2020 Re-Vision

Well, there you have it. 2020. A giant puddle of piss, year-wise, but we’re finally almost through it. There’s just enough time to thank you all for joining us for yet another year of celebrity nonsense – and to revisit a few of the brighter spots 2020 saw fit to throw up.

We’ll be back on New Year’s Eve with our annual RIPbitch memorial issue, sending the celebs that we lost this year off with a final Popbitch tribute.

In the meantime, we wish you all a very merry Christmas – and fingers crossed for 2021…

pb x

anon writes:
“I used to run a media/arts centre in Huddersfield in the late 90s. As Andrew was the Duke of York, we were included in a mini-tour he did of community arts projects in Yorkshire. At the time, we had a big art installation in the lobby, made up of loads of refurbished monitors from old PCs arranged in a grid. The artist had programmed them so that large letters scrolled across the screens with what looked like random text. It looked interesting enough for Andrew’s people to suggest using it as a backdrop for press pics, so I posed with Andrew, shaking hands in front of the art work.

“Later that month, the artist came to take the installation down and I mentioned we’d had Andrew in for a photo shoot in front of it. He burst out laughing and explained that the machines had been donated by a medical dept from a local university, and he’d found a text explaining the chemical composition of MDMA.

“So there are pictures out there of me shaking Andrew’s hand in front of a giant screen showing the chemical composition of E. Nice one.”

In February, back when people were still socialising, we got an interesting window into the stark divide between the hoity-toity celeb establishment and the salt-of-the-earth reality types.

In issue 975, we mentioned a well-paid ITV host who complained about the size of a line of coke that a co-worker offered them, by screeching “Oh my GOD! Are you POOR?” at them – but not everyone at ITV is such a snobby little glutton.

Someone who once racked out a line for one of the Real Housewives Of Cheshire remembers their criticism being a lot more constructive. Upon seeing the amount she’d been offered, she squealed “What are you doing? You could get four lines out of that!”

Once upon a time, in a West London branch of Waterstone’s, a lady in a wide-brimmed hat popped in to ask if the Head of Visual Merchandising was about. The staffer on the till wasn’t entirely sure if they had one, so offered to help her out instead.

The woman went on to explain that she was a local author who walked past the shop every day and was wondering if they could maybe make her book a little more noticeable in the window as she liked seeing it when she passed by. “Mine used to face out,” she said, “but now it’s side on.”

At this point, the staffer realised they vaguely recognised the woman but couldn’t recall her name, so asked her to point out where her book currently was in the window display. It turned out that it was piled on its side with a couple of others in order to prop up another book that was now the one facing out.

As this local author clearly wasn’t David Jason, Anjelica Houston or Alex Ferguson, it left only one name in the pile. They were talking to Amanda Holden. And the book she was trying to topple?

“I Am Malala”.

Dominic West earned himself a few embarrassing headlines this year for being a sneaky old horndog, but it won’t have come as much of a surprise to those who know him.

In 2011, Dom was called back to his alma mater, Trinity College Dublin, to receive the Gold Medal of Honorary Patronage from the Philosophical Society. As part of his speech, he paid tribute to his wife (who was present in the audience) by telling the assembled students a story about the time he once shagged her on the roof of a campus building instead of watching Ireland in the Italia 90 World Cup.

This romantic sentiment was later eclipsed in the Q&A portion, when a very earnest young student asked West what his favourite part of his studies had been.

West’s candid reply? “To be honest mate, I spent most of my time… er… What do you call it…? Downing pints and splitting beave.”

KC writes:
“When I was at uni at Imperial College in the late 90s, a group of us were gleefully downing pints and smoking in the union when someone decided to dance on the table. The inevitable happened, he face-planted into the adjacent table full of empties – so I, being the most sober of the group, offered to take him to Chelsea and Westminster hospital.

“Outside the union no cabs would stop for us (there was a lot of blood). Just when we thought we’d have to walk, a sleek black Range Rover pulled over and a beautiful blonde woman asked if she could help. I explained our predicament and she offered to drive. I spied white leather interiors and started to decline but she insisted she take us to A&E. We sat on my jacket in the back and after the 10min ride I was grateful to see we hadn’t stained the seats.

“She was lovely throughout the ride and genuinely concerned for my idiot friend. It was only when she dropped us off and I thanked her yet again did I realise we’d been graciously chauffeured by Elle Macpherson.”

