Last week, I saw a clip that made me want to stand up and cheer. It was of the actor Millie Bobby Brown talking back to a photographer on a red carpet. The paparazzi had been yelling at her to smile, and Brown retorted: “Smile? You smile,” before walking off. She refused to do what was expected of her.

It’s a similar story with the star of the recent TV series Alien: Earth, Sydney Chandler. The actor did not appear on the cover of Variety magazine alongside the show’s creator and one of her co-stars, after she said she didn’t want to take part in a video interview for a regular series called How Well Do They Know Each Other?. The interviewer spent the first half of the resulting cover story explaining the situation in a bemused, tut-tutting tone, noting all the stars who had been willing to take part in the franchise.

I’m sure, as the journalist points out, that after “fixing” the interview (the lengthy process of negotiations that goes on between a publication and “the talent”), it was frustrating for her to not turn up. Chandler told him that she is “just a private person”, subsequently explaining to

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