Ephraim Hardcastle
WHEN a painting of a blue horse was given to the Queen by Germany’s President Gauck in June, she gasped in disbelief about the animal’s colour and its childishly crude depiction of her late father. HM managed to appear content when President Xi gave her CDs of his singing wife, Peng Liyuan. When former French first lady Carla Bruni accompanied then president Nicolas Sarkozy on his 2008 visit, Prince Philip mischievously suggested that she might sing after the banquet. The French thought otherwise but later sent some of her CDs for his enjoyment.
PROFESSOR Stephen Hawking claims that to fend off loneliness as an Oxford student, he joined the Boat Club as a coxswain. This is contradicted by his contemporary at University College, Stephen Cockburn, who says: ‘It is absolute tosh. The fact is that Hawking and I joined the university Boat Club in the first week of our first term in October 1959.’ Who knows the truth? Hawking’s statements about the origin of the universe will also have attracted doubters.
THE late Sir David Frost’s son, Wilfred, 29, now pursuing a TV presenting career with America’s CNBC, says his father, while brilliant on television, wasn’t very good at getting his sets to work. He recalls: ‘He couldn’t actually turn one on at home.’ Sir David would call his children for help, says Wilfred, adding: ‘We’d have to go through what can only be described as childlike instructions on how to control a TV. People at our end of the call would say: “Are you talking to a four-year-old?”’
STRIKING new Tory MP Heidi Allen, 40, who used her Commons maiden speech to attack George Osborne’s slashing of tax credits, holds out the prospect of further Commons entertainment. Earlier this month, she gave an unflattering assessment of the current Tory leadership contenders, describing Mr Osborne as ‘too smooth’, while comparing Theresa May to Disney Pixar character Edna Mode, both pictured, from the hit animated movie The Incredibles. As for Boris Johnson, Heidi remarked: ‘I just see him in a room with Putin, naked from the waist upwards together, wrestling fish. It’s just not a good image for me.’ Or for anyone else, I fancy.
LABOUR MP Yvette Cooper, phoning LBC radio from the Greek island of Lesbos, where she was monitoring the migrant crisis, was asked by presenter Nick Ferrari if she would (as promised) be taking refugees into the homes she shares with husband Ed Balls in Yorkshire and London. After several seconds of silence, she replies: ‘I’m sure a lot of people would be willing if it was necessary. What they need is homes of their own.’ Where are we to find the 20,000 houses, she was asked. Sadly, Ms Cooper seemed to be cut off at that point. PRESIDENT Xi, who gave the Queen some porcelain, enjoyed a private viewing of Chinese treasures from the Royal Collection. I am told Prince Philip jested: ‘You can’t claim any of them back. Besides, we check your luggage before you go.’ My source says: ‘He uses variations of this regularly but only sometimes gets a laugh. It depends on whether the translator gets the joke.’
E-mail: ephraim.hardcastle@dailymail.co.uk