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The Romesh Ranganathan Show

Jack Whitehall: From Fangirling Over The Rock to Fatherhood

The Romesh Ranganathan Show

Ranga Bee & Platform Media

Comedy, Society & Culture

4.6713 Ratings

🗓️ 17 November 2025

⏱️ 71 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

What are Hollywood auditions really like behind the scenes? Jack Whitehall is in the studio with Romesh for a fast, funny and surprisingly candid chat that jumps from his early stand-up days and cringe-inducing “Danny Dyer” phase to his darkest acting role yet in Malice. He talks about prepping to play a manipulative villain, juggling that mindset with new-dad life, fangirling over The Rock on Jungle Cruise, blowing auditions, and navigating the circuit as the posh kid everyone expected to hate. They also get into panel shows, parenting, their unexpectedly famous parents and why teenagers insist stand-up is “dead”. A Ranga Bee Production in partnership with Listen.

 00:01 Intro 02:06 Jack on winning the Amuse moose 04:20 Jack and Romesh meeting in the early career days 06:53 Jack’s acting beginnings 07:45 Romesh has a gift for Jack 12:20 New TV Show Malice 14:42 The difference between acting and comedy 16:43 Balancing family and professional life 21:33 Jungle Cruise Movie 22:24 Fangirling over Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson 24:38 What’s the end goal? 26:15 Auditioning 32:57 A question from Shanthi 34:11 Being posh in comedy 38:05 Working in stand up 40:43 League of their own 44:05 Touring and time off 44:42 Comedy and parenting 52:25 Panto stories 56:12 Working with parents 1:01:54 Jack & Romesh play ‘Misquoted' 1:04:53 Jack’s weirdest experience of his life Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0

Super-Cala Fraudulistic, Bexby.

0:04.0

Oh God, I'm at the frame.

0:05.0

You're not on camera.

0:06.0

But I was reading because it said, it's fine if I read.

0:11.0

And I've got to hold the handbag as well at the same time.

0:15.0

I've got a present for you, have you?

0:17.0

You've not written another book, have you?

0:19.0

On one occasion,

0:22.9

was caught by Dwayne demonstrating a rock bottom on Emily Blunt.

0:25.8

I'm not full-blown,

0:26.9

but I was sort of showing her

0:27.9

and dad comes out

0:30.4

dressed as Captain Hook

0:32.3

and it's full of children

0:34.5

and within five minutes

0:36.9

they're chucking candy.

0:39.3

You have to put like a cock sock basically.

0:42.3

Right, right.

0:43.3

And they sort of left one laid out on the dressing room table.

0:47.3

And I went into my trailer.

0:48.3

I was like, okay, and I picked it up.

0:50.3

It had a little label inside it and it said, small.

...

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