There’s a savage irony about Ireland becoming the stumbling block to the ‘never-ever-shall-be-slaves’ Brexit lobby, given the 800-year history of first England, then the UK meddling, at times brutally, in Irish affairs. Joe Biden has now added a clarion call to the other dissenting voices indicating that the Good Friday Agreement can’t become a casualty … Read more
Dark tales of corruption and worse in Bollywood, the Indian film industry, are stalking the media. Which hardly makes it different from Hollywood where since the earliest days crime, cover-up and financial ‘manipulation’ have been the watchword. Even today drug-taking is almost de rigueur. Though Bollywood does appear to have stronger links to organised crime, … Read more
Charles Spencer, Princess Diana’s brother, has been talking about his upbringing and his third marriage. He says his unhappy, traumatic childhood with his mother leaving when he was two and being sent to boarding school at 8, sent him into two failed marriages until he went into therapy to sort himself out. He has four … Read more
Singer, songwriter Lily Allen has married actor David Harbour, best known for Stranger Things in Las Vegas, in a wedding officiated by an Elvis impersonator. Both have had complicated lives with Lily Allen on her second marriage with two children from a previous one, blighted for several years by an unstable stalker, with pregnancy mishaps … Read more
The suicide of a Bollywood actor, Sushant Singh Rajput, in June has dominated headlines for months, sparking off a curiously Indian media storm, with sensationalist coverage, unverified conspiracy theories and allegations given air time on nationwide newscasts. The coronavirus outbreak, the second-largest in the world, has been pushed to one side. He apparently had … Read more
Dame Diana Rigg, who has died aged 82, was a superlatively gifted classical stage actress yet she’s best known to most as the sexy secret agent Emma Peel in 1960s television series The Avengers and more recently as Lady Olenna Tyrrell in Game of Thrones. She could play it seductive, zany, funny or straight with … Read more
Another revenge memoir is out, though not political. This one is by Barbara Amiel, wife of former media tycoon Conrad Black who ended up in prison. ‘Friends and Enemies’ lambasts the socialite luminaries, once her BFFs during her years of obscene wealth and ostentatious display, who dumped her like a hot brick when he went … Read more
Breaking a promise made less than a year ago, Boris has chucked a hand grenade into the Brexit impasse saying he will tear up the Northern Ireland section of the Withdrawal Agreement to avoid returning to a hard border. Commentators say that cases of democratic governments seeking to unilaterally overwrite ratified international agreements are rare; … Read more
Alastair Campbell, the controversial aide and campaign director for Tony Blair, much-criticised for the Iraq ‘dirty dossier, has since exiting No 10 made a career out of mental health activism. He talks widely in the media about his own depression, breakdown, alcoholism, suicidal impulses, self-harm and has a new book out: “Living Better: How I … Read more
Despite sharp condemnation from Andrew Bailey, Governor of the Bank of England, the hedge fund scavengers continue to short sell, betting against stocks they reckon will fall. Bailey said what they are doing: “might not be frankly in the interest of the economy, the interest of the people.” Financier Crispin Odey claimed returns of … Read more