cries & whispers

Dillie Tante

Welcome to the first arts gossip column written by an It Girl! We begin with a red-hot exclusive from the top secret set of the new James Bond, where my spy actually manoeuvred his bottom into the driving seat of Pierce Brosnan's fabulous new car. "Oh, it's wonderful!" he drools. "It's got a ... and a ..." He subsides into guilty silence. Go on, go on! Can you tell us what make it is? "Nope!" What nationality, then? "Nup!" Dammit, can't you just say what colour it is? "No!" All he can say is that it's got an onboard computer which says things like: "Turn left at the roundabout, baddies ahoy!" Spy, you're sacked.

My motto is: if you haven't got anything nice to say about anyone, come and sit by me! Which is why I have some rather disagreeable news about Theatre de Complicite. The drama students at Crown Woods comprehensive school in south London approached the troupe with a view to performing The Three Lives of Lucie Cabrol, Comp's hit play of a few years ago about a miserable young woman in a headscarf. Did the Comps shriek "sacrilege!" and refuse permission to the acned teens? Not a bit of it. They promptly descended on the school, spending five hours a day teaching the eager wannabes how to gurn and throw shapes effectively. The first night of this "authorised production" is on the 29th. Lucie Cabrol indeed. Pygmalion was quite good enough in my day.

You may have heard of the cult game Six Degrees to Kevin Bacon, whereby players demonstrate that every actor in Hollywood worked with someone who slept with someone who co-starred with someone who was in a film with Kyra Sedgwick, who's married to ... Kevin Bacon!! My man on the case rings up: "It works," he says tersely, "only too well. Often you can make the connection in two or three moves." Cinema giant Orson Welles, for example, is but four steps away. It's all terribly worrying. But here's news of a game which could help Brit director Michael Caton-Jones. He's up to do a remake of The Day of the Jackal but unfortunately didn't run this past the original director Fred Zinnemann (yes, still alive but about 105). Now C-J's been told he can use "Jackal" but not "The Day of" in the title. All Wardour St. is on the case: Summer Holiday of the Jackal (Cliff Richard becomes a contract killer), Friday 13th of the Jackal, Holiday of the Jackal on the Buses (Reg Varney becomes a ... etc). Your suggestions will be passed on to a grateful Caton-Jones.

Talking about names, news reaches us that Tom Stoppard's next play will be about the melancholy poet AE Housman. Can anyone suggest a) a title, and b) the names of two other characters? Best suggestions will win eternal fame by being mentioned on these pages, and possibly a prize as well, even if it's only something covered in fluff from the bottom of my Kelly bag.