Tim Minchin: Who alive today do you admire most, and what draws you to them?

The question

Who alive today do you admire most, and what draws you to them?

Originally asked

The Guardian, to a different person each week, The Q&A

The Guardian's Q&A repeatedly uses this prompt, sometimes dropping 'living' while retaining the same comparative judgment.

You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.

Tim Minchin

Australian musician, writer, actor and comedian

Recorded said elsewhere, not written here

Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Maybe if we all admire her hard enough, she’ll live beyond this incredibly disturbing era.

The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 11 July 2020 source ↗

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Person Ruth Bader Ginsburg

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Shonda Rhimes

Obama. He is a man of integrity and nobody seems to have integrity these days.

Recorded Vanity Fair, The Proust Questionnaire, Vanity Fair, October 2017 source ↗

Sofie Gråbøl Danish actress

Jens Stoltenberg, for the way he united Norway after the massacre on Utøya in 2011.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 26 July 2014 source ↗

Mariska Hargitay

People who do hard, honorable work in obscurity.

Recorded Vanity Fair, The Proust Questionnaire, Vanity Fair, January 2024 source ↗

Anne Enright Novelist and short-story writer

Catherine Corless, who spent her own money to secure birth certificates for the unrecorded dead children of the Tuam mother and baby home.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 7 September 2024 source ↗

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Question How would you describe what love feels like to you? Relationships

Anxiety, mostly, once you have kids.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 11 July 2020 source ↗

Question If you could revise one chapter of your past, what would you change? Failure & regret

I’d take back some dumb shit I said when I had no audience and found that being shocking made people laugh.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 11 July 2020 source ↗

Question What period or moment in your life brought you the most joy? Time & hindsight

Maybe when my wife Sarah and I were walking back to our hotel in Covent Garden, London, through the snow after the Olivier awards when Matilda won all the stuff. Hold on, I’m meant to say the birth of my children, aren’t I?

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 11 July 2020 source ↗

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