Low life | 5 July 2008

An extraordinary email from theatre critic Mr Lloyd Evans arrived in my inbox last week. He’d written a play, it said, a two-hander, and one of the characters was based on me. He’d based the character on me after we’d met at a Spectator Christmas lunch five years ago. The play was opening at the King’s Head in Islington on Tuesday. If, after seeing his dramatic representation of me, I was minded to sue, it went on, perhaps we could come to an arrangement that benefited plaintiff and defendant at the expense of the lawyers. Meanwhile, would I like a ticket?

I don’t know Lloyd well. At The Spectator, the more sociable contributors turn up twice a year for the Christmas lunch and summer party where we are power-hosed down with champagne for a couple of hours then turned out into the street. So we all only see each another briefly and when drunk.