• To the FT’s summer party at London’s German Gymnasium, an unusual venue Monkey can’t help but think was meant to send a message: just before the paper’s takeover last year by Nikkei was announced, it mistakenly and comically reported that Axel Springer was the successful suitor instead, in what may have been a Freudian slip - and editor Lionel Barber oddly makes a point of saying he “speaks German” on his Twitter profile. Barber did, to be fair, make reference in his party speech (which also included a scholarly spanking aimed it appeared at David Cameron for his botched referendum, involving an arcane play on “PPE” and “PPI”) to “our new partners at Nikkei”. Yet strangely the official list of VIPs attending included not one Japanese name, nor (amidst myriad business bigshots) a representative of Nikkei or any other Japanese-based company, though Monkey is assured senior figures were in attendance, including Nikkei senior managing director Mr Hirotomo Nomura.
• Nor were there sushi morsels to snack on or Sony gizmos or manga books for Barber’s lucky guests to take away with them: they “enjoyed Moet champagne and canapes”, the press release trills, before leaving with “goody bags that included a custom FT branded Ettinger wallet, mini Moet and Chandon champagne, Green & Black’s chocolates ...” - all seemingly adding up to a poignant farewell to the Pink ’Un’s luxuriant European past, and possibly a reluctance to greet an Asian future that might be rather more austere.
• Joey Jones, Sky’s former deputy political editor, only joined Theresa May’s team as spokesman in May, and now is in line to be her spinner as PM just four months later if she wins. By Monkey’s reckoning this would be a reporter’s fastest conversion from hack to top Downing Street flack - in Jones’s case, from standing outside No 10 to working inside it - for 47 years, since Harold Wilson as incumbent PM recruited the Sun’s Joe Haines in 1969. Alastair Campbell, in contrast, spent three years spinning for Tony Blair in opposition after leaving Today.
• Meanwhile, Jones’s former Sky colleague Adam Boulton - Boulton was political editor, Jones his No 2, before the former was converted to an anchorman - found himself in a spot of undignified bother last week after apparently criticising Laura Kuenssberg’s pool interview with Michael Gove on Twitter. “Are you suggesting I gave a Tory an easy ride, chubby chops?” asked @bbclaurak_, to which @adamboultonSKY unwisely replied “yes you did, a free advert in fact”. Luckily, other tweeters soon alerted Boulton to the fact that he was arguing with a prankster’s fake account (Kuenssberg’s verified account is @bbclaurak). The pseudo-Laura’s not-very-BBC tweet “Sounds to me like someone’s not had his afternoon nap. @adamboultonSKY #chubster” may also have been a helpful clue.
• Could it soon be curtains for Sarah Vine at the Daily Mail? Friday’s front page was distinctly ominous for her chances of remaining its most pampered and promoted columnist, as it combined an early endorsement of Theresa May with condemning Vine’s husband Michael Gove (previously championed by the paper, which mistrusts Boris Johnson) for “treachery … savage blood letting … as Michael Gove knifes Boris”. Chiefly, no doubt, it dropped Gove so instantly and furiously for the reasons identified in its leader, that his betrayal and preceding porkies made it no longer possible to see him as a man of “consistency, strict adherence to principle and ... trustworthiness”. But somewhere in the mix of motives must have been Vine’s “Lady Macbeth” email leaked to Sky, which awkwardly portrayed Rupert Murdoch and Paul Dacre as plotters behind the scenes influencing the Tory leadership vote. Unsurprisingly, the email has yet to appear (or be mentioned) in the Mail itself, which may be considering whether it should dump Mrs Gove too.
• At least Vine has one loyal supporter in the form of Sky’s afternoon anchor Kay Burley. Brought on to discuss the leaked email, Jacob Rees-Mogg MP waffled genially that some people (No 10 or BoJo aides, he presumably meant) would be no doubt comparing her to Lady Macbeth; to which Burley reacted as if to a disgusting swear-word or insult, passionately defending Vine in literal-minded fashion as a “civilised” person no one sane could conceivably compare to Shakespeare’s murderess.
• Last week’s events also pose problems for the Spectator, where deputy editor Mary Wakefield is married to Gove’s sinister, ranting guru Dominic Cummings (also the puppet-master of the Leave campaign) and columnist Toby Young - strongly allied to the former education secretary as a supporter of his schools reforms - is an ardent Gove fanboy (as he tediously told everyone he ran into at the FT party). Yet other staffers on the Tory weekly retain a strong allegiance to Boris Johnson, and are unlikely to easily forgive the assassin - as the array of anti-Gove content on the Speccie’s website since his shock announcement suggests - for slaying their ex-editor.
• Channel 4 has always been an innovation station open to fresh talent and particularly outsiders, free from the sense of an establishment recruiting people in its own image (and even its own children - the Grades, the Cottons, the Snows etc) - that is the curse of older broadcasters. Still mostly true, but not in the case of C4’s remarkably swift appointment of a successor to drama chief Piers Wenger, after he was poached to do the same job at the BBC. Beth Willis, his replacement, has a longer TV pedigree than any Dimbleby, as she’s not only the daughter of former C4 director of programmes John Willis, but also the granddaughter of Ted Willis, a prolific screenwriter best known for the gentle long-running cop show Dixon of Dock Green. Those pitching projects to the new drama supremo, however, would probably be best advised to avoid saluting her on arrival with the words “Evenin’ All”, or dressing up in a 1960s copper’s uniform in an effort to ingratiate themselves.
• The BBC’s Wimbledon subtitlers know precious little about tennis and seem to be better at vowels than consonants, judging by Monkey’s spasmodic text-overlayed viewing in the gym. At least gaffes involving calling Andy Murray’s coach Ivan Lendl “Ivan Lewis” (a Labour MP) and former ladies’ champion Ann Jones “Dan Jones” (a male medieval historian) were swiftly corrected; but there was so such revision when a passionate cry of “Yes!” from veteran commentator Barry Davies was translated to viewers as a plaintive “Jeff!”
•This article was amended on 4 July 2016 to clarify that though they were not included in a list of VIPs, senior figures from Nikkei and Japan did attend the FT summer party
