenwriter, help us find out.

Follow @RT_sputnik