Downton Abbey actress left ‘frazzled’ by Tatler’s sexist jibe
Society magazine makes grovelling apology after suggestion Daisy Lewis was ‘probably’ fun in bed
DESCRIBED as the compilation of “the most eligible, most beddable, most exotically plumaged birds and blokes in town”, Tatler’s Little Black Book has long been one of the magazine’s most talked about segments.
That certainly was the case yesterday when the publication went to great lengths to backtrack on comments made about the Downton Abbey star Daisy Lewis in its December issue.
The actress did not take kindly to a lewd suggestion that she was “probably” fun in bed and protested vociferously.
“I’m really shocked and upset by this. But thankfully I’m ‘loud’ enough to say it,” she wrote on Twitter. “Does anyone at Tatler read the news?”
The society magazine, one of the oldest in the world, described the British actress in its Little Black Book of “the smartest, sexiest, singles on the planet”.
Accompanied by a picture of Lewis, the publication wrote: “As Daisy is quite small, you might be tricked into believing she’s quiet. LOL. She isn’t. This actress is loud. Which makes her fun at a party. And in bed. Probably.”
The magazine later said in a statement: “Tatler apologises unreservedly to Daisy Lewis. We will also be publishing a full apology in the next issue.” Speaking to the Huffington Post website, Lewis, who has appeared in Doctor Who and who starred alongside Michael Gambon in the film Churchill’s Secret, said Kate Reardon, the magazine’s editor, rang her to apologise for the piece – but admitted the story had left her “frazzled”.
She told the website: “I know the girls who wrote it,” she said. “The fact that it’s women writing that about other women is what upset me the most, really.”
The actress continued: “I genuinely believe that the people who wrote it thought I would be pleased. “That’s what makes me so sad, that [they thought] I would have been pleased to be included on a list of eligible – and for eligible to mean marriageable – people, as a sort of catalogue.
“It feels like being part of a horse trade show or something.” She added that the response she received had been “incredible” and gave her a “lot of hope”. The prerequisite to appear in the Little Black Book is typically limited to those among the rich and famous – a place where wealthy aristocrats sit alongside celebrities, making up the “the most selectable, delectable eligibles of the year”.
The article came under fierce cism from Lewis’ supporters.
“That’s such sexist c---,” wrote agony aunt Philippa Perry on Twitter. “Apologise and go on a course @TatlerUK.”
The profile of the actress, who played schoolteacher Sarah Bunting in Downton Abbey, was in the girls’ section of the Little Black Book, of “mesmerising beauties, brilliant brains”.
The boys’ section, featuring aristocracy and financiers alongside the likes of actors such as Jack O’Connell, shows “manliness at its most magnificent”.
The piece on eligible singletons, “rounded up, oiled and brought to your tent”, was written as Hollywood and politics have been embroiled in sexual harassment scandals which have put the depiction of women under the spotlight. The magazine, first published in 1901, was named after the original literary and society journal Tatler, founded in 1709.
Steeped with history as a respected high society publication with expert opinion on fashion and lifestyle, it is certainly not the first time one of its features have courted controversy.
Four years ago, it ran a feature entitled “best society breasts”, listing former MP Louise Mensch, Princess Eugenie, Clare Balding and Dame Helen Mirren among others. criti-