Hardcastle Ephraim
PRINCE Harry’s interview with Barack Obama – recorded for Radio 4’s Today show on December 27 – worries some royal courtiers. In the broadcast, Harry makes no secret of his admiration for the former president, with whom he has become pally. He interviewed Obama at the Invictus Games in Canada. Meanwhile, his American fiancee, Meghan Markle, is, like Obama, a Democrat who has publicly attacked Republican President Donald Trump. The problem is that we need a decent, post-Brexit trade deal with the US. That will depend on Trump and American legislators. Currently the majority of them are Republicans.
ROCK biddy Marianne Faithfull’s meeting in Paris with Rolling Stone Keith Richards in October wasn’t just a walk down memory lane, it has been revealed. Richards, 74, admits it was to discuss paying Marianne, 70, royalties for helping to write 1960s hits such as Sympathy for the Devil, You Can’t Always Get What You Want and Sister Morphine. Better late than never!
FORMER French First Lady Carla Bruni, who celebrates her 50th birthday tomorrow, won’t be getting a card from her leggy blonde former love rival, Jerry Hall, 61, both pictured. Asked whom she ‘most despises’, Ms Hall admits: ‘If pushed, I’d have to say Carla Bruni. I’m sure you can guess why.’ Now the fourth wife of media boss Rupert Murdoch, Jerry hasn’t forgiven Ms Bruni for having an affair with her ex, Sir Mick Jagger, in the 1990s. The philandering Rolling Stone ‘pinched’ her from fellow musician Eric Clapton.
HOLLYWOOD star Christian Slater, 48 – currently appearing in Glengarry Glen Ross, by American playwright David Mamet, at London’s Playhouse Theatre – offers a cautionary seasonal tale in an interview. His wife, Brittany Lopez, 28, wanted a raccoon as her Christmas present. He bought a stuffed one, recalling: ‘I was very excited. She opened the box – and was horrified! It led to a disastrous Christmas morning.’ A real raccoon might have been worse. They’ll eat anything.
OXFORD-educated biographer Roger Lewis, 57, who produced books about Peter Sellers and Anthony Burgess as well as the 2009 autobiographical bestseller Seasonal Suicide Notes, tells me he has fallen off the wagon. ‘I am back on the fine wines of Bordeaux,’ he explains. ‘I plan to tread that fine line between very heavy social drinking and actual alcoholism.’ So might many of us in the coming days.
CROONER Robbie Williams, 43, clearly fancies himself as a comedian telling NME magazine: ‘I’m the only man who can say he’s been in Take That and at least two members of the Spice Girls!’ At least!? What a scoundrel!