CONTENTS 07/14
IN THE BAG p47

The British styling of,
yes, Ralph Lauren
025
01
whip The sound of men Hell on
wheels Making an honourable woman
of Maggie Gyllenhaal Michael B
Jordan after The Wire Pulp non-ction
REGULARS Jack White in black and white
Getting intimate with a Sex Pistol
Wheres your daddy? A short and
AA GILL
sweet piece on Katy Perry One last
Take a deep breath. No, not that deep.
thing its Sam Riley
And why you should get out more

STYLE 086 WHAT IVE LEARNED

029 Put your foot down The items that
Matt LeBlanc on the making of a Friend
THE BEAT THAT
Chris Pine would beam aboard the
OUR HEART
USS Enterprise Lost in the liquor 146 OBJECT OF DESIRE
SKIPS p73
Costa Azzurra, by Tom Ford: the sweet
cabinet Jeremy Langmead is ready
smell of a successful scent
for anything Set the right tone this
summer Smell for leather Even
better than the real ting The best
specs under the sun Ralph Lauren
has designs on Britain Why theres HOW HES DOIN p86
not enough road where were going
Time evolution Play for your
country Cook some o-the-grid
ANDREW ECCLES/AUGUST | DAVID RYLE | TOM VAN SCHELVEN

cuttlesh and squid Wrist action

What to take on holiday (and
what to take it in) Smoke em if
you got em Viva Las Vegas
Pool your resources

069 CULTURE
The book stack to pack The geeks
who inherited the Earth A rude
awakening And an even ruder
wardrobe Coming to a cinema near
you soon (and one reason why you
should run the other way) Colombian

13
CONTENTS 07/14 COVER

UP ALL HOURS p130

24s Kiefer Sutherland
in clothes you can
wear around the clock

CHARLIZE THERON

02
PHOTOGRAPHS
Terry Richardson
FASHION Leslie Fremar
CHARLIZE THERON WEARS

FEATURES THEMS FIGHTING WORDS p80

Newsstand edition: bodysuit,
by Stella McCartney.
Underwear, by La Perla.
Giles Coren learns the (very violent)
080 GILES COREN: TOUGH JEW ways of Krav Maga
Subscriber edition: jacket,
by Carven. Bra; garter;
The Esquire editor-at-large gets underwear, all by Kiki de
to grips with Krav Maga, the not-so- Montparnasse. Tights, by
ancient Jewish art of hit n run
098 SHOOTING FROM THE HIP Agent Provocateur
Cover star Charlize Theron is not to
088 CYCLING STYLE be tried with
How riding a bike got hip (and why
theres no excuse for being a badly
108 DOES THIS FAT PIG REMIND
dressed cyclist) YOU OF ANYONE?
Dan Davies on Peppa Pigs Daddy Pig,
the pot-bellied porker who is making
British fathers look silly
RAISING THE BAR esquire.co.uk
p88
How cycling gear 114 UNDER A CLOUD Esquire Weekly
took it up a notch Why Jamaicas recent track record
Available at
with drugs is making people question
Apple Newsstand
the records being broken on the track
twitter.com/
esquireuk

03 facebook.com/
esquiremagazine

FASHION
JON GORRIGAN | OLLY BURNS | CHRIS LEAH

122 HOW TO BEAT THE HEAT SUBSCRIPTIONS

Hollywood hard man Liev Schreiber
demonstrates how to keep your cool
when the mercury rises
If you want a limited-
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with a unique cover
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130 NIGHT AND DAY call +44 8448 481 601 and
quote reference 1EQ10394
Kiefer Sutherland in the wardrobe
you need for 24/7 living

14
 Alex Bilmes
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EDITORS LETTER 07/14
he night after my interview with this
T
months cover star, I headed west
from Hollywood, through an
electrical storm so spectacular it
appeared to be computer-generated,
to a party under a marquee in a
garden in lush, leafy Brentwood,
California. I took Esquires creative director, David
McKendrick, with me for amoral support and
I was glad I did. This was Oscar week and the guest
list was stellar, so it was important to my ego that
someone even less glamorous than me be present.
The rst person we bumped into, as we ordered
sti drinks, was Amy Adams, who it so happens
I interviewed last year. Amy, one of the best actors of
ALEX BILMES her generation and a kind, good woman, recognised
EDITOR-IN-CHIEF me straight away as somebody she once met
somewhere possibly in connection with something
or other to do with work or possibly not. Looking
not at all mystied, she smiled and said hey and how
was I? (Theres a reason these people win awards.)
We talked, of course, about the weather.
Amy made us feel, just for a moment, that we
belonged. (Possibly David less so, given she
denitely had no clue who he was, but I know I felt
better about things thanks to her.) Emboldened by
that and the vodka, next thing we knew we were
shaking hands with Sly Stallone, nodding to Oprah
Winfrey, beaming at Larry David and Serena
Williams and anyone else we could nd to beam
at. David (tsk!) let the side down by having his photo
taken, civilian-style, with Snoop Dogg, but in other
respects I think we managed to just about keep our
wits about us. At least, we werent rumbled and
Statuesque:
Oscar-winner thrown out. Perhaps sensing the powerful danger
Charlize Theron, of this happening, Sienna Miller another recent
on a pedestal interviewee, and another compassionate soul
ushered us to the smoking area, where we could
spontaneously combust without setting re to
Jerey Katzenbergs suit or Chlo Sevignys hair. of us seems a smidge unfair. And even if we are
Even surrounded by such extraordinary
creatures, Charlize Theron our reason to be in
town stands out, golden and statuesque. If ever
they were to sculpt a female Academy Award
trophy, in the event that Oscar demanded a sex
change, they should cast Charlize. She was huddled
in a small group including her boyfriend, Sean Penn.
Since wed seen each other the previous evening
(You again! said Sean not, I choose to believe, Daddy P, not least as a sedative for the under-ves.
unkindly) and also that Charlize I have met on earlier
occasions, these were people who knew exactly
who we were and what we were up to. (OK, they
knew me; David, not so much.) Id like to insert a gag
here about how that made them far less pleased to
see us than Amy had been, but that wouldnt be
fair. Sean and Charlize are charming. And yes, I do
know they are also among the best actors of their
generation. And they, too, have won awards.
Take care of those babies, Charlize told me,
referring to my kids, as we said our farewells. I told
What would Sly Stallone do in this
situation? Or Snoop Dogg?
LATE-BREAKING AWARDS NEWS! Esquire has received a record six nominations for the 2014 PPA Awards (its like the Oscars, minus the famous
20 people). Congratulations to David McKendrick (Designer of the Year), AA Gill (Columnist), Giles Coren, Dan Davies and Tim Lewis (all
nominated for Writer of the Year) and Kate Moss (Cover of the Year). If anyone deserves it, she does.
her to do the same for her little boy. And with that
we made a sharpish exit, before we could entirely
besmirch the good name of this great magazine.
Charlizes summoning of my small children at
this moment of high excitement was timely.
Because if ever a man needs his feet replanted on
Planet Earth having become detached from his
roots, its mention of his kids thatll get the job done.
(David, who is miraculously childless, so far
as we know, has me to do this for him for now.)
And so it proved the following afternoon, when
I landed back in London. What did you get me?
wondered Penelope, age four-and-a-half, without
looking up from her iPad, as I squeezed my jet lag
through the front door. Before I could put my
suitcase down I noticed a smear of dark liquid on
the kitchen oor. Oscar, Penelopes little brother,
had somehow cut a gaping hole in his foot. What
would Sly Stallone do in this situation? Or Snoop?
I ran around ineectually for a while, then bundled
him into his car seat, a towel wrapped around his
toes, and continued my journey from Beverly Hills
to Heathrow Terminal 5 to Central Middlesex A&E,
without passing bed, shower or fridge.
Silly Daddy! Penelope said, when I made it
home again, hung and pung, to discover I was
now running late to take her mother to a concert on
the other side of town, which I had forgotten about
until just that moment. Gah!
Silly Daddy!, for those of you without small
children, is the catchphrase of Peppa Pig, a
princess-y little cartoon porker whose father, Daddy
Pig, has become perhaps the most divisive TV
paterfamilias since Homer Simpson rst burped
up a Du Beer. Im afraid Ive been rather down on
Daddy Pig in my discussions with fellow fathers in
the Esquire oce. The notion that the modern
British dad is by denition a lazy, inept, corpulent
gure of fun while certainly conrmed by some
liable to fall snoringly asleep in front of the football
now and then, theres no need I can see to show us
up so cruelly in front of our kids. At least allow
us to enjoy these few years of grace, before they
discover, crestfallen, what brutish berks we are.
Dan Davies, Daddy Pig to Iris and Albert, takes a
more benign view of the bum-ued blunderer than
I do. In this issue he makes a compelling case for
On that one point, Ill concede, he has his uses.
Giles Coren, of Mother & Baby magazine
fame, has previously written sparklingly in these
pages about fatherhood. This month, he turns
to another subject dear to all mens mag readers:
mindless violence. I once read a book called
Tough Jews, by Rich Cohen. Supercially, its
about Brooklyn mobsters. Really its about
exploding the stereotype that Jewish men are
all nerdy intellectuals: clever and funny but not
strong, certainly not dangerous. Krav Maga, the
system of self defence that Giles is studying,
silences that old lie as eectively as the Murder,
Inc hoods in Cohens book did their enemies.
Giles is a tough Jew now. If only he were clever
and funny as well, hed be terrifying.
GETTY
CONTRIBUTORS 07/14

GILES COREN JIM MERRETT

TERRY
RICHARDSON
Perhaps the most
distinctive of the handful
of photographers who
dominate international
magazine editorial and
advertising pages, for
his latest Esquire cover
Richardson shoots Charlize
Theron. Ive worked with
Charlize before and she
is always incredible, he
says. Shes one of my
favourite actresses. Such
a pleasure to work with!
Known for his provocative
take on fashion and celebrity,
Richardson is working on
a 20-year retrospective,
to be published in 2015.
Taking up the Jewish self- One thing that puts a lot
defence system Krav Maga of people o cycling is RICHARD MOORE
was very much something the thought of turning up Jamaicas Champs is
I did for myself, not for the to the pub dressed like a perhaps the worlds oldest
sake of writing a piece, sweaty, uorescent dork, school sports event and
says the Esquire editor- says Esquires deputy almost certainly the biggest
at-large. Unless you are chief copy editor, who this and most bonkers, says
from the Inland Revenue, in issue investigates the rise journalist Moore, who makes
which case I did it purely for of cycling chic. But all of a his Esquire debut this month.
journalistic reasons and will sudden, bike gear is more I went to Kingston a sceptic
be claiming all course and Merckx than merde. I wanted and returned disturbed by
equipment fees o tax. (We to nd out how on Earth the failings of Jamaicas
martial arts Jews may have that happened. When our anti-doping system, but
to register our hands as lethal resident bike nut is not encouraged by the talent
weapons, but we can still be carving his way around evident in the young athletes.
smart about our accounting.) London at terrifying speed, Moore is working on a
A celebrated critic and Merrett helps oversee book about the Jamaican
columnist for The Times and quality control across sprinting phenomenon, due
a well-known broadcaster, Esquire. In other words, if in 2015. His latest book,
Coren recently nished you spot any inaccuracies tape: Untold Stories of the
lming a six-part food show in or infelicities, blame him. Tour de Frances Dening
Canada and the US. His book Stages (Harper Collins)
How to Eat Out (Hodder & is available now.
Stoughton) is available now.

AA GILL DAN DAVIES

If you ask Esquires resident
agony uncle a question,
youre going to get a straight
answer. The purpose of
advice, he explains, is to
nd out what people really
want and make sure they get
it good and hard. Uncle
Dysfunctionals patients
have their fair share of
complex quandaries, and
dealing with their issues
has only conrmed me in
JON GORRIGAN
With 24 nally back on
our screens (and shot in
London), it seemed only
right to borrow its leading
man for this months fashion
pages. Kiefer Sutherland
played my ultimate school
bully Ace Merrill in Stand
by Me, photographer
Gorrigan says. He was a
I had no idea Peppa Pig
would become such a big JAMES DIMMOCK
part of my life, says the It was great to shoot Liev
father of two young children Schreiber, says photographer
and editor of Esquire Weekly, Dimmock, who captured
who this month proles the actor and director for
the unlikeliest paternal a fashion story, page 122.
paragon of our age. And Ive known him for a couple
I was certainly not prepared of years. One of our rst
to nd myself turning into conversations was in a bar
Daddy Pig short-sighted, in New York. Liev mentioned a
overweight, useless at DIY, new TV pilot he was about to
rubbish at cooking, likes lying shoot. It was Ray Donovan, a
WORDS BY RACHEL FELLOWS

my misanthropy, says Gill.
The Vanity Fair and Sunday
Times writer is currently
working on a memoir.
real gentleman all day. He
possesses a quiet cool. Top
bloke! A respected fashion
photographer, Gorrigans
work has appeared in The
Guardian Weekend and Elle.
on the sofa the list goes great show and vehicle for his
on. Daviess long-awaited talent. Dimmock, whose work
book In Plain Sight: The Life has appeared in Rolling Stone,
and Lies of Jimmy Savile Entertainment Weekly and
(Quercus) is published in July. Interview, has recently shot
TV projects across the US.

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 AA G
ncle
is Esquires

Dys tional
You have nothing to fear but fear itself (and the fear of fear, it
turns out). What if your employer gets too close, and with a cigar?
And why life in the embassy isnt all a box of Ferrero Rocher

Dear Uncle Dysfunctional,
This anxiety thing that everyones on about;
theyre saying depression and breakdowns are
going up and that one-in-three people are going
to get mentalist, and there are call this number
warnings on the telly after every soap opera,
and the papers are full of suicides and how to
spot the symptoms guides. And the thing is,
its really got to me. I cant stop thinking about
anxiety and stress and bipolar depression and
stu, and sometimes I get out of breath with
worry. Its aecting my work and home life. Its
just concern about circular thinking, just round
and round and round my head. And sometimes
I cry about it with despair. Please, Uncle
Dysfunctional, can you help me?
Alex, via email
Oh, Alex. You dont know the half of it.
bitter and paranoid, I dont trust friends. I had
everything going for me, now I have everything
going from me. Dont print that, it sounds ip.
Look, do you think I could sue the shit out of him
in your country? God, Id love to see Bill (take
that out) get eight years in maximum security
with man muck dripping down his chin and a
Camberwell carrot up his derrire. I loved
Withnail and I. You Brits have such a weird sense
of humour. Maybe Ill come and live over there.
Do you have Richard E Grants phone number?
Hes cute, and funny.
Anon, via email
Dear Monica,
[To subs: change that to Shirley]
Look, Im not sure that the law works like the
National Health Service. I dont think you can just

Dear Uncle Dysfunctional,

Id rather not give my name but some time ago a
man a very powerful man jizzed all down the
Im not sure that
front of my dress. I had really good tits then.
And he committed what I think youd call an act
of gross indecency on me with a cigar and my
the law works
front bottom. Not the lit end, the sucked end. The
sucked end of both me and the cigar. Ha, thats like the NHS. I dont
a joke, which is inappropriate could you not
print that bit? Look, the thing is, he was my
employer and very charismatic sort of
think you can just
presidential. Every woman in the world wanted
turn up with a
ILLUSTRATION BY DAVID LAWRENCE

a piece of him and, you know, when he came on

to me it was like Wow, and I really couldnt, like,
say no. It was a long time ago now and hes still
a big shot, and my life is worse than shit. Im
mocked and hated, and I have all the bad things
festering case and
about celebrity and none of the good bits. I cant
get a job, I cant keep a boyfriend, I overeat, Im ask them to treat it
25
Agony
turn up with a festering case and ask them to treat
it, although an awful lot of hookers married to
Russians seem to get divorced here and if youre
going to sue a newspaper or a magazine, this is the
country to do it: not only do we have an unfree
press but very free libel laws. Anyway, dont sue a
newspaper. So, all things considered, youre going
to get as much satisfaction from the courts here
as you got from the powerful bloke down there.
You are, though, perfectly right. And, if its any
consolation, what happened to you is one of the
most disgusting and embarrassing pieces of
righteous public witch-hunting Ive ever seen.
The double standards were jaw-dropping. The
assumption of guilt on the behalf of the victim, and
the messianic desire to excuse the perpetrator
were appalling. The reaction of women who would,
in every other case, be wise, liberal and feminist
about sexual abuse and assault in the workplace
were, in this case, hypocritical and reprehensible.
Particularly as a lot of very attractive, successful
women chose to use you as a stick to beat other
girls who might want to use their sex to get on in
business rather than pointing out that it was the
boss who was using his sex to help women get
on in business. All of this is shaming for us in the
Western democracies because it makes us
look immoral, duplicitous, uncaring. And what
happened to you is a moral, cautionary tale for
our time. This is the horrible reality version of
Nathaniel Hawthornes The Scarlet Letter. By the
way, Richard E Grant is married. But that didnt
bother you last time.
Christ, have
you ever eaten
Ecuadorian food?
No wonder they
all go to be taxi
drivers in Chicago
26
Dear Uncle Dysfunctional,
Hello? Hello? Hello, is anyone there? Hello?
OK, so Ill leave a message. I would have sent
an email but the wi- down here is Neanderthal.
Look, its Julian Assange. Yeah, remember
me? Blond, good-looking in an intellectually
maverick sort of way. Well, Im still here. Still
here in the Ecuadorian embassy. Jesus, was
that a mistake. I might have chosen a slightly
bigger country with a slightly bigger embassy.
Anyway, water under the bridge. Im here and
Im grateful for their hospitality but, Christ,
have you ever eaten Ecuadorian food? No
wonder they all go to be taxi drivers in Chicago.
I was just thinking, things have been a bit quiet
recently. The phone doesnt ring. The emails,
when they bloody get here, are all updates from
East Coast Railways and newsletters from
Mr Porter. Look, Im not going anywhere, so why
would I want a skinny-t Hedi Slimane suit?
Time moves slowly and the worlds got the
attention span of, you know, an autistic
Australian. And then theres this guy Snowden
with all the hot new emails. You know, Ive got
emails still, way better than his. Ive got some
real bombshells from the Latvian embassy in
Guatemala but Snowdens the man, I know.
I dont think hes that good-looking, though.
Do you think hes that good-looking? Really,
the beard, the glasses? Anyway, I couldnt help
noticing that in your country some old DJs and
comedians were arrested over alleged dodgy
behaviour and not charged, and I thought,
Hey, what about me? A couple of Swedish
birds. Really? Who remembers? Its so long
ago now. Let bygones be bygones clean
sheet. I thought maybe we could start up an
Instagram/Twitter campaign thing with a
hashtag #BringOurHandsomeBlondAustralian
Home. You know, get some t models to hold up
signs, get a bit of groundswell trending thing
going. What do you think?
Julian, Knightsbridge, London
OK, Julian. Well get back to you.
Email questions for AA Gill to
agonyuncle@esquire.co.uk
For more AA Gill, go to esquire.co.uk
 STYLE
FASHION / GROOMING / TECH / FOOD / CARS
Edited by Teo van den Broeke

ESQUIRE
APPROVES
Green saffiano
leather driving
shoes, 395,
by Prada

The 01 02 03 04 05

Process
How to make Prada
driving shoes
(dont try The leather is cut by hand Rubber pebbles are All parts are mounted and Surplus leather is The vamp is double-
this at home) from a special stencil. inserted into the sole. stitched onto the last. removed from the last. stitched on by hand.
 STYLE
FASHION
02/23

THE LIST

Chris Pine photographed
for Esquire, Los Angeles,
April 2013
CHRIS
PINE
WHERE HE BOLDLY GOES,
AND WHAT HE TAKES THERE
Most men have, at one point
or another, dreamed of being an action
hero, but two action heroes? Thats
just greedy. One man whos made that
a reality is American actor Chris Pine,
though you might know him better
as Jack Ryan and/or Captain Kirk.
As if that wasnt enough, Pine is also
the face of Armanis range of Code
fragrances. Hes a good sport, too,
taking time to tell us which toothpicks
he prefers to use.

FOOD & DRINK TOOLS

WINE SPIRIT WATCH
Barolo Cannubi Oban whisky. Rolex Submariner.
Boschis by Luciano BEER SUBSCRIPTIONS
Sandrone, 1987. Asahi. The Atavist and
Its very deep DISH The New Yorker.
complex. And it Spaghetti bolognese. PENCIL
GROOMING STYLE changes over the SNACK No 2.
time you drink it. Cheez-Its. KNIFE
TOOTHPASTE JEANS Its like an art RESTAURANT Shun Cutlery.
Toms of Maine. Edwin. project thats Angelini Osteria PEN
SHAVING FOAM SHOES drinkable. in Los Angeles. Fountain pen.
Kent. Where to begin? The
MOISTURISER combat boots I got at
Argan oil. the Rose Bowl Flea
FACE WASH Market, and a pair that
Cetaphil. I like by Generic Man.
SHOWER GEL SUIT
Whatevers on hand. Armani or Ralph
SHAMPOO Lauren Purple Label.
Just water. SUNGLASSES
HAIR STYLING Persol or Ray-Ban.
Tancho wax. TIE
COLOGNE Rag & Bone or
Armani Code. Tom Ford.
TOOTHPICK BOXER SHORTS
Tea tree oil Couldnt even tell you.
toothpicks. SOCKS
Happy Socks.
SNEAKERS
Chuck Taylors black-
on-black high-tops.
WALLET
Dont have one.
TUXEDO
TECHNOLOGY HOME TRAVEL
Armani or Burberry. CAR CHAIR SUITCASE
HAT 1970 Mercedes 280 SL. I could talk about Rimowa.
I wear hats I get on CAMERA chairs all day. A George DESTINATION
movie sets, usually Canon 5D. Nakashima chaise. New York, Paris or
from the stunt team. PHONE LAMP Tuscany.
Like Vic Armstrong iPhone, but I miss One I found at the HOMETOWN
and his brother my BlackBerry. Goodwill (US charity Got to give it up to LA.
(renowned British TABLET shop chain). HOTEL
stuntmen), who iPad. DESK The Bowery Hotel, NY.
have Armstrong
YU TSAI

LAPTOP I designed it its SHOP

Action hats. MacBook. made of rosewood. John Lobb, London.

