celebrity interest

I saw Tony Blair’s new tenants locked outside their new house this morning. I’m not sure if it was the actual Michael Caton-Jones and Laura Viederman but the paparatzi were taking plenty of photos.
here is an article about the house and here is more on the new tenants.
the house and delivery truck

click for big
Tone bought his house on Connaught Square for when he stops being the Prime Minister and i walk past it on the way to work each morning.
there were worries about security but if people can’t even get through the front door when they’ve got a key i don’t think the PM need worry !
key holders and paparatzi:

no idea if this posseeee are famous. perhaps we shouldn’t care. but they seemed to enjoy playing up to the cameras.

click to see if you recognise anyone

i went to a posh work do last night and comedian Ed Byrne was the entertainment.
he was very funny and here’s his picture.

and here is natasha someone or other (BBC morning newsreader apparently):

It’s Charlie Dimmock from Ground Force wearing a coat on Tottenham Court Road.

click to inspect this celebrity

i walked past ex radio 1 dj simon mayo. it was dark and my flash wasn’t on (and you wouldn’t have wanted a flash photo of the back of his head anyway).
so here he is in blurry greatness. interestingly, the bench on the bottom right of the photo is where i saw a long-haired richard e grant over the summer enjoying a al fresco drink (but failed to realise it was him until i was on the next street).

the second celebrity i saw last evening was none other than global megastar noel gallagher (of oasis fame).
he was simply swaggering slowly across marylebone high street without a care in the world. he’s a funny looking chap. and i was surprised he wasn’t surrounded by bouncers.
bizarrely i have been looking out for him for the last week since i discovered he lives in a muse house just off the north end of the marylebone high street.
i approached him and said “can i take your photo please ?” (in the same way i had to michael burke a few minutes earlier). He raised his hand in a ‘no thanks’ kind of way and off he wandered. but we did have eye contact !
so i took a photo (without flash) as he walked off. Oasis have a bit of a violent history in relation to the paparazzi so i didn’t want to make him think i’d taken a decent photo of him !

when i left my office last night i thought to myself “the only celebrities i see are either c-list non-bodies, comedians or nigel havers. i then got worried that i don’t watch telly enough and i may be seeing loads of celebrities in my daily life and not realising it.
so i set off and i convinced myself i was going to see three famous people. i did see two though (about 1km apart).
the first was michael burke the BBC newsreader. i did a google for him so that you non-UK readers can learn all about him.
i was surprised to see that my last spotting of him was the number one hit ! try it here

click to admire him in his fullness
the other celebrity is here

we popped in to the Royal Festival Hall this afternoon for a cup of tea and a nice sit down. it’s a great place to sit and do nothing without feeling you are getting in the way of anyway.
anyway, who should walk by but (solo artist and ex-Softboy) Robyn Hitchcock . he was moving a speed but kezia (in her buggy) and i managed to catch up with him and after waiting a few minutes whilst he talked to the ticket desk i asked if i could take his photo.
“no” he said “i’m in a rush” and ran off. luckily i’d got a photo of him walking by. but it would have been nice to have got a closer one.
i think he was having trouble getting in to the venue next door so was quite flustered. i’m sure he’s a nice jolly chap usually.

remember on wednesday night i ended up on national tv for split second thanks to walking past live TV cameras in paddington ? (see here or here if not).
well, at one point a chap squeezed between the two main cast members who were singing in to each other’s faces. this man was our good friend (and esther and kezia’s godfather) Steve.
we spotted him on wednesday evening when we watched it but it was repeated this evening and i got a photo for you. so here he is (on the left by the pillar)

no one i recognised.

i had another late night at work (this time a company 10th birthday party) so i arrived at paddington at around 8.30pm. i didn’t know it at the time but they were recording a live opera in amongst the random commuters in paddington station (see BBC site here)
i had 4 minutes before i got the train so whizzed through the crowds and just caught my train.
i got these photos (vision man, orchestra by the sushi bar and camera man):

on the train i read my paper and noticed in the TV guide they were doing a live flash mob opera at a mystery location, and realised that’s what i’d just seen.
it went out live on BBC 3 TV 8-9pm but they repeated it again 10-11pm and i just go back in time. so i got to see my bald head go by for a split second on the TV. i even managed to take a photo of the telly when it was on. here it is (i’m the bright white bit on the bottom right of this photo):

on the telly we saw that alan yentobb, so i missed a celebrity photo opportunity. and there must have been the BBC concert orchestra lorry somewhere too. oh well.
update: our friend steve was there too (see here). also, in the morning i’d seen them setting up (see here)

there’s filming happening all over london. it was paddington station this morning and a few hours later i spotted this lighting rig in soho on the way to a meeting.

they were setting up a BBC outside broadcast studio in paddington. if you are in those parts today you might want to go and have a nosey.

update: see here

here are some people filming a playstation advert. not sure who they are.
a few minutes before i’d been walking past the National Theatre when i heard there was a book signing so i went in. dunno who it was either, but it was cancelled anyway. so there you go.

well, i don’t know about you, but i was working from home this morning and had to go in to the office for a meeting from 6-7.30pm. so i travelled the 2-hour journey and managed to arrive early.
about 2 days early.
it’s actually on wednesday. so i came back and on the way had a look in the paper and noticed that Duran Duran were signing their new record in HMV on Oxford Street. Aha ! i thought and negotiated the tube system to reach my destination with 15 minutes to spare before they were due to finish their signing.
unfortunately i went to the wrong HMV and ended up arriving at the proper one just after they had stopped letter people in to the queue. so instead i skulked around the barriered off bit and got the shots below (but actually the last load of people didn’t get anything signed so i was better off wandering around instead of being stuck in a queue)

once they had finished signing there was little interest in the signing table, suggesting it was Simon le Bon and his musican chums people were more interested in. except for this one lady who was inspecting the table for her own interest (probably):

so i left and saw them coming out the side door and climbing in to their cars:

afterwards i read in another london paper that Eddie Izzard and possibly joanna lumley were just down the road in virgin megastore. if i’d known that i would have popped in there too. oh well.

i saw ricky gervais yesterday morning whilst walking to a meeting.
A bit later at the meeting one of my colleauges who also works nearby said he sees him most days. and he’s a regular Denis Norden spotter too.

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when george w bush visited london there was massive security around this luxury hotel. this morning the security had returned (but was obviously being prepared last week)
it’s weird as from the outside this hotel really isn’t very nice to look at. but then i guess when you stay in a hotel you are more bothered about what your room looks like than the exterior walls.
maybe that’s where i’ve been going wrong.

clive swift