ALISON BOSHOFF: Full Monty star who was sacked for allegedly ‘flashing’ runner drops his legal fight with Disney
Hugo Speer is counting the cost after being sacked from a TV sequel to The Full Monty after allegations of inappropriate conduct.
Speer, 53, who played Guy, nicknamed ‘Lunchbox’ in the 1997 British comedy hit about a group of unemployed Sheffield men trying to make ends meet as strippers, had his contract terminated by Disney+ during filming last summer after it was said that he answered a knock at the door of his trailer in the nude and ‘beckoned’ a runner inside.
He’s always denied the claims of misconduct and after the incident last July it can now be revealed that he consulted lawyers with a view to suing Disney+.
I’m told: ‘Hugh felt that what happened was unfair and discriminatory and wanted to sue them at an industrial tribunal. However, after months of legal to-ing and fro-ing he’s decided to give up the fight.
‘He’s dropped it because Disney were throwing everything at it, and it all became too expensive to continue.
Posing: Hugo Speer in the film
Hugo Speer attends the press night after party for Winner’s Curse at The Park Theatre on February 13, 2023
‘His legal team thought that he had a really good case but in the end he took a good look at what it was going to take to follow it all the way and decided that it wasn’t possible to continue.’
A runner on the movie, who is in her 20s, reportedly said she knocked on Speer’s door and the actor answered without any clothes on, and he then gestured to her to come in.
Some reports claimed Speer defended his actions by telling producers: ‘All actors walk around their trailer stark b****** naked.’
A source on set told The Sun that Speer’s sacking had ‘rocked the cast and crew’.
A spokesperson for Disney+ said at the time: ‘We were made aware of allegations of inappropriate conduct by Hugo Speer on the set of a commissioned production.
‘As is policy, an investigation was launched. Upon its completion, the decision was made to terminate his contract, with immediate effect.’
A spokesman for Speer countered: ‘He denies all allegations and will be challenging them.’
Speer was previously in BBC series Hearts And Bones and the Sky drama series Britannia. He also stars as a detective in the series London Kills. The third and fourth series of the latter show were filmed concurrently in spring 2022, before the alleged on-set incident and the fourth series will go out on the BBC later this year.
All the original stars of The Full Monty — Speer, Robert Carlyle, Tom Wilkinson, Mark Addy, Paul Barber, Steve Huison and Lesley Sharp — signed up to be in the Disney+ TV follow-up
All the original stars of The Full Monty — Speer, Robert Carlyle, Tom Wilkinson, Mark Addy, Paul Barber, Steve Huison and Lesley Sharp — plus screenwriter Simon Beaufoy and producer Uberto Pasolini, signed up to be in the Disney+ TV follow-up.
The 1997 hit was the highest grossing film ever in the UK until Titanic. The new eight-part TV series will show what has become of the characters 25 years on.
In an interview in 2020 Speer said that the hit film had changed his life, but not completely for the better. There was ‘scary’ attention from female fans who wanted to grab him intimately, and Speer remarked that if a man was doing that to a woman he would be arrested.
A spokesman for Speer did not respond to requests for comment.
Jo’s in awe of new big and proud stars
Jo Brand admires the body positive movement, but says it has come too late for her.
‘There’s a very different attitude towards it now, which I kind of admire in a way, but I’m saddled with the “you shameful hulk” attitude that we had in my day. It was always the first thing people commented on.
‘I just got used to those blows and dealing with them, and it’s fine. But I couldn’t bring myself in this day and age to wear what much bigger women wear confidently. I don’t understand how they can do that, but I do admire it.’
Asked on the podcast Get It On if she might show up dressed as flamboyant singer and rapper Lizzo she says: ‘If I ever get asked on Songs of Praise, I will.’
Rock royalty? Well, my grandad was the King…
Elvis’ granddaughter Riley Keough is easily the best thing in Prime Video’s Daisy Jones & The Six, which starts streaming today.
Critics have hailed her ‘electric energy’ and observe that she ‘carries herself with rock-star swagger worthy of her real-life lineage’ as fictional pop star Daisy Jones.
Keough was unsure how well she would tackle the singing in the show — with 1970s-style tunes written by artists including British star Marcus Mumford. ‘I was like: “I don’t know if I can do it.” ’ The cast spent six months rehearsing in order to pull off the performance scenes convincingly.
Riley has evolved into a leading lady after more than a decade of acting — and carries off the singing with panache. But she approached showbusiness with caution. Before the death of her mother, singer and songwriter Lisa Marie Presley earlier this year, she said: ‘With acting, I had a feeling I would really enjoy it. I was called up for an audition when I was 18 and thought: “Well, if you never try it, you will never know,” and I booked my first audition. If that had not happened I don’t know that I would have continued.’
