Dramas In Deepest Darling Point

Its home to some of the most desirable real estate in Australia-the harbour side suburb of Darling Point with its tree lined boulevards and grand mansions.

Tom & Nicolle once lived there. So does Edward de Bono when in town,Ita Buttrose, singer Helen Reddy, actress Rachel Griffith and the extended Bushels tea family, the Oxleys who have not only the legendary Carthona ( Tom wanted to buy it a s a wedding present for Nicolle and offered $25M ) but houses on either side to house their extended family.

Slap bang in the middle of the burb is arguably the most expensive private property on the Eastern seaboard, the neo Gothic castle of cream sandstone, Swifts.

Built in 1886 by Robert Tooth, it was once home to the Austrian brewer Edmund Resch, then owned by the Catholic Church (Pope John Paul and Paul IV have stayed there) and for the last 20 years it's been the domicile of the nursing home tsars Doug and Greta Moran.

Putting a price on Swifts is difficult with its acres of manicured gardens but the Morans spent over $20M on just restoring the house. The Morans, worth an estimated $300M have retired and their children Kerry and Shane now oversee Swifts despite the fact they were once estranged from their parents for several years. With 56 rooms to ramble about in avoiding each other possibly wasn't too difficult.

Of late though neighbours have become edgy as Swifts appears to be hosting gatherings every week from the Rolls Royce Club to Melbourne Cup Day parties to Cornucopia Committee charity fundraisers and magazine launches.

 A week ago there was an antiques fair and locals are becoming embittered about the lack of parking and the noise that emanates from the gardens and Moorish ballroom, the only parts of Swifts strangers get to see.

Residents claim a 'commercial' kitchen has been installed and for the past 4 weeks there has been a function there every Friday evening. Siblings Kerry Jones and Shane Moran say they got the appropriate council permission but residents of a block of flats opposite where Lady Walton, scion of the department store family lives say the noise has been deafening and it carries right up to their 24th floor.

Expect fiery council meetings in February 2012 when the chambers are in session again.

Reece Mastin Update

The Shuttle loves Sydney Confidential and the whole team who put it together. However it happens to the best of us, as in this slip-up in a tale about controversial Melbourne medico Dr Geoffrey Edelsten who has scored a part in British director Simon West's film Dust and Glory. We think they mean acting career !

Brush With Fame

Anyone who is a regular at press conferences or celebrity soirees in Sydney is used to the sight of Richard Simpkin.

He and an odd collection of fans of fame gather at entrances to parties to get autographs or photos. The assembled paparazzi usually swear to murder them when they momentarily stop the progress of the star du jour for a signature.

There seems to be no rhyme or reason to the concept of autograph hunting. These fans like everyone and no-one.
Sometimes catching snippets of their conversation can be illuminating. They never discuss what Cate Blanchett or Lady Ga Ga was wearing or their work - just how easy or difficult it was to get their signature. The Shuttle has questioned some of them at times and often they don't even know what the star's latest offering is. They heard they will be in town or at some event and they religiously turn up.


At the Australian premiere of Puss In Boots on Sunday with Antonio Banderas and Selma Hayek there was the lady who always gets a sleb to sign her Teddy Bear for 'charity'. She never seems to be able to tell us what charity but she almost busts a piston with excitement when she scores.

Another stopped appearing about 4 years ago when his supply of Polaroid film dried up. Sadly his collection of celebrity autographed snaps of stars done on his Polaroid camera over 30 years has begun to fade just as he was getting into his stride.

And missing on Sunday was Richard Simpkin and it took a perusal of the UK Guardian newspaper to remember what he told us as we went into a party a few months ago-a gallery was having an exhibition of his photographs of he and various celebrities. In Liverpool in the UK of all places.

Simpkin published  a book of these photos Richard & Famous about 5 years ago and it's difficult to contemplate who would actually want a book of a stranger with a variety of famous people (most champing at the bit to flee from him). He admitted there were still boxes of them under his bed. He's bound to have carted a few to the UK.