30
 0 -*) '%2 &) 4 ) 6* ) ' 8






 

 


  

  

   


REVIVE
YOUR
SPIRITS
THREE LONG-LOST COCKTAILS
WORTH BRINGING BACK TO LIFE
HARRYS BAR
1 JACK ROSE
45ml calvados/apple brandy
20ml gin
10ml French vermouth
10ml Italian vermouth
10ml grenadine
20ml lemon juice
20ml orange juice
SET: TOM ASHTON BOOTH I WEARESTUDIO33.COM
Words by Christopher Hirst | Cocktails mixed by Luca Missaglia at Quo Vadis
The irresistible urge for
cocktail innovation among
professional bartenders is
understandable, but the
results are often as tasteless
as their names. Why should
we drink the Banana Wacky
Baccy, Sminky Pinky or
Thermonuclear Daiquiri when
there are a host of forgotten
classic concoctions awaiting
our enthusiastic rediscovery?
The following potions are
among the best that ever
trickled from a silver shaker.
In his wonderfully-named
2012 exploration of Ernest
Hemingways cocktails,
To Have and Have Another,
2
LAST WORD
3
20ml gin
20ml maraschino liqueur
20ml lime juice
20ml green chartreuse
Philip Greene resurrects a
variant of the apple brandy-
based Jack Rose. He admits
being initially dubious about
the odd mix devised in the
Twenties at Harrys Bar in
Paris, where Hemingway was
a regular, but was instantly
won over. I was wrong,
Greene says. I love this drink.
The White Lady, a
venerable but excellent
mixture of gin, Cointreau and
lemon juice, gains oomph
with the addition of orange
juice in a drink called French
Sherbet. I found it in Le
Larousse des Cocktails, which
gives no more information on
FRENCH
SHERBET
20ml gin
20ml Cointreau
20ml orange juice
20ml lemon juice
STYLE
DRINKS
03/23
its origins at all other than
the name.
The assertive flavours
of the Last Word cocktail
should convert anyone who
(wrongheadedly) regards fruit
sours as a bit on the girly
side. Lauded in Jason
Wilsons excellent 2010 book
Boozehound as a thinking
persons drink, a drink with
swagger, it was invented
during the Prohibition era
at the Detroit Athletic Club,
which sounds like our kind
of sports club.
JUST THE
ONE, THANKS
All quantities quoted will
make a single drink and, of
course, should be shaken
vigorously with ice and
strained before pouring
and enjoying
33
 STYLE
FASHION
04/23

carrying a business briefcase. I looked Mr Got-All-The-Kit started waving his

like his dad. Or a perv.
I need to conjure up an outfit that
works for both scenarios boardroom
and bar or keep a change of clothes
at the office and, each evening as
I run out, morph from Clark Kent into
THE STYLE COLUMN Superman. Well, Superman is being a
arms frantically in the air and had to be
rescued by an attendant boat. Hed got
cramp. Ha!
No, I need a kit that says I may
have done a spot of cardio and met
a dumbbell or two before, but I know Im
not at the level where people are going

JEREMY
tad optimistic, but to help on that front to clap with admiration if I wander past
Ive joined a gym. Yet another outfit in a sleeveless vest carrying a protein

LANGMEAD
HOW TO DRESS
FOR ANY OCCASION
(AND THE GYM)
Im at work, at Christies, wearing a
suit, knitted tie and a pair of expensive
shoes. I bought the shoes recently
and theyre of the type, fashionable
right now, that look as if youve owned
them for decades: the polish is uneven
and they appear a little scuffed. I love
the shoes but, earlier in the day, when
I met a new colleague for the first time
a colleague not familiar with the
fashion world I became conscious
that hed have thought it odd that Id
made such an effort to look smart that
morning but had clearly forgotten to
to keep in the office; yet another set
of clothes to worry about. Gym tribes
actually deserve a whole column to
themselves, but once again Im trying
to navigate a happy medium: I dont
want to go down the baggy, ill-fitting,
Napoleon Dynamite-does-a-workout
look, but neither do I want to appear
as if I take it too seriously with a whole
load of high-tech, high-performance,
too-tight ponce-wear.
A couple of years ago, I foolishly
signed up for a triathlon. On the
morning of the event, as we prepared
to swim, the competitor next to me laid
out his super-expensive, semi-pro
equipment and made lots of impressive
grunts and stretches as we waited for
Trust a pro: the start whistle. Jesus, I thought,
Home, gymnasium Im never going to be able to compete
or work, Steve
with guys like this. The whistle
McQueen shows
went, everyone dived in and then, lo
drink (incidentally, why do protein drinks
smell of poo?). For the moment
and if you see me in the gym do say
if you think it looks rubbish I am
opting for a low-key Saturdays Surf
NYC cotton jersey T-shirt (which looks
like I found it in the cupboard, in a good
way), Nike x Undercover Gyakusou
running shorts (high-tech fabric with
an unfussy design), Nike Flyknits
(off-duty sneakers that work for the
gym), and a pair of Hanro sweatpants
(they have usefully deep pockets for
secret stashes of Haribo).
Next week, Im in New York and a
friend is dragging me to the hot new
fitness craze in town: Mitchell Waynes
class at Chelsea Studios. This intense,
60-minute, cardio-dance workout sees
you learning the moves to a different
Beyonc promo video each session.
Oh dear. At least its unlikely Ill bump

GETTY
how to dress
put my work shoes on. Im discovering for the job and behold, halfway across the lake into a colleague from Christies.
that some elements of my previous
career in fashion retail do not travel
well into the current one in art.
Its sometimes tricky trying to fit in
sartorially with an auction house soon
to celebrate its 250th anniversary
with a wardrobe bought from
a menswear website thats just
celebrated its third. The other
dilemma, which I predicted might
happen, has already raised its head:
how to pop straight out from work
to meet a mate and not look as
if I am going to attempt to sell him
a mortgage (or a painting).
Last week, a young actor friend
asked if I fancied seeing a movie at
the IMax that evening. It had been
a long day and the thought of some
celluloid escapism was a tempting
one. It turned out hed bought us both
tickets to watch, on the giant screen,
a film starring...er, himself. If I was
a handsome movie star, I suppose
I would watch myself endlessly on the
big screen, too. However, the problem
was that while he was wearing skinny
jeans, sneakers, a leather jacket and
a baseball cap (in case anyone in
the audience spotted Noahs son was
actually in Row G and not on the ark),
I was wearing a suit and tie and

34

  


  

     


 
  






  


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    !   " ! $!   ! &
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 STYLE
FASHION

05/23

295, by Alfred Dunhill

,
1

From
 STYLE
FASHION
06/23

350, by Burberry

2
Mint green cotton-mix jacket,
225, by Richard James 1,180, by Corneliani

3 4 SEE STOCKISTS PAGE FOR DETAILS

cat lk
38
  
   
       
           


  



 STYLE
GROOMING
07/23

LEATHER
REPORT
ACQUA DI PARMAS NEW SCENT
Colonia Leather
ISNT ONE FOR HIDING by Acqua di
Parma, 185
for 180ml

AVAILABLE AT HARRODS HARRODS.COM

 STYLE
FOOD
08/23

BEST
E
FOR TH T
ICIES
SP S
BURGER

ISLAND
FLING
LONDONS HOTTEST
NEW TREND: SPICY
CARIBBEAN COOKING
Time was, the only place you could
source any jerk chicken worth
squawking about was once a year at
Notting Hill Carnival. Now, thankfully,
BOOM BURGER
a swathe of hip new Caribbean-inspired Recently opened at the bottom of Portobello Road in prime Carnival territory, Boom Burger isnt much to look at from the
outside, but once youre in the cooking aromas will have you hooked. Start things off with a barrel of ginger-laced rum
joints have opened up across the
punch then opt for a plate of crispy, spicy jerk chicken wings followed by one of the house burgers. The jerk chicken
capitals centre, for those in need of option piled high with the fiery stuff is a stand out, but the eponymous, cheese-smothered Boom Burger is worth
a hit of the hot stuff. Heres our pick a shout, too. Be sure to ask for extra bacon jam its better than it sounds. boomburger.co.uk
of the best.

BEST FOR RUM PUNCH BEST FOR PATTIES

DUB JAM JAMAICA PATTY CO
Smack bang in the middle of buzzing Less a sit-down affair, more of a lunchtime
Covent Garden, Dub Jam is a tiny pit-stop spot, this hole in the wall in Covent
barbecue shack with a particularly Garden serves up the Jamaican version of
strong line in rum punch and pina Cornwalls famous pasties, and theyre
coladas. The vibe is relaxed, so be delicious. Generously stuffed with jerk
prepared to wait for a table its chicken, prawns, saltfish and the best by
worth it. The sweet potato fries are far curried goat, theyre authentic and
spicy and crispy, while the 28-day filling. Finish things off with a slice of boozy
aged beef burgers are absolutely Tortuga Rum Cake and waddle back to your
enormous. What more could you want? desk with a grin on your face.

dubjam.co.uk jamaicapatty.co.uk

BEST FOR SEAFOOD BEST FOR JERK CHICKEN

THE RUM KITCHEN NEGRIL
Originally opened in Notting Hill, The Rum Not new, this, but it would be a
Kitchen has extended into Soho with a new travesty to miss it off the list.
branch on Carnaby Street. The drinks are the A Brixton institution, Negril serves
WORDS BY TEO VAN DEN BROEKE

real winners here (unsurprisingly) but the food some of the best Caribbean food
holds its own against the booze. Start with in London. The jerk chicken is the
a plate of the island-spiced baby squid and the winner here, just be sure to come
sturdy saltfish fritters before tucking into the prepped with an empty stomach
soft-shell crab burger never has a crustacean and an asbestos mouth. Oh, and
tasted so good. a thirst for Red Stripe.

therumkitchen.com negrilonline.co.uk

42

 





  
 

 



    


 
 

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 STYLE
FASHION

DC 09/23
Vintage
tortoiseshell,
185

RAISE YOUR
SUNGLASSES
See more styles at
eyerespect
direct.com

Rufus
Matte black
and crystal,
185

Paul
Havana
tortoiseshell,
185

 STYLE
FASHION
10/23

TRUE
BRIT
RALPH LAUREN ON
HIS TRANSATLANTIC
STYLE INFLUENCES
Think of Ralph Lauren and youll
almost certainly envision the stars
and stripes rather than the Union Jack.
However, Lauren is influenced by British
style as he is by that of his native US,
if not more so.
England has always inspired my
style and designs, and my respect for
Tan Vachetta leather Cooper bag,
things that have a quality the more they 4,290, by Ralph Lauren
are worn, Lauren says. The British
have a true appreciation for heritage
and tradition. In the US, if you discovered
a hole in a sweater, you threw it out.
In England, you put a patch on it and
passed it on to your son.
This has always inspired me as
I design collections, as Im about things
that you own and keep, that you
cherish. I also like the diversity of
wearing different things you can wear
a wonderful luxury blazer or jacket with
a utility pant or denim and I believe a
look like that is the essence of what
style means today.
We asked the designer to select
five pieces from his latest collections
that best embody a British influence.
Heres his pick.
ralphlauren.co.uk Indigo cotton shawl-collar Cream/navy cotton/cashmere Wimbledon V-neck
cardigan, 780, by Polo Ralph Lauren tennis sweater, 415, by Polo Ralph Lauren
WEARESTUDIO33.COM

Brown leather Knowles jacket, Steel Sporting Automotive 45mm watch,

1,330, by RRL 8,800, by Ralph Lauren Watches & Jewellery

47


ESQUIRE
APPROVES
Maserati Ghibli
Diesel V6
maserati.co.uk
STYLE
CARS
12/23

49

A NATURAL SELECTION
IWC CELEBRATES THE EVOLUTION OF WATCHMAKING
Inspired by HMS Beagle, the brig-sloop which
transported Charles Darwin on his voyage to
the Galpagos Islands in 1832 (the vessels
portholes, nautical instruments and fittings
were all cast in corrosion-resistant bronze),
IWCs Aquatimer Chronograph Edition
Expedition Charles Darwin was a highlight
of this years SIHH Watch Fair in Geneva.
50
STYLE
WATCHES
13/23
Complete with 30-bar water resistance
(to 300m depth), this unique take on IWCs
classic Aquatimer is the first example of
bronze being used in the Swiss marques
timepi ces. Designed to take on a patina
and darkening hue over time, the watch
featur s a contrasting contemporary black
rubber strap, while the Darwin-inspired
theme continues on the case back, where a
portrai of the famed naturalist is engraved.
The watch also boasts a 68-hour power
WEARESTUDIO33.COM
reserve, a minutes and seconds stopwatch
function, date display and luminescent
bronze hands and indices on the matte
black dial, making it perfect for diving in the
Galpagos, or a dip in Guildford Lido. iwc.com
Photograph by Bruno Drummond
 Our members club Esquire+
Where subscribers can access unique opportunities, experiences and great offers from
some of Esquires favourite brands, plus exclusive giveaways and competitions

EXCLUSIVE SCREENING OF
NEW THRILLER COLD IN JULY
7PM, THURSDAY, 26 JUNE
AT MILLBANK CINEMA, LONDON
Set in Texas in the late Eighties,
Jim Mickles gripping noir thriller Cold
in July features a distinguished cast
including Don Johnson, Sam Shepard,
and Michael C Hall in his breakout film
role. Cold in July is set for release
across the UK on 27 June through Icon
Film Distribution.
Directed by Jim Mickle
How can a split-second decision
change your life? While investigating
noises in his house one balmy Texas
night in 1989, Richard Dane puts
a bullet in the brain of a burglar.
Although hes hailed as a small-
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fearing for his familys safety when
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into town, hell-bent on revenge.

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 STYLE
FITNESS

UP FOR
14/23

THE CUP Mane event:

three lions,
check
ESQUIRE PERSONAL TRAINER
HARRY JAMESON ON THE
ULTIMATE FIVE-A-SIDE KIT
The greatest sports show on Earth
is upon us, in the spiritual home of the
beautiful game. The long-awaited
World Cup in Brazil kicks off in earnest
on June 12. But you knew that.
While many have dreamed of joining
Messi or Ronaldo on the hallowed turf
of the Maracan, most of us are
restricted to weekly five-a-side with
random beer-bellied mates. That said,
theres no reason not to kit yourself
out in the latest gear to give you the
edge in those closely contested Power
League matches, or at least reduce
the risk of the dreaded pulled hammy. The shirt
So, get started with Esquires Brazil The 2014 England
2014 tribute five-a-side kit. Stadium shirt is
crafted from recycled
plastic bottles. (Other
nations are available.)
60 store.nike.com

The ball The boots The shorts

Brazuca Top Replique Nikes FC247 Bomba Again featuring Nikes
Adidass official Finale II TFs are great innovative Dri-Fit
World Cup ball. Curls, on astro turf and 3G technology, their rear
dips and swerves like pitches. Theyre also vents will keep you
no other, hopefully all super lightweight and cool though your
the way into the net. stylish to boot (sorry). local park is unlikely
20 adidas.co.uk 77 store.nike.com to be as hot as Brazil.
25 store.nike.com

The leggings The bag

The compression Sporting this Coach
technology built into nubuck tote bag,
Skins A200 long tights youll feel like a pro
increases blood flow, stepping off the team
aids recovery and bus and be the envy
helps prevent injury. of the locker room.
65 store.skins.net 645 uk.coach.com

Forget static stretches do your warm-ups on the move

ILLUSTRATIONS BY ALEX WALKER

Warm up properly to avoid Hamstring sweep Sprint start Walking lunges

injury. These are my three
favourite dynamic
stretches; do each for
6090secs after a 35min legs straight, bend at
light jog around the pitch.
Tweet any health and
fitness related questions
to me @harryjamesonPT
1 calf stretch
Place your left heel in
front of you, point Get into a sprint start
your toe up. Keep both h position but have
both feet togetherr.
the waist, sweep both h Push your hips up to
hands down your left the sky and alternate
ate
leg and past your toe. each heel down to
Repeat on the right. the ground.
2 3
Keep your body
upright, abs braaced,
and perform
walking lunges for
the full length of
the pitch,
alternating yourr
leading leg.

Photograph by Dan McAlister 53

 STYLE
FOOD
15/23

INK PASTA WITH

SQUID AND SAMPHIRE
SERVES 46
Samphire adds a pleasing summery crunch
to a pasta dish like this. You can serve this
hot or at room temperature and the black,
green and white colours look great together.
Ink pasta normally comes in fine cuts like
fettuccine or linguine.

1
MAN FOOD WITH

MARK HIX
CAST YOUR SEAFOOD NET WIDER AND
SERVE FRESH CUTTLEFISH AND SQUID
Everyones favourite seafood
seems to be squid, especially
eaten fresh somewhere hot. Im
also a big fan of cuttlefish, which
is much less popular in the UK
despite the fact it costs half
as much but is equally delicious.
Sadly, most British cuttlefish
is exported to countries that
are extremely adaptable, though
deep-fried, battered squid is the
most popular way of consuming
this cephalopod.
As with all seafood, always try
to buy squid fresh, as some of
that processed frozen stuff ends
up tasteless and chewy. Or buy
fresh squid and cuttlefish and
appreciate it more than we do. freeze it yourself, but be sure
You can replace squid with not to leave it in the freezer too
cuttlefish in any recipe and both long to avoid ruining it.

54 Photographs by Jason Lowe

 INGREDIENTS
Vegetable or corn
oil for deep-frying

600g cleaned
cuttlefish,
including tentacles
Table salt
200g Chinese
self-raising flour
1tbsp coarsely
ground or
mignonette black
pepper
Iced water to mix
1tbsp flaky
sea salt
12 chillies,
sliced thinly on
the angle

SALT AND PEPPER CUTTLEFISH

SERVES 46

This is a more sophisticated version of deep fried calamari

and Id rather eat this than the flabby stuff any time. Using
cuttlefish or squid, its a fantastic snack to go with
cocktails and also works just as well for a dinner party.

DIRECTIONS

1 | Pre-heat 8cm of oil dipping it in the batter and

to 160-180C in a thick-
bottomed saucepan
or electric deep-fat fryer.
2 | Cut the cuttlefish into
4-5cm by 1/2cm strips and
separate the tentacles, then
dry well on kitchen paper.
3 | With the flour in a mixing
bowl, whisk in enough iced
water to make a smooth
batter, then season with
some of the table salt and
add the cracked pepper.
Test a piece of cuttlefish by
frying till crisp. If the batter
is too thick or thin, adjust
accordingly with more water
or flour and add more salt to
taste. Fry the cuttlefish in
smallish batches depending
on how many youre cooking
for and keep the pieces warm
until its all cooked.
4 | When all the cuttlefish
is fried, toss it in the rest
of the sea salt and sliced
chillies and serve with a
spicy dipping sauce.

VE:
TO SER
c illi
h
Sweet ng
di i
pp
sauce

INGREDIENTS
DIRECTIONS
4 servings of
ink pasta
1 | Cook the pasta according to the manufacturers
100ml olive oil
instructions, then drain.
200g cleaned weight
2 | While the pasta is cooking, heat the olive oil
of squid with
in a pan, lightly shred the squid, season it and gently the tentacles removed
cook on a low heat with the chilli and samphire for and reserved
a couple of minutes, stirring as its cooking. 1tsp chilli flakes
3 | Remove from the heat, toss the squid mixture Salt and freshly
with the pasta, re-season if necessary and ground black pepper
squeeze the lemon juice over everything to taste. 100120g samphire,
Serve immediately. cleaned
The juice of a lemon

55

Withings Pulse
Tracks steps, distance travelled, calories burned, heart
rate and sleep. PROS: Detachable unit; dedicated app
visualises trends and improvements; clear light-up
readout; measures blood oxygen levels.
CONS: Sleep readings seem off. 90 withings.com
WORDS BY JOHNNY DAVIS
Photographs by Kat Pisiolek
STYLE
TECH
BEST
FOR
RUNNERS
Misfit Shine Personal
Activity Monitor
Tracks activities, calories burned, sleep quality. Pros: Clean
design; 50m water-resistance; syncs to smartphone/tablet,
no charging (four-month battery life). Cons: No charging
(four-month battery life). 100 misfitwearables.com
ARE YOU WITH
THE BAND?
ACTIVITY TRACKERS ANALYSED
More than 17m wearable devices, including
smart watches and fitness bands, are expected
to be sold this year. The best now aim to be
complete lifestyle monitors, tracking sleep and
encouraging you to chart food intake. To be
healthy, you have to think holistically, says
Harry Jameson, Esquires personal trainer.
Models like the Misfit Shine look sleek, but dont
do quite as much as the nerdier Fitbit, advises
Jason Jenkins, of tech site CNet. If youre serious TomTom Runner Cardio GPS Watch
about tracking your life, decide whats more Tracks pace, speed, distance, calories burned. Includes
important: how it looks or what it does? Any style built-in heart-rate monitor. PROS: Extra-large display;
and health-conscious Esquire reader stepping lets you train based on intensity, from low-tempo
warm-ups to high-intensity sprints; good interface.
into the market will, naturally, be keen on both.
CONS: A bit clunky for everyday wear. 250 tomtom.com
BEST
ALL-
ROUNDER
Jawbone UP24
Tracks activities, calories burned, food consumed, sleep
quality. PROS: Detailed sleep analysis (time to fall asleep,
number of wake-ups); Bluetooth syncing gives real-time
insights/updates; encourages progress sharing. CONS:
Fiddly to input food data into app. 125 jawbone.com/up24
57
 STYLE
NE WS

TRAVEL RIGHT
18/23

EXCESS LUGGAGE? NO ESSENTIALS FOR GENTLEMEN ON THE MOVE

CARTIER LEATHER
1 GOODS
Stylish luggage
to complement
your timepiece

Better known for piece is handcrafted

high-end timepieces from full-grain
than for producing leather finished with
man bags, French palladium hardware.
jeweller Cartier this To coincide with
month unveils an the launch of the
unsurprisingly chic collection, the brand
range of leather has also opened
goods. The Louis a new boutique on
Cartier Collection, New Yorks 59th
Caramel leather document
named after the Street. Spanning
holder, 2,250; 24-hour
marques founder, two floors, the
bag, 2,660; ebony leather
encompasses 13 flagship shop will document holder, 2,250;
pieces including not only house the card holder, 440, all
travel essentials, new leather by Louis Cartier
a weekend bag collection but also
and a briefcase, the full range of
plus a limited-edition timepieces, should Ebony leather
satchel and you fancy picking wallet, 660;
document holder. up a Tank or two portfolio,
Available in caramel while youre there. 1,020, both by
and ebony, each cartier.co.uk Louis Cartier

Flying the flag for

maritimers the world
over, yachting
apparel brand Paul
& Shark has this
2 PAUL & SHARK
Nautical gear that sends the right message 3
month unveiled LARSSON &
three new additions
to its S/S 14 Flag-print holdall, JENNINGS
collection. The 489; jacket, 395; X
capsule, consisting briefcase, 459, all
of a natty jacket, a by Paul & Shark WONG WONG
capacious holdall Watch the
and a pair of swim World Cup
shorts, plays on this
in style
season's pattern
trend, taking
inspiration from Far from the usual
brightly coloured sports tournament
nautical flags. From this Larsson & Jenn
the windbreaker X Wong Wong World
constructed from watch is refreshing
a technical nylon understated. A
blend (as good for an collaboration betw
afternoon hove-to in the Swedish watch
Cowes as for a wet brand and New
weekend in London), York-based design
to the holdall, which Steven Wong, it
is water-resistant features a dazzling
WORDS BY WILL GRICE | WEARESTUDIO33.COM

without looking it, white dial, an elega

the capsule is one gold-plated stainle
of the brand's steel case and a na
strongest offerings full grain leather st
to date. Ideal for So far, so subtle. Th
those who want to kicker? (Ho ho). Wo
have a go at the has etched a Brazil
pattern trend but flag-inspired logo o
can't quite pull off the case back in ho
Polynesian tribal of the Cups host na
print. In stores now. 280
paulshark.it larssonandjennings.com

58

  )%& 
 
'$
$  &        &)! )" )!  
$    '$' (((  

  
       
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 STYLE
TECH
19/23

LETS
TAKE THIS
OUTSIDE
WATCH YOUR SUMMER COOKING
GO UP IN SMOKE (IN A GOOD WAY)

Makers of coffee, perfume

and wine: youve given it your
best shot. But when it comes
to seductive aromas, theres
still nothing to beat the smell FOR MARK
of pulled pork slowly smoking HIXS SMOKED
over a charcoal grill. This
CHICKEN
summer, were going smoker
over traditional barbecue, RECIPE, GO TO
something sturdy and ESQUIRE.CO.UK
no-nonsense but still
versatile enough to allow
us to prepare amazing ribs,
burgers and lobster rolls.
Smokers come in all
shapes and sizes, starting
at around 20 for a basic box.
More professional models,
like Webers peerless Smokey
Mountain Cooker series, come
with built-in thermostats,
aluminium dampers
and water/drip pans to help ESQUIRE
regulate heat and humidity. APPROVES
When youre smoking
Weber 37cm Smokey
meat, you want fat, Mountain Cooker
says Brad McDonald, chef Smoker 300,
at Londons The Lockhart. weberbbq.co.uk
Its not always an easy sell
in these times of trendy diets
but the fact is the fat carries
the flavour. It also stops the
outer layer drying out.
At The Lockhart, we
smoke at low temperatures
110-135C in a low box.
Well take a piece of meat THANK YOU FOR SMOKING Not up to doing it yourself? We recommend these British venues
and lightly rub it with salt to
draw moisture out, then rub
it with sugar, which dissolves
back into the meat. At that
point, you can add any layer
of spice that you want. I use a
spray bottle of cider vinegar.
Of course, its not
WORDS BY JOHNNY DAVIS

just about the food, he adds,

its about the company.
The Lockhart, 2224 Seymour
Place, London W1H 7NL
lockhartlondon.com
LARDO THE POTTED PIG HILL & SZROK
New rooftop bar/grill/rotisserie, with A nose-to-tail subterranean meat eatery in Butcher by day, grill by night, appropriately
views of London Fields. 205 Richmond a former bank vault. 27 High Street, Cardiff set in former slaughterhouse. 60 Broadway
Road, London, E8 3NJ lardo.co.uk CF10 1PU thepottedpig.com Market, London E8 4QJ @Hillandszrok

Photograph by WIll Thom 61

 STYLE
TR AVEL
20/23

The authorities should have learned their lesson with

Prohibition restrict an Americans access to pleasure and
he will find ever-more creative ways to enjoy himself. When
that pleasure is gambling, Exhibit A is Las Vegas, and Sin City
might be the most accurate branding exercise of all time.
Loyal to the maxim excess is best, its a place where there
are hotels within hotels (Nobu at Caesars Palace), and you
can do yoga with dolphins. Not that were complaining; though
Vegass 24/7 hedonism can scale dizzying heights, were too
busy having fun to look down. Tom Barber is a founder of
award-winning travel company originaltravel.co.uk

STAY LUNCH WHEN IN

A mere $3bn in the making, the
Wynn hotel and sister Encore
have a staggering 4,750 rooms,
13 restaurants, six bars, five
nightclubs, four pools and
two esplanades between them.
And, the daddy of all casinos.
wynnlasvegas.com
SEE
The Neon Boneyard Park on North
Las Vegas Boulevard is the final
resting place of vintage signs from
bygone eras, kind of a capitalist
variant of the Lenin statue parks in
former Soviet cities. Alternatively,
study the influence of the Mafia
at the Mob Museum, complete with
infamous mug shots, murder
scenes, wiretap recordings and
sharp suits (namely John Gottis
white silk number). neonmuseum.
org; themobmuseum.org
AVOID
1) Getting married in an Elvis
Chapel; and 2) sleep, although your
stamina will give out at some point.
Vegas is like Mecca for meat. Diners
wont be left hungry at Burger Bar,
where patrons create their perfect
combo from endless fleshy proteins
(beef, lamb, chicken, salmon, turkey,
etc). Anything goes, even sprouts.
Flipping brilliant. burger-bar.com
DRINK
For a serious view of the Strip,
the 23rd floor bar of the Mandarin
Oriental is hard to beat. To get a
flavour of old, low-rise Vegas, head
to hipster haven The Griffin on
Fremont Street. Listen to indie acts
while drinking too much Hamms
draft beer. mandarinoriental.com;
fremontstreetbars.com
DINE
Holding its own against venues like
the Wynn mega-hotels is The
Cosmopolitan, home to another daft
raft of eateries, each more starry
than the next. Quirkiest is China
Poblano: Chinese meets Mexican
under the guiding eye of El Bulli
graduate Jos Andrs. It shouldnt masse. Avicii and David Guetta
work, but theres actually a logical
twist to a duck tongue and fresh
lychee taco. Wash it down with
kick-ass salt-air margaritas with
lime and pomegranate.
cosmopolitanlasvegas.com
SHOP
When you inevitably win big on
the slots (ha!), make your way to the
Penske-Wynn Ferrari dealership
at the Wynn and splash $350,000
on a 2013 Ferrari 458 Spider.
penskewynnferrari.com
End the night, or start the early
morning, at the Double Down
Saloon, a deep dive bar that is the
anti-Strip. Drown your post-casino
sorrows alongside touring bands
and locals on the charmingly
named house special, Ass Juice.
The secret recipe is surprisingly
pleasing. doubledownsaloon.com
DO
This is male wish-fulfillment city,
so you can tear up a racetrack in
a Mustang Shelby GT500, work real
construction equipment or take
a heli tour of the Grand Canyon; but
the ultimate has to be at Machine
Guns Vegas where you can indulge
shooting fantasies for real, using
everything from vintage Mob-era
pistols to real Seal team hardware.
machinegunsvegas.com
PARTY
Money talks, and the worlds top
dance DJs must be listening as
theyve invaded Las Vegas en
have 2014 residencies at the
Wynns XS and Surrender while
Tisto and Steve Aoki are at
Hakkasan at the MGM Grand.
hakkasanlv.com
WHY NOW
Summer pool parties will be in full
swing. Follow Prince Harrys
lead, shake off your bodyguards
and join the bikini-clad babes
at the Hard Rock Hotels Rehab or
Encores Beach Club. rehablv.com;
encorebeachclub.com

