‘I thought Brassed Off might be popular within a 10 mile radius of Barnsley’: the director of Andy Burnham’s favourite film on its 30 year anniversary

Ahead of a live performance in the Royal Albert Hall, the writer Mark Herman explains why he’s not surprised it’s one of the new Prime Minister’s favourites and a why film like this wouldn’t get made nowIt is one of the prime minister’s all-time favourite films and has endured in the hearts of the British public since it was released in 1996. Ostensibly a story about a small town colliery band’s journey to the finals of Britain’s biggest brass band competition at the Royal Albert Hall, Brassed Off is unashamedly political.“I think the people who went expecting a political film got the bonus of a bit of a comedy,” says its writer, Mark Herman, three decades on. “And the people who went expecting comedy got the bonus of the political message. I think anybody who went got a sort of bonus they might not have expected. Continue reading...