People - Here, There and Everywhere
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Conran's canvases airlifted from flood
FASHION designer Jasper Conran is the latest high profile victim of the recent floods. Having spent £7.25m last year on Walpole House - an historic property on Chiswick Mall, formerly owned by Thomas Walpole, which inspired the setting for Thackeray's novel Miss Pinkerton's Seminary for Young Ladies - Conran (pictured) is now distraught to see it ravaged by flood water.
Moreover, he has had to
organise an emergency rescue operation, airlifting his precious art collection from the basement of the building. "It's been extraordinary to watch all these David Hockney paintings being air-lifted out," said one neighbour. "Poor Jasper's been there less than a year and had only just begun to settle in when this happens."
Conran - the son of design guru Sir Terence - fell for the house when he discovered that the huge double garage beneath it would provide plenty of room for his classic car collection, which fortunately has not been damaged. A spokesman for Conran declined to comment.
Sultan of Sleaze arrested over Cruise extortion
AN ARIZONA man with a history of peddling celebrity sex tapes has been arrested by the FBI for extortion after trying to sell Tom Cruise stolen pictures from his own wedding.
David Schmidt - nicknamed the 'Sultan of Sleaze' - tried to get $1m from Cruise's
representatives for the photos from Cruise's 2006 wedding to Katie Holmes (pictured with Tom).
Schmidt's modus operandi is to contact celebrities like Paris Hilton and Colin Farrell in advance of trying to sell explicit private photos or videos to see if they want to buy back the material to stop it from being seen publicly.
July 27: Peter Gabriel, Isaac Hayes, Ben Taylor play at the WOMAD festival, Charlton Park, Wiltshire
July 27: Faithless, Basement Jaxx, Carl Cox, David Guetta, Sasha are among acts performing at the Godskitchen Global Gathering, Long Marston Airfield, Warwickshire
July 28: 50 Cent, Alesha, Akon (above) appear at Medfest 2007, Nicosia, Cyprus
July 29: Bryan Robson, Les Ferdinand, Angus Deayton, Bruce Grobbelaar take part in tribute match the Alan Ball Memorial Cup, Stadium MK, Milton Keynes
Mia links Spielberg to Nazis
Steven Spielberg's agreement to act as an unpaid artistic advisor to the 2008 Beijing Olympics has landed him in the middle of a row involving Mia Farrow and other Hollywood Darfur activists who are protesting at China's refusal to take action against Sudan for the atrocities in the region.
Under the headline "The Genocide Olympics", Mia Farrow (above with Spielberg) wrote an (Continued below ad)
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(Continued from above ad) editorial in the New York Timescomparing Spielberg to the Nazi director Leni Riefenstahl whose film Olympia was a paean to the 1936 Berlin Games. "Does Mr Spielberg really want to go down in history as the Leni Riefenstahl of the Beijing Games?" asked Farrow. "Is Mr Spielberg... aware that China is bankrolling Darfur's genocide?"
Spielberg, who made Schindler's List and then founded the Shoah Foundation to record the testimony of Holocaust survivors, was deeply upset. He has written to the Chinese president, Hu Jintao, saying: "I add my voice to those who ask that China change its policy toward Sudan and pressure the Sudanese government to accept the entrance of UN peacekeepers to protect the victims of genocide in Darfur." He has also contributed $1m to aid groups working in Darfur.
However, a spokesman for Spielberg has denied a report on ABC News that the director - currently shooting the new Indiana Jones film with Harrison Ford - has threatened to resign his unpaid post as Beijing advisor. "We are doing what we can to engage the Chinese. We'll make a decision how productive those efforts are in the very near future."
Get ready for Roo unzipped...
WHEN IT emerged that investigative journalist John Sweeney was writing a no-holds barred biography of loutish footballer Wayne Rooney, the England striker's lawyers were quick to bare their teeth. Bookstores have reportedly been threatened with legal action if they stock the lurid tome, catchily titled Roo Unzipped. However, Random House have thrown caution to the wind, and announced they will publish it in August. Wayne's story,
they trumpet, will be about "Britain's demented cult of celebrity, his love for sweetheart Coleen, sex - excruciatingly bad sex with a PVC-clad grandmother known to her admirers as 'the Auld Slapper' - and gangsters... a story of a potential £100m 'cash cow' that everyone wants to milk, of 'sweeteners' offered by way of a quarter of a million quid in cash, of people who know people who make money by killing people..."
Rooney's camp will, doubtless, work up a huge storm over the book, but then Sweeney is no stranger to controversy since his profane outburst during a documentary on Scientology.
Monsoon chucks Hurley as sales fall
IS Liz Hurley losing her touch? Sales at fashion chain Monsoon, which paid an estimated £1m a year to have Liz front their advertising campaign, are at a record low. Pre-tax profits slumped by 16 per cent in the 12 months to the end of May, a situation described by chairman Peter Simon as "even more disappointing than the previous year" - then billed as the worst in the company's history. To try to turn things round, the company have ousted Liz, and replaced her with veteran supermodel Helena Christensen. They have also dropped Lily Cole from their Accessorize chain, replacing her with German model, and wife of Seal, Heidi Klum.
Earlier this month Liz was in another ad controversy: she was reportedly forced to withdraw a picture of her five-year-old son Damian wearing a bikini (from her swimwear range for girls) from her website, after accusations that she was exploiting him for financial gain.
Rod impressed by Tommy's chopper
YOU MIGHT have thought Rod Stewart would not be best pleased his daughter Kimberly, 27, is stepping out with Tommy Lee - the 44-year-old hellraiser who has been imprisoned for assault and made an infamous porn video with ex-wife Pamela Anderson. However, it seems he was won over when Tommy hired a helicopter to whisk Kim (pictured) off on a date, even though he forgot to get permission to land.
When the Motley Crue drummer arrived at Rod's LA mansion in a chopper, Rod was not there to OK him to land, so Tommy ended up having to fly to a nearby airport. "I've tried some manoeuvres to impress a woman, but I've got to admit this is a pretty strong move," laughed Rod. "He is quite something!"
It is not just a love of the grand gesture that the two men share, but also a taste for younger gals. Rod, 62, recently married 36-year-old model Penny Lancaster.
Britons Kenneth Branagh, Peter Greenaway and Ken Loach are shortlisted for the Venice Film Fesitval's Golden Lion award... Bob Dylan (below) has agreed to let hip New York producer Mark Ronson remix a dance version of a classic track from his 1966 Blonde on Blonde album... Jennifer Aniston (below)
has split from her Essex bricklayer boyfriend Paul Sculfor... A biker who broke his leg in a collision with Bob Geldof's car says the ex-Boomtown Rat was to blame, claiming: "He left me needing a lot more than a Band-Aid"...
Bono and Penelope Cruz enjoyed a night out together in St Tropez... Des Lynam is to front new football channel Setanta Sports... Keira Knightley is to play the fifth Duchess of Devonshire in a film adaptation of Amanda Foreman's biography...
Wagnerdammerung
Katharina Wagner, the great-grandaughter of composer Richard Wagner, was booed after staging one of his operas complete with giant plastic phalluses and topless dancers. After the final curtain fell on her seven-hour production of Die Meistersinger von Nurnberg at the opening night of the annual Bayreuth Festival, the audience - which included German chancellor Angela Merkel and EC President Jose Manuel Barroso - jeered Katharina.
German magazine Der Speigel described the production as a "top-heavy pizza with too many toppings on a thin base", an especially damning verdict in light of the three-way battle she is fighting with fellow Wagner scions Eva and Nike to succeed her 87-year-old father, Wolfgang, when he steps down from his role as festival director.
