With those Disney dimples, she was perfect for panto
She’s behind you! Don’t look now Boris, but Jennifer Arcuri has arrived just in time for the pantomime season. Puss in Boots? Beauty and the Beastly? It is too soon to say. But with her Cinderella hair, that ironjawed kale- crunching California smile and those astonishing Disney dimples, sunny Jen was simply born to stride across a stage in buckled shoes shouting: ‘Oh no I didn’t!’ while slapping her velvet clad thighs. Oh yes she did? At breakfast time yesterday it was up to Piers Morgan and susanna Reid to find out if there was a poisoned pip at the heart of her panto apple.
Thrilled with a world-exclusive interview, Good Morning Britain (ITV) devoted a whole hour to the woman at the centre of allegations concerning her relationship with PM Boris Johnson when he was mayor of London. straight away, successful businesswoman Jennifer established that she was miffed about being objectified in the UK as ‘an ex-model pole dancer’.
Whatevs, but Piers was keen to know what role the nightclub dancing pole in her shoreditch flat had played in their friendship. This led to the following astonishing interlude. ‘Did you ever use the pole when Boris was there?’ ‘Oh God no. Categorically not.’ ‘Did Boris ever use the pole?’ ‘I am never going to tell you that,’ said Miss Arcuri, dimpling attractively as the nation choked on its cereal.
The thought of the pinstriped Boris buttocks clamped around a pole in fashionable east London was too much for many to bear.
Arcuri also couldn’t tell her host exactly how many times Boris had visited her flat. For a Tech entrepreneur – which is how GMB billed her – Jennifer seemed woefully unsure of numbers.
‘Five, ten times, a handful of times?’, she shrugged.
‘What is a handful, Jennifer? asked Piers, solemnly. What indeed.
susanna had on her best ‘I’m A Feminist, Too’ face while going in for the kill. she clearly didn’t seem to believe that there could be friendship between male and female colleagues without intimacy, even though she works with Piers every day. so she asked again. What was the nature of their relationship? ‘It’s really not anyone’s business what private life we had,’ said Arcuri, adding; ‘I’m not going to be put in a position where you weaponise my answer. What a bunch of churlish little guttersnipes.’
No one could have weaponised her answer had she simply denied the rumours. Yet she chose not to, while Piers and susanna took her slur in their stride.
Throughout the interview they were more dogged than a dog yoga festival on the Isle of Dogs on a dog day afternoon when everyone was doing the downward dog.
Their persistence reminded me of that terrible night back in 1996 when Richard and Judy interviewed OJ simpson on their evening television show, and tried to winkle a murder confession out of him before the ad break and a song from Neil Diamond. I recall that the build-up was huge. ‘he is one of the most controversial men in the world,’ said OJ of Richard. Or was it the other way around?
Anyway, Judy was so wound up she said ‘c*ck up’ on air, which was just about as bad as showing off her bra at the Brit Awards four years later.
In short what I am saying is this; thank God for Piers and susanna. Their attempt to ascertain just how close Boris Johnson and Jennifer Arcuri really were is not scurrilous, but germane to any future investigation of his conduct.
At the end of the day – and indeed the start of the morning – good journalism is all about someone knocking on a door, picking up a phone, clipping on a mic and asking an embarrassing question.
Unusually, everyone came out of this interview well, not least Jennifer Arcuri herself. she emerged as a winning character – ebullient, confident and with an eccentric charm.
I liked her apparent loyalty and the fact that she clearly is no lady victim, sobbing into her lace handkerchief as the man she says she bonded with over shakespeare texts pedals off into the sunset. Who knows what will happen next, however. et tu, Boris? Only time will tell.