‘Trainspotting’: an oral history of the cult film and its sequel

As 'T2: Trainspotting' hits cinemas, Barry Nicolson speaks to key players behind the book, film and soundtrack that defined a generation, and the sequel that seeks to do the same “Choose life. Choose a job. Choose a career. Choose a family…” When Trainspotting was released in February 1996, those words – voiced by Ewan McGregor’s Mark Renton as he legged it down Princes Street to the strains of Iggy Pop’s ‘Lust For Life’ – sounded like a clarion call for a nation preparing to throw off the yoke of Thatcherism and usher in a new era, a new culture, and a new politics. With Britpop in full swing and New Labour around the corner, Danny Boyle’s kinetic adaptation of Irvine Welsh’s...