Joe Corre Burns His Entire £5 Million Punk Collection
(Picture: Getty Images)IT WAS a stunt that went round the world, but now a former associate of Joe Corré has claimed his burning of £5 million of punk memorabilia on the Thames was just an elaborate hoax.
“It was a trunk full of old toot,” Richard Hillgrove tells The Londoner. “Five years on it’s about time people realised.” Corré, the son of Sex Pistols manager Malcolm McLaren and designer Vivienne Westwood, created a global sensation on November 26, 2016 when he set fire to what he said was £5 million of punk memorabilia on a barge in the Thames.
But Corré yesterday denied it was a hoax: “To be clear, I certainly burned genuine items. Richard was not there. Afterwards he tried to convince me to announce that it had all been a hoax and I had only burned fakes. I told him I thought that was a terrible idea and completely stupid.”
Hillgrove, a PR who used to work with Corré, said the burning was “based on the great rock’n’roll swindle, the Sex Pistols song. The punchline is, ‘He’s swindled you’ – but where’s the punchline?” He added: “Everyone knew it was a farce.” Corré countered: “I don’t know what he is talking about … You will be able to see what a nonsensical statement that is when you see the film.”
Corré is due to release a documentary, Wake Up Punk, next year which features the burning event.
The uni that said No! to Cleese...
John CLEESE has twice been rejected from giving a talk on creativity at the University of Bath. The Monty Python star told an event last night he wrote to Bath and “offered them twice to do talks to the students, remote, and never heard back from them on either offer”. Speaking at the Emmanuel Centre in Westminster for a How to Academy event alongside scientist Iain McGilchrist, Cleese asked: “What is that about?”. McGilchrist replied: “You’re probably too woke for them”. The University of Bath has been contacted for comment.
Anguish of ‘where are you from?’
Riz AHMED says being asked, “Where are you from?” throughout his life has weighed heavily on him. “It’s a seemingly innocuous question but there’s a question underneath that question, which is, ‘Where do you belong?’” the actor, inset, told an audience at Leicester Square’s W Hotel last night. He was at a screening of his short film, The Long Goodbye, which he says was inspired by being asked that question so often.
East India Club’s behind the times
DISQUIET at the East India Club after a motion to admit female members failed last week. Seventy-three per cent of members voted in favour, but there is a threshold of three quarters for such rule changes at the club, which calls itself a “home from home for dynamic, sociable and hard-working gentlemen”. One member tells the Londoner “the issue is not resolved”, as “it’s so close that neither camp is satisfied”. Perhaps it’s hard for any institution related to the plunderous East India Company, and which still proudly displays pictures of its fleet of clippers on the walls, to fully embrace the 21st century.
A star ensemble for night of theatre
A THESPY evening last night. James Norton and Tina Daheley were at the opening of Rumi: The Musical at the Coliseum, while Natalie Dormer was at the Barbican for The Comedy of Errors. Elsewhere Jeremy Irons attended a screening of Munich: The Edge of War at the Soho Hotel and Daisy Edgar-Jones and Dame Helena Morrissey were at The Londoner Hotel for a Harper’s Bazaar at Work Summit.
