The 88-year-old actor has appeared in more than 100 films, playing everyone from presidents to prisoners. Here, he reflects on AI’s ‘robbing’ of his voice, not believing in Black History Month – and why he’s nowhere near retirement

In a dishonest age when truth is under siege, media attention shatters into a thousand shards of glass and nothing is quite what it seems, what could be more precious than a voice of authority? Cue Morgan Freeman, an actor who has portrayed a US president, Nelson Mandela and the Almighty, and replaced Walter Cronkite on the voiceover introducing the CBS Evening News. If John Gielgud’s baritone was described as being “like a silver trumpet muffled in silk”, Freeman’s is like rich wood polished to a quiet shine.

It was less God’s gift than the product of hard work, thanks to an inspiring voice and diction instructor at his community college in Los Angeles. “If you’re going to speak, speak distinctly, hit your final consonance and do exercises to lower your voice,” says Freeman, dapper in light jacket , via video call from New York. “Most people’s voices are higher than they would be normally if they knew how to relax it. He taught that sort of thing. It was Robert Whitman: I will never forget him.”

The corporation should have stood up to the Telegraph, Trump and the Tories. Now, its enemies know how little it takes for it to fold

The resignation of the BBC’s director general, Tim Davie, over accusations of bias comes as a shock and leaves a gulf at the top of the corporation when it needs leadership most. Davie stressed that the decision was his alone – neither the board, nor even many of those who led the coordinated attack among rightwing press and politicians expected it.

Now the resignations of both Davie and the CEO of BBC News, Deborah Turness, have shown that baying for blood gets results.

Jane Martinson is professor of financial journalism at City St George’s and a member of the board of the Scott Trust, which owns the Guardian Media Group. She writes in a personal capacity

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Jonathan Watts sets off on a three-day boat trip down the Amazon – with indigenous leaders, scientists, artists and more – to report on Cop30, the climate summit taking place this year in Brazil

This week, delegations from countries from all over the world are flying into Belem, Brazil, to attend Cop30, the world’s biggest climate summit.

The Guardian’s global environment reporter Jonathan Watts, however, had a different idea – to take the slow road. Or, in fact, the slow boat – a three-day journey up the Amazon, across hundreds of kilometres, to arrive in Belem just in time.

Attenborough’s latest extravaganza is packed with such high drama it’s like Game of Thrones … if Cersei was a hyena. If only it hadn’t been bumped down the schedules because of Strictly

As I watch a leopard hunt in Kingdom, the BBC’s latest David Attenborough-narrated documentary, I find myself thinking about a YouGov survey from a few years ago that found that half of Britons wouldn’t take a free trip to the moon, with 11% turning it down because “there isn’t enough to see and do”. As well as it providing a fantastic insight into the great British public’s psyche (would outer space be better if it had Alton Towers?), I can’t help but wonder if it also explains the pressure that TV commissioners feel under to find new ways to interest the pesky human race in sights that would previously have been greeted with wonder.

Back in 2017, Blue Planet II was the most-watched programme of the year, with 14.1 million viewers tuning in to see dolphins surf on prime time. Today, the six-part Kingdom has been bumped to the teatime slot, and finding out which Strictly celeb’s rumba has been voted the most mediocre is deemed more important to the schedule.

Jessica Guo hiked 30 miles a day, becoming the first woman to continuously hike two historic US trails in a calendar year

Jessica Guo had only slept for two-and-a-half hours on an overnight bus when she arrived at the Mexico-US border near Lordsburg, New Mexico, in April. Out of the window she saw a flat, shadeless landscape. First-day jitters had Guo questioning what she was doing there.

The former consultant had left corporate America to attempt something no woman had completed: a single, continuous hike of the Continental Divide Trail (CDT) and the Great Divide Trail (GDT) in one calendar year.

Reform’s leader may hope to tread a similar path to Italy’s prime minister, but she is an experienced parliamentarian open to collaboration and compromise

One of the more striking images from June’s G7 summit showed a small group of world leaders engaged in an impromptu and informal evening chat at the venue’s restaurant. In the foreground of that photo was a familiar blond head: Giorgia Meloni.

During her three years as the Italian prime minister, Meloni has moved beyond her hard-right populism, not to mention her fascism-adjacent origins, to earn at least the respect of other leaders – Keir Starmer among them – for her pragmatism and flexibility. Among those watching this transformation from the sidelines will be the man hoping to be Starmer’s replacement: Nigel Farage.

Brazil’s André Corrêa do Lago says countries should follow China’s lead on clean energy as conference begins

• Cop30: what are the main issues?

• Net zero to NDCs: your Cop30 jargon buster

Rich countries have lost enthusiasm for combating the climate crisis while China is surging ahead in producing and using clean energy equipment, the president of the UN climate talks has said.

More countries should follow China’s lead instead of complaining about being outcompeted, said André Corrêa do Lago, the Brazilian diplomat in charge of the Cop30 conference, which begins on Monday.

Davie says departure is ‘my own decision’, while head of news also quits. Insiders say it ‘feels like a coup’ by broadcaster’s enemies

• BBC bias row: how a week of hostile headlines from rightwing media led to resignations

Tim Davie, the BBC’s director general, and the head of BBC News have resigned after a former adviser to the corporation accused it of “serious and systemic” bias in its coverage of issues including Donald Trump, Gaza and trans rights.

In an announcement that caused shock within the corporation, Davie said his departure was “entirely my decision” and it comes as the BBC prepares to apologise for the way it edited a Trump speech.

The amended package will still have to be passed by the House and sent to Trump for his signature, a process that could take days

The Senate on Sunday made significant progress towards ending the longest US government shutdown in history, narrowly advancing a compromise bill to reauthorize funding and undo the layoffs of some employees.

But the measure, which resulted from days of talks between a handful of Democratic and Republican senators, leaves out the healthcare subsidies that Democrats had demanded for weeks. Most Democratic senators rejected it, as did many of the party’s lawmakers in the House of Representatives, which will have to vote to approve it before the government can reopen.

Exclusive: Homelessness charity planning to buy properties as it can no longer rely on access to social housing

‘Similar pressure to London’: the housing crisis reaches Newcastle

The homelessness charity Crisis is going to become a landlord for the first time in its 60-year history, saying the housing crisis in the UK has reached a “catastrophic scenario”.

Matt Downie, the charity’s chief executive, said it was preparing to launch a fundraising appeal to buy its own housing stock as it can longer get access to social housing to help homeless people.