Stars of stage and screen often have a problem with talking to the Daily Mail – especially since it has aligned itself so closely with Boris Johnson’s demented government – so Baz Bamigboye’s impending departure to the showbusiness website Deadline is causing panic on the paper.
“No actor ever minded talking to Baz, who made little secret of the fact his own politics were very different from his paper’s,” whispers my informant. “When he was appointed by Sir David English, the paper’s editor in the 1980s, there were few journalists of colour, but Baz made the job his own. He also handled – in the early days especially – racism that was then endemic in the industry with great grace and dignity.
“I know a lot of actors who’d say they’d never dream of talking to the Daily Mail, but they would talk to Baz. They made that clear distinction. The Mail will feel his loss keenly.”
