EastEnders gets gay bar as it ‘champions diversity’

A GAY bar is to open on Albert Square to reflect the diversity of London, the new senior executive producer of EastEnders has said.

Kate Oates recently joined the show from Coronation Street and said she has big plans to champion diversity.

In a video posted on the soap’s Twitter page, she said: “I am really interested in bringing some more LGBTQ characters in.

“We are looking at opening a gay bar on the square which will be a super-cool precinct where gay and straight characters can all just hang out and loads of stories can cross.”

Oates also teased the return of some well-known characters, but would not name names.

She said: “There is one coming back in spring that I am really excited about. It’s going to be for a fairly short stint, but I think it’s going to have a really big impact.”

CELEBRATING her damehood more than 50 years after first becoming a household name as a teenager, Twiggy had hopes of stardom that were initially met with disapproval.

After the youngster’s photo in a Mayfair hair salon attracted attention in early 1966, Twiggy’s father William wrote to her north London school requesting his daughter, pictured (born Lesley Hornby), be given time off for photo shoots. “We were getting calls from magazines,” she has since recalled. “My dad wrote to the headmistress and we got a very rude letter back saying how stupid I was.”

SHOULD anyone be in any doubt, combative presenter Piers Morgan insists: “My New Year’s resolution for 2019 is to be just as annoying, argumentative and insufferably right about everything as I’ve been in 2018. Zero apologies in advance to all whiny PC-crazed snowflake imbeciles who will be horrifically offended by absolutely everything I say.”

Did anyone really imagine Piers might become a shrinking violet overnight?