Happy New Year, friends. Welcome to 2026. Welcome to soundtracking with me, Edith Bowman.

And we start a brand new year with a brand new collection of hopes and wishes and excitement for the films, the conversations and the music that we can all share in the year ahead. I hope you are starting

the year in a good place and I hope that you are excited about the opportunities that the year

ahead offers. I know that I am. I'm kind of ready to get back into it. I sit here on a Sunday

morning the day before I start back at work properly after having

a really lovely time off with a family where I really put tools down and gave myself a moment just

to exist which was so beautiful and so lovely. But I have missed it and I'm ready to get back into

it. So yeah, I got loads of exciting things coming up over the next couple of weeks. But I'm

very excited to share this first episode with you. And this first episode, very, very special for so

many reasons. It's a Hamlet special on soundtracking as first we have writer, director, Chloe Zhao,

and then thrilled to share with you my conversation with stars of the film

Paul Mescoe and Jesse Buckley. Now, Hamlet is based on Maggie O'Farrell's novel, who also worked

on the script really closely in collaboration with Chloe. And it tells a story of how the

horrendous tragedy that strikes Shakespeare and his wife, Agnes,

inspired him to write Hamlet.

I saw this film months ago.

In fact, I saw it on the same day as I saw Deliver Me from Nowhere, the Bruce Springsteen film,

and both films kind of really moved me in very different ways. I knew that this was

going to be an emotional one. I knew the conviction in the performance stage, particularly from

Jesse. I'm such a massive fan of Jesse Buckley. From way back, I think you've heard me talk about

her on the show and she's been on the show before actually when she was in the EE-E Rising

Star for BAFTAs way back.

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