This time last year, Greg James opened the Crossed Wires Festival with a 2 hour show attempting to persuade Sheffield legend Michael Palin that he needed to do a podcast. Despite a wonderfully entertaining show, that didn\u2019t happen. This year, Greg James opened Crossed Wires with his podcast co-host Alice Levine \u2013 clearly announcing a live show was enough to persuade Levine to do a podcast with James!<\/p>\n
When the show was originally announced, Greg James and Alice Levine weren\u2019t podcasting together but since then they have started\u00a0Bad Chat. With a mixed audience \u2013 some who were Bad Chatters and others who were just keen to seen what chaos would ensue with James and Levine on stage together \u2013 it\u2019s safe to say everyone had an enjoyable evening.<\/p>\n
Bad Chat with Greg James + Alice Levine\u00a0was a brilliant start to the Crossed Wires Festival, complete with a full set design. James and Levine are both brilliantly entertaining. Their contrasting personalities work excellently together, elevated by the fact they were clearly both friends in real life. Both are funny and quick-witted \u2013 Levine\u2019s dry sense of humour comes across particularly well on stage. It\u2019s a delight to see James and Levine share the spotlight when we often just get to see them interview and shine the spotlight on others.<\/p>\n
However, that\u2019s not to say James and Levine were alone on stage throughout the evening. They were joined by some guests who were each brilliantly entertaining and unique.<\/p>\n
First up were Mark Herbert and Amy O\u2019Hara from powerhouse local film and TV production company Warp Films for a segment Levine surprised James with. Based on a conversation had on the podcast previously, James had to pitch his idea for a film about the ghost of snooker player John Virgo! The section went far better than Levine had hoped \u2013 maybe we\u2019ll actually see the film one day?! It even led to an audio cameo from Stephen Graham who James pitched to play Virgo!<\/p>\n
Next we were introduced Simon Brock, Sheffield-based clog maker. This was a slightly surreal segment in equal parts funny and insightful. Will Greg James were clogs to Taylor Swift\u2019s wedding? We\u2019ll have to wait and see! Finally friend of the podcast Jordan joined James and Levine on stage for a regular segment in which a listener tells a bizarre lifestory. There were certainly plenty of laughs to be had from Jordan\u2019s childhood in a rural village, but the storytelling did drag on a little.<\/p>\n
Greg James and Alice Levine pitched the evening very well, not assuming anyone had ever seen or heard the podcast whilst giving enough inside jokes or segments to please those who are regular listeners. A wonderfully entertaining evening to start the weekend of podcast goodness!<\/p>\n
Reviewed on 2nd July 2026.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n Crossed Wires is the world\u2019s biggest podcast festival, returning to Sheffield for its third year. The \t\t\tThe Reviews Hub Star Rating<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"This time last year, Greg James opened the Crossed Wires Festival with a 2 hour show attempting to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1068089,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[8817],"tags":[292916,292917,292918,748,92797,393,4884,93763,292919,1620,52572,292920,506,16,15,292921],"class_list":["post-1068088","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sheffield","tag-alice-levine","tag-amy-ohara","tag-bad-chat-with-greg-james-alice-levine","tag-britain","tag-crossed-wires","tag-england","tag-great-britain","tag-greg-james","tag-mark-herbert","tag-sheffield","tag-sheffield-city-hall","tag-simon-brock","tag-stephen-graham","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-warp-films"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1068088","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1068088"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1068088\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1068089"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1068088"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1068088"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1068088"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
festival brings the biggest names in podcasting together for a weekend of live shows, never-
seen-before performances, special guests, DJ sets, Q&As and fan events.<\/p>\n