Steve Coogan reflects on Jeremy Corbyn’s election defeat: “It was a personality thing”

Coogan was vocally pro-Corbyn in the run-up to December's General Election

Steve Coogan has reflected on Jeremy Corbyn’s heavy defeat in last December’s General Election in a new interview with NME.

The actor, who stars in new film Greed about a billionaire retail tycoon, was a vocal supporter of Corbyn’s through the election campaign.

Asked what he made of the Labour leader’s defeat, Coogan said: “I think there was a confused message on Brexit. I think the press didn’t help – they demonised him. I don’t think he was particularly charismatic, I don’t think he wanted the job in the first place.

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“I think if you asked people who didn’t want to vote for Corbyn which of his policies they didn’t like they wouldn’t have been able to tell you, so to me it was actually a personality thing.”

Greed
Steve Coogan as Sir Richard McCreadie in ‘Greed’. Credit: Sony

Speaking about the ongoing climate crisis and the resistance that has been shown by activist groups in recent months, Coogan continued: “Extinction Rebellion is sort of an organic pressure group that grew out of an accumulated feeling; people communicating with each other on a local level.

“I think Labour can learn a lot from that, rather than theorising about how to help working people, they need to actually listen to working people.”

Coogan plays tycoon Sir Richard McCreadie in Greed. A four-star NME review of the new film called it a “caustic satire of the nouveau riche”.

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“The film is consistently entertaining and frequently hilarious. An effective portrait of a very specific and odious kind of person during a time of capitalism run rampant.”

Coogan is set to return for a second series of the Alan Partridge show This Time later this year, and is also set to explore the #MeToo era in a new Channel 4 comedy drama called Chivalry.

The actor also recently revealed that The Trip To Greece, the latest edition of his show The Trip alongside Rob Brydon, will be the final edition of the series.

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