The Big Interview
In-depth conversations with global leaders in art, design, literature, politics, business, and food. Learn from the best about their craft and successes.
Latest Episodes
Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya
Belarus’s exiled opposition leader speaks to Monocle’s Tomos Lewis about the state of the resistance movement and her hopes for the country’s future.
Benjamin Zander
We kick off a new season of The Big Interview with something magically different. Monocle’s Emma Nelson speaks to world-renowned conductor Benjamin Zander, the founder of the Boston Philharmonic Orchestra, about the transformative power of classical music.
Theaster Gates
In our final episode of a special series of conversations ahead of the US elections, Chicago-born visual artist and urban planner Theaster Gates talks to Tomos Lewis about making art, redeeming spaces that have been left behind and the ongoing existence of racial violence in the US.
Jane Fonda
The Academy Award-winning actor and legendary campaigner talks to Tomos Lewis about the importance of protest, using her celebrity platform for social change and why she is inspired by a new generation of activists.
Charlie Sykes
The former radio host and founder of the conservative news website The Bulwark talks to Chris Cermak about a career of two halves: before and after the rise of Trump, losing listeners to Trumpism and how to win them back over to the moderate fold.
Karen Donfried
In the third episode of our US election series, Karen Donfried, the president of the German Marshall Fund of the United States, talks to Chris Cermak about the challenges for the transatlantic relationship and how to get the alliance back on track, regardless of who takes the White House in…
Chris Wallace
The veteran Fox News anchor was the man tasked with moderating the fractious first presidential debate between Donald Trump and Joe Biden. In our second episode in our special US election series, Tomos Lewis speaks with Wallace about the state of US media, what makes a good question and why…
Ben Rhodes
In our first episode of a special series on the US election, Monocle’s Tomos Lewis sits down with Ben Rhodes, the former speechwriter, foreign-policy adviser and deputy national security adviser to President Barack Obama. He talks about how the US has changed since the Obama years and about his new…
Michel Comte
For more than 40 years, the Swiss artist and photographer has worked for all the major fashion houses and publications including ‘Vogue’ and ‘Vanity Fair’. The subject of his forthcoming book is his grandfather, Alfred Comte, a legendary Swiss aviation pioneer. He sits down with Tyler Brûlé to reflect on…
Masha Gessen
Now a columnist for ‘The New Yorker’, the prize-winning journalist and author spent over two decades covering the resurgence of totalitarianism in Russia. Gessen’s latest book ‘Surviving Autocracy’, turns a lens on the US. Andrew Mueller spoke to Gessen about meeting Putin, Donald Trump’s America and how to find the…
