Ephraim Hardcastle
EX-INTERNATIONAL Development Minister Grant Shapps says he needed to ‘do the right thing’ in response to the ‘Tatler Tory’ bullying scandal surrounding the death of election volunteer Elliott Johnson, aged 21. Shapps, Tory cochairman at the time, resigned, saying it was necessary for someone senior to take responsibility. Colleagues say he was disappointed to lose the party chairmanship after the May election triumph and ‘won’t be shedding too many tears’ over losing the consolation job. Isn’t politics fascinating?
BROADCASTER Gyles Brandreth, 67, disapproves of the Calendar Girls craze, saying: ‘ No more calendars featuring unclad folk of riper years, saying that they’re doing it for fun, but secretly thinking they’re quite sexy. One of life’s better basic rules: Keep your clothes on.’ Make sure they’re your own, though. Some haven’t recovered from seeing Gyles playing Lady Bracknell in The Importance of Being Earnest (pictured).
COMEDIAN John Cleese, 76, complains: ‘Ephraim Hardcastle accuses Eric Idle and me of “cashing in” on our recent tour (of America) Absolutely right! He’s caught us at it’ (I also mentioned an Australian Fawlty Towers stage show organised by Cleese). ‘We were “cashing in” on the fact that a fair number of people think we’re quite talented and so will pay us to entertain them.’ Quite talented? Such modesty.
CARRY On star Kenneth Williams, pictured, who died in 1988 of a barbiturates overdose aged 62, taunted friends by saying he was putting them in his astonishingly acidic diaries. Now the British Library has acquired 43 of them and 2,000 letters. His published diaries, which comprise less than 20 per cent of the whole, contained calumnies such as: ‘I see that old idiot (Sir) Adrian Boult (composer, 1889-1983) had the double- hernia operation, and that ghastly old man, Lewis Casson (actor-theatre director, 1879-1969) is dead: let’s hope his wife (actress Dame Sybil Thorndike (18821976) takes the hint too – dreadful pair of charlatans.’ Williams’ last diary entry was: ‘What’s the bloody point?’
DAMAGED by the scandal of the charity Kids Company, of which he was chairman, the BBC’s creative director Alan Yentob, 68, steps down from administrative duties but retains his chairmanship of BBC Films and his role making Imagine documentaries. He is credited with axing Jimmy Savile’s show, Jim’ll Fix it when he was BBC1 controller. Savile said: ‘Along comes Jack the Lad and if he sacks a small show he’s only a small manager but if he sacks a big one like mine, he’s a big manager.’