The Second Serve // Willing Celebrity Ball-Munchers

It’s not just on her latest film set that Millie Bobby Brown has been a bit of a nightmare. When she was filming Enola Holmes, a fire alarm went off mid-shoot. As the production was filming in a building made of timber, management thought it would be worth their while to investigate the issue – rather than simply let things play out with their fingers crossed.

They quickly began to wish they hadn’t bothered though, after Millie BB stormed over to chew them out, yelling: “YOU’RE RUINING THE SHOT!”

After a very quiet week of Eurovision rehearsals, delegates and journalists on the ground in Turin finally threw themselves full force into the party spirit at last night’s Turquoise Carpet event.

As organisers in Italy have been pretty strict with numbers this year, the press centre had been a bit of an empty wasteland for the first seven days. Clearly everyone had been crying out for a big get-together though as we hear the bar last night had been drunk dry by 10pm – all except for vodka.

Presumably someone forgot to tell the bartenders that Russia hadn’t been invited this year.

We’ve been reading Tina Brown’s new book on the Royals this weekend and there’s some interesting supplementary information in there for Popbitch readers.

Stories of Prince Andrew’s days as a special representative for international trade and investment have appeared in PB mailouts for years – most notably ones about Andy’s preferred choice of translators (attractive, young females who weirdly don’t really speak English all that well…)

According to this new book, the translator wasn’t the weirdest member of his entourage. Andrew also insisted on having a flunky on hand whose job it was to carry his favoured six-foot long ironing board from suite to suite at every hotel they stayed in.

Another interesting nugget that Tina Brown mentions in the new book is that when Meghan Markle first came to the UK in 2013, the person she approached to represent her was Professor “Jonathan” Shalit.

Shalit has been the driving force behind many tabloid-friendly figures like Myleene Klass, Katherine Jenkins, Tulisa and Charlotte Church. He also keeps the IACGMOOH jungle half-full of willing celebrity ball-munchers – so Meghan’s career could have taken a very different trajectory had that all panned out.

He also could have given her a much simpler way of becoming Princess Meghan too.

In 2012, Jonathan was brought on as a visiting professor at Henley Business School and immediately took to using the title “Professor” at every chance. He liked the sound of it so much that he wanted it on his passport, so applied for a new one – filling out his form as “Professor Jonathan Shalit”.

When it came back without the title (passports don’t use titles) he filled out a second application, writing his forename as “Professor” and “Shalit” as his surname – relegating “Jonathan” to a middle name – to make absolutely certain that PROFESSOR JONATHAN SHALIT would appear in print.

(Sadly, we don’t think it was ever submitted.)

It can be tricky, as a celebrity, to get yourself out of an interview that you don’t want to do – but Jamaican cricket ace Chris Gayle has a foolproof method if anyone’s in need of one. This is how he ended an interview with the Observer this weekend:

CHRIS GAYLE: Ask me what time I’m going to bed.
INTERVIEWER: OK. What time are you going to bed?
CHRIS GAYLE: Now.

Before shutting his eyes, lying down on the sofa and dropping off – leaving his handler to make apologies.

claretbadger writes:
“As an art dealer in St. James’s, I used to see James Stunt and his acolytes pratting about, often pulling up outside Christie’s in a four black car convoy; normally at least two Range Rovers and a Lamborghini Aventador with the number plate S7UNT.

“In all my years of seeing the billionaires kicking about these parts, I’ve never seen anyone come close to the desperation of Stunt in trying to be the big I am. It was embarrassing. The billionaires we deal with tend to arrive in a normal black cab, believe it or not.”

Last week, we had audio quizzes on the themes of Neil Parish MP, Studio 54 and Smash Hits Award Winners.

This week, we’ve got another five rounds lined up. 50 songs shredded up and stitched back together into a rickety old mix. You get a point for every song you can pull out of there and another point for every artist. Couldn’t be simpler.

Monday’s theme: Eurovision

[Play it here]

Learn to play synths in your browser
[Fun interactive site]

Where did all the Cumberbitches go?
[Read on Insider]

A two part podcast on Wagatha Christie – to warm us all up ahead of the trial starting this week…
[Part One]
[Part Two]

Clerks, colourised
[Watch on YouTube]