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Tuesday 2 December 2008

Status Anxiety

I managed to crash the Vanity Fair Oscars party – but not Boris’s victory do

‘It’s just us,’ said Andy Coulson to the chief official as he lifted the velvet rope. ‘I don’t know who this lot are.’ He then took his boss’s arm and steered him towards a bank of lifts. The security guard eyed me suspiciously. ‘Yes, I have no idea who they are either,’ I said, indicating a group of obedient campaign workers filing through the lobby. ‘Probably gatecrashers.’

‘He meant you,’ said the man, snapping the velvet rope back into place.

‘I see you’re doing an excellent job,’ I said, patting him on the shoulder. ‘But don’t worry, we’re on the list.’ ‘Name?’ ‘Lynton Crosby. I’m Boris’s campaign manager.’ He checked his list and, sure enough, there I was — or, rather, there was Lynton Crosby. He was about to lift the velvet rope when a red-faced man emerged in the lobby, looking like he had run all the way down from the 29th floor. ‘Don’t let that man in,’ he panted. ‘That’s Toby Young.’

It was Nicholas Boles, the Conservative mayoral candidate who had stood down in favour of Boris last year. It turned out he was angry with me for having given a bad review to a West End play he had produced six years earlier. He was particularly aggrieved because I had called him up and asked for a couple of free tickets to the first night. By now, the two girls had uncoupled their arms from mine and were edging away.

Fortunately, after Nick had called me a ‘c***’ several times, he calmed down and told the security guard to let me in. ‘It’ll be over in ten minutes anyway,’ he said. We had done it! We jumped into an express elevator and shot up to the 29th floor. By now the girls were falling all over me, wide-eyed with shock and awe. ‘It takes more than a couple of Clipboard Nazis to stop me,’ I said.

The elevator doors opened to reveal Boris’s deputy campaign manager. Next to him was a hulking Australian man with the smallest forehead I had ever seen. ‘No media,’ he said, holding me back with one hand and preventing the lift doors from closing with the other.

I peeked over his shoulder and spotted someone who looked surprisingly like the editor of this magazine in conversation with Andrew Gilligan. ‘But...’

‘No exceptions. Show him the way out, Gripper.’ With that we were bundled back into the lift and ejected from the building. By the time I had picked myself up and dusted myself off, the girls were speeding away in a taxi.

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