The true story behind Channel 4 drama Brian and Maggie

Margaret Thatcher’s decade-long premiership came to a screeching halt on October 29, 1989, when she sat down for an interview with renowned political broadcaster Brian Walden.

The pair were friends: he was her favourite interviewer. But the fallout of that fateful hour-long television special would have ramifications far beyond the studio they were sat in, setting off a chain of dominos that would eventually lead to Thatcher’s resignation in 1990.

Now, the story, which was previously explored by James Burley in the 2023 book Why Is This Lying Bastard Lying To Me?, has been turned into a Channel 4 TV show. Starring Steve Coogan as Walden and Harriet Walter as Margaret Thatcher, it’s set to be a tempestuous look at a turning point in British politics.

But what really happened between the pair?

Who were the main players?

(Channel 4)

Though they occupied different positions on the political spectrum, both Thatcher and Walden came from humble beginnings.

Walden was a Labour MP who came from a trade background. Born in 1932, he attended West Bromwich Grammar School, before winning a scholarship to Oxford – he was elected president of the Oxford Union in 1957.

After a few attempts to become an MP, he finally won a seat at Birmingham Ladywood and served as its Labour MP from 1964 to 1977, when he became disillusioned with the party. After Thatcher was elected as the leader of the Conservatives in 1975, he toyed with the idea of defecting – Thatcher’s biographer Charles Moore later wrote that Walden was "considered the most eloquent of his generation of Labour MPs" and was "more clear-sighted than most in seeing that Mrs Thatcher stood for real change.”

Instead of defecting, Walden resigned in 1977 and pivoted to a career in broadcasting. It was a hugely successful career move: he made his name with tough political interviews, and by the 1980s, he even had his own programme, called The Walden Interview.

Thatcher came from a similar background to Walden: famously the daughter of a greengrocer, she won a scholarship to Oxford to study chemistry and segued into politics in 1948, when she joined the Conservative Association. She finally became an MP in 1959 and by 1975 had become the driving force in her party.

She and Walden were in Parliament at the same time, and their mutual respect for each other deepened at some point into friendship. During Thatcher’s 1983 election campaign, Walden cut short a drinking session with his colleagues to help her rewrite the last party political broadcast before polling day, something Burley adds was a “mind-boggling” conflict of interest. Walden went onto call her “the master spirit of our age” – and he interviewed her numerous times.

What happened in the interview?

(Channel 4)

By 1989, Thatcher’s once rock-solid control over the Conservative Party was slipping. Though her interview with Walden had been scheduled for months, it took on an extra relevancy when her chancellor, Nigel Lawson, resigned three days before it was due to air.

Lawson resigned because Thatcher allegedly refused to sack her economics advisor, Sir Alan Walters. On the day, Walden told Woodrow Wyatt, one of Thatcher’s friends, to ask Thatcher what questions he should pose to her.

Despite this attempt to prepare, the interview went badly and – despite Walden’s apparent intentions to be a sympathetic questioner – became a spotlight shone on the chaos in Thatcher’s government. Political writer John Campbell later wrote that Walden’s “journalistic instinct and her lack of candour made for a devastating exposé, watched by three million people with their Sunday lunch.”

In it, Walden repeatedly asked Thatcher about Lawon’s resignation – to which she claimed she had no idea why Lawson had left. At one point, he asked her, “Do you deny that Nigel would have stayed if you had sacked Professor Alan Walters?”

“I don’t know,” Thatcher replied, before saying, “I did everything possible to stop him.”

When Walden replied that it was a “terrible admission,” she snapped back, “I’m not going on with this.”

Later, Walden put to her that one of her backbenchers had dubbed Thatcher as “slightly off her trolley, authoritarian, domineering, refusing to listen to anybody else – why? Why cannot you publicly project what you have just told me is your private character?”

(Channel 4)

“Brian, if anyone's coming over as domineering in this interview, it's you,” she replied.

Thatcher’s evasiveness, paired with Walden’s relentless questioning, was the killer blow.

The aftermath

According to Burley, the pair never spoke again after this interview.

But the damage was done: a few months later, backbencher Anthony Meyer challenged her for leadership of the party. Though Thatcher won, her cabinet continued to be plagued by resignations and firings, and in November 1990, Michael Heseltine challenged her again.

Eventually, she was forced to resign, and left Downing Street in tears.

Walden, meanwhile, moved from The Walden Show to a new ITV show called Walden, and continued his career in journalism. He died in 2019 at his home in Guernsey.

Brian and Maggie will air on Channel 4 on January 29 at 9pm