64 Illustration by Damien Weighill

 HERE
GET T
Virgin
BA and tes
e ra te rou
op ily
e UK da
from th

65
 STYLE
FASHION
22/23

Pale blue
polyester,
10, by H&M

Navy/white
polka dot ELL
KEEP
polyester, 65,
by Gant Rugger

THIS
SHORT
NO BOARDIES, NO SPEEDOS,
NO THONGS DONT TAKE
A DIP THIS SUMMER IN
ANYTHING BUT CLASSIC
Teal polyamide, 45,
by Tommy Hilfiger
SWIMMING SHORTS.
IN BLUE, NATURALLY

66 Edit by Teo van den Broeke | Photograph by Luke Kirwan

Teal
polyamide,
135, by
Orlebar Brown

Navy print
polyamide,
99, by
Paul Smith

Blue swordfish
print
polyester,
155, by
Dolce & Gabbana

Navy cotton/
polyester, 16,
by Topman

Pale blue
polyamide,
120, by
Vilebrequin
at Mr Porter

67
 Edited by MIRANDA COLLINGE Film / Music / Books / TV / Art

CULTURE EYES
DOWN
THE BEST
SUMMER
BOOKS
ILLUSTRATION BY JEAN JULLIEN
Culture

THE
HIGH-BROW
BEACH-READ
ROUND-UP
A BOOK ABOUT
VENGEANCE Out
11 J
uly
(AND FORGIVENESS)
The True American: Murder
and Mercy in Texas

Anand Giridharadas

A BOOK ABOUT
WHO WE ARE
Ten Cities That Made An Empire
Tristram Hunt

A BOOK ABOUT ENDINGS Out 5 Ju

ne
In Paradise
Peter Matthiessen

A BOOK ABOUT
ANOTHER BOOK
The Zhivago Affair: The
Kremlin, the CIA and the
Battle over a Forbidden Book

Peter Finn and Petra Couvee

Out 5 June

70
 Culture

A BOOK ABOUT RELIGION YOUR FAVOURITE

(AND DENTAL HYGIENE) NEW SITCOM DWEEB:
To Rise Again at a Decent Hour
Joshua Ferris ERLICH IN SILICON
Out
5 Ju
ne A BOOK
ABOUT MUSIC
Travelling
Sprinkler
STUDIO 33

Nicholson
Baker

Silicon Valley
starts on Sky
Atlantic in July

Before creating sofa- show-stealer is comedian

surfing Nineties icons
Beavis & Butthead for
which, uh, like, thanks,
uh-huh-huh Mike Judge
was an engineer in
Silicon Valley, and
Out its this experience he
5 Ju
ne
explores in his new
comedy of the same name.
Focused on an acne of
nerds (thats the correct
collective noun, right?)
trying to launch a
start-up, theres a lot of
comedy potential to mine
and Judge and co-creator
Alec Berg happily send up
tech billionaires and Ted
talks alike. But the
TJ Millers portrayal
of Erlich Bachman, a
stoner millionaire in
whose start-up
incubator/house, the
nerds are based. From
his inane T-shirts (I
know HTML How To Meet
Ladies) to his peculiar
beard and ineffectual
put-downs (Well call
you when we want pleated
khakis), Bachman is
arrogant, lazy, utterly
plausible and makes Jesse
Eisenberg in The Social
Network look like Ryan
Gosling in Drive.
Huh-huh. Cool.

A BOOK ABOUT
HILLBILLIES THIS MONTHS MOST
Fourth Of July
Creek
MELODIC SWEARERS:
Smith Henderson
IRST AID KIT
I always thought that youd
be here / But shit gets
fucked up, and people just
disappear, sings Klara,
Out 5 June
or maybe its Johanna,
Sderberg the young
Swedish sisters (steady)
who perform together as
First Aid Kit on their new
song Master Pretender.
The duos excellent third
Out
19 J
album, Stay Gold, has the
une sweetness of a babbling
Stay
creek and the toughness
Fir Gold of a sun-bleached prairie,
b
(Col st Aid K y much like its makers.
umbi
a) i it
on 9 s
June out

71
Cultur
HOW
RUDE!
Thinking about it, the notion of rude boy
probably rst entered my life, like many
others, through the 2 Tone ska revival
in the Eighties, photographer
Dean Chalkley says, I would
have been about 11 or
12 years old, down
Annabellas nightclub in
Southend. As I got older,
some London use,
72
Tip your hats
and raise your
hems as a new
photography
show celebrates
the rude boy
renaissance
I began to appreciate what an important
thing it was.
Even if you werent into prepubescent
clubbing, men of a certain age will
remember the excitement of rude
boy style as appropriated by
Retu British mods and skinheads
Rude rn of
Boy, the the short trousers, the
to 2 13 J
Some 5 Au u n e jaunty hats, the skinny ties
rset gust,
Ho a look that has made a
rset welcome return, as a new
hous
e.or
g London exhibition of photos
by Chalkley attests.
Rude boys originated in
Jamaica in the late Fifties, a youth
subculture embraced by young men who
were often unemployed and angry, and
sometimes turned violent. The original
rudies were often essentially sartorial
gangsters, says creative director/stylist
Harris Elliott, who has co-curated the
exhibition with Chalkley. Nowadays, the
maverick attitude doesnt lead to such
an extreme way of life.
Were not sure what the maverick
lm-makers, stylists, tailors and fashion
bloggers photographed for the show
would have to say about that it can get
extreme out in the wilds of Savile Row
but the threads and the tunes, which
will be picked by the collaborators and
piped out into the gallery, are certainly
looking and sounding as fresh as ever.
FILMS WERE
LOOKING
FORWARD TO
THIS MONTH
In diminishing order
of excitement
FRUITVALE STATION
OUT ON 6 JUNE
A worthy prize-winner at both Cannes
and Sundance. See our interview with
star Michael B Jordan on page 75.
COLD IN JULY
OUT ON 27 JUNE
Dexters Michael C Hall plays a Texas
father who shoots an intruder, only to
find the cops have purposefully
misidentified the deceased to pull
off a cover-up of their own. Tense,
taught and bloody. Thatll do nicely.
22 JUMP STREET
OUT ON 6 JUNE
Channing Tatum and Jonah Hill cash in on
their surprisingly funny 21 Jump Street
reboot by moving across the street and
going undercover at college. The law of
diminishing returns may well kick in,
but well give it a chance.
OF HORSES AND MEN
OUT ON 13 JUNE
An Icelandic film about
the relationship between
humans and horses,
included primarily on
the strength of this
still (right). Weve all
been there.
112 WEDDINGS
OUT ON 13 JUNE
Documentary director Doug Block revisits
couples he filmed in his sideline as a
wedding cameraman to see how married life
is working out. Its hardly escapism,
but would make for a thought-provoking/
argument-starting date movie.
THE ART OF THE STEAL
OUT ON 20 JUNE
A heist comedy starring Kurt Russell as
an art thief and stunt man called Crunch
Calhoun. On another occasion, possibly
involving alcohol, the previous sentence
might have put this at the top of our list,
but them's the breaks.
MRS BROWNS BOYS DMOVIE
OUT ON 27 JUNE
Brendan O'Carrolls inexplicably popular
sitcom character gets her own film, in
which her fruit and veg stall is under
threat from Russian gangsters. If you
pay to see this one you only
have yourselves tblame.

LOOK WHATS COOKING
Its some biscuits! And also Sofa Vergara,
the worlds sexiest sous-chef
While not helming mega-budget Iron Man
movies, Jon Favreau has directed and is
starring in a new smaller-scale oering,
Chef, thats more in the charming ramshackle
mode of his breakthrough 1996 debut,
Swingers. In the new lm he plays Carl
Casper, a trendy LA chef who gets a bad
review, has a mental breakdown, and opens
a Cuban food truck. In amongst the oozing
Chef is out o
BOYS NOISE:
NEW RELEASES
FROM MEN WHO
MAKE MUSIC
grilled sandwiches and succulent steaks
(when we saw it, one lingering shot of
barbecued meat made the audience actually
moan), theres another feast for the eyes in
the form of Modern Family star Sofa Vergara,
who plays Carls ex-wife and biggest
cheerleader. If that wasnt enough theres
also Scarlett Johansson as a sultry
waitress for afters. Now thats just greedy. THE LADS
48:13 by Kasabian
Out 9 June (Sony Music)
Theres something infectiously
likeable about Leicester band
Kasabian: singer Tom Meighan with
his daft utterances, guitarist
Sergio Pizzorno with his upside-
down-tulip hairdo, the other two
with, er, whatever theyve got.
Their fifth album offers up plenty
of new crowd-rousing choruses
for their Glastonbury slot.
THE GUYS
Love Frequency by Klaxons
Out 9 June (Akashic Rekords/Sony Red)
The London trio have survived
nu rave and created a third record
that has street cred producers
include LCD Soundsystems James
Murphy and new much-vaunted duo
Gorgon City but could also be
played over a montage of the cast
of Geordie Shore getting mortal in
Cancun. Spacey electro-indie with
serious dance-floor potential.
THE FELLOW
Await Barbarians by Alexis Taylor
Out 16 June (Domino)
The second solo album by Brains from
Thunderbirds Alexis Taylor from
Hot Chip opens with an instrumental
version of 1933 Tin Pan Alley song
Lazy Bones and includes a ballad
to his own immune system. Not for
nothing is he among the most quietly
clever indie-pop stars around.
73
Culture

THE BIKERS APOSTROPHE

Danny Lyons seminal photo series on Sixties motorbike
gangs features bad boys, bad girls and bad grammar

Danny Lyon:
The Bikeriders,
19 June to
16 August, Atlas
Gallery, London Welcome to the
atlasgallery.com
clubhouse of the
Outlaws, Chicagos most
fearsome motorcycle
outt. We wouldnt have
wanted to venture much closer
(let alone comment on their
signage), but photographer
Danny Lyon is a braver sort.
He embedded with the gang for
four years in the mid-Sixties,
crossing the US on long rides and
race-meets, resulting in an
extraordinary set of photographs
that will be on display at Atlas
Gallery in London this month.
His startling images capture a
world of slick-haired men called
Cockroach and Cowboy who
care little for road safety or
conventional hygiene and if it
doesnt make you want to rush
out and buy a leather jacket
or even a Harley we dont
know what will.

DANNY LYON. COURTESY MAGNUM PHOTOS/ETHERTON GALLERY USA/ATLAS GALLERY LONDON | GETTY
Clockwise from
left: the Outlaws
clubhouse, Dayton,
Ohio, 1966; two
riders in Elkhorn,
Wisconsin, 1965;
crossing the Ohio
River, Louisville,
Kentucky, 1966

Maggie Gyllenhaal makes her debut on British TV

AN HONOURABLE in this smart new series from Hugo Blick (The
Shadow Line) about a young woman whose fathers

MENTION FOR THE dodgy dealings in the West Bank result in her
gaining a life peerage and a tortured conscience.

HONOURABLE WOMAN The Honourable Woman starts on 3 July on BBC Two

74
 Q&A:
MICHAEL
B JORDAN
Pit stop: Jordan
as Wallace, far
left, in The Wire
LL COOL J(ARVIS)
New Pulp doc provides definitive proof of the
laws of attraction governing indie-band frontmen
and members of the opposite sex
One of the things that made me
want to be in a group when I first
started it at school was that
thing of being shy and thinking
NICOLAS GUERIN/CONTOUR
that that would help me get girls,
says Pulps Jarvis Cocker part-way
through Florian Habichts
entertaining documentary
structured around the indie bands
Culture
After starring in both The Wire (Wallace!) me. But Friday Night Lights was my rst
and Friday Night Lights (Vince!), the chance to showcase a little bit more of
actor with the all-important middle initial my acting.
branches out into cinema for real-life
drama Fruitvale Station. He plays Oscar
Grant, the innocent 22-year-old shot dead
by transport police on New Years Day
2009, which sparked riots in California.
ESQ: Itll be dierent again playing the Human
Torch in the new Fantastic Four lm.
MBJ: Well, Im not dying in this one, which
is fucking awesome. I get to live. But yeah, its
going to be fun. I grew up reading comic books
ESQUIRE: Why did you want the role? and this is the rst big budget action lm
MICHAEL B JORDAN: It was a no-brainer. Ive done so far, its all been $900,000
Oscar [Grant] didnt just look just like me, he indies so lets see how it turns out.
could have been me. When [writer/director]
Ryan Coogler said he wrote the role with me ESQ: Will you be sticking with movies for
in mind which was the rst time that had a while, then?
happened it was even more of an honour. MBJ: Yeah. Me and Ryan are working together
again on a spin-o of the Rocky franchise.
ESQ: Was it daunting given Im playing Apollo Creeds grandson,
the political implications and weve got Stallone on board.
of the lm? Its gonna be fun.
MBJ: It made it
much more ESQ: Will it involve going
special; we took toe to toe with Rocky?!
it that much MBJ: No way, man, that
more seriously. wouldnt be fair! But
The pressure I am getting in the ring in
of knowing his other circumstances.
family and I dont like faking it, so
people that really Im doing my homework
knew him his Jordan as Oscar Grant in at the moment working
daughter, who is Fruitvale Station out hard.
in the script would
see the lm one day made ESQ: How about when youre not
you want to take care of it. working or working out?
I think we did a good job of showing MBJ: I love to grill! When its a nice day out,
Oscar straight up, aws and all. Im probably doing
some lamb chops,
ESQ: Was it dicult to lm? some salmon, some
MBJ: The scene on the platform was hard. corn, some chicken
I was lying over the actual bullet hole, steak My homemade
which was still there in the ground where mashed potatoes are
Oscar was killed. It was very tough mentally. pretty incredible, too.
My top tip? Prep. If
ESQ: Youve been in two of the biggest TV you have everything
shows of recent years. Which did you prefer? lined up beforehand,
MBJ: Ah man, thats like picking your you can just knock it
favourite kid! They were both special. out like an assembly
The Wire was a show that fucked the system. line. Sam Parker
I had no idea it was going to be as big as it was. Fruitvale Station is
Playing Wallace opened up a lot of doors for out 6 June
reunion gig in their home town
of Sheffield in 2012. Habicht
films short ones, tall ones,
thin ones, fat ones, young ones,
old ones, British ones, foreign
ones, all keen to let Cocker m
twang the elastic of their ath
customised Jarvis knickers. ts
Mission very much accomplished. ne
75
 Culture
1. The denition of Lazaretto.
Were sure you knew that its a
quarantine station or a prison
ship on which unwanted
visitors can be detained, but
excuse us for having missed
that particular lesson in
maritime history. Its also the
name of Jack Whites second
solo record, out this month.
2. White still loves the blues.
Everything from the Detroit
musician from The White
Stripes to Dead Weather to
The Raconteurs has had
blues at its heart. True to form,
Lazaretto opens with Three
Women, a version of a 1928
tune by Blind Willie McTell,
though White has added funky
keys, natty bass and tastefully
refreshed lyrics (ie, I got
three wimmins/Yallar,
brown and black becomes
THIN I got three women/Red,
blonde and brunette).
WE . ut he also still loves
country. Though Lazaretto
has plenty of the kind of
LEARNED heavy rock ris Jack White is
known for (not for nothing do
sports fans around the world
FROM chant the opening bars of
Seven Nation Army), theres
JACK a so ting, ddle-fuelled
existentialism (Temporary
Ground), doomed honky-tonk
WHITES romanticism (Alone in My
Home) and sexy-yet-
rollicking alcoholism
NEW Lazar
(Just One
Drink).
ALBUM, Jack etto
W hi by 4. Jack
Man R te (Third
ecord
s/XL
White
Recor
din speaks
out 1 gs) is
LAZARETTO 0 Jun
e Spanish.
Or maybe he
PUNK PROSE
Least erotic sexual enc
ounter involving two music icons:
his willy out.
I slide down to his crotch. He gets
all do. []
He smells of stale piss. So do I. We
of licking away, I hear an
After a little while
in Crisp and
imperious voice from on high, like Quent
with the Artfu l Dodger you
Kenneth Williams mixed
Stop it,
know, that nasal north London whine
down here.
Viv. I look up. Whats he want? Im busy
it, Viv, he says. You re trying too hard.
Stop
Clothes, Clothes, Clothes. Music
, Music, Music. Boys, Boys, Boys.
by Viv Albertine (Faber & Faber
doesnt, but still Yo trabajo
duro/Como en madera y yeso
from the title track will become
your new favourite singalong
Spanish phrase since Soy un
perdedor. (It means I work
hard/Like wood and plaster,
in case anyone asks.)
5. Women do neat stu, too!
Ha! But we knew that. As did
White, and perhaps as a
riposte to the sexism
accusations thrown at his last
record and a nod to the
opening track of this one
he dedicates it to three
formidable females: Florence
Green, the last surviving
First World War veteran;
Voltairine de Cleyre, an early
20th-century anarchist and
radical feminist and Amazing
Grace Hopper, a US Navy rear
admiral and computing pioneer.
6. Jack White can rap.
Or do shouty-singing anyway,
and it isnt hard to imagine
lyrics such as When I need
to know/I play dumb like
Columbo/And get my feelings
hurt/And move to New York
like Im Dumbo (from That
Black Bat Licorice), coming
from a battle-scarred MC.
Jay Dubs in the house.
7. Hes one conicted guy.
The binary impulses that gave
Whites last album such an
electrifying charge to
control or to submit; to believe
or to doubt; to love or to ght
are as present as ever and
embodied in nal track Want
and Able, an acoustic ditty
in which Jack White performs
a duet with Jack White. May
the best man win.
The perils of
skills on none
Rotten, as reca
debuting ones
other than John
blow-job
ny
one-time guit
lled by Viv Al
bertine,
arist of cult
The Slits. Her punk band
autobiography
invigorating, is
honest and funn
she writes with
out
y
pretension an
d
phoniness an
d
gives a lively
account of the
ins and outs of
the Seventies
music scene.
GETTY
) is out 5 June
 Culture

THIS MONTHS UNFESTIVE LITERARY TREND:

AB NT FATHERS
Noticed a sudden glut of warm and fuzzy books on the Welsh borders memory; when the man working on the last-ever
about fathers and their offspring? How they (stay with us) who dictionary goes missing, his daughter sets out
learned to ride a bike, support a rubbish receives a surprise to find him and discovers murky anti-literate
football team, love message about her dad corporate forces and outposts
humanity again, etc. but given that she of word-loving outlaws.
It makes the arrival of was kidnapped as a A father also goes astray
three new novels about child, its unclear in A Questionable Shape by
dads who arent around who this could be. Bennett Sims, out 5 June
seem somehow not in the Rachman, knows how to (Oneworld), though theres
spirit of things in a ratchet up mystery; a good excuse: the zombie
good way. The Rise & Fall as does Alena Graedon, apocalypse. Three friends
of Great Powers by Tom author of The Word Exchange, out 5 June scour Baton Rouge for any signs
Rachman, out now (Sceptre), (Weidenfeld & Nicolson). In Graedons that he might be dead, alive,
is the story of Tooly, a dystopian future, face-to-face interfacing or somewhere in between.
woman working in a bookshop is finished and even email is a fading PS: happy Fathers Day!

NEW ART SHOW FEATURES

SOME SERIOUS EYE CANDY
Katy Perry in her birthday suit? Sweet

Knickerbocker
glories: Cotton
Candy Katy (2010);
Consuming Folly
(200910) by
Will Cotton

New York artist Will Cotton was He wound up painting the cover of
minding his own business when Perrys 2010 album Teenage Dream
COURTESY THE ARTIST AND MARY BOONE GALLERY

an emailed pinged into his inbox.
It was from Katy Perry telling him
how much she liked his work. Its
hardly surprising that his art, often
involving sugar-laden landscapes
and naked girls covered in melting
ice cream, would have obvious pop
culture appeal, or that Cotton
would love pop culture right back.
and art-directing the video for her
single California Gurls (though
the whipped-cream-can bra was
apparently her idea). Cottons work
is held in the collections of the
Smithsonian and the Seattle Art
Museum, and this month will be
shown in Londons Ronchini Gallery.
Dont forget your toothbrush.

77
Culture
1 very international. It was a Joy
2 Its always a Joy Division fan. It
3 hotel bar or go out, but I just went
4 the German guests laughing and
The last time I
Put on an accent was probably
for Malecent (1) [Disneys Sleeping
Beauty reboot; Riley plays Diaval,
the right-hand raven of Angelina
Jolies evil queen]. I was an Irish
raven. Southern Irish well,
Dubliny. Im just covering all bases
so I dont oend anyone from
Cork. I thought he should have
come from Leeds.
Sang in public was in the car.
I think it was Elvis Costello(2).
My inner frontman is released on
unsuspecting people crossing the
road at trac lights. I wind down
the window deliberately so they
can hear me singing. What a twat.
Had a lie-in? Well, my wife and
I have a baby boy [Ben] and even
during the pregnancy there wasnt
a lot of sleep. I just went to New
York for two days, and usually its
nice to spend the evening in the
78
The star of Control and On The
Road on sleepless nights and
smokeless cigarettes
to bed 3. It was the rst time Ive
ever done that in my adult life.
Smoked a cigarette
unfortunately, was this morning.
I did give up for three weeks when
my son was born. I moved on to
those e-cigarettes(4), those ones
that look like Doctor Whos
screwdriver, that you dont want
to get out in public.
Grew a moustache was last
summer, for a lm called Suite
Francaise. Im very proud to say
that at the age of 33, I was nally
capable of puberty. It took about
two months, but for the next six
months I had a very spiy
moustache. It was a bit more
Freddie Mercury(5) than Clark
Gable, but I thought it was very
dashing. I took a lot of seles.
I was tempted to keep it for the
premiere of my wifes [actress
Alexandra Maria Lara] lm, Rush,
but she begged me not to.
Ate a bratwurst was quite
a while ago. The thing in Berlin
[where Riley lives] is currywurst (6).
It isnt a curried sausage, its a
bratwurst drowned in ketchup with
curry powder sprinkled on the top.
Its good after a few pints. Or litres,
as they have here.
Got stopped in the street was
in New York. That made me feel
Division fan [Riley played Ian
Curtis in the 2007 biopic Control].
doesnt happen all that often
actually, though its nice when
it does. Usually its, Are you
Pete Doherty? (7)
Strolled the Yorkshire Dales
it was a great hangover cure. You
walk across to the hair-of-the-dog
pub at the other end. Im going to
England this weekend, Ill be
taking Ben, so Im pretty sure that
will involve my brothers and
friends wetting the babys head,
like. Ill probably be taking him for
a stroll on the dales(8) in one of
those irritating things young
fathers wear.
Played football was when we
got married. We did a penalty
shoot-out(9) between the German
guests and the English ones.
I thought it might break the ice.
The pictures are hilarious
because on the one side theres all
enjoying it and thinking its great
fun, and then theres the English
guests looking like its happening
all over again. But we did em.
I think a whisper must have gone
around that if they were going to
have a good party they should
probably let us win.
5
INTERVIEW BY MIRANDA COLLINGE | NICOLAS GUERIN/CONTOUR BY GETTY | GETTY
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 EXPERIENCE
have always
wished I could
do martial arts.
It comes from
as far back as
wishing I was
Batman, but
stayed with me
long after I lost
interest in the
capes and badges and alter-egos.
Well, mostly lost interest in them.
I wanted to have that secret
violence. I wanted it to be the thing
about me that you didnt know:
that if you came near me, if you so
much as looked at me, I was going
to fuck you up.
I didnt actually want to fuck
anyone up. I am not a violent
person. I just wanted to know that
I could. I wanted, as a smallish boy
at a private school with a pink uniform
in the angry and impoverished
London of the Seventies, to feel safe
on the street. But I didnt. So I didnt
go on the street. Ever. Except to get
in my mums car.
A martial art, I believed, would
have set me free. But I only wanted to
have the skills. I didnt want to learn
them. Learning anything at all was
such a monstrous pain in the arse.
And I continued to feel that way into
adulthood, and I still do. In that
regard, my desire to know karate
is like my desire to speak Spanish
or play the piano or sh trout with
a y they are all things that would
improve my life in a generalised,
abstract way but which I really cant
be shagged to start learning now,
right from the beginning, at a time
in my life when Ill be dead before
Im any good.
I have got close to picking it up
in the past, been down to boxing
gyms and shaolin temples, spoken
to gurus and kung fu masters about
quick ways to put re in my sts. But
they all give out the same shit about
no fast way: must rearn inner peace
and self-dissiprin before embark on
path of samurai.
Yeah, fuck o Mr Miyagi. If
I wanted meditation, breathing
lessons, special diets and a load of
Eastern bullshit Id have married
Gwyneth Paltrow. I just feel weak and
soft, and I want to feel hard. I have no
idea what it is like to ght another
man, or what I would do if I had to.
I have dreams occasionally where I am
trying to punch someone but my arms
are so heavy I can hardly lift them and
82 the punch is so slow it never gets to
the guys chin (is it even the chin a view to ending the ght as quickly
youre meant to hit?). as possible, scanning for secondary
Realistically, of course, I have attack, then escape.
reached a point in my life where the Oh, right, I said.
chances of my getting into a ght are Its what the Israel Defense
virtually nil. I do not go to pubs, I do Forces use, also the Mossad and Shin
not go to nightclubs, I do not go to Bet. And it is what Haganah used.
football. I do not even leave my house And so I stopped making jokes.
after dark except to put out the bins. For the Israelis are the hardest
The worst that could happen is I bump motherfuckers in the world. Everyone
into a chef somewhere who didnt like knows that. Whether we are talking
my review of his restaurant. But in about the army, the secret service,
general, chefs are far too timid to throw the national service kids who hit the
punches, they just piss in your soup. beach wearing Speedos and a
And yet still the yearning is there machine gun or the famous terrorist
to have a supernatural protection organisation from which they all grew.
system coded into my brain. Just the Now, it is possible that my
one-inch punch would do, and maybe view of Israel is going to be dierent
some sort of ying kick. Something from yours. To me, whatever its
so that in desperate circumstances, government does, whatever the
should they ever arise, I will have injustices of its foreign policy,
a choice other than death. Israel constitutes a protected place
which the Jews who survived being
o then one day, I was slaughtered to extinction in the
walking through the Forties built with their bare hands
foyer of this new Jewish because Europe was no longer safe
community centre for them. And as far as I am concerned
in north London where they can do anything they like, to
I had been reviewing anyone, to keep it safe. So fuck you.
the (excellent) restaurant
for my day job, when
my eye fell upon a yer
on the reception desk
for something called Krav Maga.
Welcome to the UKs rst Krav
Maga School, it said. Our instructors
are trained and qualied to the
highest standards in Israel, oering
courses for adults, kids and women-
only. When you train with London
Krav Maga, you can have the
condence that you are training in
the best self-defence system in the
world with the most qualied
instructors, all certied by Krav Maga
Global in Israel.
A Jewish martial art? I said to
the guy on reception. Whats that,
a load of lethal shrugs?
He did not laugh.
No wait, dont tell me, I went on,
certain there was great humour here.
Is it where you complain your
opponent to death?
I suddenly sensed he had heard
these gags before; maybe seven or
eight million times.
Its not a martial art, he
said patiently. It is a system of
self-defence.
Oh, a Jewish system of self-
defence, I said. You mean running
away? Ha ha ha.
If you can, yes. Of course, said
the guy. But if you cant, then instant
counter-attack, extreme violence with

