Stephen Fry on passion, privilege, and the power of storytelling
White Wine Question Time
Stak
4.6 • 1.2K Ratings
🗓️ 25 April 2025
⏱️ 58 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Joining us today is one of the most celebrated thinkers and entertainers of our time – a writer, actor, comedian, and cultural icon whose voice and wit have been part of the fabric of British life for decades. From Blackadder and Wilde to QI and Harry Potter, he’s done it all – and now he’s back on our screens hosting Jeopardy! It’s the incomparable Stephen Fry.
In this captivating conversation, Stephen reflects on a career that’s spanned comedy, drama, literature and documentary, offering profound insight into his extraordinary life, both on and off the stage. He speaks candidly about the privileges and opportunities that shaped his early path, the importance of working hard once doors are opened, and the creative hunger that’s driven him for over 40 years.
Stephen also delves into his global activism through projects like Out There, explores the impact of Greek myths and the Harry Potter universe as moral compasses in turbulent times, and shares how his love of quizzes drew him to the iconic game show Jeopardy! From his Oxford days with Emma Thompson and Hugh Laurie to his belief in storytelling as a force for good, this is Stephen Fry at his most thoughtful, passionate, and utterly brilliant.
You can catch Stephen hosting Jeopardy! on ITV and stream it on ITVX. And if you haven’t yet, dive into all three volumes of his autobiographies – they’re essential reading!
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello, Kate here. Just a quick one. Before you dive into this episode with Stephen Fry, this was recorded ahead of the BBC's announcement that he was indeed joining the line-up of celebrity traitors. How exciting. Can't wait. Enjoy the episode. |
| 0:24.3 | Coming up on this episode of White Wine Question Time. |
| 0:34.0 | The worst thing a contestant can ever, ever say is, it's before my time. |
| 0:37.4 | Everything's before your time in a quiz or should be or could be. How dare you use that as an |
| 0:39.7 | excuse? That's absolutely pathetic. I love this. You're making Anne Robinson look cuddly at this |
| 0:44.8 | point, Stephen. Ask someone who's been through that because they will know, but I have had |
| 0:52.3 | every door open to me without me having to knock on it. |
| 0:55.7 | And that sounds so, I'm such a dreadful thing to have to admit, because, you know, one ought to |
| 1:02.2 | have struggled. And it's deeply unfair. For me to be so lucky is just extraordinary. Yeah, but you did, |
| 1:10.3 | you did have to kind of recover |
| 1:11.7 | from being sent to prison to get into the university. |
| 1:15.0 | So, you know, listen, hello. |
| 1:17.0 | There's some early struggle in there. |
| 1:18.4 | I'm going to just remind you of that. |
| 1:20.0 | That's a bit of a hill to climb. |
| 1:23.0 | So whenever I hear people talk about the woke mind virus |
| 1:26.9 | and how |
| 1:27.7 | wokeness is destroying the world, I just want to remind them that just, |
| 1:33.5 | yes, there have been some people on the left who have said preposterous things |
| 1:38.0 | and insisted on rules and things in universities and elsewhere that make you feel the world's gone a bit mad. |
| 1:46.3 | Yes, that is true. |
| 1:47.8 | But compare that to some of the suffering, misery, exile, loneliness, mockery, shame |
... |
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