{"id":104226,"date":"2025-10-26T00:59:07","date_gmt":"2025-10-26T00:59:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/104226\/"},"modified":"2025-10-26T00:59:07","modified_gmt":"2025-10-26T00:59:07","slug":"british-airways-pulls-louis-theroux-podcast-funding-over-bob-vylan-interview-ents-arts-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/104226\/","title":{"rendered":"British Airways pulls Louis Theroux podcast funding over Bob Vylan interview | Ents & Arts News"},"content":{"rendered":"

British Airways (BA) has paused its sponsorship of The Louis Theroux Podcast following an interview with Bob Vylan’s frontman.<\/p>\n

Pascal Robinson-Foster, one half of the controversial punk duo, told Theroux<\/a> in an episode which aired earlier this week that he was “not regretful” of chanting “death, death to the IDF [Israel Defence Forces]” at this year’s Glastonbury.<\/p>\n

He added that he would “do it again tomorrow, twice on Sundays”<\/a>.<\/p>\n

British Airways said on Saturday that the content “breaches” its sponsorship policy and has since paused its advertising on the podcast, the Jewish News first reported.<\/p>\n

An airline spokesperson said: “Our sponsorship of the series has now been paused and the advert has been removed.<\/p>\n

“We’re grateful that this was brought to our attention, as the content clearly breaches our sponsorship policy in relation to politically sensitive or controversial subject matters.<\/p>\n

“We and our third-party media agency have processes in place to ensure these issues don’t occur and we’re investigating how this happened.”<\/p>\n

\"Bobby<\/p>\n

Image:
\n Bobby Vylan crowd surfs during his performance at Glastonbury Festival. Pic: PA<\/p>\n

Following Bob Vylan’s Glastonbury performance, the band were dropped by a number of festivals and performances including Radar festival, a show at a German music venue and their US tour after their visas were revoked<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The comments were condemned by the US as a “hateful tirade” and “appalling hate speech” by British Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

The BBC’s Executive Complaints Unit has since found the broadcast of Bob Vylan’s set breached editorial standards related to harm and offence<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The band have also had to reschedule dates of its upcoming We Won’t Go Quietly UK tour in Manchester<\/a> and Leeds after Jewish leaders and politicians called for the show to be postponed.<\/p>\n

\"Theroux<\/p>\n

Image:
\n Theroux has not commented on BA pausing its sponsorship of his podcast. Pic: AP<\/p>\n

In a statement on Facebook, the group said: “Due to political pressure from the likes of Bridget Phillipson and groups in the Northwest of England we have had to reschedule our Leeds and Manchester shows.<\/p>\n

“All tickets remain valid and all other shows are continuing as planned.”<\/p>\n

Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

1:49<\/p>\n

Calls for Bob Vylan concert to be cancelled<\/p>\n

When asked by Theroux, Vylan said he was taken aback by the uproar the chant has caused<\/a>, saying: “It wasn’t like we came off stage, and everybody was like [gasps]. It’s just normal.”<\/p>\n

He added that he wanted an end to “the oppression that Palestinian people are facing”.<\/p>\n

Read more: Who are Bob Vylan?<\/a><\/p>\n

Despite the criticism, the group have seen support from fans, with their album Humble As The Sun re-entering the charts and climbing to number one in the UK Hip Hop and R&B album category.<\/p>\n

A spokesperson at Mindhouse Productions – which was founded by Theroux and produces The Louis Theroux Podcast – has not commented on the BA sponsorship, but told Sky News: “Louis is a journalist with a long history of speaking to controversial figures who may divide opinion.<\/p>\n

“We would suggest people watch or listen to the interview in its entirety to get the full context of the conversation.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"British Airways (BA) has paused its sponsorship of The Louis Theroux Podcast following an interview with Bob Vylan’s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":104227,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,43,40,38,41,39],"class_list":{"0":"post-104226","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104226","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=104226"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104226\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/104227"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=104226"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=104226"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=104226"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}