Alex Godfrey
@mrgodfrey
Features Editor at Empire magazine. BSME Best Feature Writer 2023 and 2026. Shortlisted for PPA Best Writer 2025. Previously: words for Guardian / GQ / Esquire / Telegraph / Sunday Times Culture / Wired
The new issue of Empire is on sale tomorrow. I interviewed Miriam Margolyes for our esteemed 'How Much Is A Pint Of Milk?' questionnaire. I think the word 'riotous' is overused in journalism but, well. Just including our opening exchange here. The rest is just as fruity.
In 2024 I interviewed Christopher Nolan and Emma Thomas, on the phone, about their career. They wouldn't discuss what film was next, but at one point I asked this question about Trojan-horsing ideas. We discovered recently that they exchanged amused looks about that. Anyway: this is a fun answer.
Well I did NOT know Peter Mayhew's grave looked like this. That's how to do it. Coyness be damned. www.findagrave.com/memorial/198...
Of all the social platforms, Facebook is the one that has become the most baffling, a swamp of AI-written, AI-illustrated nonsense, an endless load of lawless horseshit that nobody asked for. This, which was spewed into my phone yesterday, is particularly awful. Look at the state of it.
Tony Stella was the best. I could barely believe we got him to make art for us at Empire. Here are some of the feature openers he did for us, and a cover. It was a thrill to receive these masterpieces (all magnificently hand-painted), and a joy to see his work on our pages. He was untouchable. RIP.
The original Neighbours painting of Mrs Mangel by Helen Daniels is up for grabs. Proceeds going to the Dementia Australia charity. Currently at over 5k. Genuinely iconic. www.ebay.co.uk/itm/40687689...
Catherine O'Hara was amazing forever, but even in the last couple of years alone it seemed she was having the time of her life, scene-stealing like there was no tomorrow. Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, The Last Of Us, The Studio... she just WENT for it, every time. A gigantic force.
10 years ago I interviewed Dexter Fletcher. I asked him about Alan Rickman, who'd been a proper guardian angel to him, saving his career and possibly his life. I've stuck a bit here, but there's much more on, erm, Tumblr - it's a sweet read about a beautiful man. mrgodfrey.tumblr.com/post/1420114...
When I interviewed Spinal Tap and Marty DiBergi this summer, none of them broke character, for the whole hour. Except Rob Reiner, once, losing it when Michael McKean's David St Hubbins talked about minimalism. I didn't use this in the feature and hadn't published any audio, but this is joyful.
Seeing a lot of people reporting on this and I don't know why anyone would think for one second that this unverified Instagram account is actually Daniel Day-Lewis. As if he would chose this as his profile photo.
Writing about Boogie Nights. PTA really went for it with the John Holmes recreations.
I saw a video from the guy who shot Tom Baker's MBE investiture the other day. "I was Tom's photographer for 15 years," he said. I just think people should check over automated subtitles. They're often a bit mad. If you don't have the audio on this might seem pretty wild. Even Tom looks shocked.
Had the time of my life writing this for our new issue: The Tim Burton and Paul Reubens collaboration, mostly on Pee-wee's Big Adventure, but also beyond, including the years when Reubens was very publicly shamed and Burton stood by him. I had a nourishing talk with Burton for it. On sale tomorrow.
Extremely engrossing read on the felling of the Sycamore Gap tree, by Andrew Hankinson in The Observer. Some of it reads like folk horror. Some like The Banshees Of Inisherin. share.google/8Hs2oskTXc5I...
I love shots like that. Crew hiding in every nook and cranny. Reminded me of this one from Goodfellas.
Hadn't seen this Elephant Man bts before. Lynch and crew shooting Michael Elphick. Cinema!
One of my favourite things is actors on set in full make-up having a cheeky drink or smoke.
This feature - reuniting Michael J Fox and Christopher Lloyd to talk 40 years of Back To The Future - has been in the works for a while. I knew @ollyrichards.bsky.social would ace it. It's a delightful, poignant, funny conversation. The chemistry is real. In print only. New issue in shops on Thurs.
Just heard someone singing Blood, Sweat & Tears' 'Spinning Wheel' and remembered Nicolas Cage telling me how much David Lynch hated that song.
I Swear is in UK and Irish cinemas today. It's an emotional workout - sweet, sad, funny, upsetting and, ultimately, as uplifting as cinema gets, I reckon. John Davidson is an inspiration, and Robert Aramayo does him justice: it's a gobsmacking performance, in a hugely compassionate film. Go see it.
One ep of Alien: Earth to go and every time a beastie pops up I think of HR Giger, and how none of this exists without him. A gazillion films and TV shows over nearly 50 years, and arguably none of it would have hit - or endured - were it not for his art. An incredible legacy for such perverse work.