Paper Monitor
11:17 UK time, Friday, 21 November 2008
A service highlighting the riches of the daily press.
Paper Monitor may still be sniffling, but the box of tissues has been moved from the sofa to the desk and normal service is resumed today. Another gritty Brit doing his duty for his country is Guy Ritchie.
He and Madonna are expected to divorce today and the newspapers are obsessed with one fact - he doesn't want any of her £300m fortune. As he reportedly told the Mirror: "£10m? No thanks, I just want the boys." And with those words the heavenly angels started singing and St Guy was born.
His refusal to take her cash has made him a national hero in the papers. The good old Brit who knows that money isn't the most important thing in life, it's love. A reader's comment published in the Daily Mail sums it up: "How rare to hear of a man with such integrity in the celebrity world... he's a much better catch than her."
Yeah, take that you money-grabbing, fame-obsessed Yanks. Forget the fact he is worth £30m anyway, which is still enough money to have quite a nice lifestyle. But the only question in Paper Monitor's head is how did he make that much? Surely not from one good film made nearly 10 years ago? Answers on a postcard please.
The prize for running with an idea - and running, running, running - goes to the Times. It has absolutely exhausted a throw-away comment from the Mayor of London, Boris Johnson.
Talking about the average floor area of a home in the capital - just 77sq m - he said: "We're not Hobbits." Cue full-page spread and detailed, coloured graphic on Hobbit homes and why none of us will be living like Bilbo Baggins any time soon. Although with "whole rooms devoted entirely to clothes", according to paper, material girl Madonna might be tempted. Not the lovely Guy Ritchie, of course.
The Strictly/Sergeant story shows little sign of going away. In the Daily Mail today we are treated to a full-page comment piece from Today programme presenter John Humphrys. It details why he turned down the show twice and, in doing so, "made John Sergeant into a superstar". So, would he do it now? There's still no way. But don't be sad, the Strictly staff are probably on the phone to the lovely Guy Ritchie right now, booking him for next year.
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