Guido picked up a copy of this month’s painfully woke GQ, which has just hit the news stands. In it the Daily Mail’s editor, Geordie Grieg, has granted only the second interview of his editorship. The first interview with the FT resulted in a complete car crash after he dissed the great Paul Dacre to such a degree that Dacre wrote to the FT to deliver a monumental slap down to his successor. His second interview is timed to coincide with the Daily Mail finally surpassing The Sun in daily sales. Or as the hagiographic Matt Kelly puts it:
“… now the Mail has in all actualité, attained the one great prize to elude even Dacre, you’d have to have a heart of pure weapons-grade vitriol to begrudge Grieg and his team their moment in the sun, as they passed The Sun to become the bestselling newspaper in the country.”
This interview was done in June, before the newspaper industry forced ABC to cease publishing sales figures that have dramatically plummeted during the pandemic. Guido however has managed to prise open the undisclosed ABC circulation figures and can reveal that The Sun in July returned to being the tabloid primus inter pares. Geordie’s day in the sun was short and the interview’s whole premise was overtaken in July by cold hard print sales figures…
The latest figures (not published) by the Audit Bureau of Circulation show that in July The Sun outsold the Daily Mail by 1,030,000 to 999,000 – both titles down double digit percentages from pre-pandemic. Geordie doesn’t have much luck with his annual interviews…
GQ editor Dylan Jones tells the Today programme Corbyn’s aides didn’t understand that Jezza “would have to be presentable and couldn’t just turn up in his anorak” and that they “pushed him around like a grandpa”. Jones says the younger GQ staff who attended the shoot went in as fans and came out underwhelmed. Never meet your heroes…
Read extracts here…
Jeremy Corbyn was the star turn at the GQ Man of the Year awards last night, where he handed the Solo Artist of the Year award to rapper Stormzy. Jez praised Stormzy’s album Gang Signs and Prayer, after which Stormzy blasted Theresa May as a “paigon“. For those not up-to-date with street culture, “paigon” means “liar“, “witch“, “snake“, “snitch” or “enemy“. Alastair Campbell thought he called her a “pig“. Not sure which is better…
What is it with Jez and sharing platforms….
George Osborne just about recovered from his 2011 w*nker joke faux pas to land the coveted GQ Politician of the Year award at the Royal Opera House last night.
Westminster style icon Osborne was presented the award by his friend Bob Geldof, who revealed he personally called the Chancellor the day before to give him an ear-bashing about the refugee crisis. George’s gags were much better received this time, including an obligatory dig at the Labour leadership contest:
“The Labour leadership contest hasn’t got long to go and I’ve got three more votes left to cast”
Piers certainly enjoyed it…
The ever-svelte Osborne had a whole table sorted for his top Treasury team, though they quickly slipped off before the after party for prettier guests. GQ Politician of the Year 2016: Jezza Corbyn and his vest…?