And if Israel has a martial art,
defence system, whatever, a way to
fuck up people who try to attack it,
then you can be sure it will be quick
PHOTOGRAPHS BY CHRIS LEAH | ILLUSTRATIONS BY ILOVEDUST
to learn, violent as hell and contain
very little Eastern philosophical
bollocks of the sort I have always
found so o-putting.
No philosophical bollocks at all,
said the guy on reception. No special
kit, no elaborate protocols, no silly
postures, no element of ritual. Its
what Matt Damon does in the Jason
Bourne movies. And I think Daniel
Craigs Bond as well.
So I signed up on the spot (we
Jews love a celebrity). Annoyingly,
KA-POW! though, I had missed the most recent
beginners course and would have to
STAMPING: wait a few weeks. So, I inquired about
FOR INDISPOSING some one-on-one lessons to get a
ASSAILANTS avour before I started.
(AND FRUIT) They said no problem, and set me
up with an instructor called Deborah
Bekhor (Ill be using fake names here
because I am bound to get stu wrong
and misrepresent some aspect of Krav
Maga and I dont want anyone but me
to take the blame) and my rst
thought was, naturally, A bird?
A fucking Doris? How am I going to
get tough ghting a woman?
But then I thought about those
Amazon sex goddesses you see on the
EXPERIENCE
telly when the Israeli army wants to
get the West onside: sun-tanned,
half-naked Bar Refaeli-types in
bikini tops and combat trousers with
ammo belts and jungle knives (or did
I dream that?). I saw myself being
wrestled to the ground by one of these
teenage nympho warriors and very
possibly raped. And the vision
leased me.
y rst reaction upon meeting
eborah and discovering
er to be a softly spoken
north London
Jewish mum of about
my age was, I confess,
disappointment. But it
didnt last. In fact, the moment
she adopted a balanced position
to demonstrate the most basic
defence against a punch, her whole
physical manifestation seemed to
change. Just from the way she was
standing, you would think twice
about grabbing her handbag. And
one little demonstration air-punch
(heel of the hand, not knuckles, to
avoid nger breakages and allow for
the possibility of a double eye-gouge if
absolutely necessary) would turn you
away from a life of crime forever.
For a while, though, we just
talked. Was this the Jewish martial
art itself? In a way, yes, she said.
The main thing is to avoid a ght.
So you hope to talk your way out of it,
calm things down. And you look for
exits and you hope to just move away.
Or run if you have to. But then if a
conict is impossible to avoid, you
strike fast, end it, and then run away.
(This, of course, is how Israel has
always operated: strike fast in
anticipation of worse to come,
possibly overdo the force a little,
because after all you didnt ask
for a ght, then back o and say,
I told you so.)
Its good that its a Jewish
system, I said. Because although
I am not generally afraid of being
mugged or beaten up, if there is a tiny
part of me that is, then its
I know, she said. The Jewish
part. I almost cried. She understands.
They will all understand. It is part
of being a Jew: however safe you feel
in whatever country you have ended
up in, no matter the extent of your
deracination, regardless of what
a daft-arse, public school, media
tosspot party boy you have become,
you still have that feeling that they
will come for you in the end, that
there is a st or a stick or a rock out >
83
 EXPERIENCE
there with your name on it. And if you
ever have that feeling, Jew or not,
then Krav is for you.
Its not actually Israeli though,
she went on. Krav Maga which
means contact combat in Hebrew
was invented in Bratislava by Imi
Lichtenfeld, a Slovak Jew who was
a boxer and wrestler and wanted to
organise his community to protect
itself from anti-Semitic gangs in the
Thirties and, ultimately, the Nazis.
He saw that conventional ghting
techniques were no use on the street,
so developed his own, more
applicable methods.
Bloody hell. A Slovak Jew from
Bratislava. Just like me. Or, at least,
just like my maternal grandparents,
Michael and Isabel Kasriel. They, too,
were intimidated by such gangs (my
grandma recalled never going out of
the house in Easter Week because the
Slovaks liked to celebrate by beating
up any Jew they saw) and then ed
to Britain as the Nazis moved in.
Perhaps they knew Imi
Lichtenfeld. He would have been
about their age. There were no more
than 15,000 Jews in Bratislava at that
time. Maybe they played bridge, ate
cholent, talked about getting the fuck
out of Dodge. Who knows, maybe
they sparred?
From Slovakia, while my
grandparents ed to Derby (someone
sure sold them a pup there), Imi made
for Palestine, where his methods
were quickly adopted by the Jewish
paramilitary organisation Haganah,
which later became the IDF.
From there it spread to the civilian
population (which happens quickly
in a state like Israel) and then out to
the diaspora, especially the US, where
it exists today in many forms, all
claiming to be the real inheritors
of Imis system.
And then suddenly, Deborah is
whacking me with a round arm punch
and Im blocking it with a forearm and
being told to punch her immediately
in the nose in the same instant as
I defend because in good Krav Maga a
bystander shouldnt be able to tell who
is the attacker and who is the victim.
And then hit her again, kick her
in the goolies, move out of her line of
attack, away from my blindspot, turn,
scan for more attackers (crazy bitch
Jewish mums with bicycle chains,
I guess) then run. And again, and
again, and again. And you havent got
it right until the running away is a
reex, because unless you practise
84 the escape time after time after time,
you might forget it on the street, and competition version. The guy comes
stand there gloating over your victim for you, you block, punch, kick, move,
while her mate comes up and shanks block, punch, kick, there might be 10
you in the kidneys with a rusty blunt. of them, they might have sticks,
knives, guns
fter a couple of They might indeed. Krav Maga is
these lessons, a pessimistic system for a pessimistic
Im ready for people. So we learn about knives early
a course. They on, and guns, too. We expect to be
make me buy attacked from behind (probably at a
some appy, cashpoint), from the side, in the dark.
black tracksuit And we learn stamping.
bottoms and On heads? I ask.
a T-shirt, arm Technically, no, says Ben.
and shin Technically, we mean stamping on
pads and a shins. We dont teach stamping
nutguard. And on heads anymore.
now we meet Anymore?
Ben, who will take the class. Ben is a Not since CCTV, he says.
tough Jew. I like a tough Jew. They CCTV is not kind to head-stamping.
make me feel safe. Ben is roughly my It looks bad. It makes a mess of your
height except there are two of him. reasonable force defence in court.
He isnt muscle-bound and he isnt This is not the last time CCTV is
fat, he just looks like two of me have mentioned. There seem to be a number
climbed into my tracksuit. He smiles of moves they dont teach since CCTV
and hes funny and he talks a lot (hes BLAM! came in. But they tell us what they are
a Jew, in case I didnt mention that) anyway. I begin to wonder if, when Im
ATTACK IS THE BEST
and the class loves him, but he moves, FORM OF DEFENCE: moving o the line of attack, covering
when he is in character, with the THEAUTHORPRACTICES my blind spot and scanning for further
economy and menace of a shark. And ON A FEZ-WEARING assailants, I am perhaps also supposed
when he throws a jab he stamps his MCC MEMBER to be scanning for cameras.
back foot and the building shakes.
The class, by the way, does not
seem to have many Jews in it. There
are maybe 30 students 20 boys, 10
girls a couple of young black men,
half a dozen Asians, some beefy
Wasps, the odd Jew, me.
We jog round the room and warm
up, do some stretching, assume the
position. But its just a relaxed,
balanced footing. Its not a combat
position. We do not want a ght. If
there is threatening movement our
hands come up to cover our face more
or less like a boxer (but not as close to
it, we havent got nice soft gloves on
to protect our noses) and a foot goes
back to give more solid balance. But
we dont want to make aggressive
gestures that might be misinterpreted.
And then we pair o and ght.
And then Ben stops us and shows us
another defensive move. And we do
that. And then he puts us in groups of
four and its three against one. Then
four against one. We do the famous
zombie game where ve guys are
going after one guy (slow, like zombies)
trying to strangle him and he has to
keep batting them away.
Krav Maga assumes that there
will be multiple assailants, Ben says.
We dont throw a fancy combination
CHRIS LEAH
and then stand there. There are
no points for Krav Maga. There is no

For even this civilian form of it
(Ben teaches military Krav Maga as
well) is supremely aggressive. The
Metropolitan police are not allowed
to use it for example. Because it
counter-attacks in the very instant
of defending and has a notion of
reasonable that is dierent from
an English courts. If we fear lethal
intent from more than one attacker
then we punch for the suprasternal
(jugular) notch, we punch with split
ngers to the eyes, we break a
choke-hold with an explosive break,
then hold his wrist, lean back,
unbalance him, and punch him in
the throat. If we are attacked on the
ground (we are shown how to fall,
turn, how to get up without exposing
the head) then we trap an ankle with
a foot and break their shin with the
other. And if we get our man down
and we see two more coming at us,
then we dont want the rst guy getting
up and joining in again. So we take our
stamp, I guess, that is meant for shins,
and we do it to his head after rst
scanning for those pesky cameras.
We practise our stamping on the
sprung wooden oor. Stamp! Stamp!
Stamp! People driving down the
Finchley Road 100 yards away turn
to see what the commotion is. And
they see me, stamping on Nazi heads,
making sure those sons of bitches do
not get up and point their Lugers at me.
Then Ben misses a week for some
appointment or other. And Danny
takes the class. Danny has silver hair
and looks like four of me in a tracksuit.
He looks like he ate three Bens for
breakfast. He doesnt talk as much,
but you wouldnt need many of him in
your army to feel safe in the desert.
He is not sure where weve got
to in the course, so just dives into the
technique for breaking a headlock.
I dont know which comprehensives
you went to, he says to us (I think
of my time at Westminster School:
the long-haired fops, Nick Clegg
among the prefects, our own special
pronunciation of Latin and the
ancient Shrove Tuesday pancake-
ipping rituals) but the headlock was
pretty standard, wasnt it?
Danny looks for someone to put
him in a headlock. Eventually, he
picks the one guy with a long enough
arm to get it round his neck and shows
us not to strain at the arm but to go
with it, turn in, bite the nipple, reach
round with the outside arm and pull
the guys head back at the forehead
(or better still, the eyes) until he rolls
backwards, then emerge from the lock
EXPERIENCE
and break him with a single hammer
punch to the exposed Adams apple.
I nearly shit my pants just watching.
But I am hooked. Ben is back the
following week and the classes gather
pace. We now begin by prowling
round the room together, attacking
imaginary assailants (like the tragic
judo squares at school), then squats
and press-ups and press-up ghts
(top fun) then ghting each other.
Learning leg-defences and rolling
falls. I try to avoid women and the
soppier blokes because I want to be
tested (in Israel, says Danny, they
think the way Krav Maga is taught
in Britain is a bit soft they prefer
to go for it with more physical intent
because it provides more realistic
adrenalin, and I am with them on
that) and I have some good battles
until I overstretch, choose a guy half
my age and twice my tness and get
a bit of a pasting.
But I love it. And at the end, when
we stretch and then stand and bow
and say Kida (which is Hebrew for
Im not quite sure what but feels good
coming out of my mouth), I feel very
good indeed for taking the beating.
What the fuck are those?
my wife asks later, when she sees
the bruising on my arms and legs.
Krav tattoos, I say. Because that
is what they call them. And I am
proud to have them and proud to be
part of the thing they come from.
I am really not a joining-in kind of
guy. I am not a team player. I dont like
classes; I dont like learning. But I go
back to Ben (or Danny or Deborah)
every week because they are portals to
something ne, noble and dangerous
that is not silly or self-deluding and
speaks directly to the Batman in me.
Which is all I ever wanted.
I have no idea how Id make out
now in the street. Ive only been at
it a couple of months. Probably still
get my ass kicked. But thats not the
point. Krav Maga is about making
yourself ready for the people who
want to kill you. It is about being as
prepared as you can be. Just like the
Jewish centre I train in is prepared,
by being set back from the road,
having bomb-proof windows and a
guy checking every bag that comes
into the building.
I spent years trying to suppress
the Jew in me, because he was a bit
of a wuss. But now my inner Jew is
my hardest part. He is Bat-Jew.
And if I ever do nd myself in a
bit of bother, it is he who is going
to save me, or die trying.
85
WHAT IVE LEARNED
MATT LEBLANC
FORMER FRIEND, 46
My mother calls me Matthew when Im in trouble. Matthew Steven
if its really bad.
Im not a workaholic. I like being a dad. Right now my daughter is 10
years old; shes still a little girl and she wants me around. Shes going to be
a teenager soon and tell me to go fuck myself. Then maybe Ill work more.
I cant believe that my nose has never been broken. I got into ghts as
a teenager and Ive been sucker-punched in bars. Some guys girlfriend
will say, Oh, theres Joey from Friends. Then the guy has to come
over and prove himself by smacking me in the mouth.
Measure twice. Cut once.
My manscaping regime? Do I shave my balls, is that what youre asking?
I just let nature take its course. When it gets out of control, Ill trim it.
Gary Oldman is great. Thats someone who can be super-dramatic or
really funny. Hes like the Swiss army knife of actors.
I can order in a sushi place. Toro is the fatty part of the tuna belly.
Theres been a lot of untruths printed about me. There was a rumour
that I died of a drug overdose in a nightclub; there were rumours that
I was gay; that I fucked this girl and fucked that girl. Ive heard it all.
Sometimes theres a bit of truth in it, sometimes its completely
fabricated. There was another rumour that I was in rehab. Complete
bullshit. Whether I should go to rehab or not is a dierent story...
Invest conservatively. Only be risky with ve per cent of your money.
We lm some exterior scenes for Episodes in LA but for the most part
its shot in England, so Im over here quite a lot. I love sh and chips.
Cant get my head around a Guinness, though. Or tea. Ive picked up
a few phrases. Slapper. Twat. Tosser. Mostly words, not phrases.
If youre castrating a bull, dont cut your hand and try not to get kicked.
My political views are irrelevant. I have my opinions but its not my
business to voice them because Im not in the public eye as a lawmaker
or a politician. Im an entertainer.
I dont like dishonesty. I dont like the paparazzi. I dont like asparagus.
Itd be nice to quit smoking. Some days, I only have a couple of
cigarettes, other days its a couple of packs. Have I ever smoked weed?
Yeah. Recently? I havent smoked it today.
86
INTERVIEW
BEN MITCHELL
PORTRAIT
TOM VAN SCHELVEN
Im 5ft 10ins. I tried to model and got told pretty much straight away
that I was too short. So that didnt pan out.
Becoming a father changes your perspective on everything. I learned
that I could function on less sleep; I never realised how patient I could
be; I never realised that I had the capacity to love another person as
much as I love her. Fantastic pride. Its a very primal thing. You get this
feeling of, Wow, this is why were here. You know, to procreate.
A hammer is fun because it can be used to build or break.
The Stig has an oce and thats the only place hes allowed to take o
his helmet. When I was on Top Gear, I never saw his face.
The rst band I ever saw live was Cheap Trick. I was 13, 14 something
like that. Rick Nielsen had that guitar with ve necks and he used
to throw picks out into the audience. One landed right in front of me
and there was this mad rush to get it. Then over the music, I could
hear screaming. Me and my buddy started pulling people back to get
to the bottom of the pile and there was this small girl with a sneaker
imprint on her cheek. Someone had stepped on her but she didnt care
because she got the pick.
I dont like to be in the ocean that much; I feel like shark bait. Maybe
thats because when I was a kid I saw Jaws. Im alright in a lake.
Ive got used to being well-known. Its something you grow into. When
you rst put that suit on it doesnt t right so you might rip it or stretch
it. After a while it wears in and gets comfortable. You lose your
anonymity but you can get a table at a great restaurant at short notice.
I was raised Catholic, so I guess I believe in God. I havent been to
church in a while but I do pray. Ive been to confession. Not lately,
but I havent done anything that I feel I need to go to for.
GROOMING: SARAH GRUNDY USING COSMETICS LA CARTE
The best taste in the world is probably Jameson whiskey.
Friends was a pretty big show and it still is. I mean, its on all the time.
Now theres a younger generation thats getting introduced to it. Theyll
come up and say, Youre Joey! Youre so old! Thats a little unkind,
but they were just watching it and I was 26. Now my hairs grey...
Im an optimist for sure. The glass is always half full. I would have been
happy whatever I did. I might not have had as fast a car but what are you
going to do?
Be nice. Nobody likes an asshole.
Read more in our series of What Ive Learned interviews at esquire.co.uk
I DONT LIKE
DISHONESTY.
I DONT LIKE
THE PAPARAZZI.
I DONT LIKE
ASPARAGUS
The boardroom

Right:
Navy wool/mohair mix jacket
(sold as suit), 1,450, by Alfred
Dunhill. Blue pinstripe cotton
shirt, 125, by Hackett. Red wool
knitted tie, 80, by Hardy Amies

Far right: Cyclist:

Grey wool/cotton checked
jacket, 185, by Hardy Amies.
White cotton shirt, 129, by
Paul Smith. Black/white polka
dot silk tie, 75, Hackett
White cotton-mix shirt, 150,
by Rapha. Blue cotton-mix
trousers, 90, by Giro. Grey
wool knitted tie, 80; blue
leather belt, 95, both by
Hardy Amies. Custom-built
track bike, POA, by Nagasawa
available at kinokocycles.com
 CYCLING
90
T
HEY SAY THERE IS SAFETY IN NUMBERS,
in which case riding a bike in London
is less risky now than its been for
a long time. That said, most of the
citys cyclists can probably still give
you a list of near misses even those
who arent on GPS tracker app Strava. Take
Michael Smiley, for instance. He could hold his
own with Robert Shaw in Jaws.
I split my face open, he says. Fractured
my skull, split my nose, smashed up my teeth,
broke my elbow, broke my knee. I hit a lamppost
by Marble Arch going at 35mph on a pushbike.
One time, a car pulled out in front of me;
I went over the handlebars, landed on the bonnet.
He ran over the bike, drove up the road with me
on the bonnet of the car smacking the window
trying to get him to stop. He was trying to shake
me o. This was years ago, when I was a courier.
Smiley has never won the Tour de France.
He holds no world records, has claimed no
Olympic gold medals and is not a knight of the
realm. He doesnt have his own line of Fred Perry
cycling jerseys, but it is just possible that he has
had a greater impact on the way British cyclists
dress today than Sir Bradley Wiggins. Smiley
is an actor. You might recognise him from his
role in Kill List (2011). Perhaps for his short-lived
part in Channel 4s Utopia. Maybe Luther
the odd time, he adds. But its more likely you
know him as Tyres, the uorescent messenger
with the stunted attention span in late-Nineties
sitcom Spaced, the series that also introduced
the world to Simon Pegg and Nick Frost.
We were all living together Simon, Nick
and I, Smiley says. Simon and Jessica, was
Stevenson now Hynes, had commissioned this
character for the series who was based on me.
Smiley became a cycle courier after rst
arriving in London 30 years ago. I was homeless,
Top gear: Michael Smiley
unemployed and I had a child; I needed a job, but
as easily distracted
cycle courier Tyres there was no work. Then one day, I saw someone
in Spaced, 1999; Smiley go past with a bag on their shoulder and a
recently returned to radio and I thought: I could do that. I managed
Northern Ireland for
BBC cycling travelogue to scrape together some money, bought a bike,
Something to Ride Home joined a courier company and away I went.
That self-determination gave me the
condence to try stand-up comedy, then to
try acting, which gave me the career that Ive
got today I can trace it all the way back to
throwing my leg over a Dawes Galaxy in 1985.
In the annals of British subcultures, the early
cycle courier can be seen as the proto-hipster.
The likes of Tyres set in motion the trend for
xed-wheel bikes and cycling caps that today is
familiar to the point of derision. But back in 1999,
when Spaced was rst screened, the courier look
was largely unknown. It was very much of the
underground, Smiley says. I didnt really want
someone [on the show] dressing me who didnt
know what was going on. So I said: Ill do all that,
leave it to me. And I brought in my own gear.
Daniel Behrman quote hangs
A proudly in the toilet of the London
caf Look Mum No Hands!: The
bicycle is a vehicle for revolution.
The bike lends itself to such
rhetoric (its wheels go round, after all).
Swedish statistician Hans Rosling calls the
bicycle a piece of life-transforming technology;
a means of empowerment as well as a mode of
transport. He says this in the context of far-ung
villagers in Mozambique, but the sentiment
is equally true of children across the UKs vast
homogenous suburbs experiencing their rst
taste of freedom on a second-hand Raleigh.
Britains modern-day bike boom isnt about
them, however, its about people like you.
According to the 2011 census, the proportion
of people in the UK making their journey to
work on a bicycle held static at 2.8 per cent.
But in British cities, cycling has reached critical
mass: Brighton, Bristol, Manchester, Newcastle
and Sheeld all recorded an increase of 80 per
cent or more in the number of commuters on
bikes during the Noughties; in inner London,
the increase was a staggering 144 per cent.
Look Mum No Hands! is testament to the
revival of cycling in London; it sits on Old Street,
the main artery into the north-east of the capital
and the road with the third-biggest volume of
bike trac in the city. It is a biker caf, as in
bicycle, serving coee the socially acceptable,
performance-enhancing drug among cyclists,
according to co-founder Matt Harper and cake,
with an in-house bike repair shop and bike frames
mounted in the windows like works of art.
We opened in April 2010 and I was surprised
by how immediately popular it was, Harper says.
Even two years before it might not have worked.
It just seems that the uptake of cycling in London
went through the roof.
Theres now a second branch in Hackney
where 14 per cent of commuters ride bikes and
with plans for further outposts across the city. >
The bar Left:
Blue linen mix cardigan, 135;
camel cotton chinos, 100,
both by Gant Rugger. Pink
pinstripe cotton shirt, 195,
by Alfred Dunhill. White canvas
Jack Purcell sneakers, 50,
by Converse
Centre:
Cream wool jumper, 80, by
J Crew. Orange cotton twill
trousers, 130, by Hardy Amies.
Black leather brogues, 450,
by Hardy Amies available at
Harvey Nichols

