EDEN CONFIDENTIAL: Frederick Forsyth’s mission to take on Clarkson proves impossible

Frederick Forsyth’s life and career are the stuff of legend. No one, after all, will surpass his record of being accepted by the RAF aged just 17, thereafter becoming its youngest ever jet pilot.

Even then, he had already given ample evidence of his precocious talents, speaking fluent French and German by the time he was 15, and mastering Spanish – and rudimentary Russian – a couple of years later.

Still in his 20s, he was Reuters correspondent in Paris and then in Berlin, where he also began doing occasional missions for MI6.

Less than a decade later, after reporting on the war in Biafra, he wrote The Day Of The Jackal in 35 days, and has since sold well over 70 million books.

But now, aged 86, Forsyth appears to have been shot down in his quest to fulfil a final ambition: to become the oldest ever celebrity contestant on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? On his previous appearance, in 2002, he was paired with Gloria Hunniford and won £250,000 – a record matched only once since then, by Stephen Fry.

Forsyth tells me that he recently contacted a key executive at the production company which makes Millionaire, to see if he might compete again.

‘I checked at the highest level – and it’s over,’ says the author, who’s recently seen The Jackal resurrected in a new series starring Eddie Redmayne. ‘They’re not going to make any more.

‘He was very nice about it. He replied to my email and said, ‘Unfortunately, we think it’s over now’. They’ve got a few in the bag. They’ll get through those and that’ll be it.’

Yet ITV insists that it has no plans to axe the series.

Forsyth, who’s convinced he could crack the £1 million prize, is not entirely surprised.

‘I suspect that I’m black-marked,’ he tells me, adding that he had intended to reveal which charity was going to benefit from his winnings only at the end of the show.

‘It would have been the Widows’ and Orphans’ Fund of the Special Air Service,’ he tells me.

‘It gets no crowd-funding, for obvious reasons. They would have appreciated a nice little pot of money,’ muses Forsyth, who stood down as president of the Special Forces Club seven years ago. ‘I think it would have been very popular.’

Hofit Golan warns of ‘woke’ Cannes 

Hofit Golan sees through Cannes Film Festival’ new dress code which ban ‘nude’ dresses.

‘I’m not offended by a nipple,’ the model tells me. ‘The French have nude beaches, so why are you going to lose sleep about some nipples?’ 

Hofit, 40, pushed her luck in a revealing dress designed by Joli Poli couture at the Mission Impossible: Final Reckoning premiere.

And it caught the eye of star Tom Cruise. ‘He said to me he liked my dress,’ she says.

‘If you take away the glamour from Cannes, what is Cannes? It can’t become ‘woke’ like the Oscars. We don’t want that.’

The smart set’s talking about… Cupid’s stroke of serendipity for Tatler star

Tatler cover girl Esme Bertelsen, who was listed by the society magazine as one of Britain’s 100 most eligible women, has found love in the most random way.

The 23-year-old daughter of television personality Susannah Constantine has been swept off her feet by Luke Moreton, an alumnus of £60,000-per-year Milton Abbey School in Dorset.

‘We met in Barcelona in the craziest way,’ she tells me. ‘We literally bumped into each other. I dropped my stuff and he picked it up.

‘It sounds like something out of a movie.’

Art consultant Esme says Luke, who works at the arty Friends of Friends Festival, has won the approval of her mother, who used to deliver withering verdicts on people’s wardrobes on the hit BBC show What Not To Wear.

Jerry’s secret tips for Georgia May to be a perfect model

Jerry Hall once remarked: ‘My mother said it was simple to keep a man: You must be a maid in the living room, a cook in the kitchen and a whore in the bedroom. I said I’d hire the other two and take care of the bedroom bit.’

Now, the Texan reveals the advice she gave her daughter Georgia May, who followed her mother into modelling. ‘I told her to be nice and be on time – and she always is,’ Jerry tells me at the Magnum Cannes Beach Party.

Georgia, 33, whose father is Sir Mick Jagger, enjoys hitting the town with her mother, 68.

