Ephraim Hardcastle
DID Olympic Games heroes Laura and Jason Kenny, odds on for a damehood and knighthood, miss out on the top gongs after rio? The Honours and Appointments Secretariat, according to a source, needed to retain the most prestigious awards in anticipation of their Tokyo triumph. After the 2016 Games goldfest, their OBES were upgraded to CBES. Honours Unit bods fretted that they’d have nothing left for 2021 so decided to make them wait. Fortunately, the Kennys delivered. They will need a larger sideboard to display their forthcoming gongs alongside their astonishing 15-medal tally.
TEAM GB should receive a collective John Pius Boland award, urges eccentric Tory peer Lord Lexden. Who is he? As an Oxford undergraduate, Boland was a spectator at the inaugural modern Games in Athens in 1896. ‘He entered the lawn tennis tournament on the spur of the moment with a tennis bat of sorts he bought at a local bazaar,’ says Lexden. ‘He won the men’s singles and then replaced an injured player in the doubles, winning that too. Fortunately, the Games were held about Easter, and it was possible to be back at Oxford in time for his last summer term.’
THE late Queen Mother and poet laureate Ted Hughes had a relationship similar to Queen Victoria and John Brown, claims novelist Andrew O’Hagan, recalling in the London review of Books that Hughes and the QM enjoyed fishing expeditions in the Highlands. He cites William Shawcross’s authorised biography of the Queen Mother: ‘It gives the distinct impression that they had a hidden affair, never entirely acknowledged and certainly never consummated but definitely there.’ Who’d have thought?
CALL My Agent! star Camille Cottin, pictured, has been inundated with Hollywood offers after the US triumph of the French comedy. She spent lockdown in Paris and said she was unaware of its success, adding: ‘I was miles away imagining that I was buried alive.’ Green-eyed Camille gently nudges downwards in her CV an appearance in Connasse, a French TV prank show. She scaled the railings of Kensington Palace in search of Prince Harry.
A RADIO 4 documentary on polymath Jonathan Miller reveals his deathbed reconciliation with literary rival Alan Bennett, who held his hand. ‘Alan was very nervous about doing the documentary,’ Miller’s son William tells radio Times. ‘He had a difficult relationship with my father. I think he was worried that he’d upset my mother or would seem disingenuous, but actually he didn’t at all.’
PRINCE Charles has been outed as a fan of Postman Pat by Lewis MacLeod, who does the character’s voice. He says: ‘I got to meet Prince Charles and he said: “So you’re Postman Pat? What does he sound like?” I replied: “Hello, Mrs Goggins!” ’ No mention of Lewis’s other job: Impersonating Prince Charles on Spitting Image.