Hardcastle
AS next year’s 30th anniversary of Martin Bashir’s Panorama interview with Princess Diana looms, the BBC seems intent on ignoring it, having turned down two unsolicited drama treatments of the subject. Does it fear it’s impossible to touch without provoking Prince william’s ire? After Lord Dyson’s 2021 report into the murkiness of Bashir’s methods, william said: ‘It is my firm view that this Panorama programme holds no legitimacy and should never be aired again.’ The BBC seems to be listening, william.
THE WOKESTERS have got their way with the BBC axeing of Motherland. Why has the show about harassed mothers, school runs and wine o’clocks been dropped? A Beeb source says that in these gender-fluid times, when ‘birthing parent’ is sometimes preferred to ‘mother’, the show was ‘a bit too heteronormative’. What does that mean when it’s at home?
PROMOTING her 60th anniversary ‘farewell’ tour, Lulu, 75, recalls her 1993 collaboration with Take That: ‘They were very, very respectful, because they of course were in their teens, I think, and I was 40 ... and now we’re family.’ Take That’s Howard Donald claims bandmate Jason Orange, then 22, had a particularly close relationship with then 44-year-old Lulu. no Boom Bang-a-Bang took place, howls the Scottish songstress!
INTERVIEWING
Andrew Scott, pictured, about his new
Netflix series Ripley,
Radio 4 Today’s Martha Kearney mischievously remarks:
‘Tom Ripley in the book and in previous versions is a younger man. Don’t get me wrong, you appear in a very tiny swimsuit and look great!’ Co-host Nick Robinson observes to perky Martha, who’s soon leaving the show: ‘There’s a bit of a theme here emerging, Martha. Daniel Craig, you flirted with about jam. Now it’s Andrew Scott about his swimming trunks.’ Another thigh-slapper from throttlebottom Nick!
AB FAB star Julia Sawalha punishes ex-beau Richard Herring when invited on his podcast before a live audience, declaring: ‘May I say he dumped me by text.’ Herring insists that wasn’t his memory, but Julia adds: ‘I got a drunken call from you. And you were “I oh yeah, I’m out, I’m out.” Phone went dead. next minute (a text): “I don’t think we should go out any more. I don’t think this is working.”’ Isn’t revenge before a live audience grand?
IRISH comedienne and actress Aisling Bea confesses to once indulging in sex while listening to high-octave Hibernian warbler Enya. ‘It was Sail Away,’ she remembers. ‘It’s quite a difficult song to have sex to. Don’t ever put it on girls! Don’t ever have sex to, or with, Enya. Imagine if you’re having sex with Enya and she starts singing.’