Jon Ronson On
First broadcast from 20041214 to 20080925.
Journalist and broadcaster Jon Ronson looks at the human condition with the help of interviewees and reporters from the world of writing and performance.
| Series | Episode | Title | First Broadcast | Description |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 01 | 01 | Amateur Sleuths | 20041214 | Journalist and broadcaster Jon Ronson explores the world of amateur sleuthing with a collection of extra-ordinary stories illuminating the human condition. This week he talks to Jeremy Dyson, of the League of Gentlemen, who recalls his search for a missing childhood maze, philosophizes with a man who spent his life looking for the Loch Ness Monster, and meets Tony Frewin, Stanley Kubrick's live-in amateur sleuth who tracked down Kubrick's impersonator. |
| 01 | 02 | Being Invisible | 20041221 | This week he talks to Michael Foot, a World War II Veteran who was fooled by a French resistance spy who could turn his personality off and Frank Ahearn whose job it is to make people vanish. He also meets comedian Jon Holmes, whose parents are 'invisible' to him as he is adopted, and Maggie O'Farrell who recalls her time as a chamber maid, cleaning hotel rooms while guests carried on extremely personal activities. |
| 01 | 03 | Positive Thinking | 20041228 | Jon Ronson explores ideas surrounding positive thinking with extra-ordinary stories illuminating the human condition. Ian Haworth talks about his experience of making a break from a cult. |
| 01 | 04 | Going West | 20050104 | Journalist and broadcaster Jon Ronson hears a collection of extra-ordinary stories illuminating the human condition from people who have all decided to 'go west'. This week he hears from Tom Fremantle who followed in his ancestors' footsteps across America, and writer Chris Ettridge who battled with the bureaucracy of US customs. |
| 01 | 05 | The Comfort Of Strangers | 20050111 | Journalist and broadcaster Jon Ronson hears a collection of extra-ordinary stories illuminating the human condition from people who have taken comfort in strangers. Jon talks to Abdullah Redpath who found, then lost, the love of his life in a remarkable 12 hour period. And Miranda Sawyer interviews Mark Pilkington who hitch-hiked and found himself in the company of helpful strangers who turned out to be criminals. |
| 01 | 06 LAST | Magical Moments | 20050118 | Journalist and broadcaster Jon Ronson hears a collection of extra-ordinary stories illuminating the human condition from people who have decided to provide magical moments to others. Jon talks to Jeremy Dyson who's father changed his life by providing a trip to a Blackpool joke shop and Danny Wallace who takes it upon himself to perform random acts of kindness. |
| 02 | 01 | Living In The Past | 20060117 | This week he asks why he can't seem to leave a particular incident in the past behind when he was thrown into a lake by school friends. Jon confronts his bullies at his school reunion as Father Ted writer Graham Linehan remembers his own bully. Comedians Dan Tetsell and Robert Popper also discover they have parallel stories one has a Nazi as a grandfather, the other a Jewish evacuee as a grandmother. |
| 02 | 02 | Irrational Thoughts | 20060124 | Jon asks why his inner conversations spiral into irrationality and discovers he isn't alone. Actress Jessica Stevenson created a whole imaginary world for her boyfriend, while comedian Danny Robbins can't stop himself singing 'hopefully not' after the chorus of American Pie. |
| 02 | 03 | Lying | 20060131 | This week Jon confronts his compulsive lying disorder with the help of Danny Wallace who tries to get him out of his funk by teaching how to say yes more. Danny Robbins visits a town in the US Midwest where lying has got so bad that the mayor has banned it and James Rawlings recounts how his whole life turned into one great lie. |
| 02 | 04 | Friendship | 20060207 | Jon asks whether friendship is over if the power balance becomes skewed. Lawrence Howarth recounts how a relationship ended because his girlfriend wouldn't reveal her date of birth for two years, Caitlin Moran discusses a moment when friendship was challenged over the bird flu vaccine, and Jon visits a party held by a woman who has 25,000 'friends' in her contacts book. |
| 02 | 05 | Waiting | 20060214 | Jon asks what happens in the space while we wait. He talks to Richard Thomas who has spent his professional career waiting to record events such as his stomach on Christmas Day and eggs frying. He also talks to comedian Janey Godley on why she pretended to be ill in order to avoid waiting in queues at a theme park, and he meets the world's leading 'waiting' scientist. |
| 02 | 06 LAST | Building Bridges | 20060221 | Jon asks why and how we learn to build bridges. He talks to Tom Hart Dyke who was kidnapped by Colombian rebels when out orchid hunting. He spent nine months trying to build bridges with his captors. Jon also hears how writer Jesse Armstrong remembers failing to build bridges while working in politics. |
