I managed to crash the Vanity Fair Oscars party – but not Boris’s victory do
It was not until I saw Boris making his acceptance speech at City Hall just after midnight that I decided to gatecrash his victory party. I was quite drunk, having just hosted a dinner party, and my wife had long gone to bed. The only two girls remaining were about to share a cab home together, but I implored them to come with me to Millbank Tower where the celebrations were already underway.
‘Are you sure we’ll get in?’ asked one of them as I squeezed into the taxi. ‘Are you kidding?’ I said. ‘I’m the only journalist in the country to gatecrash the Vanity Fair Oscars party. This’ll be a doddle.’ ‘But, surely, if we don’t have an invitation?’ ‘My face is my invitation,’ I said. ‘Watch and learn.’
There was a long line of people snaking round the building when we arrived — loyal campaign workers waiting to get in, no doubt — and the girls automatically gravitated towards the back. ‘No need to queue up with the rest of the civilians,’ I said loudly, piloting them to the front of the line. ‘We’re VIPs.’
I pushed past the befuddled officials counting off the guests at the door and arrived in the lobby with a beautiful girl on each arm, what Frank Sinatra used to call ‘cufflinks’. At this point, we were faced by a second, more formidable group of officials, these ones carrying clipboards and barking orders into walkie-talkies. I could feel the girls tighten their grip, as if to say, ‘What now?’ At that very moment, David Cameron swept in, accompanied by his trusty spin-doctor, Andy Coulson.
‘David,’ I said, flashing him my best Hugh Grant smile. ‘Congratulations on a marvellous victory.’ He smiled back, clearly not knowing who I was, but by now I had fallen into lockstep beside him. As we approached the final checkpoint, I motioned frantically for the girls to follow. My plan was to fool the security guards into thinking we were part of Cameron’s entourage. If questioned, I was planning to flash my Acton Library Card and describe myself as his ‘MI6 Liaison Officer’.
‘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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