Whenever Gregg Wallace or John Torode find themselves feeling thirsty on the set of MasterChef, they will put on a baby voice and ask the nearest runner to get them a “fuzzy waawaa”.

“Fuzzy waawaa” is not, as you might imagine, just fizzy water said in an eerie way. It is very specifically (and all studio runners must understand this) a glass of sparkling water served with exactly two cubes of ice, one slice of lemon and one slice of lime.

It is only ever referred to as “fuzzy waaawaa”.

Kirstie Allsopp used to enjoy an A-List hometown hero reputation in the village of Broadhembury, Devon. Sadly, her name is now mud among the locals because they all blame her for bringing Covid-19 to their doors when she chose to flee London in March and quarantine her infected family in their peaceful little idyll instead.

But maybe the locals underestimated Kirstie? Maybe she’s better versed in disaster scenarios than they first realised?

A reader who rented a holiday cottage from the Allsopps discovered that the property sat on the wider family grounds and had once been used by Kirstie as a sort of young adult annex. This cottage boasted a huge DVD library which guests were free to use. But two films – obvious favourites – had been clearly branded with the name KIRSTIE, written in thick permanent marker.

Deep Impact. And Armageddon.

Victoria Beckham got raked over the coals earlier this year, reversing her decision to furlough staff at her fashion label after taking a beasting in the press. Sadly for her, it was too little too late as everyone who had a story about Victoria’s legendary avarice had already shared it.

For instance: someone at 19 Management once secured Posh and Becks a free Audi as part of a deal and proudly announced it to them over lunch. Obviously the Beckhams already owned a few fancy cars by this point, so no-one was expecting hot tears of gratitude from them – but they weren’t expecting Victoria’s first question either.

She wanted to know why hadn’t got two Audis, so they could have given one to their nanny?

When Japan reopened its theme parks in July, authorities issued very strict guidance to visitors that screaming on rollercoasters was banned. As it risked the spread of coronavirus, parks kindly requested instead that riders “Please scream inside your heart”.

If that sounds difficult, perhaps they could take a lesson from Loose Women pundit, Jane Moore, who seems to have perfected the art of doing just that.

One Popbitch reader remembers being at a launch event at Thorpe Park where they made full use of the lack of queues for Nemesis Inferno. Just before they were due to enjoy a ride on an otherwise completely empty carriage, Jane Moore came running up asking if she could get on too.

Thinking she was excited to ride, they invited her to sit next to them – but was surprised to discover that, as the ride set off and the whiplash kicked in, Moore made absolutely no sound, expression or show of emotion for the entire thing.

And then, when it was finished, walked off in total silence.

Ever since his Question Time appearance in January, you’ve barely been able to switch on a telly without seeing Laurence Fox plastered all over it. Just be thankful this didn’t happen sooner.

A few years back, Laurence was lined up to host a pilot episode of a TV entertainment show – but the shoot did not go well. After seeming alright for the day leading up to filming, Lozza suddenly became very weird on camera. Bleary-eyed, erratic, no-one could figure out what had gotten into him. They later discovered it was a massive amount of cocaine – which he’d apparently tried to counterbalance with a touch of ketamine.

Needless to say, he didn’t get a call back.

Look out of strangers’ windows, all around the world
[Window Swap]

Take a virtual drive around a city while listening to its local radio station
[Drive & Listen]

Someone called every number listed in Jeffrey Epstein’s little black book
[Read on Mother Jones]

Take On Me, arranged for Excel spreadsheet
[Listen on YouTube]

Bohemain WAPsody
[Queen x Cardi]

2020’s hottest accessory, the Danny DeVito bumbag
[aka Fanny DeVito]

Crap jokes on stock images
[PunHub]

Fun conspiracy theory of the year: Is Ghislaine Maxwell secretly one of the world’s most influential Redditors?
[A brief primer]

Lou Bega x Rage Against The Machine
[Mambos On Parade]

Celebrity Headline Of The Year? “Phil Collins Wants To End Ex-Wife’s Armed Occupation Of His Mansion, Lawsuit Says”
[Thank you, Miami Herald]

Still Bored?
If you want more stories, you can catch up with all our back issues this year. The weekly archive is here and our 2020 special daily editions are here.