Yahoo News Londoner's Diary: Weinstein still talk of town at Man Booker Prize
ANOTHER year, another Man Booker Prize. The Londoner mingled with the literati at The Guildhall last night. George Saunders’s Lincoln in the Bardo was a worthy winner, but we crowned our own wits for their inimitable way with words...
Anne winks off Weinstein
Acerbic TV presenter Anne Robinson doesn’t suffer fools or alleged serial harassers for that matter. “Harvey Weinstein tried to buy the Weakest Link — I persuaded everyone else to bid against him,” she said. The Weakest Link presenter says she knew not to give him the show because “I’m an old reporter and I could smell trouble. NBC ended up buying it.”
Just as well the show hasn’t been tainted by the entertainment mogul. But why was Robinson so keen to stop Weinstein buying it? “I just thought, ‘I can’t do business with him’, I met him and he disgusted me. You’ve got to smell it out we [women] need to trust our instincts.”
Lipman lets off wind
NEWLY single chick-lit author Kathy Lette was keeping coy about her love life when the Londoner quizzed her — that is until her actress friend Maureen Lipman joked: “She’s still dating Harvey!” But Lette rubbished the claim: “he [Weinstein] optioned one of my novels but I avoided the gruesome gropes because I was 30 and he only preyed on vulnerable young woman. If he’d touched me I would have used his testicles like maracas.”
Lipman then told a story about Harry Potter actress Miriam Margolyes. “She was in a lift with him and he touched her breast — she farted and he passed out.”
It all adds up for Bradley
MINISTER for Culture Karen Bradley was at the event with her husband Neil. Did the party get her creative juices flowing and inspire her to write her own novel? “Never,” she said. “I’m not the literary type. I’m a mathematician, I’m very boring. I could write about numbers, or I could write in numbers.”
She’s doing her best, though. “Well, I’m working my way through the long list,” she said. “I’m determined to get through as much as I possibly can: it’s always a challenge with work.”
Does Bradley’s preference for numbers over words signify that she’s trying to get the Chancellor gig? “I’m happy where I’m am,” she said nervously. Watch this space.
Honeymoon’s over
ALSO there was Liz Murdoch and her new husband Keith Tyson, an artist, who were making their first public outing as a married couple after missing the GQ awards. “This is more our style,” Tyson told us.
Begging for supper
AT THE dinner there were complaints about the decision to have 50 minutes of readings from the books by actors including Maxine Peake and Olivia Williams. This began after the starter and before the main course.
“All the extracts were too long and everybody was getting bored and hungry,” said one former Man Booker winner.
Even the organisers admitted afterwards that the experiment had not worked. It meant a rushed announcement of the winner at 9.45pm whereas it had been due for the BBC News channel live at 9.30pm. The sweet course was then not served until 10pm.
We wonder if the Duchess of Cornwall, the evening’s main guest, was amused?
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Leonardo's in the bargain basement
ARTIST Jonathan Yeo has spotted a bargain: Leonardo da Vinci’s Salvator Mundi, pictured, on sale at Christie’s New York with an estimate of $100 million. That, observes Yeo, would be cheaper than Untitled (1982) by Jean-Michel Basquiat —it sold for $110.5 million — he writes on Instagram, “which wasn’t even one of his best”. Salvator Mundi is one of only 20 canvases known to have been painted by Da Vinci. “It does make one question the sanity of the art market,” writes Yeo. We’re calling the bank for a loan.
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Quote of the Day
"I cried when Alan resigned."
That Alan being Alan Yentob. The tear-shedder was Camila Batmanghelidjh, who says she wept when Yentob quit as chair of charity Kids Company
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DONALD Trump may not be welcome in Britain but it looks like our fashion designers are lining up to herald his wife Melania. Last week she was seen in a little green number by Samantha Cameron’s Cefinn, but she’s also been spotted in a Victoria Beckham jumper. “With regards to the first lady, she did wear something of mine the other day,” Beckham said at a Vogue Forces for Fashion event in New York last week. A freebie? “She bought it from the shop.”
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Emily gets tips from Uncle Joe
LAST night the Londoner was at the premiere of Armando Iannucci’s film the Death of Stalin, a comedy which depicts the scramble for power after the dictator died in 1953. Among the fans we couldn’t help noticing was top Corbynista and shadow foreign secretary Emily Thornberry, pictured. Getting tips we wondered? The Labour frontbencher sashayed down the red carpet, clearly unbothered by the implications of being there.
Jason Isaacs was on hand to tell us how the film was going down in the old Communist heartlands. “So far there’s only two people in Russia who have said they didn’t think this was a good idea,” the actor, who plays Marshal Zhukov in the film told us. “One is the head of a very far, far Right party which worships Stalin and the other is some lowly minister at the culture ministry. I’m just hoping I can keep working and not have to drink irradiated tea.”
Maybe wait for Emily’s verdict before heading to Westminster?
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Tweet of the Day
“David Davis tells Commons: ‘The maintenance of the no deal option is for negotiating reasons’. THEY CAN HEAR YOU IN BRUSSELS. THEY KNOW.”
Political correspondent Tom Peck is concerned at our Brexit Secretary’s tactics
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Contestant of the Day: Scottish Tory leader Ruth Davidson is to compete in The Great British Bake Off. Will she find it a piece of cake?
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A hairy moment for Paul
Who’s this Jeremy Corbyn lookalike? Why it’s 1980s heart-throb Paul Nicholas, who was channelling the Labour leader at The Vaults in Waterloo. Just Good Friends star Nicholas was in the original cast of seminal musical Hair, so showed up to the theatre’s 50th anniversary production. Half a century later, he’s keeping his clothes on. Phew.
