Author Lesley-Ann Jones has come under attack from Queen ‘loyalists’ as she prepares to publish Love, Freddie – a bombshell book based on the diaries of Freddie Mercury given to her by his alleged secret daughter.
Jones, filming a documentary about the book for Channel 5 in Switzerland this week, is sticking to her guns ahead of publication on September 5.
However, it’s understood that Mary Austin, the love of Freddie’s life, is planning to deny she knew anything about his daughter in an interview with a Sunday newspaper.
And criticism of Jones, including misogynistic smears, has been circulating on a WhatsApp group of former staffers, saying ‘no one’ in the ‘inner circle’ ever heard talk of a daughter.
One former associate writes: ‘I don’t understand why he didn’t leave his only child something in his will.
‘I’m not saying it’s a crock, but as it’s the [SLUR DELETED] writing yet another book about a dead person, the facts are not looking good at the moment.’
Author Lesley-Ann Jones has come under attack from Queen ‘loyalists’ as she prepares to publish Love, Freddie – a bombshell book based on the diaries of Freddie Mercury
Similar derogatory comments have been made on social media. Peter Freestone, Mercury’s live-in PA for 12 years up to his death in 1991, said this week: ‘I never saw any diaries. I never saw any child.’
He added: ‘I’m not saying they don’t exist… It was a surprise to me when I heard. Very much.’
The ‘real’ inner circle, meanwhile, are staying tight-lipped. Brian May smiled but said not a word when I asked him about the book at a Live Aid 40th anniversary event recently.
His wife Anita Dobson has previously said: ‘I think there have always been rumours. The person to ask would be his sister, Kashmira. But even then, I think, sometimes if people keep secrets, they do really keep those secrets.’
Which sounds like a hint she thinks the story is right. Dobson explained her husband wants to stay ‘neutral’.
‘He said: “People were always saying all sorts of things about Freddie. Let’s take it with a pinch of salt.”’
So far the Queen estate, which represents all the band members and Freddie’s sister, has not commented in any way.
Jones told me: ‘There are a lot of extremely nasty comments being made, and some people are trying to discredit the book.
It’s understood that Mary Austin (pictured), the love of Freddie’s life, is planning to deny she knew anything about his daughter in an interview with a Sunday newspaper
‘What I would say is that the real inner circle – the other members of Queen, and Freddie’s sister – would have denied this if they could, weeks ago, when the story broke. ‘
They cannot because, as Freddie’s daughter says, they know that it is true.’ HER new book tells of a child – referred to only as ‘B’ – conceived accidentally during a fling with the wife of a close friend in 1976, a year after Bohemian Rhapsody was a hit.
The revelation came as a shock to the singer’s fans, who have long loved and accepted him as a gay man.
Yet the legendary showman had a number of relationships with women, including Mary Austin, whom he met when she was 19 and he was 23, before he came out.
She remained close to Freddie for the rest of his life. There was another, later, romance, in the early 1980s, with actress Barbara Valentin.
But the liaison with B’s mother was something Freddie reportedly kept top secret. In the book, there is a hand-written letter from Freddie’s daughter in which she says: ‘Freddie Mercury was and is my father.
‘We had a very close and loving relationship from the moment I was born and throughout the final 15 years of his life. He adored me and was devoted to me.’
Former child star with her eye on the prize – and Lily’s hubby.
Who could possibly induce anyone to cheat on Lily James? Step forward rising British actress Raffey Cassidy.
The 23-year-old will play Millie, a young woman who rolls a hand grenade into the middle of an apparently happy marriage in the movie Photo Booth, which starts filming at the end of the summer, with Rupert Friend completing the love triangle.
Millie gets pregnant after a one night stand with a man called Ben (Friend). Meanwhile, back at home, Ben’s wife Jean (James) is struggling to have children.
A performance artist who mines her own emotional difficulties for her art, Jean decides to invite the young woman to live with them. She offers to look after her financially…in exchange for the baby.