‘It’s so fun,’ she says. ‘We love getting dressed up and going out. It’s so nice to get to do it together. She’s always been my mum, but I knew that she was the most glamorous woman in the world. We’ve always been close.’

Comic’s wife is laughing all the way to the bank…

Russell Howard had to live apart from his wife, Cerys, during the pandemic lockdowns because she returned to work on the NHS frontline even though she was on sabbatical when Covid struck.

And now the comedian, 45, has demonstrated how much he treasures the doctor by giving her half his fortune.

I can disclose that Howard, who is in the middle of a world tour, has handed over 50 per cent of his private company Skylarking UK to Cerys, who gave birth to their first child last year.

The transfer has just been reported in a confirmation statement filed at Companies House by Howard’s performing arts company, which he set up in 2008.

Latest accounts, to March 2024, disclose £10.1million worth of shareholders’ funds, with Howard enjoying a £730,000 upturn in the value of unlisted investments. His financial assets increased in value to £6.1million, with cash reserves reported at £4.6 million.

The Lady’s Julia Budworth leaves son out of will

Only last month I disclosed that The Lady, oldest and stateliest of women’s magazines, had been abruptly placed in liquidation, leaving many of its contributors painfully out of pocket. 

But they may find consolation in the £1.5million will, published this week, of the splendid Julia Budworth, matriarch of The Lady, founded by her grandfather in 1885.

Drawn up in 2022, two years before Julia died aged 92, the will contains a striking omission. Her youngest son, Ben, The Lady’s final owner, goes entirely unmentioned, unlike Julia’s other sons – Richard, William and Adam – who are primary beneficiaries.

Ben bought The Lady’s London offices for £6.2 million from his uncle – Julia’s brother, Tom – and sold them on for £12.4 million.

Resisting his mother’s plea to share his windfall with his brothers, he instead bought Bylaugh Hall in Norfolk for £1.9 million, where he lives with Helen Robinson, The Lady’s last editor. Ben, who declines to comment, also snapped up a helicopter.

Seven months after confirming his romance with vegan ‘influencer’ Heidi Kadlecova, Hugh Bonneville remains reluctant to give up meat. Asked to describe his ideal diet, the Downton star offers: ‘The one where you eat a massive amount of roast chicken with English mustard, bread sauce, sprouts and potatoes and you’re guaranteed to shed 20lb.’

Don’t tell Prince Harry, but King Charles is beefing up his own security. His Majesty seeks a ‘physical and technical security manager’ who will be paid £60,000 per year.

Based at Buckingham Palace, the successful candidate will ‘lead on providing protective security advice and support to the Royal Households, covering multiple residences across the UK’, says the ad on the royal website.

West raises eyebrows, and lots of charity cash 

Dominic West raised eyebrows with some of his comments as he hosted a charity gala in London.

The actor, 55, who played King Charles in The Crown, gave a speech about sick children in India, where a typical salary is less than £3,000 per year.

‘If, like me, you’re wearing more than £10,000, raise your hands in the air,’ said West, who was in a dinner suit. Speaking at the DKMS gala at the Natural History Museum, he said: ‘I recently saw two watches I loved that were over £10,000 each and I bought both of them.’ He added: ‘£5,000 – let’s face it, that’s what some of us call lunch.’

His patter seemed to work: Sting’s wife, Trudie Styler, set the ball rolling with a donation of £10,000.

It was billed as the final film in the series, but Bridget Jones: Mad About The Boy might not be the last after all.

Sally Phillips, who played Bridget’s friend Shazza in all four films, says: ‘This was supposed to be the last one, but I’ve been wrong every single time. 

‘They asked me after the first one. I said, ‘No, that’s a standalone thing.’

‘Then we did a second one and I said, ‘Well, that wasn’t as good as the first one, so I don’t think they will do another one.’ And then we did do another one and they said, ‘Is it done now?’ and I said, ‘It’s definitely done now’, and we did a fourth one. This one is the highest-grossing – it beat Barbie at the UK box office.’