HE found global fame as the bumbling, foppish star of Four Weddings and a Funeral back in 1994. But times change and Hugh Grant has become better known of late for his heated political views, even playing a leading part in events on the day Boris Johnson resigned.

 

Ah, Four Weddings!

The laugh-a-minute comedy, directed by Mike Newell and written by Richard Curtis, set the Box Office alight back in the 1990s, making Grant a global superstar. He has since gone on to to star in movies such as Notting Hill, About a Boy and more recently played the villain of the piece, Phoenix Buchanan, in Paddington 2.

 

However?

The father-of-five children, now 61, is still acting, including playing the mysterious husband of Nicole Kidman in the HBO series, The Undoing, in 2020, but he is also becoming increasingly vocal on politics and the media.

 

Saying…?

Boris Johnson has been the focus of his ire online, not an unusual position for the outgoing PM it has to be said. But on Thursday, as Boris Johnson prepared his resignation speech, Grant used his Twitter account 'HackedOffHugh', to request that anti-Brexit, anti-Tories activist, Steve Bray - who has his own set of speakers set up outside Westminster that were returned to him, having been briefly confiscated - play a request. Grant tweeted: “Glad you have your speakers back.  Do you by any chance have the Benny Hill music to hand?”

 

As a result?

The silly-sounding theme song to the 1980s programme Benny Hill, Yakety Sax, was played at such a loud volume, it was the backdrop to the day’s events, audible in news broadcasts. Mr Bray tweeted a video of the music playing, saying: “Just for @HackedOffHugh as requested here today at the media circus…College Green. The Benny Hill theme tune.”

 

As for Brexit?

Following the UK election in late 2019, in a US interview, Grant was asked how he felt Britain was faring after Johnson was voted back in with a vow to ‘get Brexit done’. He responded: “It’s a catastrophe…the country’s finished.”

 

Media views?

Grant, a board member of Hacked Off - which campaigns for ‘a free and accountable press for the public’, last week claimed in a tweet: “Dear World, You may be wondering what happens next in terms of the British constitution. The answer is that 3 newspaper owners - all of whom are non domiciled in the UK for tax purposes - get together and choose our next Prime Minister or “Poodle”. The Queen then anoints them.”

 

He has some experience?

On the silver screen. He memorably played a rather romantic Prime Minister in Curtis's Love Actually, released in 2003, who falls in love with straight-talking staff member, Natalie, played by former EastEnders actress, Martine McCutcheon. In a speech on screen, he tells the US President, played by Billy Bob Thornton: “We may be a small country, but we’re a great one too. Country of Shakespeare, Churchill, The Beatles, Sean Connery, Harry Potter, David Beckham’s right foot, David Beckham’s left foot. A friend who bullies us is no longer a friend. And since bullies only respond to strength, from now onward I will be prepared to be much stronger. And the President should be prepared for that."