Michael Spicer, the comedian behind The Room Next Door sketches, is writing a book based on his character, a special adviser who tries to offer support to flailing politicians during press conferences though a secret earpiece. The Secret Political Adviser will conjure the life of the character from his video skits, which have gone viral and show him working with Boris Johnson, Prince Andrew and Donald Trump.
But Spicer has followers — if not fans — among real politicians. “I’ve been followed by cabinet members,” he tells The Londoner, adding, “it seems like a cry for help. They’re reaching out to me to say, ‘Yes I’m in the middle of this chaos, but I like what you do.’” Inspiration for the character came when Spicer watched Boris Johnson say he liked to paint model buses to relax. “He was struggling with the answer: one, should you confess that you paint model buses; two, should you lie? I thought it would be funny to have an adviser in the next room thinking up a lie on the spot.”
Spicer, a long-time comedy writer, confesses the clips going viral “is just astonishing to me”. Happily, he says that “there’s lots and lots of new material out there, from Trump, from the UK briefings”. Better to laugh than cry…
---
Rupert Everett is leading calls to save Coram’s Fields, the children’s playground and park on the site of the Foundling Hospital in Bloomsbury, as it faces a funding black hole due to coronavirus. The actor has lived next door for 25 years, and warns that the future of the site “is looking incredibly uncertain”. London’s living history could be lost.
---
Emma Freud tells us she and the Comic Relief team have been “blown away” by the response to their T-shirts fundraising for coronavirus, which feature a design drawn by artist Charlie Mackesy. A slew of celebrities have been pictured in them and Freud adds “we’ve never, ever, had a product that has been as in demand”. The silver linings of Covid-19.
SW1A
Brandon Lewis, the Northern Ireland Secretary, is training for three virtual triathlons for charity (the first starts today). An aide says this also helps him burn off his wife’s “delicious baking treats”. The Londoner needs no such excuse.
---
Baron Harris of Haringey has set up a virtual Bishops’ bar to give Labour peers a place to gossip and plot, recreating their favourite haunt in the Lords. We’re told the online gatherings are rather spirited but fuelled only by teas and coffees. Weak.
Shakespeare in lockdown: there’s an art to protection
Plain face-coverings are so yesterday. A series of high concept face masks, depicting William Shakespeare and Florence Nightingale, have been designed by artist Ron Arad as part of the “Smile for our NHS” charity project by the Ostro Fayre Share Foundation, a project which raises funds for frontline workers.
Former newsreader Natasha Kaplinsky and actors Elizabeth Hurley and Jason Isaacs showed off the masks, which also feature “impressions of paintings by Picasso, Matisse and Dali”. Not your usual Shakspearean masque.
