I cried after presenting my first Today programme
Radical with Amol Rajan
BBC
4.5 • 919 Ratings
🗓️ 9 October 2023
⏱️ 15 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Amol and Nick are two of the BBC’s most experienced journalists. In this bonus episode of The Today Podcast they talk through their first day presenting Radio 4’s Today.
They remember the emotion of those first mornings as well as their favourite moments on the UK’s most influential radio news programme.
Also: find out what happens when a guest oversleeps and why Nick found himself running between Downing Street and a studio when Today was on air.
Subscribe to The Today Podcast to get Amol and Nick's take on the biggest stories of the week every Thursday. With insights from behind the scenes of the programme.
Get in touch by sending us a message or voice note via WhatsApp to +44 330 123 4346 or email Today@bbc.co.uk
The Today Podcast is presented by Amol Rajan and Nick Robinson. The producers are Tom Smithard and Stephanie Mitcalf. The editors are Jonathan Aspinwall and Louisa Lewis. The executive producer is Owenna Griffiths.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, Podcasts. |
| 0:04.8 | Right, we're back. |
| 0:06.1 | This is a bonus edition of the Today podcast with me, Nick. |
| 0:10.0 | And me, Amol. |
| 0:11.0 | And The Today Podcast, if you don't yet know, |
| 0:13.7 | is a new weekly podcast from the team behind the Today program, hence, |
| 0:17.7 | the very original name. |
| 0:19.1 | We spend a long time working on it. |
| 0:20.6 | It's the Today podcast. Wow. Hence, the very original name. We spend a long time working on it. |
| 0:23.0 | The Today podcast. |
| 0:42.7 | One of the weird things about the Today program is despite being three hours long, three hours is actually not very much to tell people about everything that's going on in the world. |
| 0:50.1 | And with a podcast, we have space, we have time, we have depth, we have freedom to explore things in much more detail than we would on a program. |
| 1:00.0 | Yeah, some people listen to three hours of the Today program, but a lot of people listen while they're getting dressed, while they're taking the kids to school or doing the commute, or making their breakfast. |
| 1:09.0 | They may be listened to just 15 minutes is why we try and squeeze in a lot so that you get a briefing on what's happening in the news on that day today. But the podcast allows us, sit back a little bit, kick off your shoes, relax, |
| 1:15.0 | and go in depth on the subject we're interested in. And also one that we've had a bit of time |
| 1:19.3 | to prepare on because one of the things that people may not necessarily know about the Today |
| 1:25.3 | programme, which is an extremely intellectually challenging |
| 1:29.5 | program to listen to, but even more so to work on, is we have an amazing team of producers |
| 1:34.3 | who like us are expected to know about a huge range of subjects. And quite often, because we |
| 1:40.1 | are a live program, stuff happens on air and you have to respond to it straight away. |
| 1:46.2 | We don't get a lot of time, do we? What was your first day like? Well, my first day, I mean, |
| 1:51.5 | I interviewed Quasi Quarteng at 810, who was the business secretary at the time. |
... |
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