Who could possibly induce anyone to cheat on Lily James (pictured)? Step forward rising British actress Raffey Cassidy
The 23-year-old will play Millie, a young woman who rolls a hand grenade into the middle of an apparently happy marriage in the movie Photo Booth, which starts filming this summer
Brother and sister writing team Lloyd and Spencer Harvey promise ‘electric’ performances from their three leads.
Cassidy is that rare thing: a former child star who has made the transition to more mature roles. She played the young Snow White in Snow White And The Huntsman (2012) and also appeared in 2015’s Tomorrowland with George Clooney.
Three years ago she was cast in Noah Baumbach’s satire White Noise alongside Adam Driver and Greta Gerwig.
And last year she won a major role as Zsófia, the selectively mute niece of Adrien Brody’s tortured architect in the Oscar-winning film The Brutalist.
By George! He’s after another Oscar
And they’re off! George Clooney has launched the Oscars 2026 campaigning with a long profile in Vanity Fair to plug forthcoming film Jay Kelly.
Clooney plays a fading film star – and Adam Sandler his loyal manager – in the picture directed and co-written by Mr Greta Gerwig, Noah Baumbach.
It will premiere in Venice at the end of this month and is already at the centre of a solid awards campaign in advance of its theatrical release in November. (After which it will stream on Netflix.)
Clooney said of Sandler, best known for comedies, including Happy Gilmore 2, currently doing great numbers for the streamer: ‘He’s actually a really beautiful, wonderful actor.’
Warming to his theme, he said Sandler’s ‘pay cheque’ films – the ‘big goofy comedies’ – allowed him to do smaller, more artistic projects.
George Clooney has launched the Oscars 2026 campaigning with a long profile in Vanity Fair to plug forthcoming film Jay Kelly
‘When he does these other, beautiful, Uncut Gems kinds of movies, it reminds people that he’s not just a good comedian.’
Clooney, who already has two Oscars under his belt, weeps elegantly in Jay Kelly and by all accounts gives an awards-level performance of his own.
In the meantime, what is the collective noun for films about fighting? Because there is a fracas incoming: Christy, starring ‘Good Genes’ Sydney Sweeney as boxer Christy Martin; The Smashing Machine, with Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson as wrestler Mark Kerr; and The Cut, starring Orlando Bloom.
People were confidently predicting some Oscars attention for Sweeney, but that might now get lost in the noise about her American Eagle jeans ad.
The Smashing Machine, though, which is an A24 movie and will also be in Venice, has people excited about Johnson and co-star Emily Blunt.
Forget the fjords, I’m pining for Bath
Monty Python star John Cleese, is hoping to buy a home in Bath, close to where he grew up.
Cleese, 85, who insists he’s ‘surprisingly poor’, has lived in Monaco in the past, and more recently in Nevis in the Caribbean, where there’s no income tax.
He said in April he’d gifted his £1.5 million flat in Chelsea to fourth wife, Jennifer Wade, ‘to make her feel secure’.
The pair are understood to spend most of their time in London. However, it seems they’re house hunting in the West Country.
Speaking at Clifton College, the £19,000-a-term Bristol private school he attended as a boy, Cleese said: ‘Unquestionably, my home is the West Country. My wife and I are thinking very seriously of buying in Bath.’
Monty Python star John Cleese, is hoping to buy a home in Bath, close to where he grew up
He added: ‘When I look back at my time in Weston-super-Mare…There were a lot of very nice people having peaceful, friendly lives and being nice to each other and behaving really pretty well. And how little of that there is around these days.
‘It’s an idea which has come from America, which is that if you are not either rich or powerful – or both – then somehow your life has been a failure. I think that is a terrible idea.’
Cleese bought a flat in Bath’s Royal Crescent in 2016, but it was back on the market in 2018, when he left the UK and settled in Nevis.
He’s been complaining of penury since his 2008 divorce from third wife, Alyce Faye Eichelberger.
She reportedly got a settlement of $20million and Cleese said two years ago he was still paying it off.
