Brett Easton Ellis and Kanye West
(Picture: Publisher handout / Evan Agostini/Invision/AP,)AMERICAN PSYCHO author Bret Easton Ellis caused an audience walk-out on the London leg of his book tour last night as he defended his former collaborator Kanye West over anti-Semitic comments.
Speaking in a Q&A at Westminster’s UnHerd Club, Easton Ellis said. "Kanye now is no different from the Kanye I met in 2013. He is outrageous, he is provocative. I don’t believe he is an anti-Semite”, Easton Ellis said. “He is a destroying artist. He wants to live in a world that is completely free. He just wants to say ‘f*** you’ to everybody." West, who now goes by the name Ye, has recently praised Adolf Hitler and flirted with Holocaust denial.
Easton Ellis’s comments caused something of a commotion in the audience: The Londoner saw a handful of guests leave the event in protest. The Unherd Club prides itself on being a venue for free speech and thought.
In the talk Easton Ellis, who was hailed as America’s “voice of a generation” in the 1980s, railed against millennial sensitivities and would not say how he planned to vote in the next US Presidential election. He is touring his new novel The Shards in Europe but not the US because he refuses to engage with American journalists: “There’s no reason to try to deal with a fake media that is out to get you.”
A century of the Tory 1922 Committee
The Conservative Party descended on the Hurlingham Club in west London last night for a lavish dinner to celebrate 100 years of their 1922 Committee, the group of Conservative backbenchers which meets when Parliament is sitting. PM Rishi Sunak, Theresa May and 1922 Chairman Graham Brady all spoke. Brady had a busy 2022: his committee got rid of two Prime Ministers, so attendees gave a cheer for his hard-working parliamentary secretary.
Meanwhile, Sunak seems to be on the offensive as his predecessor Boris Johnson has made a series of media appearances. Tonight he’s on TalkTV with Piers Morgan. He may have got one over on Johnson, who will appear on the channel with Nadine Dorries tomorrow.
Grayson’s night in
It should have been a big night for Grayson Perry with an opening party for his Posh Cloths exhibition at the Victoria Miro in Islington this evening. Sadly, the artist has tested positive for Covid so he won’t be at the bash. It would have been a first outing since being made a Sir in the New Year’s Honours. Sir Grayson can stay at home instead and watch the second part of his new C4 series, The Full English.
Tory Condoms out and proud
The LGBT+ Conservative branded condoms have finally been released after mysteriously being pulled before the Tory Party Conference in September pic.twitter.com/7t7chVm5AT
— Sam Francis (@DavidSamFrancis) February 1, 2023
“Strong and stable”, Theresa May’s unloved 2017 election slogan, made a comeback at a Tory LGBT+ event this week... on the wrapper of a condom. The group aimed to release the branded prophylactics last year, but plans to give them out at Tory conference in September strangely fell through. One wrapper reads: “Labour isn’t working but this condom will (99% of the time)”. How tasteful.
Royal tribute to Asian influence
The King threw open the Buckingham Palace gates yesterday for a reception celebrating the UK’s British East and South-East Asian communities. He cheerfully met model Alexa Chung and her brother Dominic, who is Global Head of Music at Soho House. Queen Consort Camilla and Princess Anne and Prince Edward made it a royal flush. Elsewhere, Mike Tindall was at the Nordoff Robbins Legends Of Rugby Dinner at The Grosvenor House Hotel, alongside fellow ex-England player Chris Robshaw.
