The Londoner: Nigel Farage won't rule out joining Henry Bolton

Nigel Farage and Henry Bolton, a fellow ex-Ukip leader, may be resurrecting old alliances in case the UK is still part of the EU when European elections are held in May.

Farage recently confirmed he would come back to British politics full time as a candidate for a new party, The Brexit Party, but if the name isn’t registered in time, he is “completely open-minded” about joining Henry Bolton’s Our Nation Party. Bolton founded Our Nation in March last year after he lost a second confidence vote as Ukip leader and had to resign. At the first vote — only of the national executive committee, rather than all party members — Bolton only received one vote in his favour (from himself).

It was his affair with Jo Marney, who had sent “racist texts” about Meghan Markle, that sent Ukip into revolt. Bolton initially tried to found Our Nation as One Nation, but was barred from doing so by the Electoral Commission for its similarity to an Islamic charity.

The Londoner understands that Farage likes Bolton (they were Ukip colleagues) but dislikes his party’s name. “My own view,” Farage told The Londoner, “is that The Brexit Party is a very good name,” though he conceded that if this party were not registered in time he might join Bolton’s outfit. Leavers such as Farage and Bolton, who have largely been offstage as the UK has tried to negotiate its exit from the EU, see in the possible delay of Article 50 an opportunity. If Britain were to extend Article 50 — and thus remain in the EU a little longer — some Brexiteers want to ensure that they could stand in elections to the European Parliament.

They would hope to send a contingent of strongly Eurosceptic MEPs to Strasbourg and Brussels to counter fears about not leaving the EU.

Surely the rise of the distinctly occult “super blood wolf moon” and the possible return of Farage and Bolton is just a coincidence?

Uncivil hair don't

Toby Haynes, who directed Brexit: The Uncivil War, says producers told him to limit how much hair star Benedict Cumberbatch should have shaved off to play Dominic Cummings. “People funding the film would’ve been horrified if we said we’re gonna cut all Benedict Cumberbatch’s hair off,” he says. “[But] that’s the thing about Benedict: if he does something, he really does it full pelt.”

“It was a bit crushing at the time,” Cumberbatch concedes. “I had what’s called a ‘no-hawk’ — no hair around the middle, and then I had my normal hair at the sides. It wasn’t pretty, but it worked.”

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Sir Philip Green’s famous temper may be inflamed when he learns that a character based on him in the forthcoming Michael Winterbottom film Greed is killed off. “A bastard all the way through and then he dies,” says Steve Coogan, who plays a billionaire retail mogul. “So that’s refreshing.”

Thrones star finds a charity platform

Actor Gala Gordon joined Game of Thrones’ new recruit Denise Gough to celebrate non-profit theatre company Platform Presents at the West End’s J Sheekey Atlantic Bar last night. Ahead of the highly anticipated third season of The Crown, two of its newly crowned actors were in attendance, namely Tobias Menzies, who replaces Matt Smith as Prince Philip, and Harry Treadaway, who will star opposite Helena Bonham Carter as Princess Margaret’s “toyboy” lover, Roddy Llewellyn. The pair were snapped over the weekend shooting airport scenes for the new drama.

Elsewhere, Tamsin Greig and Anya Taylor-Joy were at the 39th London Critics Circle Awards at the May Fair Hotel, while all eyes were on Richard E Grant as he won the Best Supporting Actor prize. He will be hoping for an Oscar nomination for the role in Can You Ever Forgive Me? Also this weekend, the Count and Countess of Weymouth were at the Buddha Bar for friend Lisa Tchenguiz’s birthday.

SW1A

Tory moderate Nick Boles says his office was recently called by one person threatening “to burn my house down”, and another threatening “to cut my balls off”. Boles told Nick Robinson in podcast Political Thinking that he felt he was “about to get one of those vile treatments by one of those particularly unpleasant characters in Game of Thrones”. Robinson asked whether the fact Boles had almost died from cancer in 2017 made him more sanguine about such political lunacy. “Yes,” Boles replied, “I’m sure that has a huge impact.”

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John McDonnell MP was at the Soho Theatre on Friday night, tweeting his praise for Kieran Hodgson’s excellent new show about the 1975 EEC referendum. “Absolutely incisive, funny, moving and brilliant,” declared the shadow chancellor. Lest we forget, in 1975 a vote of Remain was returned. So just how moved was he…?

What Meghan truffles up for lunch

The Duchess of Sussex can’t shake off her hipster roots. This weekend the former actor and wife of Prince Harry invited her make-up artist friend Daniel Martin over for lunch. He posted a photo of her offering on Instagram: tea, truffles, and avocado on toast. “Thank you Meghan for being the consummate hostess this weekend,” he wrote. The Duchess shut down all of her social media channels when her relationship with Harry became serious. She may not thank her friend for the reminder.