Joan, 88, flees from boozy bread roll attack at arts club

IN a scene that wouldn’t be out of place in Eighties soap opera Dynasty, Joan Collins had a bread roll viciously lobbed at her at a swanky private members’ club. The ‘frightening’ confrontation led to the roll-thrower being banned for life – and the man she was a guest of having his membership of Chelsea Arts Club suspended.

Joan, 88, tells us of the incident, which occurred when she was out celebrating with a friend earlier this year, saying: ‘A drunken diner who inappropriately wanted to sit with us got upset and threw a hard bread roll at me, and she didn’t have the decency to follow it up with the butter.

‘It was a private dinner for a friend’s birthday, my once PR Stella Wilson.’

Nobody in their small party knew the dough-thrower.

Joan’s long-term friend Stella, who is now retired, adds: ‘Joan understandably was upset. Nobody likes to have something thrown at them. She and [her husband] Percy left. I was disappointed she had to miss the rest of my birthday but I understood why she left. I would have walked out too. Thank goodness it was only a roll. That was the frightening part of it.’ Stella says the woman came over to their table and was ‘swaying around and not making any sense’. ‘She knew who Joan, pictured, was because she told her, “I’ve always admired you”. ’ The woman was then persuaded to return to her table, at which point she took the bread roll and threw it at Joan. ‘None of us could understand why she threw it,’ Stella says. ‘It was an upsetting incident for everybody.’ Chelsea Arts Club is frequented by many stars, from Bake Off judge Prue Leith to Hollywood’s Harrison Ford.

The club said it ‘absolutely’ can’t comment due to the nature of a private members’ club.