Is it art, an obsession, an illness, creepy, weird ?. Who knows? The comments section following the newspaper's article says all these things.
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Now the Guardian is getting in on the act and is requesting their readers to send in their own 'brush with fame' snaps (they'll be sorry !) with a prize of-wait for it- a ticket to the 'VIP' opening night of Richard's Liverpool exhibition in January (bus fare included).

All photographs by Richard Simpkin (and assorted passersby)

Elton John Goes Potty

The Hope Estate in the beautiful Hunter Valley produces not only excellent wines but has become the venue of choice for visiting performers including Neil Diamond, The Who, Whitney Huston, James Taylor and Carole King. Last week Dolly Parton sang there and this weekend Elton John gives two concerts.

Any excuse to visit the Hunter should be grabbed and vintner Michael Hope by combining with promoters like Michael Chugg has won big time with this concept and is cleaning up. Over the past year he has built a brand new amphitheatre and early next year has George Michael and Rod Stewart in his line-up of star acts.

Hope Estate

Now the local Cessnock Council wants in on the action. Visitors to the Hunter always marvel at the glorious landscape but the roads are a real shocker and full of potholes. Over the past month the council has taken heed of local’s complaints and has been discussing a $50,000 levy to be charged to the concert promoters which would add an extra $3 to ticket prices.

The powerful Tourism Transport Forum says it’s an “absolutely appalling” idea : “you have a council that’s reaped a benefit from having a vineyard on its doorstep for decades and now it wants to tax people for having fun”, seemingly ignoring the notion that Hope has now over taken the Sydney Entertainment Centre for staging large concerts.

Small local business owners are backing the council and one who wished to remain anonymous and who says he represents 30 others told the Shuttle today:

“We have no problem with the Hope Estate concerts but they bring an extra 35,000 people to the Hunter on concert days and few other businesses see a benefit from that. The visitors spend all day at the Hope Estate which controls all their spending. Food and drinks must be purchased at Hope. Hampers cost about $100 and some tickets cost up to $699. The thousands of extra buses and cars are causing havoc on the already creaking roads and we are expected to subsidize the roads for Hope”

Looks like this one may be destined for the courts.

Kylie-Then and Now

Australia's beloved singing budgie Kylie Minogue has been inducted in the ARIA Hall of Fame yesterday at the annual Aria Awards at the Olympic Park (in fact we all deserve an award for schlepping out to that park),

The award was presented by PM Julia Gillard who met Kylie earlier this year in Japan at a fundraiser for victims of the tsunami  disaster.

Nice to see the former Neighbour's star who is ginormous in her adopted Britain has returned to her natural blond look after appearing last week on X-Factor with dark hair.

Not Such Happy Feet 2

Every time the Shuttle has encountered film director George Miller over the past few years he has been wearing his 'lucky shirt'- a black silk number with three embroidered red peppers. Sadly it looks like his luck is waning of late.

After the brilliant success of the Oscar winning Happy Feet, the charming cartoon film about penguins, it's successor Happy Feet 2 has opened  in the USA with dismal takings of only $22M which doesn't bode well for it's future success.

Most reviewers are praising the 3D effects in the kid's movie but the bad box office takings are creating spin off damage. It's rumoured around 200 staff will be laid off at Miller's Sydney animation studios based in the magnificent art deco Metro Theatre in Kings Cross.

Further rumours are flying around that Miller's new Mad Max movie Fury Road could be in trouble. The flick is the fourth in the series and will star Tom Hardy and Charlize Theron. The first three shot Mel Gibson to international stardom .  
Fury Road has already had some major hick-ups with an 2003 starting date with the late Heath Ledger in the lead role being cancelled followed by shooting in Namibia being post-poned because of the Iraq invasion.

Now pre-filming which was to start in a few weeks outside Broken Hill where many scenes from the first 3 films were shot has been abandoned.  Recent and unusually heavy rains have transformed the desert which doubled as a post nuclear war terrain into a green paradise !.
Location managers are desperately looking for a similar area in Australia. They could always try Maralinga in SA which is a real-life post-nuclear frontier. Seven giant nuclear bombs and hundreds of smaller ones were exploded there between 1955 and 1963 making it the most nuclear bombed country on the planet. 