What happens on the Tour:
Team Sky rider Bernhard Eisel
models for Rapha (with
mandatory caffeine fix); 2012 Tour
de France winner Bradley Wiggins
Trans-Europe espresso:
east London bike hub Look
Mum No Hands!; both
cycling and caf culture
land in the British capital
CYCLING
92
The same year the caf set up shop, a Mintel
report revealed that regular cyclists were
disproportionately likely to be well educated,
earn at least 50,000 a year, read a broadsheet
newspaper and shop at Waitrose. In the two
years up to 2010, in the midst of the recession,
sales of high-end bikes rose by 54 per cent; the
Association of Cycle Traders recorded 30 per cent
year-on-year growth in the sale of bikes worth an
average 1,000 through cycle-to-work schemes.
The new cyclist is auent, cosmopolitan and,
Mintel says, twice as likely to be male as female.
And he doesnt just want the expensive bike, he
wants to look the part. That doesnt necessarily
mean an all-in-one gimp outt traditionally
accociated with cycling. The Mamil (middle-aged
man in Lycra) exists, but the new wonder fabric
is old-school wool: merino to be exact.
When we started selling merino back in
2000, the decision was driven by how the
polyester base layers we were using for our sports
stunk after sport, and sometimes after washing,
says Ade Gunn, business development director
at Welsh sportswear label Howies, one of the rst
to bring merino to the cycling market. Serious
users buy kit to perform in tough conditions, and
they will pay the premium for superne merino.
The price people will pay has increased
in recent years, making certain newer fabrics
aordable to use that maybe were not in the
past, says Yanto Barker, a former professional
cyclist who set up performance brand Le Col.
But the real upsurge has been in crossover
clothing fusing the capabilities of all-out cycling
gear to urban style aesthetics. Giants like Levis,
with its bike-orientated Commuter range, and
H&M have exed their muscles, selling stretchy
denim jeans with reective detailing and
reinforced seats for more comfort. Even Marks
& Spencer now boasts a line of cycling chinos.
But the moment belongs to more recent start-ups
who have emerged from the cycling scene itself.
Vulpine is among the leading lights.
The Vulpine test is if you can walk into a slightly
rough pub and not look like a dick, then its
right, founder Nick Hussey says. His company
is one with aspirations to sell on Mr Porter
rather than in Evans Cycles; its still very much
technical gear but with the less palatable aspects
of outdoor clothing such as Velcro, the enemy
of good knitwear rethought or thrown out.
Hussey says that an inow of new cyclists
has forced the industry to aim higher. Cyclists
are very value-based, whereas in the wider
world, 200 quid for a jacket is pretty normal.
But no matter how nice it looks, the gear
has to work. Were a performance brand thats
stylish, he adds. We are not a style brand. As
soon as the gear stops working, were stued.
High-end French brand Caf du Cycliste
comes from a similar place: We wanted
technical products but we preferred to be well
dressed rather than dressed up, the companys
director Rmi Clermont says. There is no reason
to buy costumes that make you look like a pro.
Several friends have had their girlfriends say,
Youre not going out wearing that, are you?
says Will Miles, co-founder of Chapeau!, a bike
clothing importer turned maker. We wanted
a range that might not elicit that response.
Look Mum No Hands!, too, has its own line of
clothing. Its bestseller happens to be a trio of Tour
de France pants, in yellow, green and red polka
dot, but it is also working on serious kit; a recent
collaboration with venerable English institution
Lavenham produced a quilted jacket and gilet.
However, no brand better embodies the
aspirational, middle-class cyclist than Rapha,
the 10-year-old company that last year ousted
Adidas as the kit-maker for Team Sky, the team
behind Tour de France winners Bradley
Wiggins and Chris Froome. With its statement
marketing and steep price points, it polarises
opinion among cyclists (although even its most
outspoken detractors begrudgingly admit that its
clothes are incredibly well made). Here, a jersey
could cost you 200 fork out 300 and you can
get a pair of cycling shoes made from yak leather.
And business couldnt be better: last year, Rapha
grew by an unprecedented 67 per cent, with an
estimated turnover of 26.5m in 2013.
They have successfully introduced a brand
image thats probably more recognisable to the
non-cycling public than traditional brands like
Assos or Campagnolo, says Chris Morris of
Swrve, a company known for pioneering jeans for
cyclists. Very few brands escape into the broader
non-cycling world thats really impressive.
Rapha put a bug in peoples heads that
things could be dierent, Vulpines Hussey
says. They were ahead of the curve. We
denitely followed in their slipstream.
Urban crossover clothing makes up about
a quarter of Raphas sales, but at its core it is a
road-racing brand, and to some extent that has
shaped the market.
 CYCLING

Theres all kinds of cyclists, its just that road
racers shout a lot louder, Hussey says. That
could be for a reason; they are the high achievers.
I remember turning up to a club ride in the
South West about two years ago wearing a Rapha
jersey and getting, Did your mum buy you that?
or, You can tell hes from London, says Josh
Greet, who works at London bike shop Kinoko.
But now its the norm.
When I moved to London, it was deemed the
only people who were riding bikes were those who
couldnt aord a car or some lefty artist-type,
Michael Smiley says. Its very much the new golf
now, isnt it? The thirty- or fortysomething bloke
whos got himself a bit of money who can buy
himself a 2,000 bike with a full groupset [gears],
go o in his Rapha clothing into the countryside
legitimately for four hours with his friends, so you
can get away from the wife and kids. And it keeps
you t, so the missus cant complain.
he same year that Spaced rst aired,
93
Theyre dirty and hollow-eyed and a bit fucked
thats what it feels like to be a messenger.
Back in the Nineties, Mottram wasnt a
messenger he was an accountant but he
wanted to be one. I just thought they were really
cool, he says. They wore all black, so I always
wore black. I was a fakenger [a fake messenger]
before there were any fakengers.
Messengers oered an edgy alternative
to the mainstream view of the cycling. Theyd
tapped into the cycling heritage that was then
Famous cyclist #1
alien to Britain the mass-start racing favoured Pharrell Williams
in mainland Europe was banned in the UK,
only adding to its mythical allure. I used to like
going into vintage shops and buying wool-mix
jerseys, Michael Smiley says. Nice old French
and Italian cycling clubs.
But mostly, the couriers curious dress
code had come out of necessity. Peter Walker,
who set up The Guardians Bike Blog, worked
as a messenger post-university. I can remember
riding around in fraying shorts over a pair of my
girlfriends winter leggings, he says. The bike
gear available then was purely intended to race,
so couriers worked out their own solutions. Famous cyclist #2
Smiley recalls wearing cycling shorts with Brad Pitt

T Lance Armstrong began his

domination of the Tour de France.
By then, professional cyclists had
become, according to Rapha boss
Simon Mottram, technical machines
impossible to relate to even before we knew about
the drugs. Who can feel anything for that?
rock-climbing leggings. When you were riding
around on a bike, it looked OK, but then youd be
standing in the pub afterwards and youd have
people pointing and laughing, he says. What
we developed then were cut-o combats over
the top thats where that came in.
Through their line of work, couriers were
The rise of the machine:
Lance Armstrong on his
way to claiming his sixth
of seven (now void) Tour
Mottram set up Rapha in 2004 having naturally what Malcolm Gladwell would classify de France titles, 2004
spotted a gaping pothole in the market. In the as connectors, people who joined the dots
Nineties, cycling was just this geeky, super-niche between networks. And o the clock, the >
sport, he says. Something sad people did.
You were either a racer or a commuter and
neither really cared about the kit. If you were
a racer, it was just about going faster, and if you
were a commuter, it was about function and
Youre not going out
being seen not being hit.
It was a time when British men were growing
evermore sartorially aware. Most of us woke up
wearing , are you?
and realised you could actually buy some really
nice clothes, Mottram says. But if you became a
bike rider, you had to sacrice any sense of style.
If you wanted a cycling jersey, your only
option was a team replica, typically in garish
colours, emblazoned with logos. Its like playing
football in a Man United shirt. You dont do that
unless you play for Man United.
The sport Armstrong had propelled himself
to the top of was one of stats, measurements
and data. It had forgotten the romance.
Mottram pulls out what amounts to Raphas
earliest business plan: a scrapbook of behind-
the-scenes photos of the tours that took place
some 30 years before Armstrong, when cycling
was a noble pursuit. These guys were putting
themselves on the line, and unlike most of the
shots of the guys today, they were totally human,
he says. Their suering in a small, pathetic
way, thats what we feel like when we ride bikes.
 CYCLING
subculture spilled into the emerging club scene.
Chill-out rooms were the hotbeds of ideas,
Smiley says. You were fuelled by the exuberance
of the dance oor and the beats, and the heavy
use of Lucozade youd open your mind.
Outsiders were becoming receptive to the
courier look, and in the clubs the clothing
came into its own. Youd keep your cycling gear
on [when you went out] because it was great for
wicking sweat away, Smiley says.
The courier look has oered a lot, Swrves
Chris Morris says. Its a great mix of individual
style with the practical needs of spending the
working day moving on a bike. Anyone looking
to make regular clothes more bike-friendly
will look to messengers to some extent because
so much of their look is all about function.
The rules of engagement:
Hugo Koblet prepares for
battle, 1951; a snapshot
of The Rules; Eddy Merckx,
centre, won both the Tour
de France and Giro dItalia
here are rules about what you
T
five times (and looked
cool doing so), seen here should wear on a bike. Or rather,
with Joop Zoetemelk and
theres The Rules.
Gsta Pettersson, 1971
Rule #16: Respect the jersey.
One of the great things about
being a cyclist is that were skinny, Frank D
Strack says. Clothes look great on skinny
people. Strack is a founding member of the
elominati, a freemason-like fraternity of
yclists, the keepers of the cog. The Rules ,
published in 2013, is their compendium of road
racings unwritten code, written down. It covers
everything you need to know about life inside
the sport, from race etiquette (Rule #43: dont
be a jackass) to what to order in the caf after your
94
ride (Rule #56: espresso or macchiato only). But
foremost, The Rules dictate how you should look.
Rule #17: Team kit is for members of the team.
Cycling has always been a vain sport,
says Alex Metcalfe from high-tech bike gear
specialists Gore Bike Wear. Right back in the
late Sixties, riders such as [Belgian cycling
icon Eddy] Merckx looked just right and huge
attention was paid to team kit.
At the starting line, the guys who are the
most intimidating are the ones with all the gear,
says Matt Harper from Look Mum No Hands!,
who used to compete in road races. Theyve got
the glistening calf muscles, the shaven legs and
the smart kit. Theyve already got the upper hand
before youve started peddling. You look at photos
of Merckx or [Italian sprinter Mario] Cipollini
and they look slick. They could be models.
Many of the greats such as [ve-time Tour
de France winner Jacques] Anquetil, [Swiss
champion Hugo] Koblet and [Louison] Bobet
[the rst rider to win the Tour de France three
years in a row] always raced with a comb in their
pocket so they could look fantastic at all times,
Strack says. And, as [French poet] Paul Fournel
wrote, To look good is already to go fast.
Rule #8: Saddle, bars and tyres shall be
carefully matched.
The crossover ranges are great for getting
people to view the bike as an accessible way to
get around, Strack says. But you wont catch
me dead riding my race bike in any of that stu.
Rule #22: Cycling caps are for cycling.
The guys who write The Rules clearly do it
in a tongue-in-cheek way, says Klaus Bellon, who
runs the Cycling Inquisition blog, but its also
somewhat serious. They say you shouldnt wear
a cap when o your bike, yet several of them were
photographed doing just that while watching
a race in Belgium last year. People get a kick out
of catching them breaking their own rules.
he new aesthetic that Rapha
T ushered in was subdued, marrying
cutting-edge technical fabrics and
features with the classic, clean
silhouette of late-Sixties Merckx-era
road racing. A Fordism, the bulk of the early line
was black as celebrated in the brands new 10th
anniversary Kings of Pain line but accentuated
with an unlikely signature colour: pink. This
was rst the tone of the Giro dItaly not the
yellow of the Tour de France (Yellow is too
obvious, Mottram admits) but also a nod to
Paul Smith. I used to buy a lot of Paul Smith and
I always liked that contrast of dark grey and pink
highlights, the Rapha chief executive says.
A keen cyclist himself, Smith returned the
compliment by collaborating with Rapha, rst
in 2007, and designers Timothy Everest and >
 CYCLING
Christopher Raeburn have both followed suit.
Meanwhile, Oliver Spencer recently worked with
Vulpine on a blazer that has become Spencers
best-selling one category, one colour jacket.
With a trend, things go o on an extreme,
Spencer says of high-end cycling clothing.
If you like, thats the Rapha side of it. Now
its nding its ground; Vulpine is stepping into
a massive gap that Rapha doesnt do. More
wearable, more normal more everyday.
According to Spencer, there are parallels
Famous cyclist #3
Jared Leto between what is happening in the cycling
industry and the rise of sport-luxe, in which
the fashion houses have embraced technical
clothing as a whole. But cycling has taken it
up a gear; for a start, brands like Gucci, Herms
and Chanel have launched their own bikes.
Cycling is actually inltrating fashion now
and thats the big dierence, Spencer says.
The co-opting of messenger culture by the
mainstream had a profound eect on the cycling
community and its relationship to fashion, says
Dylan Robbins. When Kanye aunts his Cinelli
[handmade Italian bike] like its a Benz, you know
the conversation has changed.
Robbins is the spiritual advisor of Team
Round 2: below, wannabe JVA, a racing team from Portland, Oregon, a city
cyclist Kanye West shows
off his other-other wheels thats home to a vibrant cycling scene (as
a fixie, 2008 lampooned by sketch show Portlandia).
The inux of young fashionistas was a bit
of a shock, Robbins says. Some of those who
When flaunts his
Cinelli like its a , by perpetuating the notion that riding a bike
the conversation
has
had been cycling for years reacted like the
obscure band theyd loved for years suddenly
had a top-10 radio hit.
Team JVA themselves came to the attention
of the wider cycling community a few years ago
when they set up a website for a ctitious brand
called Jahvahaal Internationale, an obvious
spoof of Rapha. It included slogans such as
Were Kind of a Big Deal, Women: Kind of an
Afterthought and Sans Serif plastered in
a sans serif typeface across pictures of super
serious cyclists, much like Raphas own site.
We saw satire as a way to hold a mirror up
to people who we thought we taking themselves
way too seriously, Robbins says. [As cyclists]
we put on costumes, shave our legs and pretend
that were waging epic battles every time we
sprint for a city limit sign. Rapha succeeded in
96
tapping into that penchant for self-delusion.
Rapha was instrumental in changing the
aesthetic of performance clothing for the better,
Robbins admits. But to non-cyclists, we all
probably still look like helmeted gure skaters.
hen exactly did cycling become
W
cool? It can all be traced
back to a rather specic date,
Julie Kierkegaard says,
14 November 2006. Before
then, there was little on the internet or in the
public consciousness regarding urban cycling.
On that date Mikael [Colville-Andersen] took
what [was] later called The Photo That
Launched a Million Bicycles. Cycle Chic was
born. Without Cycle Chic, no Rapha, no H&M
cycling wear, no Chanel.
Kierkegaard works for Copenhagenize, a
design agency that places the bicycle at the centre
of its push to make urban environments more
liveable spaces. Every year, it compiles an index
of the planets most bike-friendly cities; in 2013,
Amsterdam came top (no UK cities featured).
Mikael Colville-Andersen set up
Copenhagenize, as well as the Cycle Chic blog,
described by The Guardian as The Sartorialist
on two wheels. The Bike Blogs Peter Walker
calls Colville-Andersen the Richard Dawkins
of cycling hes certainly headstrong. In one of
his Ted talks, he makes a compelling case for
cycling helmets causing more harm than good
is inherently dangerous. But one thing Colville-
Andersen insists he isnt is a cyclist.
Cyclist has developed into a dirty word,
he says. I dont personally wish to be called one.
If Im in a bar in London and mention to
someone that Im a cyclist, theyll get a picture of
me in homoerotic outts, shitting all over society
with my perceived bad behaviour.
The Photo That Launched a Million
Bicycles couldnt be further removed from that
image. It features a woman, shot from behind,
on what youd call a utility bike; she wears her
hair down; no helmet; a black, belted jacket; a
billowing checked skirt; and calf-length boots; a
satchel clamped to a rear carrier. It became Cycle
Chics rst entry. From that rst photo, things
snowballed quickly, Colville-Andersen says.
Copenhagen is a style capital. People see
our impeccably dressed citizens moving about
the urban landscape on bicycles and get all
excited. But its just the most convenient way
around the city. We dont dress for our journey,
we dress for our destination. Just like motorists,
EMILY MAYE | GETTY
pedestrians and public transport users.
Personally, Im not a cyclist. Im just a guy
who happens to get around the city on [a] bicycle
like 55 per cent [of Copenhagens] population.
 CYCLING
97
Colville-Andersen views specialist cycling
clothing with suspicion, calling it proteering:
Nobody in mainstream bicycle cultures in
Denmark, the Netherlands, Germany [or]
France is buying into this shit. Why would they?
They already own trousers. Once urban cycling
becomes more normal, people will reject the
STYLING: STEPHANIE CRAIN, JONATHAN DANN | FASHION ASSISTANT: LUCY KEBBELL | PHOTO ASSISTANTS: HANNAH ROSE, WILL HARTLEY | GROOMING: JULIA CARTA USING SHEER COVER AND BUMBLE AND BUMBLE AT CAROL HAYES MANAGEMENT | SEE STOCKISTS PAGE FOR DETAILS
cycling clothes trend.
Antonia Maybury runs Water O a Ducks
Back, a company geared towards making clothes
that look normal but boast features tailored
towards cycling. She notes that the bicycle
is something that British people rediscover,
whereas in mainland Europe, they never stop
riding. In the UK, most people learn to cycle
when they are at school, but as soon as cars are
introduced into their lives, the cycling option
fades out, she says. This has a knock-on eect
to the clothes that people wear. Imagine that you
simply continued riding every day for the rest
of your life you wouldnt venture into suddenly
wearing Gore-Tex and neon jackets, you would
simply continue wearing your normal clothes.
I suspect that in Berlin, Amsterdam and
Copenhagen they dont have as far to cycle, is
Look Mum No Hands!s Matt Harpers take on
things. And the cycling is at a slower pace, with
more cyclists. London is quite busy and frenetic.
And if youre a guy working for a bank in the City
wearing an 800 suit, you dont want to cycle to
work in the rain.
ne Friday morning, Im invited to
O join a bunch of cyclists friends
and associates of Rapha founder
Simon Mottram for a few
laps of Londons Regents Park
before work. A casual aair, it isnt an ocial
Rapha run, but it might as well be. If not
head-to-toe in the brand, most riders wear at
least a ash of pink. (One makes a statement
by wearing no Rapha at all.)
The ride kicks o at 8.30am, with cyclists
joining in spurts before a true peloton is powering
around the park. Later on, Ill hear it described as
an organic entity, or like a swarm of locusts that
suddenly bursts into a sprint for no good reason.
On the surface, its all smiles old boys (and girls)
catching up; nothing like the suering endured
by the riders in those vintage photos Mottram
showed me of the Tour de France. But no matter
how relaxed this is supposed to be, pride is clearly
at sake; one rider condes afterwards that
everyone was hurting at some point during
the ride, even if they claim otherwise.
I manage little more than 30 minutes at the
back before Im dropped by the peloton without a
hope of catching up and peel o to the caf in the
parks Inner Circle, where the riders will end up.
Other cycling brands like to sell the idea of
inclusivity, anyone is invited; Rapha knows
that its most loyal customers like to feel that they
are part of an elite club. Theres a secret range
called Imperial Works that is made available
on an invite-only basis to, as Mottram puts it,
the people who really care or spend the most
money, crudely. Super-fans also get rst dibs
in sample sales the most middle-class jumble
sale you will ever see, Im told and the rst
riders in the caf are wearing the spoils of one
such event that took place the day before.
One sports a 200 Team Sky jacket with
cut-o sleeves that he has indeed cut o.
(Pro riders remove them when they get too hot,
but then they get given a replacement jacket
the next day.) I wouldnt have done it if Id
bought it at full price, he tells me. No one likes
to admit it but everyone was up at 6am working
Upwardly mobile:
out if their socks coordinate with their outt. The Photo That
The remaining riders pull up and soon the Launched a Million
cafe is buzzing if Ive learnt anything it is Bicycles, the
inception of the
that cycling is good news for the coee business. Cycle Chic blog
In fact, its good news for business, full stop.
I had two meetings last week, both of which
were done on a bicycle, another rider says.
Twenty years ago, that wouldve been during a
round of golf; now its on a lap of Richmond Park.
ichael Smiley recently gave his
M Tyres cap away, to a friend of
a friend who is undergoing
chemotherapy. What are you
going to do: keep it as a museum
Famous cyclist #4
Leonardo DiCaprio
piece? he asks. Or give it to someone who will
appreciate it. Its nice to pass stu on to think
that a silly sitcom helped someone get through
something quite frightening. The actor ponders
on what would have become of his alter ego.
Id like to think that Tyres is a masseur for the
Bermudian Ladies Cycling Club. Or maybe hes
developing clothes; Id love for him to be sitting
around with the boys from Vulpine and Swrve.
Swrve have got a lovely Belstay waxed
jacket, cut long at the back, short at the front,
a zip pocket on the sleeve for your keys
Famous cyclist #5
innovation that obviously comes from the
Jude Law
saddle. Smiley describes his own look these
days as countryside alliance meets agent
provocateur: I like to mix and match: a nice
pair of moleskin shooting breeks with a pair
of really pingy New & Lingwood socks, so the
legs are going up and down and theyre getting
ashed you cant say you didnt see me. I want
people to think, He must be a gentleman, look
at the way hes dressed. Its all subterfuge. You
can very much do that with cycle clothing.
Then again, being well dressed isnt
everything. You can look as good as you want
on a pushbike, youve still got to ride the fucking Famous cyclist #6
thing, he grins. Thats the best bit. Arnold Schwarzenegger
 Interview

SHOOTING
FROM
THE HIP
FRANK, FEARLESS, FORMIDABLE AND FUNNY, TOO
CHARLIZE THERON IS A THROWBACK TO THE GLORY
DAYS OF HOLLYWOOD, A LEADING LADY WITH STYLE AND
TALENT TO BURN. ESQUIRE JOINS THE GUNSLINGING
STAR OF A MILLION WAYS TO DIE IN THE WEST
FOR DRINKS IN LA AND DISCOVERS THAT, ACTUALLY,
THEY DO STILL MAKE EM LIKE THEY USED TO

