Jeremy Corbyn is no stranger to the small screen after 40 years in politics, but with his parliamentary career on the slide he has made the jump onto the big screen.
We spotted the former Labour leader in the trailer for rapper and director Adam Beacon’s new film, Sumotherhood. The synopsis describes the movie as “a parody of the UK urban genre”.
Frowning through a pair of specs and wearing a brown fiddler cap, Corbyn appears for a couple of seconds to deliver the line: “Allow it, wasteman.”
It is not clear if he is playing himself or a fictional character, but his wardrobe looks unchanged from his days as Labour leader.
There are some other surprise cameos along with Corbyn. Ed Sheeran, Jennifer Saunders and Denise Van Outen are all trailed to appear.
SUMOTHERTRAILER. From the mind of Adam Deacon comes #SUMOTHERHOOD, in cinemas October 13. Watch the official trailer now. pic.twitter.com/lUlF9BgHTA
— Sumotherhood (@sumotherhood) August 30, 2023
While this is Corbyn’s first cameo, it is Sheeran’s sixteenth. The singer played himself in Bridget Jones’s Baby and Yesterday, and portrayed an alien in Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker.
Deacon had a breakout role playing Jay in Kidulthood and Adulthood, two gritty crime dramas set in inner London. It seems that Sumotherhood, with its similar name, will riff off these films.
Corbyn has been MP for Islington North since 1983. The Labour party has barred him from standing as its candidate in the constituency, meaning he is likely to lose the seat to Labour at the next general election. Corbyn and his allies have hinted that he could stand as an independent candidate or, perhaps, run for Mayor.
007 is a centrist dad
What are James Bond’s political views? When Ian Fleming dreamt him up in the 1950s, the spy lamented the decline of the British Empire. But according to a new Bond novel authorised by the Fleming estate, 007 is a centrist dad.
On His Majesty’s Secret Service, by Charlie Higson, follows Bond as he tries to foil a Right-wing plot to disrupt the coronation of “King Charles the Woke”. In the novel, Bond places himself “in the centre”. “He disliked anybody, and any movement, that was too ‘far’ in any direction,” Higson writes. “If that made him bourgeois, if that made him dull and mainstream, then so be it.”
Is PM about to mend his ways — and take his trousers down?
He wants to be seen as tough on crime, but what about crimes against fashion? Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s trousers have been under fierce scrutiny again this year. He has attracted the ire of menswear commentators the world over for the short and slim tailoring of his bottoms, with the formidable Derek Guy repeatedly calling out his “bad tailoring”.
But apparently the PM is planning to mend his ways before a General Election — he was spotted over the weekend at an agricultural show in his Yorkshire constituency sporting some uncharacteristically lengthy slacks.
Sunak’s go-to tailors at Henry Herbert have defended his choices thus far. The company’s owner, Alexander Dickinson, recently told the Standard: “If you are a young guy in the city, you are looking for something more cropped and slimmer on the bottom.” Sunak used to work for Goldman Sachs. So is that where he picked up his bad habits?
