Raffish royal restaurateur takes secrets to the grave

THE bon viveur restaurateur who was privy to more society secrets than anyone else has died — and kept most of them intact.

The sudden death of Michael Proudlock, for more than 25 years the raffish host of legendary Chelsea celebrity hang-out Foxtrot Oscar, has brought tributes from friends and family.

His eaterie is where Fergie’s lover hid out, where Prince Harry took dates as a teenager and liz Taylor famously fell off her stool.

it’s hardly surprising that Proudlock, who was aged 70, was the most connected restaurateur of his age having previously shared a New York flat with ‘seducer of the valleys’ Sir Dai llewellyn, brother of Princess Margaret’s lover Roddy.

Foxtrot Oscar, founded in 1980, was at the epicentre of the Sloane Ranger world and attracted dissolute marquesses like moths to a flame.

While the Duchess of York’s one time ‘financial adviser’ John Bryan hid out there from the paparazzi, Fergie, too, was a regular.

She was first wined and dined there by Paddy McNally, her racing driver boyfriend before she met Prince Andrew.

it also played host to the teenage Princes William and Harry, and a well-refreshed Elizabeth Taylor. Proudlock relished his feuds as much as his friendships.

He barred the late restaurant critic A. A. Gill from his establishment for ‘writing rubbish about my place’, though later the pair made up.

There was high drama, if not always haute cuisine.

He fell out with the then Marquess of Blandford over a £28 unpaid bill, and once famously bought a racehorse after a drunken lunch, saying to the agent: ‘Don’t Tell The Wife,’ only to find the nag running under that name and in his colours within days.

Unfortunately this oversight culminated in the end of his second marriage to lena, mother of Ollie and his sister laurie.

After selling the venue to Gordon Ramsay in 2007, Proudlock maintained his bachelor apartment above the restaurant and continued to be a man about town.

His last social excursion was to host along with former business partner Rex leyland the annual lunch for ex-Foxtrot staff and managers. Yesterday, Rex and staff gathered again to raise a glass.

‘Michael always said: “Death is no excuse”. He would have wanted us to meet and eat,’ Rex tells me

‘You were a force of nature,’ his son Made in Chelsea star Ollie wrote in a tribute on social media.