JESS BOULTON: 'Strictly star should feel a shiver down their spine after latest move'
Jessica Boulton works on the Mirror's features desk, specialising in celebrity features and interviews. She also writes a weekly observational comedy column Jess Saying, which runs each Saturday. In addition, she oversees the entertainment pages, helps co-ordinate the Pride of Britain coverage and newsletter and guest edits The Diary. Jessica joined The Mirror's sister paper The People in 2006, and has since worked on the Sunday Mirror and Now magazine. Most likely to be found raving about The Oscars, BAFTAs, Netflix, Friends or Star Wars.
Daily Mirror Columnist Jessica Boulton takes you through the up, downs and ridiculous moments of the past seven days in showbiz in the latest instalment of her wry, witty and oh-so-slightly sarcastic weekly column Jess Saying......
And where better to start than with my pictures of the week? Anyone who read last week's column last week will remember my unbridled joy at the prospect of a Dawson's Creek reunion between Katie Holmes and Joshua Jackson. So imagine my reaction at now having seen the first shots of them filming in NYC this week?
It's been 22 years since we last saw them as Joey Potter and Pacey Witter, two-thirds of the Noughties' most angst-ridden TV love triangle. But from the looks of these pics on the set of romcom Happy Hours, it seems their age-old chemistry hasn't changed a bit.
Katie is writing, directing and starring in the movie – about childhood sweethearts who reunite. And talking of exes... Katie's ex Tom Cruise, 63, this week finally went public with long-rumoured love Ana de Armas, 37. Ana has cemented her name as an action star after hits like John Wick's Ballerina. But will thrice-divorced Tom make the relationship work this time? Or will it go up the same creek as his others? And I don't mean Dawson's.
Of course, Katie and Joshua were just the cherry on the cake of an deliciously-varied week in the world of celebs.....
Good job Monday
The Lionesses have done it again! The England Women's Football Team celebrated their Euros victory with a well-deserved open-bus top parade after bringing home yet another major trophy. It was quite the sight to see – and one we rarely get to enjoy. I mean, let's face it the last time I saw The Three Lions bring home a major trophy, I must have been… Um …Let me think…I'm just doing the maths… Yes, that's right …...AN UNFERTILISED EGG.
I mean, who would have thought Baddiel and Skinner's '30 years of hurt' would actually end up being a wildly optimistic underestimation? We're now on 59 years and counting. In hindsight, maybe it was a good job the FA had their sexist ban on women women from playing football for so many years. The way The Lionesses are going, they would have filled their share of the England trophy cabinets a couple of decades ago. Still, I suppose they could've borrowed a few empty shelves from the men.
Tweed Tuesday
Get your coat, Lady Victoria Beckham! There's a new fashion designer hot on your tail. And this one boasts a title that's even more impressive. Yes, King Charles has decided to turn his hand to a new skill and has launched his own range of Sandringham Royal Tweed overcoats. Each comes with a brown collar and belt and costs between £39.99 and £49.99. His models are a bit bitchier than VB's glam pals however.
Because the King's clothing line … is just for pups. Or, as the sales blurb says, 'Pooches in the parkland" who "can now look effortlessly stylish.' Obviously his Autumn/Winter pup line sorted. But what will his clients be strutting down the cat, sorry, dog- walk next summer? If it's not a range of tweed dog-kinis, I am going to be royally disappointed…
Cry me a river Wednesday
I've never been as keen as most on Gwyneth Paltrow. But until this week I could never quite put my finger on why. It wasn't her meme-worthy Oscar-weeping (or the fact she won one for a so-so performance in Shakespeare In Love). It wasn't that her critically lauded take on Emma wasn't a patch on Alicia Silverstone's Clueless take the year before.
And it wasn't because she insists on flogging fancy jade eggs for people to put in their, um, hidden little nooks and crannies. No. I actually realised this week it was because everything appeared to come so very, very easy for Miss Paltrow. An intro to Hollywood from her famous parents? Check. An Oscar before she was 30? Check. A hot fiance (or several)? Check, check, check.
However a new biography making headlines this week seems to argue Gwynnie hasn't always had a smooth ride. For it reveals she was once forced to make an impossible, unenviable, life-changing, Sophie's choice. Yes, in 1995, she faced a dilemma so big, it's difficult to understand how she ever got through it… No, it wasn't heating or eating. Or who to save in an accident. It was a choice that was even tougher...
