The 22-year-old history student spent almost two years on a popular French quiz show – becoming a multimillionaire in the process. He discusses the importance of curiosity, frugality and 10-11 hours sleep a night

Being a TV general-knowledge quiz champion is a funny kind of fame, because random strangers want to test you on all sorts of trivia. “Sometimes I’ll be walking down the street, a car slows, the window goes down and someone screams: ‘Capital of Brunei?’ I answer and they drive off – it’s amusing really,” says Émilien, a 22-year-old history student who this summer became not only the most successful French gameshow contestant of all time, but the biggest gameshow winner in European history and the world record-holder for the most solo consecutive appearances on a TV quizshow.

And everyone, of course, wants to know how he did it.

Modelling has changed hugely over the decades. Two models from different generations discuss the highs and lows of the industry, from the joy of travel and dressing up to predatory behaviour and physical pressures

It’s easy to think of models as people whose lives are full of glitz and glamour, who “don’t wake up for less than $10,000 a day”. But according to New York-based Danielle Mareka, 27, and 62-year-old Dee O, who lives in London, the reality for most models is a constant hustle to get noticed.

That’s not to mention keeping up with the fashion world’s changing landscape: since O began modelling in 1983, the internet and social media have transformed the way the industry operates. And models are now navigating innovations such as AI models appearing in Vogue and the impact of GLP-1 weight-loss drugs on the sector. O and Mareka met to discuss their careers past and present.

The chancellor might need to break manifesto pledges and a 50-year taboo, but she has a chance to steer UK finances back on track

There might be three weeks to go until Rachel Reeves presents her budget, but in the topsy-turvy wonderland of the budget process, the real drama happens in the next few days. The chancellor will have to submit her major decisions to her official forecaster, the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR), this week. This means no more discussion, debate and seat-switching between No 10 and No 11 – once the spreadsheet is sent it is rarely changed. I hope that it includes an increase in the basic rate of income tax, something we haven’t seen since the 1970s. It is hard to see how else Reeves can navigate the three trials of this budget: fixing the bottom line, supporting growth and distributing the pain fairly.

First, the hole in the public finances must be filled. New Resolution Foundation analysis estimates that borrowing is on course to be £14bn higher than it was in March – enough to break her fiscal rules. That’s smaller than some have speculated but still leaves a mountain to climb. And the chancellor will need to do more than match this shortfall – and build a far stronger financial buffer against her fiscal rules – if she is to reassure the markets and avoid coming back for even more tax rises or spending cuts at the next budget. Doing so would be unusual – typically chancellors under-react to bad economic news and overreact to good news. Only one budget in the past 14 years has responded to a worse underlying forecast by more than making up for the deterioration (George Osborne, in 2012).

Ruth Curtice is the chief executive of the Resolution Foundation

In a hugely successful TV and film career, her waitresses, neighbours, moms and daughters ranged from comedy to drama to David Lynch films, always with compelling authenticity

• Diane Ladd, Oscar-nominated star of Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore, dies aged 89

Diane Ladd was part of a Hollywood aristocracy of character actors who from the golden period of the American New Wave onwards lent star quality to supporting roles. She brought an authentic, undiluted American screen-acting flavour to everything she was in, and ran hugely successful movie and TV careers in parallel for decades, playing waitresses, neighbours, moms, sirens and daughters, and ranging from comedy to drama.

She was famously the mother of screen actor Laura Dern and wife of Bruce Dern, and repeatedly acted with Laura in a remarkable mother-daughter partnership in which the two women’s closeness always shone through. You might compare it to Judy Garland and Liza Minnelli, or Debbie Reynolds and Carrie Fisher — although Diane Ladd and Laura Dern were far more trouble-free and without that kind of angst. They were Oscar-nominated together for their joint appearance in Martha Coolidge’s Depression drama Rambling Rose from 1991. And they also both appeared in David Lynch’s Wild at Heart and Inland Empire, Alexander Payne’s Citizen Ruth, and in Mike White’s HBO drama Enlightened – and in three of these they played, naturally, a mother and daughter. In Joel Hershman’s 1992 comedy Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me, Ladd acted alongside her own mother, the stage actor Mary Lanier.

After a colleague had the bright idea of a workplace version of the hit BBC show, I lied and cheated with impunity. Then the strain began to show

There aren’t many people who understand the stress that the celebrity Traitors Cat Burns and Alan Carr have been feeling as their stint wearing that famous green cloak draws to an end – but I do. I spent four weeks lying, cheating and murdering friends and colleagues in our office version of The Traitors.

I almost lost my mind.

Ed Campbell is a journalist who reports on British culture, politics and the internet. He also co-hosts the PoliticsJOE podcast

Guardian US writer Adam Gabbatt and columnist Mehdi Hasan explore how Democratic nominee Zohran Mamdani came from nowhere to the brink of becoming mayor of New York City

A year ago, Zohran Mamdani was a political nobody. On Tuesday, as New Yorkers head to the polls, he is the overwhelming favourite to become the city’s next mayor.

Guardian US writer Adam Gabbatt charts his rise from his radical campaign promises to his savvy social media videos, and explores how this most unlikely of candidates – a self-proclaimed Democratic socialist, Muslim, born outside the US – has propelled himself to the summit of the city’s politics.

Chancellor says she needs to respond to challenges in speech intended to frame tough choices UK faces

• Analysis: Reeves aims to prepare voters and markets for tax rises

• UK politics live – latest updates

Rachel Reeves has refused to rule out tax rises in this month’s budget, insisting she must “deal with the world as I find it, not the world as I might wish it to be”.

The UK chancellor foreshadowed an income tax increase, a breach of Labour’s manifesto commitment, as a result of the public finances being in a worse state than expected after “years of economic mismanagement”.

LNER employee Samir Zitouni, who was hospitalised after Saturday’s incident, hailed by police for ‘incredibly brave’ actions

A “heroic” member of staff who was seriously injured after the mass stabbing onboard a train in Cambridgeshire on Saturday has been praised for his “incredibly brave” actions to protect passengers.

Samir Zitouni, 48, who has worked for London North Eastern Railway (LNER) for more than 20 years, remains in hospital following the attacks.

Government settles claim from former post office operator more than 20 years after he began his campaign for justice

• Business live – latest updates

Sir Alan Bates has agreed a multimillion-pound settlement with the government more than two decades after he began the campaign for justice for post office operators over the Horizon IT scandal.

Bates has previously accused the government of presiding over a “quasi-kangaroo court” system for compensation, and last year said that post office operators may return to court over delays with settling claims.

Exclusive: Lawyers tell Home Office about health issues of man who says smuggling gangs make it too dangerous for him to go back to France

An Iranian man who returned to the UK on a small boat after being sent back to France under the “one in, one out” scheme is facing his second removal on Wednesday despite mounting concerns about his vulnerability.

He is being held in a UK immigration detention centre and receiving hourly welfare checks by staff because of concerns about his mental health. He claims to be a victim of modern slavery at the hands of smugglers in northern France.