BY

ALEX BILMES

PHOTOGRAPHS BY

TERRY RICHARDSON

STYLING BY

LESLIE FREMAR

Esquire 98/ 99
 Interview
T
all, beautiful, imposing, the Sunset Tower
rises above West Hollywoods Sunset Strip
with her art deco nose in the air tight-
lipped and straight-backed, her ball gown
trailing in the dirt. Once a chichi apartment
block, now a ritzy hotel, the Towers history
is as star-dusted as that of any building in
LA. Still, appearances can be deceiving
even, or perhaps especially, in Hollywood. The facade is
glamorous, rened, but if walls could go o the record she became exasperated with me when I momentarily
In Hollywoods golden age, the Tower was home at one
time or another to Marilyn Monroe, Greta Garbo, Joan
Crawford, Jean Harlow and Ava Gardner. Thats just the
gals. Sinatra kept an apartment here. So did John Wayne,
Howard Hughes, Errol Flynn and the gangster Bugsy
Siegel. The Sunset Tower, Truman Capote wrote, is where
every scandal that ever happened, happened.
Today, the bar at the Sunset Tower Hotel remains a
prime spot from which to observe the comings and goings
of the movie industrys power players, their plunges and
ascents, losses and win-wins. Particularly today, with only
three days to go to the Oscars and the town or at least
this ultra-privileged corner of it rehearsing its collective
acceptance speech, a knot in its yoga-toned stomach.
Trouble is, right now the bar is closed. Which wouldnt
be so bad, except I have an appointment for drinks with
a Best Actress also tall, also beautiful, also imposing.
What to do? Where to sit? Who to call? I nd a table in
a corner of the lobby, order a sparkling water, and try to
ignore the sound of drilling coming from the lift shaft.
Who the fuck closes a bar? Charlize Theron
announces upon arrival. She shrugs o her coat, collapses
her elegant frame into a low chair, clicks her tongue
against the roof of her mouth, leans way back, runs her
hands through her hair, stretches her arms in the air, and
nally comes to a rest, xing me with a look, languid but
expectant not quite a challenge, maybe more in the
region of a dare. Go on, then, this look says, its left eyebrow
raised: ask me something good.
Charlize Theron is a bombshell in the classic style.
Even dressed down, as she is today in faded jeans and a
pink sweatshirt, the woman is poised, soigne: what one
understands they used to call, back in the Sunset Towers
ring-a-ding heyday, a classy broad. Lithe and athletic, with
a halo of golden hair and cool blue eyes, quietly appraising,
she is quite something to behold, and also to be beheld by.
If I hadnt met her before, Id be a little intimidated.
In fact, I think I am a little intimidated, even though I have
met her before, and I know that the supermodels bone
structure, the sportswomans physique and the penetrating
stare dont tell the whole story. Charlize might initially
seem a little daunting but shes
PREVIOUS PAGE: good fun, too.
Jacket, by Carven.
That said, You certainly do have
Bra; garter;
underwear, all by Kiki to bring your A-game when you go for
de Montparnasse. a drink with her, the writer-director
Stockings, by Agent Paul Haggis told me when last I wrote
Provocateur about Charlize, in 2008. Shes got an
incredibly quick wit. If youre not careful, shell twist you
around in a knot.
Shes a take-the-piss artist, says Woody Harrelson,
Charlizes co-star in three lms to date. Thats one of the
cool things about her. She can drink you under the table
but at the same time shes laser-focused.
Laser-focused and no-nonsense scarily so, if youre
the kind of person liable, in weaker moments, to fall back
on nonsense. Six years ago, in a photo studio in New York,
forgot myself and said something bland and uy, the
kind of insincere compliment that is often tossed about in
photo studios when famous people are present: Thanks so
much, Charlize! That was amazing.
Dont say that! she said. Thats bullshit! You dont
even mean that.
Embarrassed in front of my colleagues, I crumpled a
little, which only made her angrier. Be a man! she said.
And she whacked me in the chest. Bitch.
This time, Im careful not to slide into lazy celebrity
sycophancy. Still she pulls me up sharply when I attempt
an awkward segue from her lm career to her love life.
Shit, Alex, you did so well up to that point, she says,
looking at her phone to check how long Ive managed to be
not annoying. Wow. That was like a solid two hours.
Not that she refuses to talk about her private life, just
that my indirect way of asking about it you might call it
cowardly irked her. Shes one of those people: theres
nothing small about her. Consequently, because no one
wants to be disapproved of by someone admirable, she
makes you want to be bigger and better than you are.
Its not just me who nds himself falling short. Even
here and now in the lobby of the Sunset Tower during
Oscar week: world epicentre of ummery at its moment
of greatest oiliness she will only allow a certain amount of
fuss before she begins to look bored and uncomfortable.
Dimitri, the Sunset Towers slick, bow-tied matre d,
buzzes around her, dispensing compliments like warm
nuts. She plays the game but her smile becomes eortful.
When we actually need a waiter, of course we cant nd
one. Charlize wants a Gibson. What would I like? Id like a
vodka and tonic. She bolts upright and strides across the
lobby towards the bar, calls back over her shoulder: Any
particular kind of vodka? Er, Belvedere? She returns not
quite triumphant its not that big a deal but satised,
and we clink glasses, look each other in the eye. Good to
see you again, she says. And because her own bullshit
detector is so sensitive, this doesnt seem like an empty
statement. Its good to see her, too.
Before I get too caught up in the moment, a solidly built
man, dapper in a dark suit, and with the faintest pencil
moustache decorating his weather-beaten face, passes
by our table. On his way through he leans down to tap
Charlize on the shoulder and point to the bar, towards
which he hurtles, still in a semi-crouched position, like a
sprinter coming out of the blocks. It is, unmistakably,
Sean Penn, Charlizes new beau, ready, when were nished,
to take her to a party. Later, she makes the introductions:
Pleasure! says Sean, and he, too, clinks my glass.
(All this could go to a boys head.) The following night at
another party its Oscar week; there are lots of parties
I chat briey to Sean. He is an intense, committed actor,
as everyone knows, but in private he turns out to be an
open and convivial sort, a man pitched at an amused angle
to the world, knees slightly bent for balance, like hes
standing in a boat on a gentle sea or maybe a surfboard.
Sean has been dating Charlize for close to four months
when I meet them. He makes no eort to disguise his
happiness about this. Not that its particularly relevant
to our story, but for this, among other things, I like him.
(Also: hes Sean Penn.)
T
en years ago, almost to the day of our interview,
Charlize Theron won the Oscar for Best
Actress for her portrayal of the serial killer
Aileen Wuornos in the independent lm
Monster. Chilled as a cocktail olive, she says it
hadnt occurred to her until I mentioned it that
this anniversary was looming. Not that shes sniy about
the Oscars. Shell be presenting an award at the ceremony
on Sunday, and shes learned over the years that rather
than pretending to be above such things, its best to enjoy
the hoopla for what it is. Its like our prom, she says, played a hateful author of ction for teenagers. Her
which I take to mean the showbiz communitys chance to
put its glad rags on again and obsesses about whether
or not they are likely to bump into a former partner and
his/her new squeeze.
(Hollywood trivia. The winner of Best Actor on the
night Charlize won for Monster: Sean Penn, for Mystic
River. As is customary, they were photographed together,
beaming, 2004s Hollywood prom king and queen.)
Charlize was 28 when she won her Oscar. A former
fashion model and dancer her ballet career ended
prematurely by an injury to her knee she already had
seven or eight years experience as a successful movie
actress. Shed worked with big stars and for top-drawer
directors. Some of the lms were good, others less so.
Charlize always lit up her scenes, even when she wasnt
given an awful lot to do.
Still, its no exaggeration to say that Monster changed
her life. A good deal was made at the time of her physical
transformation from glossy thoroughbred into bloated
street hooker, and the weight gain and make-up job are
certainly impressive, but her work on the lm was more
than cosmetic. Charlize brings a deant humanity to
Aileen Wuornos. It is one of the great performances in
modern American lm.
I AM PRESENTED AS THIS DARK PERSON WITH A
DARK PAST OBSESSED WITH PLAYING DARK PEOPLE.
IT COULDNT BE FURTHER FROM THE TRUTH
Esquire 100 /
You wait a whole career for a chance to be that
miserable, Charlize tells me at the Sunset Tower.
This sounds ippant. Its not meant to. Monster revealed
Charlize as an actor deserving of far more interesting
parts than the leading mans great-looking girlfriend.
She was something rare: a character actor in the body of
a star. A descendant, in her way, of the high-minded
actresses of the Seventies and Eighties Meryl Streep,
Jodie Foster, Jessica Lange and others who combined
o-screen glamour with on-screen grit.
In the decade since, Charlize has continued to seek
out work that is challenging and discomting. She was
nominated for another Oscar for North Country (2005),
a lm based on a true story about a group of women who
sued the owners of a Minnesota iron mine for sexual
harassment. Bridesmaids it aint.
In the sombre In the Valley of Elah (2007), she was a
put-upon, single mother cop. In Sleepwalking (2008), she
played a fading beauty who abandons her child literally
kicking her out of bed in favour of a last shot at romance.
In The Burning Plain (2008), she was a self-harming,
sexually incontinent restaurant manager stranded in
dreary Oregon. She took a small part in The Road (2009),
the adaptation of Cormac McCarthys terrifying downer.
In the magnicent, misunderstood Young Adult (2011), she
character was slovenly, solipsistic, dowdy, delusional,
drunk a woman who greets each morning with a
hangover and a curled lip. She also wasnt very nice.
Its not that Charlize never signs up for crowd-pleasing
blockbusters, just that even when she does there tends to
be a sting in the tail. A few years ago, she made a superhero
movie, but in the case of Hancock (2008), the superhero was
a misanthropic alcoholic; she was a cheating wife. More
recently, in Ridley Scotts sci- shocker Prometheus (2012),
she was a chilly corporate executive. In Snow White and the
Huntsman (2012), she was a vicious fairy-tale queen.
But its for the uninching portrayals of working-class
women in desperate situations that she is now best known.
And so Charlize has become xed in the public
consciousness as a rather serious person. Someone who,
for all her personal glamour and even undiscovered
Amazonian tribespeople cannot by now have escaped her
ubiquitous Dior billboards appears far more interested
in exploring the darker corners of America and of the
human psyche, than in manufacturing the shiny
entertainments provided by her contemporaries. She is
a sex symbol without any apparent vanity. A campaigner,
through her Africa Outreach Project, against HIV/Aids.
A UN Messenger of Peace. Not someone to be tried with. >
101
Clockwise from top: Charlize Theron in this
months A Million Ways to Die in the West; with
Idris Elba in Prometheus (2012); in Young Adult
(2011); an Oscar-winning performance in
Monster (2003); in the upcoming Dark Places
 Interview
I even wanted something like [a relationship]. Then one
day you go: Oh, [Jacksons] almost two now, and he has his
little activities that he goes to and hes got a bedtime now,
and you have more time again. And its like if you are open
to something, if you just let it happen, it will happen.
When you least expect it.
In summary: It was nice to be single and now its nice
to be not single.
T
hese recent, happy changes in Charlizes life
have occurred against the backdrop of a
post-apocalyptic nightmare. In 2009, she
signed up for Mad Max: Fury Road, the
writer-director George Millers long-delayed
return to the dystopia he rst visited in the
original and still thrilling 1979 Aussie punk-western,
which made a star of Mel Gibson.
Charlize spent a full eight months training for the
physical challenge that would be required to play her
character, the less than cuddly Imperator Furiosa.
She worked hard to build muscle, to gain weight, to get
into what she calls warrior shape.
She joined the rest of the cast and crew in Australia in
2010 for the beginning of lming, but the desert locations
that had been chosen were suddenly disastrously, for
the production transformed by heavy rain into lush
green meadows. A further year was spent waiting for the
right weather conditions. Because she was under contract,
for a period Charlize was unable to accept other oers of
work, so she was forced to turn down the lead role in
Prometheus, which went to Noomi Rapace, and she
initially had to say no to Jason Reitman when he brought
her Young Adult. Ultimately, Fury Road was made in
Namibia, southern Africa, in 2012. Charlize wants to
believe that the enforced delays were benecial to the lm.
It is better now than it would have been, she thinks.
Her performance, too, was helped by having so long to
prepare. She shaved her head for it, which might not sound
such a huge thing but she feels it was a key moment,
allowing her to fully inhabit her character who at points
in the lm has to pass for a man and signalling, to
herself as much as anyone, her commitment to the project.
She took Jackson with her to Africa, when he was just
three months old. Gerda came, too, uprooting herself for
a year to live with her daughter and grandson in remote
Namibia. It was wonderful to be able to spend that time
with Jackson, she says, but the making of Fury Road was
not an unalloyed pleasure. It was, she tells me, the hardest
thing shes done in her career.
AFTER THE ORDEAL OF MAKING MAD MAX, I TELL
HER, I HOPE THE FILM TURNS OUT TO BE GOOD.
YOU DO? F*** YOU! WHAT ABOUT ME?
Esquire 104 /
When I originally said yes to the movie, I had just
split up from my relationship [with Townsend], she says.
So, there was a part of me that thought, This is what you
need to do, you need to go and sit in a desert. Im going to
go to Australia and have a walkabout. Im going to nd
myself. I was excited about it.
Three years later, all that was a distant memory.
I had become a mum and I was nesting and I was happy
and I was like, Fuck!
Shes always prided herself on not being the kind of
actor who brings her work home with her. She leaves her
characters, their aws and neuroses and pain, on the set.
That was more dicult to do in Namibia. You couldnt
go home, she says. You couldnt really call anybody
because youre 12 hours ahead, or whatever the fuck it is.
And youre experiencing things that nobody can really
relate to. They cant even imagine where youre at. I dont
like that. I didnt enjoy that. I felt isolated. I can do anything
for a couple of months but that was a lot. She thinks for
a moment. It was hard to remain happy on that movie.
Charlize returned to LA from Namibia both physically
and emotionally exhausted, with a temperature of 39C
(104F). I was sick, she says, just drained.
After that ordeal, I tell her, I hope the lm, when it
is nally released next year, turns out to be good.
You do? Fuck you! What about me?
Following Fury Road, she was determined to do
something entirely dierent, something fun. A Million
Ways to Die in the West, in cinemas now, is a comedy
western from the showbiz polymath Seth MacFarlane
actor, writer, director, producer, animator, crooner and
creator of Family Guy whose previous lm, Ted, about
a foul-mouthed cuddly toy, was a huge hit in 2012.
Starring opposite MacFarlane himself, as well as
Liam Neeson and Amanda Seyfried, Charlize plays a
quick-draw gunslinger who falls for a klutzy sheep farmer.
She still seems pleasantly baed by this turn of events.
I dont do comedies, she tells me. I mean, I just dont.
This is not strictly true. Early in her career, she did
two Woody Allen movies: Celebrity (1998), as a horny
supermodel, and The Curse of the Jade Scorpion (2001),
as a boozy femme fatale. And in 2005, she did ve episodes
of Arrested Development. But its true that comedy is not
the genre with which one associates her. I ask Seth
MacFarlane how he came to cast an actor best known for
harrowing dramas in a bawdy summer romp.
I dont think of Charlize as dark or gritty or whatever,
MacFarlane says. Shes very strong, but she never loses
that feminine quality, either. I found her to be somebody
who could do any tone successfully. The trick with his >
105
 Interview
movies, MacFarlane says, is that for the jokes to work they
must be delivered with total sincerity a denial of the fact
that any joke is being made. It takes a heavy hitter of an
actor to do that, he says. The jokes are on the page and
they dont really need to be gilded with a bunch of shtick.
If someone is a great actor, they can be a great comedian in
one of my movies. And Charlize is certainly a great actor.
I dont think Im funny in it, she says, plain speaking
as ever. But I dont think that was my job.
W
eve been talking for a few hours now. Sean
is waiting for her at the bar. I try to tie up
some loose ends by remarking that
Charlizes life now seems very settled.
Her career is in good shape. She is a mother.
She is in a new relationship. The exchange
that follows is, I hope, illustrative of her allergic reaction
to the platitudinous nature of the celebrity interview.
It would be so much easier for her to nod and smile and
concede that all is well. But thats not Charlizes style.
It doesnt suck to be you, I say.
It depends who you ask, she says.
Im asking you.
If youre asking me then, yeah, my life is really good.
Who would say it wasnt?
Im sure some people would be like, I would never
want to have that life.
Why would they say that? You have an enviable life.
Oh, Im sure theres a lot of aspects to my life that a lot
of people wouldnt want.
What aspects?
Just personal choice things. Like the fact that
Im single at 38. Thats not necessarily what a lot of
women want.
But youre not single.
I mean unmarried. But Im just saying, a life is good
if its the life that you want.
Is this the life that you want?
Yeah, it is. I am living my life in a way that if
tomorrow it ended and I hope not because I have a kid
but if it did, this was the life that I really wanted to live.
But I work at that, you know?
She stops again, xes me with a look. Heres the one
thing Ill give you. If you do go through any severe trauma,
if you are put in a situation where you understand that it
very easily could have gone the other way, you realize very
quickly the value of life. That becomes very, very clear.
You were 15 when you learned that.
I learned it at a very young age.
I AM WHO I AM TODAY BECAUSE I WAS RAISED BY
PARENTS WHO INSTILLED CERTAIN FUNDAMENTALS
IN ME. I WAS LUCKY TO BE BORN INTO THAT
Esquire 106/
But it wasnt the death of her father alone that taught
her to value life. I was raised in an environment where
our country was heading towards civil war, she says of
apartheid-era South Africa. There was violence, there
was an Aids epidemic. There were a lot of things
reminding me, constantly, of my mortality.
As a result, she has never been the sort of person to
let life pass her by. She couldnt aord to be. Thats not
always the way, she says, with people who survive tragedy
or trauma. Some people are defeated by circumstance.
They are dened by their victimhood.
That can happen as well, she says, you go through
something and you just never come out on the other side.
You just walk around with a chip on your shoulder and go,
The world owes me because Ive been fucked over. That
happens a lot. And a lot of times people come from trauma
and dont end up being good people.
Why does she think she didnt fall prey to that?
I think I am who I am today because I was raised by
parents who instilled certain fundamentals in me,
she says. Yes, there were things in my family that werent
LIGHTING TECH: SETH GOLDFARB I DIGITAL TECH: DAVID SWANSON I HAIR: ENZO ANGILERI I MAKE-UP: PATTI DUBROFF I MANICURE: APRIL FOREMAN| SEE STOCKISTS PAGE FOR DETAILS
healthy like any family but maybe to a little bit more of
a severe degree but the one thing I can give both of my
parents was that I was raised with a really good
foundation. I was fucking lucky to be born into that.
What was it that her parents taught her?
Self-worth, she says. Being a young girl and not
putting your worth into your beauty. That was not
something that I was raised with. So when I left home
and everybody was like, Oh, youre pretty, I was like,
I dont even know what that concept means.
Her eyes ash when she says this. On this point, as so
many, she is impassioned, almost angry. It marks her out,
this intensity, here in the gilded lobby of the Sunset Tower,
where everything is plump and comfortable. Its not just the
way she looks, although that is part of it. Its her singular
self-assurance that makes her stand out. Shes not haughty,
not at all. Theres no froideur. But she really is quite
formidable. And now shes done with the chit-chat. She
promised Pharrell Williams shed make an appearance at
a charity event hes hosting tonight, and shes running late.
Im dumping you for Pharrell, she says. I hope youre
OK with that.
And o she goes to the bar to collect Sean, head held
high, stride brisk and purposeful. The Sunset Tower has
seen movie stars before: dazzling, powerful, take-no-
prisoners women, larger in life even than on screen. But
they dont come along too often like this any more. Even
the beautiful old building seems impressed.
A Million Ways to Die in the West is out now
107
 FATHERHOOD

DOES
THIS
FAT PIG
REMIND
YOU OF
ANYONE?
108
 FATHERHOOD

Hes lazy, inept and out of shape. Hes also the

most famous father on British TV (if youre under
five or over 40). Does Peppa Pigs silly Daddy
resonate with toddlers and their parents because
modern dads really are rubbish? Or is it like
map reading and DIY a lot more complicated than
that? A fellow father considers the facts

BY DAN DAVIES

Daddy Pig at home, doing what he does best

109
 FATHERHOOD
IT
starts with the very rst
sound of the day, a rising
whine that slices through
the fog of sleep before
clarifying itself as a
mantra. Kicking o the
duvet, I head numbly
towards its source. To do
so I am required to step
over snap cards and books
with sti cardboard pages, both decorated with pictures of
simple but stylised anthropomorphic pigs.
Theres also a tiny pram and a collapsible fabric play tent
to negotiate, similarly adorned with images of the same
one-dimensional porcine family. A small pink rucksack lies
gaping at the tents entrance, contents spilled to create
a landslide of gurines of varying sizes. Among them are
more of the smiling porkers with their stick-like arms and legs
sprouting from smocks of red and blue.
Hanging on one end of the cot is a plastic bag containing
a childs vanity case. Both are in shades of lurid pink; both are
covered in images of a small, female pig with both eyes on one
side of her head. And there, holding onto the rail as she jumps
up and down, is my two-year-old daughter. It is a little after six
in the morning and she is chanting: More Peppa, more Peppa,
more Peppa. It was one of the rst things she learned to say.
She is wearing a pink nightdress bearing, needless to say,
a portrait of her idol. I pick her up and take her into our
room where my wife, who knows the drill, has ipped open the
laptop and is cueing up an episode from the DVD. It is the only
thing that will allow us a few more minutes of precious sleep.
I slide my daughter under the covers, grope beside the bed
for the pink plastic headphones (with a pig on each can,
naturally) and plug her in. Silence reigns, save for the tinny
tinkling of the theme tune, which sounds like an early Nokia
ringtone. We feel like bad parents but two ve-minute episodes
perform the same function as the snooze button once did.
We will all be downstairs soon in any case. A pig-branded
bib will be placed around our daughters neck. Slices of
Marmite toast will be dropped onto a pig-branded plate and her
pig-branded feeding cup will be lled with water. And as the
morning countdown continues on Milkshake! (Channel 5s
childrens strand), we will be reassuring her that she doesnt
have long to wait before the back-to-back episodes begin.
B
More Peppa, more Peppa, more Peppa.
efore becoming a father, I was
vaguely aware of the phenomenon
that is Peppa Pig. I knew that it was
catnip for pre-school children in the
same way that Teletubbies had been;
a show with the power to transform
and transx bawling infants via some
strange alchemy of primary colours
and simple tales with a message.
I had a basic grasp, too, that Peppa,
a ve-year-old female pig who lives with her parents and her
two-year-old brother, George, was a slightly annoying,
occasionally bossy character.
110
I HAVE COME TO
RECOGNISE IN DADDY
PIG MANY OF MY OWN
FAILINGS AS A MAN
As my daughter reached the age where she became
interested in more than the lights and voices coming out of the
box in the living room, I was gradually immersed in the world
of contemporary childrens television. Much of it I hated.
Postman Pat: the biggest waste of resources in the history
of the Royal Mail, a man who has been given a helicopter and
a garage of vehicles yet cannot be guaranteed to deliver the post
on time in a village of no more than 10 people. Mike the Knight:
precocious little shit. Bob the Builder: hangs out with talking
vehicles and a truly horric scarecrow. Thomas the Tank Engine
& Friends: dubious on the basis of The Fat Controller alone.
Peppa Pig was dierent and I was totally unprepared
for the role it would come to play in my day-to-day existence.
Its intrinsic value in the successful management of family life,
specically in the mornings and at bedtime, is only one part
of it. More interesting is the fact I genuinely look forward to it.
I laugh at its knowing gags and have been known to dissect
episodes with fathers of children of a similar age with all the
enthusiasm others might reserve for Breaking Bad, Game of
Thrones or True Detective.
The biggest surprise, though, was that one of its supporting
cast of characters, the corpulent, unshaved and generally inept
Daddy Pig, would speak more eloquently about modern
fathers, and how we are portrayed and perceived, than David
Beckham, Jamie Oliver or any of the more celebrated paternal
paragons of our age.
For the uninitiated, Daddy Pig is, perhaps not surprisingly,
Peppas father. He is married to Mummy Pig (neither would
appear to have a Christian name; in the show, the world is seen
through the eyes of ve-year-old Peppa). Daddy Pig is a
bespectacled pink blob with a booming voice and bum-u
whiskers. An unqualied disaster when it comes to map
reading, DIY and barbecues, three of the skills men might
traditionally expect to possess, his favourite pastimes are lying
on the sofa watching television, sitting in the sun reading
a newspaper and eating vast quantities of chocolate cake.
His gluttony, and subsequent weight problem, sees him
constantly teased about his big tummy, as Peppa likes to
describe it. He is variously seen failing to squeeze into the tent
on a family camping holiday and a tree house built for his
children by Grandpa Pig. It also explains why the parents
of Peppas animal friends are so insistent that he attempts
a sponsored fun run, and so keen to watch.
In one episode, he walks into the front room to nd
Mummy Pig doing keep-t exercises. Thank goodness I dont
have to exercise, he laughs. Im naturally t. After being
challenged to touch his toes, and failing, he concedes that
 FATHERHOOD
maybe he should do some form of training. And I will start,
he announces, collapsing into his armchair, tomorrow.
Pressed further, Daddy Pig manages two press-ups
and seems quite pleased. But Peppa wants him to do 100, and
leaves him in the front room to get on with it. From the kitchen,
where Peppa and George help Mummy prepare lunch, Daddy
Pig can be heard counting o the press-ups. Worried that
he is overdoing it, Mummy sends Peppa in to check on him,
whereupon she nds her father lying on the sofa with remote
control in hand, counting out loud while channel surng.
Mummy Pigs subsequent suggestion that he tries her
old exercise bike is enthusiastically received, as it means
he can work out while watching television. The squeaking
from the pedals proves to be a major drawback, however:
Its impossible, this bike is too noisy, Daddy Pig moans.
I cant hear the TV.
In another episode, Mummy Pig wants a picture of the
children hung. Leave it to me, Daddy Pig boasts. I am the
DIY expert of the house. Mummy Pig goes out, having rst
pleaded with him not to make a mess. After marking an X
on the wall and telling Peppa and George to stand back and
watch a craftsman at work, Daddy Pig takes a wild swing with
his hammer and proceeds to crack the plaster. His attempt to
rectify his mistake then sees him ripping out a great chunk of
brickwork. The rest of the episode is spent xing the damage in
time for Mummys return. This he achieves, all save for hanging
the picture, a failure that Mummy Pig admonishes him for
before completing the task with the minimum of fuss.
IT SEEMS PERVERSE
TELLING MEN TO STEP
UP AND BE INVOLVED
WHILE RUNNING THEM
DOWN IN THE MEDIA
Then there is the episode in which Mummy Pig goes out
to a Mummies re engine practice at the local re station.
Daddy Pig scos that it is an excuse for them to sit around
drinking tea and chatting. Ive got a very important meeting
with the daddies football team, he announces before, right
on cue, the doorbell rings. Waiting outside, in matching white
football kits, are Mr Bull, Mr Rabbit, Mr Pony and Mr Zebra.
They are clutching barbecue accoutrements. Trust me,
Mummy Pig, we daddies know all about barbecues, Daddy
Pig says, charging o down the hill and into the garden.
As Peppa and George are shown around the re station,
pus of smoke begin to appear on the horizon. Daddy Pig
is scolded for calling Mummy Pig on the number reserved for
emergencies, more so when it transpires he has only called
to enquire where she has put the tomato sauce.
Later, as the plumes of smoke increase in size and
frequency, a second call comes through. Fire, re! shouts
Daddy Pig down the line, before we jump-cut to the hapless
dads hopping in panic as the barbecue blazes wildly.
Mummies to the rescue, chorus Mummy Pig, Miss Rabbit,
Mummy Pony and Mummy Sheep, as they slide down the pole,
board the re engine and set o to put out the ames.
These are just three examples of Daddy Pigs
incompetence; there are a great many more in the 208 episodes
of Peppa Pig made over the last 10 years. And if this all sounds
like I watch far too much Peppa Pig, that would be a fair
assessment, but in doing so, I have come to recognise in Daddy
Pig many of my own failings as a man.
There are dierences between us beyond our species:
rather than chuckling merrily at my own failures, the mirrors
tale of middle-age spread sends me into prolonged bouts of
self-loathing, while the pain inicted by my doomed attempts
to get t, x even the simplest cupboard door or successfully
barbecue a humble sausage leads to bursts of high-volume bad
language. And as someone who was in his forties by the time
he started a family, the Sports Day episode, in which Peppa
turns to her father before the parents race and says, But
Daddy, youre not very good at running, feels like a window
onto the certainty of future humiliation.
Whats also evident from these beautifully crafted,
consistently amusing ve-minute vignettes of everyday family
life (if youre a talking pig, that is) is that the well-worn clich
of male uselessness is alive and well. Daddy Pig, some argue,
is just the latest in a long line of bumbling cartoon fathers,
a lineage dating back to Fred Flintstone that includes Homer
Simpson and Peter Grin of Family Guy. What makes this
myopic swine dierent, though, is he appears in a format
aimed squarely at children aged between two and ve.
Why should this be signicant? During a debate about
whether Peppas occasionally brattish behaviour was setting
a bad example to children, Dr Aric Sigman told The Daily Mail,
Some 80 per cent of brain development is between birth and
three years old, so if [small children] spend a lot of time
watching the TV, they will copy the forms of behaviours that
they see on the TV. What the psychologist could have added
is the inuence Peppa Pig has in creating a negative and
formative stereotype of fathers.
Last summer, a survey undertaken by the website
Netmums threw up some interesting results. Of the 2,150
respondents, 93 per cent claimed childrens shows did
not represent real-life dads, with 46 per cent criticising books,
adverts and television shows like Peppa Pig for portraying
fathers as lazy or stupid. More than a quarter agreed this
amounted to a subtle form of discrimination against dads
while almost one-in-ve believed it made children believe
dads are inherently useless. They maintained that it would
cause an outcry if the same humour were aimed at mothers.
Its never been harder to be a father, said Netmums
founder Siobhan Freegard, but good dads have never been
more needed by their families. It seems perverse we are telling
men to step up and be involved, while running them down in
the media. The type of jokes aimed at dads would be banned
if they were aimed at women, ethnic minorities or religious
groups. Some people claim its just a joke, but theres nothing
amusing about taking away good role models for young boys.
In the same week, research by the Centre for Social Justice
reported that one million children in the UK are eectively >
111
 FATHERHOOD
fatherless. This statistic is all the more worrying when
considered in the light of a 2006 Oxford University study on the
role of father involvement in childrens later mental health.
Having followed 17,000 children since 1958, it demonstrated that
the presence of an engaged and involved father makes children
far less likely to break the law or suer from mental health
problems in later life, and far more likely to do well at school.
So why is it that fathers specically, and men in general,
are routinely depicted as lazy, feckless and stupid? And does
N
Daddy Pig bear his share of the blame?
eville Astley is not a father, but he
is half of the animation duo that
devised and writes Peppa Pig,
and one-third of the partnership,
Astley Baker Davies Ltd
(alongside Mark Baker and
producer Phil Davies), that makes
each episode and owns 50 per cent
of an empire now worth nearly
390m a year in licensing
and merchandise alone. The latest range of Daddy Pig
merchandise, I am told, sold out unusually fast, which
might explain why none of it as yet is owned by my
daughter. I ask Astley what it is about Daddy Pig that makes
him so popular. I dont know, he says. Is there really that
popularity? From who, the children or from the dads?
Probably both, I tell him.
He mulls it over for a moment, before giving a more
considered answer. He is the funniest one. Kids love to laugh
at adults. We decided not to have the children as comedy
characters because it can be hurtful. But dads can handle it.
Of course, a lot of people complain its really horrible to all men,
that we put men down and that they need a bit of a helping hand.
Sometimes, weve actually put the humour onto Mummy, but we
nd it harder, especially because most of the writers are men.
Were much more comfortable taking the piss out of the
men because thats us, chimes in Phil Davies, who met his
future colleagues while running Middlesex Polytechnics
Animation Department in the late Eighties.
Men can handle it, Astley agrees. We all come up with
our own examples of how useless we are. And the thing is,
[Daddy Pig] is a bumbling fool, but then when it comes to it,
hes also a tower of strength as well.
And very thoughtful, Davies adds.
We are sitting in their oce, known as The Elf Factory
(a reference to the elf and fairy protagonists of their other hit
childrens TV show, Ben & Hollys Little Kingdom), on Londons
Regent Street. I have told them about the role they play in my
life, and now want to know their thoughts on the Netmums
survey and its claims of the casual contempt for men
propagated by shows such as theirs.
Hopefully, we balance it out, Astley counters. [Daddy
Pig] isnt a complete idiot and buoon, he turns it around.
He does equally have good qualities as well.
All the characters in Peppa Pig are fallible, Davies says.
Peppa isnt super-sweet. She can be bossy. Daddy Pig isnt very
good at reading a map or putting up a shelf but he is very good
at other things. It is quite obvious that he has been to college.
This much is evident from the episode Daddy Pigs Oce,
in which Peppa and George are shown the day-to-day reality of
their fathers job as a structural engineer. After watching how
Mr Rabbit (a Welsh rabbit, no less) rubber-stamps very
important pieces of paper, and Mrs Cat draws shapes on the
computer, Daddy Pig stands before a whiteboard and says,
My job is quite complicated. I take big numbers, transmute
them and calculate their load-bearing tangents. Peppa and
George look perplexed. Daddy Pigs job is very important,
intones the voice-over.
It is a scene that encapsulates the rare skill of a show that
is now shown in over 190 countries: although seen through
the eyes of a small child, it succeeds in appealing to the adults
that watch with them; adults like me, and the fathers of small
children I know. It might otherwise be known as the Pixar
eect. Astley admits the show is written as a comedy and is
based rmly on what the three of them like rather than any
research, or what child psychologists might have recommended.
He is a real character, Davies says of Daddy Pig. He is not
a weird construct of a perfect human being which you often
nd in issue-based childrens programmes.
Kids like nothing more than seeing an adult fall over, Astley
continues. Its been the same since I was a kid with [performers]
like [Fifties bumbling clown] Mr Pastry or the Chuckle
Brothers. Its adults acting like children. Kids love seeing that.
They dont want to see other kids being the fall guy but they
love seeing their dads do it.
Daddy Pig might be rubbish at many things, but its true
that he embodies the hands-on role many modern fathers now
have in their childrens lives: he works hard but he always makes
time for his kids. Does that make him a product of his time;
a time in which research collated by the Fatherhood Institute
shows men have assumed a greater responsibility for home life?
WHY IS IT MEN ARE
ROUTINELY DEPICTED
AS LAZY, FECKLESS
AND STUPID? DOES
DADDY PIG BEAR HIS
SHARE OF THE BLAME?
Thats a tough one because we dont really think of it
like that, answers Davies, who has two grown up children.
I hardly ever saw my dad because he was out at work the whole
time. And I was the only dad in the playground when I was
taking my kids to school. I think thats now changed a lot.
Daddy Pig is the sort of dad who would take Peppa in to school.
Hes a modern man in that sense.
Richard Ridings, the actor who supplies the extraordinary
sub-bass voice for Daddy Pig, admits it is rare for a day to pass
in which he is not approached by parents on account of his
112
 FATHERHOOD