Kerri-Anne Lashes Out

Kerri-Anne

Jo Cassamento & Ronan Keating

It was fairly gloomy day yesterday- grey skies and intermittent rain. The atmosphere outside perhaps reflected that inside at the chic Darlinghurst restaurant Spic I Am where around 40 friends and production staff gathered for a farewell lunch for TV's daytime queen Kerri Anne Kennerley who has been dumped after a nine year run at Channel Nine.

Spice I Am owners Padet Nagsalab and Sujet Saenkham are pals of Kerri-Anne and the restaurant's chef had appeared many times on her programme. They laid on a sumptuous Thai banquet and champagne for the crew to drown their sorrows.

But things took are a dramatic turn when Kerri-Anne heard of one guest who had been invited-the top columnist from the Sunday Telegraph Jo Cassaamento. It seems Jo had a written a piece about Kennerely in the past which she didn't like.

A hapless publicist was dispatched to telephone Cassamento and rescind the invitation to lunch. The Shuttle gathers the publicist received a right royal roasting from Jo. I'm sure we'll read all about this Sunday !

As for Kerri-Anne, rumours are that there is already an offer in the pipeline from another network. Not that she needs the work. Hubby John Kennerley, who with partners started Littlewoods Pools in the UK is loaded.

Reece Mastin's Victory

When the Shuttle encountered X-Factor contestant Reece Mastin 5 weeks ago at Sony's Wharf4Ward charity fundraiser at the Finger Wharf in Woolloomooloo we asked him if he was going to win. "No" was the answer.

Britain's biggest selling tabloid agrees with the Shuttle

But just as with young Jack Vidgen who won Australia's Got Talent, we already knew what Reece did not, and what a handful within a tight circle did. Sony Music was so convinced that the ex-Scunthorpe lad would pick up the gong, plans were already in place to set Reece's career into high gear the day after the contest ended.

And so it came to pass. Sony are banking on the 17 year old (his birthday is today) to become a major world-wide rock star and they are pulling out all the stops. As of today, his first release Good Night is the number one itunes download. His album will be released on Dec 9th. Listen below to Good Night:

It's Raining Men

Joel & his Great Gastby look

The Sydney Opera House-splendid in the sunshine, gloomy in the rain. It bucketed down tonight at GQ’s Men Of The Year Awards.  We didn’t let that stop us attending yet another red carpet shindig where nice statuettes are handed out at another excuse for a celebrity turn out.

Maybe not quite as celeb heavy as the UK awards in October with Johnny Depp, Keith Richard, Duran Duran and Bradley Cooper, or the LA awards with winner Jay-Z, Justin Timberlake, and Michael Fassbender.

We did have Jack Thompson, Alex O’Loughlin, Rachel Taylor and this year’s Man Of The Year-Joel Edgerton who is currently filming in Baz Luhrmann’s The Great Gatsby (in glorious 3D) around Sydney.

Xavier Samuel at GQ

Jay-Z

Rachel Taylor

Speaking of which-I wish Baz would choose his dates better when filming around Centennial Park (which is standing in for Long Island in the movie). Last Saturday, trying to get to Paspaley Pearl’s Polo In the Park was a nightmare with streets blocked off and hundreds of sightseers hoping to glimpse Leo DiCaprio (he was only there on Thursday but you can catch him bike riding through Centennial Park in the afternoons. But not in 3D)

Geoffrey Rush In Drag-and he's Brilliant!

Our favourite Oscar winner Geoffrey Rush is appearing as Lady Bracknell in Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest and he's brilliant!.

Rush is receiving rave reviews and is being compared favourably with previous notable efforts, the two Queens of the stage  Dame Edith Evans and Dame Judi Dench.


