Spectator Life

‘Isn’t Naples beautiful? I’ve always dreamt about it. I always wanted this city all for myself; I didn’t want to share it… I alone deserved it because of everything I lost and I would have done anything to get it.’ So says Ciro Di Marzio – nicknamed ‘the immortal’ because he has survived so much mafia bloodletting – in the hit TV crime drama Gomorrah.   He is not talking about the churches or castles, the arcades or theatres or museums. He may have been out on the bay at night when the words are uttered, but the Naples he knows, grew up in and by then controls is the Naples of Scampia and Secondigliano, places up on the ridgeline of the city: the Naples of high rises and concrete, the Naples of drugs and murder.

‘I know,’ I said to my friend recently. ‘Let’s see a film!’ We booked the Everyman Kings Cross, the only cinema that happened to be showing what we wanted to watch at a convenient time and location. You might already be familiar with the Everyman concept. According to the chain, it’s ‘redefining cinema’ with an ‘innovative lifestyle approach to our venues, where you swap your soft drink for a nice glass of red wine and a slice of freshly made pizza served to your seat’. And apparently it's popular – an Everyman opened in September in Egham, Surrey, bringing the total to 38, and another one is announced for Durham early next year. But after my latest visit, I found myself marvelling at the success of what might be the most annoying cinema concept on earth.

George Edward Stanhope Molyneux Herbert, 5th Earl of Carnarvon, was bitten on the cheek by a mosquito some time in early March 1923. The bite became infected. By April he was running a high fever, had pneumonia in both lungs and his heart and respiratory systems were failing. He died in a Cairo hospital on 5 April. His death came less than six months after Howard Carter, the Egyptologist whose excavations Carnarvon was funding, first discovered evidence that there was an undisturbed tomb in the Valley of the Kings in Thebes. That was on 4 November 1922 – 100 years ago this month. A few days later, Carter, Carnarvon and his daughter, Lady Evelyn Herbert, had squeezed through a roughly-hewn hole in the wall of the burial chamber of Tutankhamun, uncovering its glittering treasures.

The 34 early Georgian houses that line Fournier Street, in the heart of Spitalfields, are a perfectly preserved microcosm of East London life through the centuries. Since it was built in the 1720s, the street – which runs between Brick Lane and Commercial Street, in E1 – has variously been home to the city’s wealthiest and poorest. With many of its first residents Huguenot weavers escaping religious persecution in France, the street is characterised by its series of highly glazed lofts, harnessing the light vital for the skilled textile work, with many of the houses subsequently bought by those in the silk trade. Arguably one of the finest houses on the street, No.

It’s hard to imagine how baffled the British public must have been by the arrival of David Bowie on to TV screens in the early 1970s. With his saffron hair, make-up and androgynous clothes, superficially he looked like a rejection of everything his post-war south London childhood had taught him. One of the most pivotal scenes in Moonage Daydream, the recent film about his life, is his 1973 interview with chat show host Russell Harty. Throughout this awkward cross-examination, Harty searches for a label he can stick on Bowie for the benefit of discomfited viewers. ‘Are those men’s shoes? Or women’s shoes? Or bisexual shoes?’ Harty inquires, looking down at Bowie’s strappy red and gold platform sandals. ‘They’re shoe-shoes, silly!

Farewell, Truss’s twisty lectern. Last week in Downing Street Rishi Sunak used one with a straight column. If he follows recent Tory tradition, he’ll have one made to his own design, paid for by the party (£2,000-£4,000 a pop) and loaned to the government. [Getty Images] Each lectern (from the Latin legere, ‘to read’) has sent a message.

When the burly honchos of the Rugby League World Cup gushed about taking the game to new heights, no one was actually thinking about the Golan Heights – but that’s where we are. What sounds like a fascinating quarter--final takes place on Friday (as I write) when the dominant team in global rugby league, Australia, take on Lebanon in Huddersfield – the birthplace of the game. Amid the blizzard of sporting world cups currently taking place across the globe, this match has it all. The Lebanese team, known as the Cedars, are coached by Australian Michael Cheika, one of the world’s most eminent coaches and a former boss of the Wallabies’ rugby union side. That’s an awful lot of rugby in the mix already.

It’s harder than ever to get away from it all in the Cotswolds. Come Friday night, west Londoners pack their bags and descend on the countryside. Many ‘up from Londoners’ head to places such as Soho Farmhouse. The success of Clarkson’s Farm, a hit TV show based at the former Top Gear presenter’s Cotswolds patch, has only added to the chaos. The Cotswolds’ blessing – its proximity to the capital – has become its curse. Trudging around the area’s beautiful towns and village isn’t what it once was. Fortunately, though, there is a way to escape the hordes and still enjoy the Cotswolds. You could do worse than follow a simple tip: steer clear of the four Bs – Bibury, Burford, Broadway and Bourton-on-the-Water. Instead of these tourist traps, head north.

When Idi Amin’s voice crackled through the radio on 4 August 1972 with his fateful ultimatum, my family paid little notice, save for wondering briefly why a government announcement had interrupted the blaring Bollywood tunes. My father’s two sisters were getting married the next day (both tying the knot at the same time meant half the wedding cost) and preparations were in full flow. In any case my family – like many of Uganda’s 76,000-odd Asians who were subject to Amin’s expulsion, giving them 90 days to leave the country – thought the President could hardly be serious. Despite being a small minority of the country’s population, the Asians were responsible for 90 per cent of Uganda’s tax revenues. To expel them would be madness. But madness came easily to Amin.

Once upon a time, well within living memory, a free-born Britisher could drink as much as he or she liked and smoke with a carefree abandon – all within working hours, and even without leaving their desk. You may remember elevenses – immortalised in those moments when M briefs Bond in the 007 films and the decanter comes out. That’s how people did a business meeting once, before Starbucks and 15 types of coffee. And then there was lunch. This could begin with a pint of beer or a steep gin and tonic, before some wine, and then perhaps a glass of port or brandy. Water? Kah! That’s for rinsing the glasses, not going in them. Nowadays, if you suggest having a glass of wine at a work lunch people will look at you like you’ve just offered their toddler a line of cocaine.

From Fawlty Towers to Psycho, hotel horrors have long provided a rich seam of material for big screen and small. HBO’s The White Lotus, which returns to Sky Atlantic tonight for its second series, swept the board at last month’s Emmys, with ten wins in the limited series category for its sharp social satire set at an upmarket holiday resort. Visiting the establishments you’ve seen on screen isn’t always a good move. I was excited to check in to Rome’s Grand Hotel Plaza, which has been used as a location for movies including L’innocente (1976), Gangs of New York (2002), Ocean’s Twelve (2004), The Man from U.N.C.L.E. (2015) and John Wick: Chapter 2 (2017). But I soon discovered why my suite was so heavily discounted.