distinctive, and now extremely famous, dulcet tones. He

HOT TO
agrees that his characters strengths as a father signicantly
outweigh the aws that make him, well, human.
He adores his children and his family, Ridings says.
Theres a warmth and a kindness to him and even though

TROTTER
hes pompous and maybe overestimates his abilities at times,
underneath it all, theres a kindliness. But also, for children,
hes reassuringly large and approachable. He gets things
wrong, but I think thats good for children to see, especially in
this day and age when theres such a pressure to get everything
right the rst time. That ability to see a parent make a bit of
OK, so hes a bit of a porker. But theres
a mistake but still be able to laugh about it afterwards, I think

E
no reason Daddy Pig should dress so badly.
its really important actually.
(Turquoise, really?) With some help from his
creators, Esquires Teo van den Broeke gives
the cartoon pig a makeover
xecutive producer of The Simpsons,
Al Jean, makes no apologies for Homer,
describing him as the father that no one
will admit to being, but that many fathers
e
are. He loves his kids, but there are a lot Befor
of times when hed rather just go out
for a beer. Daddy Pig is a dierent beast,
literally, but like Springelds most famous
paterfamilias, he strikes a chord.
When asked to draw a picture of a
vegetable to take in to playgroup, Peppa sketches her father in his
armchair watching television. But, as Richard Ridings is at pains
to stress, she is constantly surprised by her fathers array of skills:
limbo dancing, diving, calculus, jumping in muddy puddles.
Ive never seen him as a loser because as a dad, hes a
winner, Ridings says. Hes bringing up really healthy kids
and he is a positive role model. Its hard because hes also a bit
of a slob, a bit lazy, but its that willingness to have a go and the
humour in that it doesnt have to be perfect. Its the idea that
you are there having a go and trying to be a role model for your
children. Thats very important.
The outraged of Netmums can say what they want. I am
perfectly comfortable with what Peppa Pig teaches my
daughter about family, and Daddy Pigs place in it. I might wish
r
his shortcomings did not so neatly match my own, and that his Af
te
girth were not so prodigious, but as Neville Astley reveals, it
could have been worse: Originally, before it got banned, it was
going to be Daddys big bottom. Channel 5 wouldnt let us do
that so we did big tummy instead.
Ultimately, though, my daughter recognises that Daddy
Pig, silly Daddy, loves Peppa. While he might not be perfect,
while he might not be able to touch his toes or run more than
a few yards, he would do anything for her. Hopefully, my
little girl will grow up feeling the same of me.
And in my case, doing anything means even allowing
another man another pig, no less to put my daughter to
bed. Richard Ridings, as he has done for parents and fans
on countless occasions over the last 10 years, was kind enough
to record a message for her in which he tells her that its time Navy wool pinstripe single-breasted suit, 765, by
to close her eyes and soon she will be asleep. I have the message Richard James. White cotton shirt, 155, by Turnbull
ASTLEYBAKERDAVIESLTD

stored on my phone, and once Ive pushed aside the Peppa & Asser. Burgundy knitted tie, 95, by Drakes.
Dark brown calf leather shoes, 490, by Crockett
Pig pram, put the Peppa Pig nightdress on her and read her
& Jones. Sunglasses, 310, by Cutler and Gross
the Peppa Pig books, the very last thing my daughter wants is
for me to ring Daddy Pig so that he can bid her goodnight.
It works every time.

113
 Sprinters at the start
of a race during the
UTech Classic in the
National Stadium
in April, two weeks
after Champs was held
in the same venue,
Kingston, April 2014

114
 sport

JAMAICA HAS BEEN PRODUCING WORLD-BEATING ATHLETES SINCE LONG BEFORE

BOLT AND BLAKE SPRINTED INTO THE RECORD BOOKS, BUT A NEW STORM
OF HIGH-PROFILE DOPING SCANDALS IS THREATENING TO RUIN THE ISLANDS
REPUTATION FOR FAIR PLAY. AS THE ATHLETICS WORLD GEARS UP FOR THE
COMMONWEALTH GAMES, WITH JAMAICA EXPECTED TO STAR AGAIN, ESQUIRE
REPORTS FROM KINGSTON ON A NATION FACING INTENSE SUSPICION

under a cloud
by RICHARD MOORE Photographs by ROBIN MOORE

115
sport
S
ixty policemen, holding long, thin
batons, line the perimeter of the
track. I hadnt noticed them arrive;
they led into the stadium by stealth.
Now they stand 10 metres apart,
backs to the action, eyes xed on the
swaying mass in this bowl of 30,000
people, dancing, shouting and
singing, bouncing up and down,
blowing vuvuzelas.
And then the army appears.
As soon as the sporting action
nishes, equally young men in
fatigues march in and fan across the
track, separating one team from the
other as they re-emerge for trophies
and a closing ceremony, for which
spectators are encouraged nay,
implored to stay.
Later will come the after-parties,
the police ban on such events having
been lifted. Promoters promise
violence free events was the splash
in the mornings tabloid Jamaica Star,
trumpeting the lifting of a curfew
imposed after a surge in violent
clashes between fans of opposing
teams. On Monday, the same paper
will report some good news: there
were no murders following the games.
Welcome to Champs: Jamaicas
inter-secondary schools boys
and girls athletics championships.
Yes, athletics. And yes, schools.
They dont do athletics in Jamaica
like they do it elsewhere. For the
schools, many of them more than a
century old and with a proud athletics
tradition, there is much at stake a
fact underlined by the intensity of the
occasion. The supporters, a mix of
current and former pupils, stand in
blocks according to school; it isnt
clear whether this was self-
116
We could
be heroes
segregation, or as the presence of Below: at Champs this year, with a time of 45secs, schoolboy
the police suggested because they Javon Francis broke the events under-19 400m record set by
were kept apart. Usain Bolt in 2003. Bottom: Zharnel Hughes won the 100m
race in 10.12secs to beat Yohan Blakes 2007 record
I had been told about Champs
before travelling to Kingston it was
all I was told about. You wont believe
the atmosphere. Trust me, nothing
compares to Champs. I would nod
politely, thinking: it may be amazing,
but lets not get carried away. Ive
been to Old Firm derbies. This is a
schools event. And, sure, school
sports day could get a little rowdy,
but come on. Wise up.
On day one, with the stands of the
52-year-old National Stadium it
opened the year Jamaica gained
independence in 1962; it was here that
Bob Marley played his One Love
Peace Concert in 1978 still to ll
with people, I pick up the ocial
programme and begin reading. Page
two contains the rst clue that this is
no ordinary schools championship.
From next year, it says, drug testing
REUTERS
will be introduced. It is such a pity
that the hard work and natural talent
of our young athletes is now being
scrutinised with suspicion, reads the
editorial before going on to question
whether this is to ensure fairness,
protect Brand Jamaica, or to
appease international critics.
Scrutiny, suspicion and
international criticism: all have rained
down on Jamaica since six athletes
including Asafa Powell, the former
100m world record holder, and also one
schoolboy tested positive for banned
substances last year. But these cases
were followed by more disturbing
revelations. Renee Anne Shirley, the
former executive director of the
Jamaican Anti-Doping Commission
(Jadco), went public with her concerns
that the islands drug-testing body was
hopelessly ineective and complacent,
carrying out only one out-of-
competition test in the run-up to the
London Olympics.
In summer 2012, Jamaica would go
on to dominate the sprint events, Usain
Bolt winning the mens 100m and
200m and Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce
winning the womens 100m. That
wasnt all: Bolt led a one-two in the
100m, and a clean sweep in the 200m,
with Yohan Blake and Warren Weir
second and third. These three were not
just from the same (tiny) country, they
were from the same club, with the same
coach. Indeed, all three were born in
one corner of the island: Bolt and Weir
in Trelawny, Blake in Montego Bay.

For some, including US track
legend Carl Lewis, the glut of doping
cases vindicated long-held
lo o k at t h es e suspicions; the nine-time Olympic
gold medallist says it is right to ask
guys. theyre questions. Meanwhile, Jamaicas
superstars like Bolt have dismissed
fighters and Lewiss comments as attention
seeking and a deliberate attempt
to taint the sport.
cham ps prepares The fall of Lance Armstrong
brought the issue of drugs in sport to
t h e m fo r wa r. the forefront. Jamaicas sprint factory
was to be the next sporting fairy tale
to come under scrutiny.
a lot of them Champs runs for ve days,
building and building to its grand
c o m e f r o m p o v e r t y. nale each day I was told: just wait
until you see it tomorrow. Come the
these kids are nal day, the National Stadium is full
(the gates are locked at 4pm; it nishes
at 9pm) and the noise of bands tussling
running for with vuvuzelas is overwhelming. The
stories about violence and the presence
a better life of the police seem grotesquely out of
place; the atmosphere is exuberant
rather than menacing.
The athletes warm-up track
at the UTech Classic meet at
the National Stadium, where
Yohan Blake was joined by
Jamaicas stars of the future
sport
And the talent on display is
breathtaking. Beautiful, purrs
Keith Barnier, head track and eld
coach at Abilene Christian University
(ACU) in Texas, one of several US
college coaches who have come to
Champs to recruit talent. The
talent-ID part of this process is, says
Barnier, easy as hell. Just look at
these guys. They jog faster than my
guys run. Beautiful.
They have more than this,
Barnier adds: theyre soldiers and
Champs prepares them for war.
Theyre ghters, but theyre really
easy to coach. They dont mess
around. The coaches dont
mess around. If there is a secret, says
Barnier, this is it: good coaching.
And they give a shit. Track and eld is
a priority. And its a cheap sport, and
these kids are poor. Not just poor; a lot
of them come from poverty. Hope is
so important and these kids, a lot of
em, are running for a better life.
Im handing out $46,000-a-year
scholarships, Barnier continues,
and their coaches want them to go to
college, not work in a grocery store.
I catch up with Coach Barnier
every day he is ebullient and
aable, and high on the prospect of
luring some of these athletes to ACU
to bolster his track and eld team as
he spends increasing amounts of time
in what he calls the boiler room, the
warm-up track, haggling with high
school coaches. Id tell you how long
I spent there today, he says on the
last day, holding up an empty wrist,
but I traded my watch. For an
athlete? He winks, adding that one
coach had oered him the pick of his
athletes if Bernier could secure
his own son a basketball scholarship.
As in 2013, records are broken.
Bolts 11-year-old 400m mark is
improved by Javon Francis, who,
as the charged atmosphere in the
stadium somehow intensies,
performs his own version of Bolts
famous thunderbolt gesture before
dropping to the track and, la Bolt
again, doing press-ups (pathetic
eorts, it has to be said, though he
can be forgiven). As he gets up his legs
wobble, he crumples to the track and
is loaded onto a stretcher before
clambering once more to his feet,
possibly because he remembers hes
got the 200m in a couple of hours.
Zharnel Hughes (an 18-year-old
Anguillan with a Jamaican mother
who has lived and trained in Jamaica >
117
sport
for two years but is likely to represent
Great Britain at the Olympics) breaks
Yohan Blakes 100m record. In total,
21 Champs records are broken over
ve days. As Bolt and Blake, the two
fastest men in history, are almost
completely written out of the record
books, the message seems clear:
the Jamaicans domination is set to
continue beyond the current crop
of superstars. But so is the suspicion.
T
here is anger in
Jamaica at the
scepticism that has
accompanied their
athletes success.
When Anne Shirley
wrote about the
failings of Jadco in
Sports Illustrated an American
publication, which made it worse as
far as some were concerned she was,
she says, called a Judas, a traitor;
people said that Id committed treason;
my passport should be taken away...
Some feel that the worlds
suspicion only betrays its ignorance.
They have a point in so far as much of
the world doesnt realise what athletics
means to Jamaicans, and that any
runner of promise is likely to end up
not as a footballer, basketball player
or even a cricketer, but on a track.
Every Jamaican school has a
rudimentary grass running track and
an athletics coach, but there are
various theories as to why track and
eld has become as closely identied
with national identity as Bob Marley,
ranging from the fact that one of the
heroes of independence, Norman
Manley, was a sprinting star at
Champs in 1910 (its rst year), or
that Gerald Foster was a world-class
sprinter who tried to compete for
Jamaica at the 1908 Olympics in
London he sailed there on a banana
boat only to be denied the right to
compete as Jamaica wasnt aliated
to the IOC but went on to beat the
worlds best at post-Games meetings
(today, the college established in
Fosters name trains the countrys
athletics coaches). Others say the
roots of the phenomenon began with
Arthur Wints 400m gold medal at the
London Games in 1948 and that the
Bolt-led charge since 2008 has only
deepened the islands obsession.
The emphasis on schools athletics
is surely a legacy of Jamaicas years as
a British colony, when so many of these
118
institutions, modelled on British
public schools, were established
by expats with athletics and cricket
(the other national obsession) the
staple sports. It is tempting to see
Champs as the cradle, the wellspring,
but the process actually begins long
before. Top schools like Calabar and
Kingston College recruit the best
talent from all over the island,
sometimes, allegedly, in exchange for
gifts for the parents: deals that are
typically brokered not by the schools
but former pupils. Refrigerators
are said to be the favoured currency
for trading in school-age athletes.
Technically speaking, it is not
allowed. But smoking ganja is illegal,
and you can hardly walk down a
street in Jamaica without smelling it.
The day after Champs, I visit
Dennis DJ Johnson, the fastest
man in the world in the early Sixties,
in his home on one of the hills
overlooking Kingston. Of the spate of
recent positive tests, Johnson says,
the whole thing is stupid. They took
a supplement and in the supplement
is a banned thing. He is talking
about the high-prole cases of Asafa
Powell and Sherone Simpson,
who claimed they didnt realise the
supplements they were taking
contained banned drugs. The rules
should be about stopping people
cheating, Johnson continues.
"They werent trying to cheat!
Johnson, dogmatic and
unyielding in his mid-seventies, is the
father of the current generation of
Jamaican sprinters. He in turn was
coached by the grandfather, Herb
McKenley, a member of the 4 x 400
relay team that won the nation a gold
medal at the 1952 Olympics. Herb
was a beautiful person, Johnson
says of his mentor, while Donald
Quarrie, the Olympic 200m
champion in 1976, says, theres a bit
of Herb in every Jamaican athlete
(an accidental double entendre in the
land of the holy herb).
Johnson was a winner at Champs
in 1958 before going to San Jos State
University on an athletics
scholarship. There, he was part of
Speed City, a group of sprinters
coached by Bud Winter. Winter,
an American, had spent the war
teaching ghter pilots how to relax,
and he did the same with athletes
(and wrote a book, Relax and Win).
In 1966, with his sporting career
behind him and his head buzzing

BANNED ON
THE RUN
Above: Sherone Simpson, pictured winning a womens
100m race at Zurich in 2006, tested positive for the
banned stimulant oxilofrine in June 2013 and is
currently serving an 18-month ban.
Left: former Jadco drug-tester Dr Paul Wright is highly
critical of Jamaicas sports drug monitoring system.
AFP/GETTY I GETTY
Below: Asafa Powell poses next to his world record
100m time, September 2007. In June 2013, he also
tested positive for oxilofrine and is suspended from
competiton until December this year
with Winters ideas, Johnson returned
to Jamaica and to his fathers
questions about what he was going to
do with his degree. I told my father
I was going to teach people how to run:
how to sprint. He had a t. Who the
hell would make a career out of that?
Johnson did. He wrote to a
cigarette company, Carreras, who
agreed to sponsor his crusade; then
he toured the island with a mobile
cinema, showing track and eld lms
in the evenings and visiting schools
during the day, teaching kids how to
run fast. He also invited Bud Winter
to give a talk in Kingston, and
among those in the audience was
Glen Mills, who today is coach to Bolt,
Blake, Weir and the latest Champs
star, Zharnel Hughes. Mills is
more Bud Winter than Bud Winter,
Johnson chuckles.
What you were looking at
yesterday, Johnson says of Champs,
and performances from some
young athletes that were sublime
bordering on ridiculous, most of
it comes from my philosophy, which
I took from Bud. But I introduced
that to Jamaica. You understand?
Im not sure I do.
Look, he says, we are doing
things that nobody else is doing! We
have two million people. The US has
300m. India has one billion. And it
never occurred to anyone to run the
relay the way we do it. This, Johnson
goes on to explain, is to put the fastest
man rst, because, thanks to baton
the whole
thing is
stupid. they
took a
supplement
and in the
supplement
is a banned
thing
sport
changes, he runs the furthest. Its
a small, simple thing, he explains,
but emblematic of the stupidity,
or myopia, of the rest of the world.
People like to have existing ideas
reinforced. They dont innovate.
I can talk about sprinting until next
week, Johnson says. But when
I watch Champs, I cry sometimes.
Where in the world do you see that?
And I tell you we are not going to
lose any sprints for the next 50 years.
Fifty?
Yes, man.
D
octor Paul Wright is
another Jamaican
who, like Anne Shirley,
went public with his
criticisms of the
Jamaican Anti-Doping
Commission. He told
the BBC he believed
last years positive tests could be the
tip of the iceberg. What was so
alarming about his comments was
that Wright has been a Jadco
drug-tester since its formation in
2008. In March this year, it was
reported he had been red. There is
no successful whistle-blower who
is not a pariah, he told local media.
I meet Dr Wright in his cluttered
oce at the Nuttall Hospital at the
busy Cross Roads intersection in
New Kingston. A small television set
on top of a ling cabinet is showing
a football match, PSG versus Chelsea.
The other surfaces are lled with
trophies. All for horse racing, he tells
me; he owns two horses.
The phone on his desk rings
incessantly: today, nally, is the day
of the verdict in the Sherone Simpson
case, nine months after she tested
positive. In two days, it is Powells
turn (both will be given 18-month
suspensions, and declare their
intention to appeal).
Wright tells me that, contrary to
the reports, he wasnt red by Jadco.
I was never red, because to re
somebody you have to have them on
a contract. Instead, Wright and the
other drug testers were paid per test:
10,000 Jamaican dollars, which is
roughly 54, even if the test involved
an eight-hour round trip to Trelawny.
Idiot money, says Wright.
Things began to go wrong for
Jadco in late 2011, Wright says, when
the World Anti-Doping Authority
(WADA) declared itself unhappy at the >
119
sport
composition of the board. There were
too many vested interests, they
said; too many people with links either
to the government or to elite sport,
and therefore to those being tested.
The board was dismissed.
At the same time, elections came
up and the country voted out the old
government, Wright says. I was
drug-testing all along, but in January
[2012], with the new government,
nothing. Nothing in February.
Nothing in March. There were no
tests because there was no new board.
So, I drive to Jamaica House to see
the prime minister [Portia Simpson
Miller], Wright recalls. I say, This is
Olympic year. We are the best sprinters
in the world. If we dont test the
year of the Olympics, people are going
to believe were hiding something.
Wright told the prime minister
(who also holds the sports portfolio)
that a board should be appointed
immediately, and recommended
some names, as well as advising some
to be avoided. That was Wednesday.
Friday, the new board is announced.
But this board, although the
names were new, had the old problem:
too many potential conicts of
interest. I call and say, What are you
doing? She said, Dr Wright, these are
our friends. They have spent their life
contributing to sports you must
stop maligning people of integrity.
There was a graver problem: still
no testing. Thus, the Jamaican team
went to London 2012 having hardly
been tested by the national doping
agency (though the highest prole
athletes would have been tested
in-competition and by the
international athletics federation).
Anne Shirley and Dr Wright
simmered with frustration. They
were angry not at the athletes, but
at Jamaicas authorities. I am more
Jamaican than anyone, Wright
protests, but you cant let that stop
you doing your job. And we couldnt
do our job.
In the medical profession,
you have doctors who sign sick leave
for people who are not sick, he says.
You have bad lawyers. You have
people who murder children. Bad
people everywhere. But, in athletics,
everyone is related to Pope Francis!
He isnt saying all the athletes
are bad no! But what I want is
to be able to prove that to the world.
This is what I say to them: dont let
them think youre hiding something.
120
A
t the end of a bruising
2013, the Jadco board
resigned en masse,
WADA arrived
in Jamaica for an
extraordinary audit,
and The Wall Street
Journal claimed that
the Jadco chairman, Herb Elliott,
had fabricated his CV, including
qualications in biochemistry and
medicine for which the universities
in question had no record. (Elliott
countered by saying that those
universities wouldnt give out that
information over the phone.)
Worse followed when the Court of
Arbitration for Sport (CAS) catalogued
a list of failings that led to one of the
islands Olympic champions, Veronica
Campbell-Brown, being cleared
of a doping oence despite a banned
substance showing up in her urine. t h e o n ly t h i n g
In a 58-page report that read like a
charge sheet, CAS said that Jadco had i put in my mouth
persistently failed to comply with
global drug-testing standards, which
amounted to a systematic and now is food and
knowing failure [that] is deplorable
and gives rise to the most serious p h a r m a c y v i ta m i n s .
concerns about the overall integrity
of the anti-doping programme.
Next day, another blow, with
im so scared about
the deputy chairman of Jamaicas
w h at s o u t t h e r e
BRUCE ADAMS
anti-doping disciplinary panel, an
attorney-at-law, arrested for running
a prostitution ring in Montego Bay.
Now Jadco reconvenes
again with a new chairman, Danny
Williams, a respected businessman
who has no formal links to sport.
Thats the whole point, he tells me.
Its not for the board to get involved
in day-to-day administration.
Our job is to get good sta in.
By and large, we think our
athletes are clean, Williams
continues. We have started an
education programme in schools,
and we intend to start testing at
Champs next year.
Having turned down an oer of
help from Travis Tygart, head of the
US Anti-Doping Agency (who brought
down Lance Armstrong), they are
being mentored by the Canadian anti-
doping agency. They are holding our
hands, and that is proving very
helpful, Williams says.
Before leaving Jamaica, I meet
Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce, the
eervescent world and Olympic 100m
champion, who received a six-month
ban in 2010 after taking the painkiller