The Australian's Chris Boyd says "Geoffrey Rush does something far more interesting and exhilarating in the role. He plays Lady Bracknell perfectly straight. There's not the slightest hint of travesty in his performance, nor is there any obvious striving for effect. Rush is engrossing to watch and, of course, to listen to"

Anne-Marie Peard  in The Age says : "It's gorgeous and fun and the joy of watching our Geoffrey is worth a leg cramp.And none frock up more magnificently than Rush. Treating the text like music, he doesn't miss a beat or a grace note and his restrained and refreshingly straight Lady B lets her power comes from more than her age and position. "

The Melbourne Theatre Company's Importance of Being Earnest plays until the 14th January 2012 and is almost sold out.
Rush to their website now : www.mtc.com.au   and put your name down for tickets !

Royals and Aristos

Chance Lodge

Few guests at photographer Susie Hagon’s book launch last week at the Wagner Gallery knew who the lady in black was although her companion, Hal Salter from Melbourne  in his jaunty red jacket and shoes is a regular sight at racetracks around the country.

Hal Salter & The Duchess of Welbergen

She was the grandly titled Her Grace Stephanie Alesandra Duchess of Welbergen who was visiting from Goornong near Geelong in Victoria where she has recently set up home with her husband David Martin.

Stephanie is a former New York stockbroker born in San Francisco and what a home she has settled in-it’s the imposing mansion with the Roman columns, known as Chance Lodge that comes with a horse stud and until recently, was the home of The Voice, John Farnham

John sold up in 2009 for a reputed $2M and sadly a fire in 2010 gutted the house which the Duchess is now about to set right.

The Voice

As Stephanie recently told the Bendigo Advertiser :“I’m very excited to rise to the challenge,” Stephanie says on renovating and re-decorating the landmark six-bedroom homestead. “It’s going to be absolutely stunning when it’s done, although I know it’s a lot of work.

Stephanie met her first husband while at University in Greece. She eloped with Rudolf Van Welbergen, the duke and married at 19.

Unfortunately the union only lasted 2 years and her mother-in –law frowned on Stephanie because of her ‘commoner’ status. All that is about to change as she and David become Chance Lodge’s master and mistress with no doubt, the grand property becoming the social focal point of the town.

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Mary & Frederick of Denmark at Bondi's Sculpture by The Sea

Zebras by The Sea

One former commoner who has become a great hit is HRH Princess Mary of Denmark. She and husband Prince Frederick attended Bondi’s Sculpture By The Sea today and spent a couple of hours wandering amongst the strange objects, chatting to locals and accepting the odd posy of flowers from little girls.

The Full Monte

TWO late arrivals at the Mother Of All Balls last week had all eyes swivelling in their direction.
Not just because one was the ample bossomed party girl Sharon Sargeant who became something of an Internet star in India when her picture from the same event last year was featured in the Times Of India newspaper, but it was also her seemingly new partner, an inscrutable looking gentleman in a rather magnificent robe that drew many comments

Even the Shuttle, well used to seeing the world's most famous private eye Frank Monte around town was momentarily fooled and thought Sargeant had found a new paramour.

Monte's superb disguise  fooled all, particularly as he wandered the room nodding and saying hello to various friends who looked perplexed at the sight of the stranger greeting them.

It was possibly the best costume of the night. According to one guest  the ball's mastermind actress Rachel Ward voiced that opinion whilst her husband, actor and producer Bryan Brown noted that the cloak Monte wore would be ideal for a feature film he had in mind.

Monte's robe was an amazing original Emperor's gown from the Shang Dynasty (3000 years ago) which normally hangs in a case on a wall in his New York office.

"When I heard that the theme was Shanghai Chic I thought it was the prefect outfit even though Shanghai didn't actually exist when this ceremonial gown was created. I bought in Paris 25 years ago and it was authenticated by the National Palace Museum in Taipei. They've said when the time is right, they would love to add it to their collection of Chinese antiquities which is the best in the world."

Until then, Monte is having the cloak crated and shipped back to New York,.

There are over 20 sponsor marquees at today's Polo In The Park at Centennial Park but most action is expected to be happening around the Paspaley Pearls tent. The event has become increasingly popular since it began in 2006.
Brisbane held the first matches last week followed by Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth.
All eyes will be on the star attraction- handsome young Argentinian player Baron Jakob Von Plessen.