| 03 | 01 | The Internet Date From Hell | 20070529 | The extraordinary story of Mary Turner Thompson, who met and married a man who told her he was a CIA agent. He carried a gun and often had to go away at a moment's notice. Mary was left holding the baby, unable to contact him and never knowing when he would come back. She even feared a targeted terrorist attack on her home. But the most bizarre twist was still to come. |
| 03 | 02 | Waking Up From A Dream | 20070605 | Jon talks to John Downes, director of the Centre of Fortean Zoology who spent his life searching for mythical creatures. When he woke up and realised they didn't exist, he turned his attention to something much more real, a giant eel spotted in Lake Windermere. Jon follows him on his underwater adventure. |
| 03 | 03 | Uncontrollable Responses | 20070612 | Jon Ronson continues his look at human behaviour by finding the moments where we respond in an uncontrollable way. Comedian Robert Popper couldn't stop his drunken friend from putting their lives at risk while at a wedding in Israel. Another interviewee who survived the 7/7 terrorist attacks found herself uncontrollably joining in with message boards accusing her of being a government plant on one of the bombed trains. |
| 03 | 04 | Crushed Egos | 20070619 | This edition features an Italian waiter who offered up his action film script to comedy writer Graham Linehan over the pasta, an American real estate entrepreneur who owns unsaleable houses all over America and owes millions, and the architects of a new town which proved a spectacular failure. |
| 03 | 05 | Getting Lost At Glastonbury | 20070626 | Jon Ronson continues his series with the first of two special programmes recorded at Glastonbury, taking a different look at the festival and the many human dramas being played out over four intense days. Jon observes how performers, audience and organisers get lost and found at Glastonbury, both literally and figuratively. With Danny Robins and Pete Paphides |
| 03 | 06 LAST | Good V Evil At Glastonbury | 20070703 | Jon Ronson concludes his series with the second of two special programmes recorded at Glastonbury, taking a different look at the festival and the many human dramas being played out over four intense days. Jon searches for good and for evil at the festival, looking for acts of kindness, bad deeds of hedonistic excess and emotional moments rarely captured. With Danny Robins and Pete Paphides |
| 04 | 01 | Bad News | 20080828 | Jon Ronson looks at how we take bad tidings. He talks to a man who was told that he had terminal cancer and spent the last six months of his life living it up, only to find out that the doctors got it wrong. He also hears the story of William Lobdell, the LA Times religious correspondent who became an atheist. |
| 04 | 02 | Being Fancy | 20080904 | Jon Ronson talks to Elliot Castro, who spent five years as a conman, living a five-star life before his eventual capture. Castro talks about his early school years when he would try to convince his school friends that he had magic powers. Other contributors include writer Charlie Brooker, who offers his thoughts on travelling first class, and wealth counsellor Theyer Willis, who advises rich people on how to cope with their huge wealth. |
| 04 | 03 | The Right Kind Of Mental Illness | 20080911 | Jon Ronson looks at how we view mental illness in society, the media and politics. He talks to former Labour spin doctor and psychoanalyst Derek Draper about sociopathic behaviour in parliament. He interviews a former Norwegian Prime Minister who resigned publicly, announcing that he was depressed, and later went on to be re-elected. Plus an update on a story from the last series. Former MI5 officer David Shayler has announced that he is the Messiah. |
| 04 | 04 | How To Stop Time | 20080918 | Jon Ronson wonders how we slow down or even stop time in a world which seems to be constantly accelerating. He talks to the scientist who claims to be developing a method of time travel and eventually hopes to visit the father who died in his childhood. He also talks to a man who holds the world record for staying awake the longest, thereby doubling his time. Guests include comedian Danny Robins |
| 04 | 05 | Anything For Love | 20080925 | Jon explores the silly things we sometimes do to prove our devotion to loved ones. He visits the perimeter fence at Stonehenge, which he once almost jumped over in an attempt to curry favour with his girlfriend. He talks to comic writer Jane Bussman about the time she decided to drop her well-paid job in the media to seek out a man who worked in Africa for a charity. Her story has some remarkable twists, not least that he never materialised |