Matt Hancock, look away now. The former health secretary may not enjoy seeing this picture of an actor in a wetsuit playing him on stage at the Hippodrome in Leicester Square last night. It was part of a show organised by Isabel Oakeshott, the journalist who leaked his WhatsApps earlier this year.
It gets worse for Matt: in a Q&A explaining her reasons for leaking the texts, Oakeshott revealed that she’s hoping to do more news stories on them, particularly on the vaccine roll-out. She also said she has Matt’s “flirty messages with another cabinet minister”, though not which one.
Actor Adrian McGlynn played Hancock, including a cringe-inducing monologue about a photoshoot in the sea, hence the wetsuit.
Matt Hancock’s people are not happy with the furore over the show, which she has co-organised with Toby Young, below, first trying to block it, and now saying it is distracting from the Covid enquiry. A spokesperson told us: "Matt has made all his records and materials available to the inquiry without making any redactions for relevance.”
Upstairs, we heard Oakeshott and Young planning a longer play about the messages. Poor Matt...
Grant Shapps branded a ‘bullsh*tter’
Energy Secretary Grant Shapps had a nightmare appearance at London Tech Week yesterday. Shapps was meant to be talking about sustainability, but made a Partridge-esque digression into praising the summer sun. “If it were a drink it would be half a pint, if it were a bathroom it would probably be avocado,” he said, to a sea of bemused faces. It got worse when the next speaker, former Unilever CEO Paul Polman, laid into him mercilessly. “Unlike the minister I don’t have any bulls**t to offer or any promises to give,” Polman said, and was then greeted with rapturous applause. Are the Tories losing the business community?
Who is the W1A baller?
There’s been confusion in W1A at the appearance of a white stretch limousine near BBC HQ. Did someone get a pay rise? The car has a sign in the windscreen saying it has the right to park anywhere in Westminster and the City of London on the say of Nickie Aiken, the local MP. But when we phoned Aiken she said she was mystified by the note. She’s tried to help the limo-man, a true London character called Scott Longman, and hasn’t given him permission to park. Longman’s website says he’s a City of London ambassador, selling City-branded merchandise. But City of London says it has no association with him. Longman was approached for comment. The mystery deepens.
The King’s Royal Collection dilemma
The accession of King Charles was quick, but other parts of the changeover from one monarch to another are more clunky. The King faces a dilemma over the large Royal Collection Trust he has inherited, some of it taken from around the empire. Will he hand a few items back? A piece in The Art Newspaper suggests he’ll lend pieces out to Collection trustees and the Government to get around any awkwardness.
Ncuti Gatwa Sex Education set battle
New Doctor Who Ncuti Gatwa has revealed how a boss on his show Sex Education tried to censor one of his ad-libs on race grounds, but he fought back and got his way. One producer said: “This ad-lib, I don’t feel like white people will understand it,” Gatwa tells Vogue. He replied that: “It’s not for white people... I want this other group of people to understand”. “They got that”.
