POLITICIANS, and others, should note that it is never too late tosay sorry. Jimmy Devlin did so with great aplomb at the Forth awardsbash at the Sheraton Grand in Edinburgh the other day.
Among the celebrity guests, apart from JD of course, were Wet WetWet, Darius and some spotty youths called McFly. However Dev'sapologia was directed at Tony Hadley.
The former Spandau Ballet singer won the Best Performer gong forhis concert at the Usher Hall earlier this year. Congratulating him,Dev recalled how he knew Tony at the height of his fame in theEighties when he was a "record plugger" for EMI and looked afteranother of the biggest bands around, Duran Duran. The two supergroupswere booked to go head-to-head on Mike Read's Christmas special PopQuiz on BBC TV.
Simon Le Bon, Dev recalled, was "a lovely guy but thick aspigs***". Dev knew there was not a chance of Duran Duran winning, sohe swiped a copy of the questions and answers from the BBC andrehearsed Duran Duran. Despite drilling into them the answers, theymanaged still to get a lot of them wrong, but somehow scraped throughto win by one point. Dev picked up his Christmas bonus and the restis history ...
Jimmy Devlin, now managing director of River Records, was not athousand miles from the scene of the crime when Simple Minds wereplaying at Ibrox and Jim Kerr came up with the wizard wheeze to burya set of rosary beads under the penalty spot at the Copeland Roadend, which could explain a lot.
Guard for Reno on Scots visit
ZEUT alors! The French Film Festival has pulled off a bit of acoup after the rather flat BAFTAs as its big star, Jean Reno, isarriving in Scotland complete with bodyguard.
"He's bringing bodyguard, girlfriend and PA, and the guy from StMalo who engineered the meeting with Liz Cameron," our cineaste says.
As we told you last week, Jean had hit it off with the GlasgowLord Provost when they met at a Euro-bash in Brittany, so maybe it issomething Liz said about the Dear Green Place that put thefrighteners up Monsieur Reno. We cannot think what.
But a French Film Festival source gives a lamer excuse: "I guessit's going through airports and such things that might attract a bitof attention. Along with Gerard Depardieu, he is one of France's top-drawing stars. And with Crimson Rivers and Mission Impossible, he'sgot the international profile. He also might want to keep the Diaryat arm's length."
Spookily enough there is a special tribute in this year's festivalto Alain Delon who, too, had a bodyguard. However, Delon and his wifewere involved in a massive scandal when the bodyguard was foundmurdered.
The 'second man' mystery
WERE we not saying last week, with our usual uncanny prescience,that the Scottish Politician of the Year awards are cursed?
Indeed, we were merely trying to urge caution in our usualcollegiate fashion to fellow hacks at the Herald newspapers who co-sponsored the shebang with Diageo.
However, in the CCTV footage of "Curtaingate", many have beenpondering the identity of the mysterious "second man" who wandersinto view at the scene of the crime, totally oblivious of the "firstman".
The word in Renfield Street is that he looks remarkably similar toRichard Walker, the editor of the Sunday Herald, who was one of theexecutives resting overnight at Prestonfield. Cracks about beingunable to smoke out a good story could be excused as ... smoke getsin your eyes.
Meanwhile, what's in a name? Diageo's head honcho in Scotland is aMr Burns.
* "OUT of the mouths of babes" can lead to even greaterembarrassment in the computer age. A seven-year-old, given some freetime on the computer at her nice Edinburgh school, decided to key ina search for her favourite popsters, Boyzone ... only to set offringing alarms as IT staff rushed to her terminal.
It seems she had keyed in "Boy Zone" which, on the internet,brings up something completely different.
SUSAN Duffy is already part of an award-winning production - thefinance committee at Holyrood, believe it or not - so who knows whatwill happen with her performance in Leitheatre's The Odd Couple thisweek?
But at least Susan will be able to take a curtain-call safely atthe Church Hill Theatre, something to be avoided at all costs at thePolitician of the Year awards. Susan is clerk to the financecommittee at Holyrood, which won Best Committee of the Year. RuthMcLaren is "Felix" to her "Oscar" in this female version of NeilSimon's classic comedy, which provided director Kate Grimes with herRichard Dreyfuss moment when a cast member pulled out. However, Kate,who used to work for the former First Minister, Henry McLeish,appreciates more than most that the show must go on.
The one that got away from the Red Army
MATTHEW Zajac, who was the forensic expert in the BAFTA winnerYoung Adam, digs a bit deeper into his own background in the playKarl Marx's Beard, which premieres tomorrow at the Arches Theatre inGlasgow.
The Scots-Polish actor's father was conscripted by the Red Army in1939 after the carve-up of the infamous Nazi-Soviet Pact, but went onto join the new Polish forces after the German invasion in 1941andthen fought under General Anders in North Africa and Italy.
Matt tells us: "There's a line in the play 'No-one runs from theRed Army, Boris' which has a particular resonance for me because, oneway or another, I think that's what Dad did." And made it all the wayto Inverness to become a tailor and raise a family.
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