6 h. ago Paris Lees on her blazing trans drama: ‘I have this compulsive desire to tell the truth, even about the darkness within’

The warm and darkly funny author and journalist has turned the pain of her upbringing into the BBC’s latest hit show, ‘What It Feels Like for a Girl’. She speaks to Hannah Ewens about attention seeking, the ways the internet makes us sick and why she’s starting to rediscover her hope

Events

3 d. ago Lee Ryan to become a father for the SIXTH time! Blue star announces his wife Verity Paris' pregnancy as he jokes 'oops we did it again'

The singer, 42, revealed that his wife Verity Paris is expecting their fourth child together, while he is already father to two other children.

Politics

3 d. ago Scientists warn that greenhouse gas accumulation is accelerating and more extreme weather will come

A team of 60 international scientists report that by early 2028 society will have emitted enough greenhouse gases that the Earth will be pretty much locked into hitting the internationally agreed upon preferred limit for global warming

Events

6 d. ago Monday’s briefing: Young Lions frustrated but goals flow at Club World Cup

Paris St Germain and Bayern Munich hit the ground running in the United States.

Politics

1 week ago Lorraine Kelly moved to tears live on air by guest’s surprise message

The presenter was left emotional by the unexpected heartfelt moment

Society

1 week ago Lorraine Kelly left in tears after guest stops show to deliver unexpected message

Lorraine Kelly became visibly emotional during this morning's episode of her ITV show when guest Paris Lees halted the live broadcast to issue a special message to the TV presenter

Politics

2 w. ago Fern Britton, 67, continues to showcase her incredible weight loss transformation in a chic blazer and high

The presenter, 67, looked effortlessly chic in a plaid blazer and trousers while resting her hand on her slender waist.

Politics

2 w. ago Dark true story behind hit drama What It Feels Like For a Girl: Transgender author Paris Lees endured horrific sexual abuse and was jailed at 16

Critics have commended the BBC 's adaptation of journalist Paris Lees' memoir, What It Feels Like for a Girl, which looks at the British writer's tumultuous history and at times dark journey.

Events

2 w. ago What It Feels Like For A Girl on BBC Three review: fearless and compelling TV

Ellis Howard shines in this adaptation of Paris Lee’s memoir of sex work, drugs and crime at the turn of the millennium

Politics

2 w. ago Paris Lees adaptation What It Feels Like for a Girl is a raw, engaging case for optimism

Messy coming-of-age tale is both universal and also rooted in the trangender experience

Politics

2 w. ago What It Feels Like for a Girl review – deeply disturbing and totally fearless TV

This extraordinary adaptation of Paris Lees’ memoir follows wild, witty teen Byron as they go from cottaging for cash aged 15 to finding solace in a raucous gang of trans and queer pals. You’ll never look at a loo brush the same wayThe title suggests a generic experience of nascent womanhood, but What It Feels Like for a Girl is miles from your typical female bildungsroman. This adaptation of journalist Paris Lees’ excellent memoir about growing up in Hucknall, Nottinghamshire (or ‘Ucknall, as the book, with its mesmeric phonetic dialect, has it) chronicles the coming-of-age of Byron, who is seen by others as a boy. Initially, our protagonist doesn’t really push back on that; despite some early gender dysphoria – angrily dismissed by their macho father – the prospect of one day openly living as a woman is completely outside their frame of reference. On a visit to a nightclub, Byron (Ellis Howard) encounters future friend Lady Die, who makes a joke about someone being a transexual. “...

Politics

3 w. ago ‘All of us felt like we had touched gold’: What It Feels Like for a Girl, the BBC’s electric coming

Paris Lees has turned her hit memoir of growing up as a working-class trans kid into a vivid, joyful drama. Its team talks teenage sex work, nostalgia for Tony Blair, and why TV drama is so posh it’s like Jane AustenWhen the BBC was casting its adaptation of Paris Lees’s autobiography, What It Feels Like for a Girl, it wasn’t the only one wrestling with how to find the right actor to play the lead in a biopic. “Cher did an interview,” smiles Lees, “and she said: ‘We just can’t find somebody that’s Cher.’ I was like: ‘Same, girl. I hear your struggles.’ So me and Cher have been going through it.” Sitting next to Lees is the actor they went with, Ellis Howard, who you may remember as the sapling Ivan VI in HBO series Catherine the Great, but who you will never have seen being this luminous.“In the beginning, we were looking for a trans person,” Lees says. She and Howard are sharing a Zoom screen, and it’s not so much that they look similar as that they both look so cinematic, the...

Politics