Elvis’ granddaughter Riley Keough is easily the best thing in Prime Video’s Daisy Jones & The Six
Her status as Elvis’ granddaughter did give her pause for thought — and she felt unnerved by covert accusations of nepotism.
‘There was a sense of: “OK, let’s see what you can do.” I was sensitive to it. It made me really nervous. I was like, should I go, “Sorry for being here”? That was my interpretation.
‘For someone like my mother, releasing music, it would have been more difficult because there was a direct comparison. Although my grandparents [Elvis and his wife Priscilla Presley] did act, it wasn’t their primary focus so there was a layer of separation there and generational separation, too.
‘I am very grateful for all of the wonderful benefits I have been able to have because of these things as well.’
Lisa died aged 54, after suffering a cardiac arrest in January. She had struggled with drug abuse and was grieving her son Ben, who died by suicide in 2020.
Super-villain Lesley storms the Citadel
Lesley Manville is playing wildly against type as a chilling villain in the hotly anticipated mega-budget new spy series Citadel.
She plays British ambassador Dahlia Archer with a ladylike but distinct menace — and Bodyguard star Richard Madden and Priyanka Chopra Jonas are the elite spies who are caught in her web.
Showrunner David Weil says: ‘She’s the villain of the story, but as all the best villains are, she’s the heroine of her own story. So we needed an actor who could achieve both: to be both bone-chilling and elegant.’
The show has been created by the Russo brothers — behind the Avengers movies — and is said to have come in at $250 million (£210 million) for seven episodes — $90 million more than the initial budget.
Bone-chilling: Lesley Manville as Dahlia Archer
Word is that Jennifer Salke, the head of Amazon Studios, did not care for what she saw at first. A new executive was brought in to rewrite, and a new director to take care of reshoots.
Its subsidiary, Prime Video, who made the most expensive TV show ever in The Lord Of The Rings: The Rings Of Power, is praying for a hit when it streams in April.
It has been conceived as a global TV series with a main show plus offshoots. It has so far seeded spin-offs in India and Italy.
Only my friends can call me Sir!
Artist Grayson Perry isn’t like some Sirs who insist on their title being used at all times (step forward Sir Ben Kingsley).
He was made a Knight Bachelor for services to the arts in the New Year’s Honours list, but only styles himself ‘Sir Grayson’ as a joke when chatting to friends.
Perry, 62, who often appears in public as his female alter-ego Claire, said: ‘I find that if you have a knighthood, the more informal the situation the more fun it is to use it.
‘You can’t use it in a formal situation or you look like a t****r. Now I sign off emails to best friends, ‘Sir Grayson’.
He briefly debated whether to accept the honour. ‘I turn down things all the time. It’s the nature of success,’ says Perry.
But daughter Flo encouraged him. Perry’s wife Philippa said: ‘We asked our daughter and she said: “Don’t be a d**k.”’
Artist Grayson Perry isn’t like some Sirs who insist on their title being used at all times
Alice Oseman’s Heartstopper novels sparked one of the biggest global hits on Netflix last year, and in series two there will be a character particularly close to her heart.
Oseman has let slip that one of her young protagonists will be just like her. She told Attitude magazine: ‘I am both Ace and Aro. Those words mean little-to-no sexual attraction or little-to-no romantic attraction.
‘Netflix will hate me for spilling but, yes, asexuality will be discussed in a really big way. I’m excited. I hope it will change the world. It’s a complicated thing to understand about yourself. People are asking the wrong questions.’
Alice Oseman’s Heartstopper novels sparked one of the biggest global hits on Netflix last year
Romcoms have been out of fashion, but after the success of Ticket To Paradise featuring queen of romcoms Julia Roberts, it seems the genre is roaring back.
Netflix has announced it is making Mother Of The Bride with Brooke Shields, Benjamin Bratt and Miranda Cosgrove.
And Searchlight is releasing a British riposte to Roberts’ 1999 romcom Notting Hill in the form of Rye Lane. Set in Peckham, Rye Lane stars rising actor David Jonsson, who is found sobbing in a unisex loo after a break-up.
Jonsson was taken aback by the script. ‘It said my character Dom was good-looking in an awkward kind of way, and I remember thinking: “OK, so that’s how you think people see me?” laughs David.
‘We’re both lads — albeit in different ways — and both like our football, but it’s for others to judge if “good-looking in an awkward kind of way” is an accurate description!’
Rye Lane opens in cinemas on March 17.
Choreographer and former Strictly Judge Arlene Phillips turns 80 in May — but says that she is like the ‘Duracell bunny’.
She’s certainly hit a purple patch — a new production of Guys And Dolls, which she has choreographed, opens today for previews, and she won an award for work on Grease earlier this year. She says: ‘I’m like a Duracell bunny, I just keep going! I never want to stop dancing. It’s my life.’
Naturally, she is going to have a big party. ‘I’m probably going to turn it into a mass thank-you for all of the people who have helped to make my life.’
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