I fell helplessly in love with Christine Hamilton

12 July 2008

In the second of an occasional series, Martin Rowson interviews Neil and Christine Hamilton. To his alarm, the arch-satirist finds himself warming to the disgraced couple

‘Not Bell. Definitely not Bell, the self-righteous, pompous prig. I mean, saying meeting me was worse than anything he’d ever encountered in Bosnia! What a wimp!’

‘Anyway,’ Neil added, ‘he’s got rather too portly to kiss these days.’

‘Oh yes! He’s enormous. But we haven’t forgiven Al Fayed either.’

This was interesting. Although Neil and Christine Hamilton had been ground down by the tragic millstones, their assailants hadn’t fared that well either (the woman who falsely accused them of rape went down for three years for perverting the course of justice). I supposed that this was some kind of vindication, although Christine responded by saying that you just had to get on with things, which is what they’d done.

On her official website, Christine writes, ‘I am thrilled to have left the artificial world of boring old politics for the madcap fun world of the media and entertainment.’ I tried pursuing this idea of redemption through showbiz — which includes the catharsis of Have I Got News for You. ‘What is this?’ Christine cried, her eyes widening in disbelief at my obvious pseudery, ‘The Psychiatrist’s Chair?’ As far as she’s concerned, they’ve just been lucky to be able to move on and have fun. They repeated, in unison, their pitch that they’ll consider doing anything that’s ‘legal, honest and faintly decent’, which includes pantos, Christine’s appearance on I’m A Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here! and their annual shows on the Edinburgh fringe. ‘None of it’s planned! We just make it up as we go along!’

Previous page 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 Next page

More articles from: Martin Rowson | this section

Print this article | Email to a friend | Permalink | Comments (3)

Post this entry to: del.icio.us | Digg | Newsvine | NowPublic | Reddit

Post comment

pj

July 10th, 2008 7:06pm Report this comment

Remarkable how silent Bell has been durung the Blair years isn't it? A failed attempt to oust a Tory in Essex & then retirement from the political stage altogether. One can only presume he considers his task of driving corruption from Westminster to be complete.

David Short

July 12th, 2008 5:04am Report this comment

The headline seems inappropriate.

We never read anywhere about this love affair.

Anyway, why does the Spectator think the Hamiltons are worthy now of this cartoon and print attention?

Michael Lee

September 2nd, 2008 2:20pm Report this comment

This criticismwwhich we used to have of the
Hamiltons is usually made by people who have
never met them.If any man cannot be attracted
to Christine after talking to her he must be most
odd.

Post comment