Schoolgirls competing in a heat at the
UTech Classic athletics meeting, Kingston,
Jamaica, April 2014
champs
at t h e
o ly m p i c s
Jamaican sprint stars Usain Bolt and Yohan Blake
draped in their national flag after winning gold
(9.63secs) and silver (9.75secs) in the mens
100m event at the London Olympics, August 2012
oxycodone, for toothache (she had
delayed root canal treatment until
shed competed in a race in China
but the pain became so severe on the
ight over that she took painkillers
oered to her by her coach, which
he was taking for kidney stones).
More recently, she threatened to
go on strike if the Jamaican athletics
federation and Jadco didnt get
their house in order and oer the
athletes more support, complaining:
You listen to accusations about
Jamaicas athletes and there is no
one to get up, take the mic and say,
What you are saying is a lie. They
are just sitting back enjoying the
benets and fruits of our labour but
when its time to actually do their
jobs they are not doing it.
Her own transgression was a
mistake, insists Fraser-Pryce, but she
cannot aord another one a second
oence carries the possibility of a life
ban. A lot of our athletes are naive,
I think, she says. I think they should
read more, research more, try to get
educated on whats out there.
They think if theyre putting
something in their mouth that they
think is not illegal, theyre OK. Thats
been the downfall for a lot of Jamaican
athletes. Thats why education is so
important, because its a mineeld.
The only thing I put in my mouth
now is food and vitamins that you buy
in a pharmacy, because Im so scared
about whats out there, she says.
If something happens, God forbid,
thats it for me. So I cant be careless.
I meet Fraser-Pryce, who in the
expected absence of Bolt is likely
to be the biggest Jamaican star at this
years XX Commonwealth Games
in Glasgow, in her newly opened hair
salon, Chic Hair Ja, in a plush business
park in New Kingston. She has come
a long way from the Waterhouse
ghetto where she grew up with her
mother, a street vendor, and two
brothers in what was called a
tenement yard. It was a small house,
about the size of this, she indicates
the reception area of her salon.
Four of us were sleeping on one
bed, and we had to turn dierent
ways so we could all t, she says.
Sometimes I had my brothers feet
in my mouth.
Yohan Blake who missed most
of 2013 with injury but made his return
to competition two weeks after
Champs at the UTech Classic, also in
the National Stadium had a similar
sport
background in Montego Bay. When
I met him, he was frank about his
reasons for running: The drive for
me was to get my mum out of poverty,
to get myself out of poverty. You see
what your parents are going through,
the suering, and you want to take
them out of that.
Both Blake and Fraser-Pryce have
foundations to help disadvantaged
young people in Jamaica, with Blake
recently opening a residential centre
and Fraser-Pryces Pocket Rocket
Foundation paying for seven
inner-city children to attend school.
J
amaica, an island nation
built on slavery and
colonialism, is a place of
duality and contradiction:
of spectacular beauty and
rotting slums; of abundant
natural resources, with
signs warning against the
danger of falling mangoes and
chronic poverty; of warmth
and friendliness and also everyday
violence. There are 1,500 gun deaths
a year, almost 300 at the hands of
the police. Jamaica is a place where
corruption is endemic and many
politicians (and sports administrators)
hold those they govern to standards
they struggle to keep themselves.
And its a place where running fast
can be a ticket to escape. Similar
running cultures exist in Kenya and
Ethiopia, but there they excel over
much longer distances. In Jamaica,
the top athletes seem to be endowed
with a speed gene. And although
not everyone can become a Bolt or
a Fraser-Pryce, athletic ability can
be enough to win a scholarship to an
American college which, for many,
can be enough.
Given last years spate of positive
test results, questions linger about
whether the Jamaican sprinters
success is all that it seems, and down
purely to natural talent and honest
labour. These doubts threaten to
overshadow the nations track record
for breaking records on the track.
Yet as Champs demonstrated, the
island is set to continue producing
the worlds fastest humans. And
to dominate the sprint events at the
Olympic Games if Dennis Johnson
is correct to 2064 and beyond.
The XX Commonwealth Games take
place in Glasgow between 23 July and
3 August; glasgow2014.com
121
Photographs by James Dimmock
Fashion by Kyle Blackmon

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As TV tough guy Ray Donovan,
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Of all the challenges of the role, memorising lines isnt one.
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at first, he says. But theres something cathartic in overcoming
that fear of being punched in the face repeatedly.
Its not the smartest hobby for an actor, as he readily
admits: Ive broken my nose twice now in the past six months.
Once was in Montreal, in a boxing gym, and then literally
a-month-and-a-half later, I walked into a glass door on a set.
But theres an essence of masculinity in it for Schreiber.
And masculinity is something he thinks about not just
because of his work, or because hes a man in his middling
years, part of a generation for whom gender roles have shifted
and shifted again. But because he has kids; he and his partner
Naomi Watts have two boys, Sasha and Kai, aged five and six.
When they came along, there was something terrifying
and sad about it, he laughs. Like it was the end of my time!
I started to enjoy acting less because I wanted to be with them.
Then Ray Donovan snapped him out of it. This character,
this bottled-up, tortured tough guy, prompted him to examine
his own masculinity, and in turn the kind he would project for >
Blue mlange wool-blend
sports coat, 1,180, by Dolce
& Gabbana. White cotton
long-sleeved crew-neck
T-shirt, 68, by Vince.
Charcoal cotton trousers,
99, by Woolrich. Off-white/
navy/red canvas sneakers,
160, by NDC Made By Hand

Right:
White cotton polo shirt,
550; two-tone checked
linen/silk trousers, 850,
both by Brioni. Black/white
leather wing-tip shoes,
455, by Salvatore Ferragamo
his boys. It made me think about the male role models in my
life, he says. What my values were and what I would pass on
to my children. Like my grandfather. He was a real tough nut.
But what I think I admired most about him was his defiant love
for my mother when she went through hard times. He put
everything on the line for her, gave up his life savings
I found that protectiveness of her and me to be very moving.
Schreibers upbringing was chaotic and eccentric, but in
other ways a source of inspiration. His father was a wealthy
actor/director, his mother a hippy bohemian, and when they
split up the custody battle was, as Schreiber calls it, very
bitter, very ugly. Liev was an infant when his mother went on
the run with him, pursued by private detectives. When she won
custody, they often went without electricity or water, and Liev
was raised with a Hindu name, sent to an ashram school and
forbidden from watching colour movies. How do we know
what made us? he asks. I love my mother and father. The
older I get the more I value everything that they gave me.
But it was his grandfather who taught him how to be a man.
And his values are safe with Schreiber, who teaches his own
boys to open doors for women and to carry their bags. However
roles may have drifted, certain principles remain.
Probably the most terrified Ive ever been, was on an
outing to Jones Beach [in New York], in the late Seventies,
he says. I threw one of those little, clear jellyfish at my
brothers girlfriend and my grandfather became livid that
I would do something so horrible to a girl. I still have night
sweats about that moment. When my grandpa was moved
to physical action, you felt utter terror. Sanjiv Bhattacharya
Ray Donovan season two begins in July on Sky Atlantic
 FASHION
July 2014

128 / 129

Navy cotton
jacket, 505;
navy cotton
trousers, 255,
both by Calvin
Klein Collection.
White cotton
shirt, 225, by
Ermenegildo
Zegna. Navy suede
brogues, 430,
by Ralph Lauren

Right:
Taupe cotton
shawl-neck
sweater, 115;
khaki cotton
chinos, 85,
both by Tommy
Hilfiger. White
cotton T-shirt,
48, by Nudie
Jeans. Cream
canvas Jack
Purcell sneakers,
50, by Converse

FASHION ASSISTANTS: PEPE (JOSE) LEON,

BUMMY KOEPNICK | MAKE UP: FABIOLA AT TRACEY
MATTINGLY | HAIR: ROBERT VETICA AT MAGENT
AGENCY | SEE STOCKISTS PAGE FOR DETAILS
 Fashion 130 / 131
July 2014

06.18

White cotton short-sleeved shirt,

165, by Alexander McQueen available
at Selfridges. Grey wool trousers,
650, by Bottega Veneta. Black
leather shoes, 435, by Mr Hare
Photographs by Jon Gorrigan / Fashion by Olie Arnold

Night and day

Working round the clock makes demands on even the toughest
outfits. As he returns to his most famous role, Kiefer Sutherland
demonstrates how to pull off 24-hour style

08.05

Grey cotton shirt, 125,

by Hardy Amies. Grey silk
tie, 145; dark grey melton
topcoat, 3,495, both by
Ralph Lauren Purple Label
10.14

Grey cashmere jumper, 710;

grey wool trousers, 680, both
by Ermenegildo Zegna Couture

July 2014
Fashion 132 / 133
 13.54

Grey wool jacket, 580; white cotton

shirt, 180, both by Paul Smith
Fashion 134 / 135
July 2014
16.32

Dark grey melton topcoat, 3,495;

grey jersey roll-neck jumper, 655;
dark grey twill trousers (part of
three-piece suit), 2,995, all by
Ralph Lauren Purple Label. Black
leather shoes, 435, by Mr Hare
July 2014 Fashion 136 / 137
K
iefer Sutherland is running late.
Production has overrun on todays
lming of the new series of 24, the
geopolitical thriller that has made him
a major star for a second time around.
He apologises profusely when he
nally makes it to the Mayfair private members club booked
for our meeting. But its not necessary. I understand:
Sutherland might not be quite as time-poor as his race-
against-the-clock alter ego Jack Bauer, but with eight
seasons of the show under his belt and a ninth underway
this one set for the rst time in London hes a busy man.
Shooting 24 looks like hard work. Physically, 24 is a
hard show to do, he says, looking lean from the four months
of gym work hes done ahead of the new series. I look
back and see we did 192 episodes over eight seasons. I dont
know how we did it. It makes you want to go take a nap.
The show provided a second wind for Sutherlands
career. Now 47, he rst broke through in 1986 with Stand by
Me and had a run of hits as a late entrant to the Eighties Brat
Pack: The Lost Boys (1987), Young Guns (1988) and Flatliners
(1990). After tabloid notoriety in the early Nineties he
was engaged to be married to Julia Roberts until she ran
o with his friend, Jason Patric Sutherlands big-screen
Physically, 24 is a hard show to do. I look back and I dont
know how we did it. It makes you want to go take a nap
career ran out of steam later that decade. 24, in 2001, turned
that around. Since then, Jack Bauer neocon poster boy
has seen o weapons of mass destruction, cyber attacks
and members of the Russian parliament, not always in
the most ethical manner. If the actor who plays him doesnt
agree with Bauers methods, he can appreciate his
characters intentions. I can say I dont believe in torture
and I believe in due process and innocent until proven
guilty, Sutherland says, before presenting a steeliness
worthy of his ctional character. Having said that, if
somebody had kidnapped my daughter in real life and
I had someone in my hands who knew her whereabouts,
then I would tear them apart until I got her back.
Sutherland has one daughter from the rst of his
two marriages, both of which ended in divorce. Hes now
a grandfather to two boys. He says turning 45 was pivotal:
That was the rst age I ever hit where I started doing the
maths in ve years I will be 50. Oh my God, in 10
years Ill be 55. In 20 years I will be 65. At 65 you get half-
price tickets to fucking movies, holy shit. But he
resolved to think positively about ageing. It made
me acknowledge how much Ive enjoyed my life. Ive got
a really wonderful family, and some fantastic friends.
19.22
Charcoal/navy wool cardigan, 195, by Hardy Amies available at mrporter.com. Navy merino crew-neck jumper,
350, by Alfred Dunhill. Black wool trousers, 850, by Ermenegildo Zegna Couture
Sutherlands commitment to family is such that when
his daughter moved out of his LA home for college in
New York, he moved, too. He downplays this (New Yorks
not so bad) but perhaps his unsettled upbringing made
him eager to do things dierently. Sutherland was born
in England in 1966 to Canadian actors Donald Sutherland
and Shirley Douglas. Kiefer and his twin Rachel were
shuttled from London to LA and Toronto as their parents
marriage dissolved. They divorced in 1970 and Kiefer
didnt see a lot of his dad, who went on to become a star
in some of the most distinctive movies of the Seventies:
M*A*S*H (1970), Klute (1971) and Dont Look Now (1973).
It wasnt until he was 18 that Sutherland saw his fathers
work, on VHS at a friends house, and made contact.
That was a big moment for us. Afterwards we started
spending a lot more time together, Sutherland says now.
Film gave us something to talk about that allowed us to
talk about everything else.
Sutherland resembles his dad more than ever, the Brat
Pack baby face having given away to Sutherland seniors
sharper features, including that magnicent, devilish chin.
Their relationship reached a professional apex last year
when they made a western together, due out later this year
and provisionally titled Forsaken. Theyd been in the same
lm before but never shared screen time. Forsakens tale
of a father and son trying to make good a relationship had
obvious reverberations.
Theres something about saying this dialogue and
telling this story and looking into that face, says
Sutherland of one key scene with his father, and the
experience I have had, like any son does, of wanting my
father to be proud, wanting him to love me. My memory
of my life with him took over. It may be one of my most
honest moments as an actor.
Filming had an impact on Donald, too, he says.
Every once in a while I will have a cigarette. My father
is a staunch non-smoker and he nished a couple of days
before I did on set. The last thing he said on his way out,
and my father is not one for goodbyes, was over the
walkie-talkie. He said: I just want to tell all of you,
including my son, that this has been one of the great joys
of my career and my life. Smoke em if you got em. And
everyone on set laughed, and lit up.
Colin Crummy
24: Live Another Day is on at 9pm, Wednesdays on Sky 1
and OnDemand
PHOTOGRAPHERS ASSISTANTS: THOMAS CATTANACH, MIKE MILLS I FASHION ASSISTANTS: STEPHANIE CRAIN, JONATHAN DANN | GROOMING: KATYA THOMAS AT CAROL HAYES MANAGEMENT FOR CRME DA LA MER | SEE STOCKISTS PAGE FOR DETAILS

02.45

of suit), 1,350, by Alfred Dunhill

available at Selfridges. Grey wool
White cotton shirt, 375, by Lanvin

Prince of Wales check trousers (part

Fashion 138 / 139 July 2014

DIRE
Even during summer, it pays to keep a light trench
coat to hand. Team with breezy cotton shirts,
knits and chinos plus some eye-catching shoes
and youre good to go

5
07
01 | Grey cotton
sweatshirt, 105,
by Sunspel
02 | Green/orange
checked cotton shirt,
75, by Lyle & Scott
03 | Orange leather
trainers, 95, by Le Coq
Sportif available at
hanon-shop.com
04 | Black leather/textile
watch, 45, by Swatch
05 | Navy canvas/leather
messenger bag, 50,
by Ben Sherman
06 | Grey cotton chinos,
75, by Lyle & Scott
07 | Camel cotton trench
coat, 69, by H&M
 02

05 07
WEARESTUDIO33.COM | SEE STOCKISTS PAGE FOR DETAILS

01 | Black cotton gabardine 04 | Beige suede double monk-

trench coat, 1,195, by
Burberry Heritage Trench
Coat collection
02 | Stainless steel mesh-
strap watch, 169, by Citizen
03 | Grey knitted cotton jumper,
125, by Sunspel
strap shoes, 405, by J Crew
05 | Blue cotton shirt, 140,
by Wolsey
06 | Blue cotton chinos, 56,
by Ben Sherman
07 | Brown leather holdall,
600, by Wolsey

141
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Lifestyle essentials
Visit Ushuaa Ibiza Beach Hotel for an exhilarating
non-stop musical and visual performance
Marking its fourth season on the White Isle, summer 2014 promises an
enviable line-up of world-class DJs, mixing international superstars
alongside a core group of underground talent, for which Ushuaa has
become renowned. Ushuaa regulars David Guetta and Avicii both
return to the iconic outdoor stage for weekly residencies on Mondays
and Sundays respectively. Former Swedish House Maa members
Axwell & Sebastian Ingrosso will step up to the decks each
Wednesday with Departures returning for its second year and
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New for 2014, Armin Van Buuren will bring a special edition of A
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Beauty in
the detail
Hideo Wakamatsu combine
Japanese heritage with modern
design to create a stylish range
of luggage, laptop bags and
accessories for the sophisticated
and discerning jet-setter.

Merci Maman
Merci Maman oers a beautiful range of
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or gold plated that will be hand engraved
with the message of your choice: a special
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presentation box sealed with a bow.
For more information, visit:
mercimamanboutique.com
or call +44 (0)20 7731 1377
Pictured is the Muscular red
frame set (169.99249.99)
The Muscular range is so-called
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and durability while also being
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due to its low density and
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View the full collection at hideowakam
or call +44 20 3697 7979 for more in
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 THE WEEKLY IPAD MAGAZINE FROM ESQUIRE

MEN WHO GET IT,

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AFTERNOONS
DOWNLOAD THE ESQUIRE UK APP FROM
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A Agent Provocateur +44 20 7439 0229
agentprovocateur.com
Alfred Dunhill +44 845 458 0779
dunhill.co.uk
B Barton Perreira available at Liberty
+44 20 7734 1234 liberty.co.uk
Ben Sherman +44 20 7437 2031
bensherman.com
Bottega Veneta +44 20 7838 9394
bottegaveneta.com
Brioni +44 20 7491 7700 brioni.com
Burberry +44 20 7806 8904
burberry.com
C Caf du Cycliste cafeducycliste.com
Calvin Klein Collection calvinklein.com
Carven +44 20 722 5110 carven.fr
Citizen citizenwatch.com
Converse available at Ospring
+44 20 7497 2463 ospring.co.uk
Corneliani +44 20 7493 7921
corneliani.com/en
Crockett & Jones +44 20 7839 5239
crockettandjones.com
Cutler And Gross +44 20 7581 2250
cutlerandgross.com
D DKNY +44 20 8743 0535 dkny.com
Dolce & Gabbana +44 20 7659 9000
dolcegabbana.com
Drakes +44 20 7608 0321
drakes-london.com
E Ermenegildo Zegna +44 20 7201 7000
zegna.com
Eye Respect +44 20 3239 7517
eyerespectdirect.com
F Frescobol Carioaca
frescobolcarioaca.com
G Gant Rugger gant.co.uk
Giorgio Armani +44 20 7235 6232
armani.com
Grenson +44 800 044 5705
Photograph by James Dimmock
H H&M +44 844 736 9000 hm.com R Rag & Bone +44 20 7730 6881
Hackett +44 20 7494 4917 hackett.com rag-bone.com
STOCKISTS 07/14
Hanon hanon-shop.com Ralph Lauren +44 20 7535 4600
Hardy Amies +44 20 7234 2436 ralphlauren.com
hardyamies.com Randolph +44 1423 701 300
Harrods +44 20 7730 1234 themandonstore.com
harrods.com Rapha rapha.cc
Harvey Nichols +44 20 7235 500 Richard James
harveynichols.com +44 20 7434 0605
Howies howies.co.uk richardjames.co.uk
J J Crew jcrew.com S Salvatore Ferragamo +44 20 7629 5007
Jack Spade +44 20 7734 2768 ferragamo.com
jackspade.com Selfridges +44 800 123 400
selfridges.com
K Kiki de Montparnasse Stella McCartney +44 20 7518 3100
kikidm.com stellamccartney.com
Kinoko Cycles kinokocycles.com Sunspel +44 20 7009 0650
Kurt Geiger +44 845 257 2571 sunspel.com
kurtgeiger.com Superga +44 20 7734 4860
superga.co.uk
L La Perla +44 20 7245 0527 laperla.com Swatch +44 845 275 2800
Lavenham lavenhamjackets.com swatch.com
Levis +44 16 0459 9735 levi.com
Lyle & Scott +44 20 7287 8307 T Tiger of Sweden +44 20 7439 8499
lyleandscott.com tigerofsweden.com
Tods +44 20 7493 2237 tods.com
M Mr Hare +44 20 7495 4200 Tom Ford Fragrance +44 870 034 2566
mrhare.com Tommy Hilger +44 20 3144 0900
Mr Porter mrporter.com tommy.com
Topman topman.com
N NDC Made By Hand +44 1323 669 1601 Turnbull & Asser +44 20 7808 3000
mohawkgeneralstore.com turnbullandasser.co.uk
Nudie Jeans nudiejeans.com
V Vilebrequin mrporter.com
O Ospring ospring.co.uk Vince vince.com
Opumo opumo.com Vulpine vulpine.cc
Orlebar Brown +44 20 7734 5892
Omega +44 0845 272 3100 W Wolsey +44 20 7434 4257 wolsey.com
Woolrich +44 20 7494 9772
P Paul Smith +44 800 023 4006 uk.woolrich.eu
paulsmith.co.uk
Polo Ralph Lauren +44 20 7535 4600 Z Z Zegna +44 20 7518 2700 zegna.com
ralphlauren.com
Proenza Schouler International 7 For All Mankind +44 20 7734 5007
proenzaschouler.com 7forallmankind.com
SHADY CHARACTER:
chrome-framed
aviators, 115, by
Randolph. Taupe
cotton shawl-neck
sweater, 115, by
Tommy Hilfiger.
White cotton T-shirt,
48, by Nudie Jeans
145
 OBJECT OF DESIRE

No. 37
COSTA
AZZURRA
BY
TOM FORD
142 FOR 50ML

WORDS BY TEO VAN DEN BROEKE

n the space of just a few years, fashion superstar Tom Ford has established

I himself as a major player in the world of fragrance. His latest scent, bottled in
electric blue, is Costa Azzurra. It combines the bright Italian lemons and
mandarins of his successful, citrusy Neroli Portofino with richer strains of
vanilla, incense and woody vetiver oil. We recommend Portofino during the day, Costa Azzurra
at night and a negroni in hand at all times the recipe for a stylish summer. tomford.com

146 Photograph by Thomas Brown

 


  

  


 
     


 

 

&UEL CONSUMPTION lGURES FOR THE #IVIC  I $4%# 32 IN MPG LKM  5RBAN   
%XTRA 5RBAN    #OMBINED    #/ EMISSIONS GKM &UEL CONSUMPTION
lGURES SOURCED FROM OFlCIAL %5 REGULATED LABORATORY TEST RESULTS ARE PROVIDED FOR COMPARISON
PURPOSES AND MAY NOT REmECT REAL LIFE DRIVING EXPERIENCE
 # #IVIC  I $4%# 32 -ANUAL IN -ILANO 2ED .ON -ETALLIC AT a /N 4HE 2OAD     .EW RETAIL #IVIC  I $4%# 32 -ANUAL REGISTERED FROM  *ANUARY  TO  -AY 
3UBJECT TO MODEL AND COLOUR AVAILABILITY /FFERS APPLICABLE AT PARTICIPATING DEALERS AND ARE AT THE PROMOTERS ABSOLUTE DISCRETION      ! " !LL SCHEDULED SERVICING AS
DETAILED IN THE VEHICLES SERVICE BOOK WILL BE COVERED FOR  YEARS OR  MILES WHICHEVER COMES lRST
 $ )N ADDITION TO THE STANDARD  YEAR WARRANTY THE CUSTOMER WILL RECEIVE A COMPLIMENTARY 
YEAR EXTENDED GUARANTEE TAKING THE WARRANTY TO  YEARS OR  MILES WHICHEVER COMES lRST 
  )N ADDITION TO THE STANDARD  YEARS ROADSIDE ASSISTANCE PACKAGE THE CUSTOMER WILL RECEIVE
COMPLIMENTARY (ONDACARE !SSISTANCE FOR A FURTHER  YEARS TAKING IT TO  YEARS OR  MILES WHICHEVER COMES lRST      4HE  9EAR #ARE 0ACKAGE IS OPTIONAL      %%
!
 USUAL VALUE a INCLUDING 6!4 AND IS AVAILABLE TO lNANCE OR NON lNANCE CUSTOMERS 0LEASE NOTE SHOULD YOU SELL THE VEHICLE DURING THE PERIOD OF COVER THE PACKAGE REMAINS WITH THE VEHICLE