BRAD or KEANU?
Yup. The biography reveals Gwynnie's big crisis was – did she take a role as Brad Pitt's love interest in Seven? Or did she take a role as Keanu Reeves's love interest in Feeling Minnesota? Schedules would only allow for her to do one…( My heart bleeds. It really does.)
Apparently it was her friend who eventually came to her aid with a poignant soul-searching question: 'Well, which one do you want to date?' Obviously for most of us there is no wrong answer. So it was hardly worth losing her head over it. But in the end, she opted for Brad and Seven, so I guess…she, kind of, actually did.
Cry me a bigger river Thursday
Harvey Weinstein was having a good old whinge from his prison cell this week. The convicted rapist and former Miramax co-founder was – inexplicably – allowed to give a YouTube interview to right-wing podcaster Candace Owens after his latest court appearances.
And while I have no intention of giving him a platform to discuss his most recent accusers, there were a couple of other things he said that caught my attention. First, poor old Harvey, ahem, is clearly questioning the Yelp reviews he read of Hotel Rikers Island, aka New York's toughest penitentiary, were wholly accurate. I hate to break it to him but Rikers - the Bronx institution where former 'guests' include Summer Of Sam serial killer David Berkowitz and John Lennon's assassin Mark Chapman - doesn't exactly come with fresh towels, housekeeping and a turn down service.
'This is a very rough place,' he whined. 'It's unhygienic. It took me five days to get a pillow. Rikers Island is medieval.' ( Save it for the 'guest' comment card, Harvey.) And secondly... it turns out he's actually plotting his next film while behind bars. And no, it's not a remake of The Shawshank Redemption. He wants to re-adapt Ernest Hemingway's 1929 novel A Farewell To Arms. It was last made into a film in 1957 and has just entered the public domain. However I think I can safely say Harvey's version would be a box-office bomb.
Why? Er, 1. His only supporters are likely to be of the right-wing MAGA-loving gun-toting variety.....who'll probably assume it's an attack on the Second Amendment. And... 2. He's a rapist. And, don't get me wrong, I like a Monster Movie - but only when the big bad beast is the star of the show, not the producer.
Freaky Friday
Couples that play together, stay together, or so former Strictly hubby and wife duo Stacey Dooley and Kevin Clifton will be hoping. The pair are part of the latest line-up for 2:22: A Ghost Story – the smash hit play that appears to have become the universal platform for a certain type of female celeb to reinvent themselves.
Just look at the previous names who have previously landed one of the two top female parts: Former popstar-turned-actress Lily Allen, Former popstar-turned-TV judge Cheryl What's-Her-Surname, Former popstar-turned-TV-personality Frankie Bridge, Former Love Island-presenter Laura Whitmore, Former-EastEnder-Since Returned-To-EastEnders Louisa Lytton.....and the list goes on.
So forget the spooky spirits in the plot. And forget working together night after night means they're practically begging to be hit by the Strictly curse. (Howard Carter emptying King Tutankhamun's tomb was possibly less risky). For, the biggest problem Poor Stace must face are the ghosts: the ghosts of every female celeb who's trodden those very board before her.
Lily got a gong. Cheryl got a rave - albeit surprised - response. Laura Whitmore, got, er, um.... well, you get the picture. The thing is, every single star, like Stacey, was a relative theatre newbie, better known for another career. And there's nothing a ghoulish theatre critic likes better, than seeing them come a cropper.
So If Stace thought Craig Revel Horwood was harsh on Strictly, the prospect of the first night reviews is what will really send a shiver down her spine.
And finally....Jess a little pick-me-up:
During a soap wedding almost anything can happen, except the big event going off smoothly.Fights, infidelities, a bride too drunk to say her vows... but none of that happened when Jack P Shepherd, Coronation Street's smart-mouthed David Platt, tied the knot with his real life love Hanni Treweek this week.
It must have been a right let down for any of the soap scriptwriters among the guests who were hoping for a bit of inspiration for their next Corrie calamity wedding storyline.In fact, the closest to a disaster seems to have been a very happy Samia Longchambon sat on the shoulders of husband Sylvain. But fear not, these two have had professional training for lifts like this, from back in their 2013 Dancing On Ice days.And this time there were unlikely to be any slip ups..... as the only ice at the scene was chilling the bubbly.
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Wales Online
39 minutes ago
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