Standard Issue

A podcast by women. For women. About everything.

@MicksterNoonan @thatdunleavy @inspireajen

[Standard Issue @StandardIssueUK]

Bloody lovely stuff from our bloody lovely boss.

[Sarah Millican @SarahMillican75]

In 2014, I was annoyed standing in front of magazine racks at train stations that there was nothing that appealed to me. The usual ‘women’s magazines’ didn’t speak to me and were too centred on beach bodies, white trousers and which fruit my body resembled.

Add to this that I love women. Ever since I worked for WHSmith and then the Jobcentre, I’ve been surrounded with women at work. When I got into comedy, those numbers dropped dramatically (they’re better now hoo-fucking-ray). So I started setting up small work places full of women. My TV series, my new material gig, writers’ rooms, my radio shows. Women, women, women.

I decided to do something about the lack of magazines for women like me (whatever that means) and thus create another all-women work space, a healthy, more interesting and feminist alternative to the magazines that were out there.
And thus began Standard Issue Magazine, edited by the fantastic Mickey Noonan. We were lucky enough to have some incredible women write wonderful articles for us. And the whole thing was run by 12 awesome women.

In 2017, I decided it was time to move with the times and we became a podcast @StandardIssueUK. The team: Mickey Noonan, Hannah Dunleavy and Jen Offord have since created over a thousand brilliant episodes of a podcast that treats women like they have brains, because we do, and are interested in the world. We are for women, by women, about everything. And we shine a light on some incredible sports women, journalists, playwrights, entrepreneurs, heck, all sorts of women from all walks of life who have something to say.

Standard Issue is a podcast championing women's voices, and packed with interviews, news, film, opinion and humour.

And on this International Women’s Day, I’d love you to give it a listen. Or comment on this post if you have listened. Or share it with your followers. It all helps. We hope you enjoy it. We’re super proud of it.

I feel this way about this project every day but today feels like a good day to shout about excellent women and their work.

[Standard Issue @StandardIssueUK]

In this week's Rated or Dated, Jen's picked 1996 family fantasy adventure Dragonheart, starring Dennis Quaid as a disillusioned knight and Sean Connery as a good-hearted dragon. Will Hannah approve of its interpretation of history? And why is Mick crying? https://t.co/NAhf7XSw26

[Standard Issue @StandardIssueUK]

Oh, for the confidence of a disgraced potato.

[Gregg Wallace @GreggAWallace]

Sweeney Todd. I produced this last night. I’m thinking of doing YouTube films, looking at iconic figures. Truth and fiction.

[Standard Issue @StandardIssueUK]

That idea of an alpha wolf, dominating the pack and OBVIOUSLY male... Total wolfshit, mate. Wolves are matrilineal families who work, play and love together a lot like humans. Our Mick chats with Natalie Lagstrom, wolf mother at Watermill Wolves.
https://t.co/NAhf7XSw26

[Standard Issue @StandardIssueUK]

Next year, our @inspirejen is running the London Marathon for the Samaritans, so in today's interview she chats to @Helen_Thorn about knees, Vaseline, always having tissues to hand, and finding joy as a middle-aged, woman marathon runner. Dig in! https://t.co/NAhf7XSw26

[Standard Issue @StandardIssueUK]

Relentless silliness, sight gags, wordplay and sheer chaotic comedic energy? Too right it was @MicksterNoonan’s pick for Flicking this month. And so she and Yosra are chatting about last year’s The Naked Gun reboot.
Listen up: https://t.co/NAhf7XSw26

[Standard Issue @StandardIssueUK]

In today's Bush Telegraph @micksternoonan and @inspireajen are talking Shane Gillis and etymology, as well as medical misogyny, good news for victims in rape cases, bold Brexit overtures, and a terrifying new Press Secretary in the White House. Dig in! https://t.co/NAhf7XSw26

[Standard Issue @StandardIssueUK]

In today's interview, Jen chats to evolutionary biologist Judy Wearing about her new book Anxious and Hairy: The Evolution and Culture of Human Hair, why we’re all so preoccupied with our own foliage, and what exactly is the point of public hair? Dig in! https://t.co/wVrHVdgCrX

[Standard Issue @StandardIssueUK]

Coming up next week...

[Standard Issue @StandardIssueUK]

📣FRESH POD📚
Liz Hyder’s new book, The Teller of Tall Tales, is aimed at young adults but a total delight for grown-ups, too. @MicksterNoonan chats to Liz about heavy awards, telling tales, the YA audience and – of course – the power of stories. https://t.co/Eflb1ZwJQx

[Standard Issue @StandardIssueUK]

Evil triumphs when good men say nothing. And so all the men silent in the face of male sexual violence against women and girls must just not give a monkey’s, right? @MicksterNoonan's written this week’s Substack, and she’s asking men to speak up. https://t.co/t6otb8gwII

[Standard Issue @StandardIssueUK]

🎥 RATED OR DATED: This Is England (2006) 🎬
Brace yourself for a tension bellyache: More than 40 years on from its 1983 setting, is Shane Meadows' violence-smeared, working-class coming-of-age drama still horribly, terrifyingly relevant?
https://t.co/Eflb1ZwJQx

[Standard Issue @StandardIssueUK]

Amelia Bullmore is about to star in Margaret Atwood's stage adaptation of her book The Penelopiad. So Hannah grabbed the chance to chat to the actress about The Odyssey and the price its women pay, as well as learning the guitar for Riot Women. Tuck in! https://t.co/OGYDtRL5DO

[Standard Issue @StandardIssueUK]

In today's podcast, Jen chats to Paralympic athletes and nominees in children’s charity Variety’s biannual Disability Sports Awards, Tully Kearney and Melanie Woods, about their careers, mental fortitude, and “inspiring” others. Dig in! https://t.co/xUXLmgExle

[Standard Issue @StandardIssueUK]

Keep your ears peeled next week...

[Standard Issue @StandardIssueUK]

In this week's BT, Mickey looks at the case of the Cornell Seven, as well as what Burnham has planned for Britain. Which may happen. At some point. Hannah's back on the sport, and there's a dispute over which is the cutest newly-discovered species. https://t.co/QVVjppjqKF

[Michael Spicer @MrMichaelSpicer]

Most TV is just this now.

[Standard Issue @StandardIssueUK]

@DeirdreBoleyn Ahh, thanks Deirdre! I loved chatting with Laleh, and her book is wonderful. [Mickey]

[Standard Issue @StandardIssueUK]

📚 FRESH PODCAST: Laleh Khadivi 📣
Iranian-American author Laleh Khadivi’s latest novel centres on a mid-life woman who comes up against some new information about her recently dead mum that questions everything she thought she knew about her. Or does it?
https://t.co/acl6aTSyUd

[Standard Issue @StandardIssueUK]

🥳 HAPPY 12th BIRTHDAY TO US 🥳
We started as a brilliant idea from our glorious founder @SarahMillican75 & become a much-loved podcast. We're super grateful for all of our excellent listeners. Thank you 🧡
There's a special bday pod for our Patreons/£3. https://t.co/3Uz30Hol56

[Standard Issue @StandardIssueUK]

Alex Cox’s 1986 biopic of punk-rock’s "ill-fated lovers" Sid Vicious and Nancy Spungen gets Rated or Dated this week. But has it romanticised a relationship in which a woman wound up dead? And in what other ways has it done poor Nancy dirty? https://t.co/oVLDL2T2dy