Interview with Louise Minchin for Time Crashers

12 August 2015

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Why did you sign up to this show? 

I thought it would be really fascinating. I am not a historian but I do my job because I am interested in stories, and I wanted to experience first-hand what history was really like and how tough things were compared to life in the 21st century.

 

Doing your job, you’re obviously plugged in to technology. What was it like taking yourself out of that world? 

I’m addicted to news, I listen to the radio, watch the television and monitor websites and social media all the time, so I thought being removed from that would be really difficult. But, far more difficult than that was not being able to speak to my family and friends, particularly my husband and daughters. That was much tougher than I thought it would be. I’ve been away from them before, but I have been able to call or email them.

  

Was there anything you were worried about going into filming? 

I was worried about the cold, and it turns out I was absolutely right to worry. There were a couple of occasions when I was frozen, and spent every era sleeping with all my clothes on! I was particularly worried about being away from family. 

           

What was your favourite era? 

I think possibly the Iron Age, mostly because we didn’t have anyone bossing us about so we were able to decide for ourselves what we did and how we did it. I also particularly enjoyed the Victorian era when we were fishwives – that was very tough, dirty and cold and pretty bleak – but we were very much left on our own and not constantly shouted at for doing things wrong. I found it much easier to be living in an era where there are not really rigid rules about how you behave, and where you are allowed to ask questions or question the way things are. So being a Victorian fish-wife was my favourite also helped by the fact we were living by the sea in the most extraordinary, beautiful part of the east coast, and being by the water just lifted my spirits. 

 

What did you find hard about listening to authority? 

I got punished for various misdemeanors. Most challenging for me was the rigid social hierarchy and endemic sexism in some parts of history. In my job I am used to being able to ask questions, voice concerns and discuss issues not being allowed to do any of that was infuriating. It gave me a huge appreciation, of being a woman in the 21st century, and the kind of autonomy we have, or certainly I have.

 

So you wouldn’t have cut it in those eras. 

I would have cut it eventually, but only because I would have had to change the way I behave, and the way that I approach life or else I would have been severely punished. For example in the Medieval era, when I was a squire charged with grooming a horse for a Knight to joust with. Just as was finishing plaiting the horse’s mane and tying a knot in it so it would stay, our boss in the medieval era shouted at me to go and eat. I continued finishing the plait and he ran up behind me, pulled my ponytail and threw me across the grass.

 

To be thrown around is quite tough. 

Well, it was, but it didn’t stop me, I shouted back at him even though I found him horribly scary, and I got punished again for it later. It is my natural response to stand up for myself, but not something that was allowed in Medieval Britain. It was a brutal time to live in. He also tried to kick me but I must have moved too quickly!  

  

So what did you make of the other celebrities? 

I thought we were very lucky because we had a really eclectic group of people but we had similar senses of humour. Meg and I immediately bonded over stale urine! The first thing we had to do was wash the Lady’s nighty in a stinking pot of pee. Once you’ve done something like that together you are going to get on. We ended up having to sleep outside the Lady’s chamber, on a wooden board with one or two blankets, and we were absolutely frozen! I got on really well with her; she was fantastic. 

 

What was it like washing clothes with urine? 

It was just disgusting, it stank, and you had to get your hands in it – you didn’t have gloves on or anything, it’s not like they had Marigolds in those days! So your hands are in the urine, scrubbing the nightgowns to get them clean, and then you are meant to dry them on bushes.

 

 What was your worst moment? 

It was the Georgian farm – everybody else absolutely loved the Georgian farm because they were outside, looking after the sheep and the pigs and the goats, and making butter, and they all had a brilliant time. Zoe and I were left in the kitchen the whole time. I had to bake 25 loaves in a bread oven; it was really tough in there. She gave me a right telling off because of my attitude and she said that I had to go back into the kitchen as punishment while everyone else apart from Zoe had a treat which was very demoralising.

 

Were you a bit of a rebel while you were doing this show? 

Maybe I am a bit. I like to question things and stand up for myself, and if I find something that’s unfair, I find it difficult not to argue. I don’t think any of my colleagues or my family would be surprised by that.

 

What did you make of the outfits? 

Well, that was another thing that incensed me! There we were working in the Georgian kitchen, with this huge bread oven, with burning coals and I’m wearing a corset and enormous skirts. Apparently thousands of women used to die in the kitchens because the coals would fall on to their skirts and they would burn to death. In the Victorian era we were fishwives and we’re wearing corsets and these voluminous skirts, in the mud! Many of the women who used to go and pick the cockles used to drown because of the heavy garments.

 

How did you feel to be plugging yourself back in to the 20th century after the show? 

I really found the whole experience, being taken away from home, with no access to my family, waking up in a different place where you have no familiarity with the surroundings; genuinely quite disturbing. I had nightmares for about two weeks afterwards.  

 

How quickly did you get on to Twitter and the news channels? 

Really quickly. I literally left our beautiful Iron Age hut at 10 o’clock at night, and I was back on the BBC Breakfast sofa at six o’clock the next morning. So it went from one extreme to another. I remember standing on the hill, foraging for nettles with Kirstie Alley – I mean what an amazing person to be foraging for nettles with – and literally thinking, “Oh, my Gosh, in less than 12 hours I’m going to be reading the news and I am absolutely filthy”.

  

Now you’ve done this, would you consider any other reality shows? 

I have watched people in the jungle and the Big Brother house, but I had no idea how intense the experience can be until I did Time Crashers. There is nothing like being filmed all the time trying to do really difficult things. I would definitely consider doing Time Crashers again, although I would find it difficult to give up the back-chat.

 

Time Crashers is on Channel 4 from Sunday 23rd August at 8pm.