Ephraim Hardcastle
THE plan that opposition political leaders should lay Remembrance Sunday wreaths at The Cenotaph in unison, not individually, to shorten the time the royals involved have to stand still, is not yet agreed after ‘unison wreath-layers’ protested. My source says: ‘Some claim David Cameron tried to tweak the plan to give himself a starring role.’ Surely not!? A suggestion that the four royals who lay wreaths after the Queen (Philip, Charles, Andrew and Anne) should do so in unison has also been abandoned. No one wants to surrender their personal moment of televised piety, evidently. When the Queen was on a tour of Ghana in 1999, Prince Charles took her place at the service. Afterwards, it was suggested the monarch give Charles permanent top billing at The Cenotaph. ‘The flunkey who suggested it only just escaped with his head,’ I am told. WITH our tour de force Queen no longer touring, Charles, Camilla, William and Kate will be fielded for foreign visits. ‘But they really want Prince Harry to find a suitable bride quickly, to join the squad,’ says my source. Now 31, Harry is under pressure to marry. At this age, his father courted Diana Spencer, and his brother, William, had been married to Kate Middleton for three years. ‘After 30 they tend to get tetchy,’ says a palace sage. AS THE new James Bond film, Spectre, is launched, frisky Dame Diana Rigg, 77, who starred in 1969’s On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, pictured, joins the debate over future 007s, saying: ‘A black Bond would be lovely. We could have a lesbian Bond, why not?’ Dame Diana says of her male model co-star: ‘George Lazenby was ill-equipped... I was there to steer him through and give it some gravitas.’ Much good it did her character, Contessa Teresa Vicenzo, who became Mrs James Bond. She became the victim of a drive-by shooting. BRASH disc jockey Chris Evans suggests the Duchess of Cornwall took a shine to him after he roared up to Clarence House in his camper van for a charity meeting. He says Camilla inquired: ‘Are you intending on staying the night?’ – then added, coquettishly, ‘You’re more than welcome!’ Egregious Evans comments: ‘Lovely lady.’ Enough to compel sensitive Charles into the greenhouse for a heartto-heart with his plants. NICHOLAS Parsons, who still hosts Radio 4’s Just A Minute aged 92, tells Radio Times the BBC wanted to end the show when Carry On star Kenneth Williams died, aged 62, in 1988. Williams had dominated the programme for 20 years. Parsons explains: ‘Kenneth came from a humble background and was self-educated. So Just A Minute gave him an opportunity to show off his intellectual ability.’ Yet his most famous line, as Caesar in Carry On Cleo, is: ‘Infamy, infamy, they’ve all got it in for me.’ WITH original Mary Poppins actress Dame Julie Andrews, 80, invited to make a cameo appearance in an upcoming sequel to the 1964 film, why not her costar, Dick Van Dyke, 89? His ‘cockney accent’ as a chimney sweep is unforgettable. He said recently: ‘I will never live it down.’