Shonkey Daddy

A few years back, there was a rumour going around the music/media industry that Rita Ora’s sister would occasionally help to lighten Rita’s workload by posing as her for the odd phone interview. Now it seems the rumour is broadening.

Rita played a show at Pryzm late last month, where fans had the option to buy pre-signed, personalised copies of her new album. It’s a neat way of shifting a few extra units, but fans have since noticed that the handwriting and signatures on the albums they received bear very little resemblance to the other albums they’ve had signed by Rita at in-person events.

In fact, they look like they’ve been signed by someone else completely.

For the last few weeks, fans have been trying to get some sort of concrete proof from the vendors and/or Rita’s team that their albums were actually signed by Rita and not an intern. As yet, nothing.

Our congratulations to Talulah Riley on the happy news that she’s going to marry the little kid off of Love Actually. Here’s hoping the wedding planning is smoother than either of her two marriages to Elon Musk.

Talaluh’s first wedding to Musk ended up being postponed a number of times – and someone who got sat next to her at a charity event shortly after one such postponement heard the full tear-soaked story of it.

Everything she said about it made him sound like a solid gold shit, but when this observation was made to her, she explained between sobs: “But you don’t understand. He’s. A. BILLIONAIRE!”

Which TV personality, actor and occasional suspect of international crime has taken on a new life in Australia, using the name Gavin Maxfield?

Tory MP Lee Anderson earned the nickname “30p Lee” for suggesting that struggling families could feed themselves easily on a budget of 30p per meal. He even revised that figure down to 29p this week, but we’re not sure anyone should take money-saving tips from him.

Lee has been happily telling anyone who cares to listen at the bar of the Carlton Club that he used to rent a flat in London for £16,000 a year, but gave it up and saved money by staying there at the members’ club instead. The membership fee is £1,700 a year, but he gets his waived as an MP – which means he only has to pay for his room.

And according to the figures filed with IPSA, the total he spent last year on hotel accommodation in London was… £16,594.60. Nearly 600 quid more than his rent.

Or, to put it in terms he’ll understand: 1,982 meals.

Every now and again we like to check in on the status of Jodie Marsh’s infamous tit-belts; the ones she’s been promising to sell on behalf of charity for over a decade now, yet still happens to have in her possession.

The two straps remain listed on her Depop site, and if you want a sign of how hard inflation has hit the UK, they’ve jumped in price from £6,000 to £25,000. The charity she’s selling them on behalf of now is her own – Fripps Farm Animal Rescue – and it seems like it could do with the money as there’s currently a juicy paternity scandal rocking the stables there.

Last Friday, Jodie’s mini-Shetland pony gave birth to a “Shonkey” foal (a Shetland pony/donkey hybrid) which caught her slightly off guard as she didn’t realise that any of her donkeys had working balls.

Mamma Mia 3, anyone?

As the famous yacht where Princess Diana spent her final summer holiday sinks off the coast of the French Riviera, it’s nice to know there are some people taking better care of their Diana mementos.

There’s an RAAF airbase in Sale, Victoria that once played host to the late Lady Di in the 90s. She took a private jet from there and the crew aboard it laid claim to what they believe was a pubic hair of hers.

Obviously a rare treasure like that can’t be squirrelled away. So they fixed it to a strip of tape, then stuck it to the mess bulletin board for all to enjoy.

There was once a time when printing details of the suspected shenanigans of Dan Wootton would earn you a punchy bit of post from feted London law firm, Mishcon de Reya. Alas, those days are no longer.

What with Dan’s legal crowdfunder having petered out at £38,000 (barely a quarter of the £150,000 he had his heart set on); the Mail quietly dropping his column; and the recent purchase of a swanky £1.25m house putting a squeeze on his personal finances, it seems some economies are having to be made.

Farewell then, the £950/hr hellfire of Mishcon. Hello, the more frugal £400/hr fights with his new lawyers Griffin Law!

It still feels like an awful lot of money to shell out for letters that don’t actually deny you’re Martin Branning. But maybe that’s just us…

Who is Donal Blaney, the new lawyer bravely taking up the case of Dan Wootton?

A self-styled “rottweiler for the right”, Blaney’s name has been a fixture in certain political circles for some time now, having high-level links to a couple of contentious conservative thinktanks, pressure groups and a company that was basically incorporated to rebrand what was left of Cambridge Analytica.

There’s ties to the Mercers, ties to Steve Bannon – all that good stuff. But if you think Blaney is only interested in representing Dan Wootton as part of the ongoing culture war, you’d be wrong. The case touches on a lot of areas in which Blaney has real bona fides.

The law firm Blaney founded prides itself helping on people who have suffered at the hands of workplace bullies – specifically those who have resigned as a result of workplace harrasment and those who have been targeted by abusers using anonymised online identities. So he should make pretty light work of getting to the bottom of who this Martin Branning guy really is.

In fact, he might have already done it.

Irish artist and former presidential candidate Kevin Sharkey has been telling a great story recently about his younger days. In the mid-80s he’d been working as a cleaner for Kirsty MacColl and the two of them became friends, so Sharkey found himself invited to her wedding to producer Steve Lillywhite.

Naturally, Kirsty and Steve’s wedding was a star-studded affair. Sharkey was delighted to attend and got all dressed up for the big occasion but, unfortunately, was a little distracted during the ceremony.

That’s because one of the celebrity guests he’d shared a car to the church with had offered him a quick line of coke before the service – Sharkey’s first, which he enjoyed so much that it led to a six-month addiction.

Not that Frida from Abba could have known that would happen, of course.

Type in a phrase, get served a clip of it from TV, movies and music
[Play around with Yarn]

How TikTok and tech made Kylie’s Padam Padam the song of the summer
[Read on Daily Beast]

Louis Tomlinson’s old Scooby Doo camper van is up for sale
[£40,000 on AutoTrader]

The third Donald Trump indictment
[45 pages]

The transcripts from Rudy Giuliani’s new sexual harassment suit are quite something
[Read on Rolling Stone]

Headline Of The Week: “Manatee Dies After ‘High-Intensity Sexual Behaviour’ With Brother At Florida Aquarium”
[6 South Florida]

Still Bored?
#FreeBritney2.0 – a look at the Britney fans who are now wondering if her conservatorship ever actually ended…
[A new theory on Vulture]