In England the premiership of Gordon Brown has begun. Alas. Great Britain's 52nd prime minister is known to some as the one-eyed Puritan after losing an eye in a rugby game. Not since the 17th century, when Roundhead Oliver Cromwell overthrew the Cavalier King Charles, have sybarites been so depressed. "Let's not forget," one aristocrat told me, "that only Gordon Brown and small children have had to be taught to smile at a camera."
In the run-up to the handover, the Tee-Bees (supporters of Tony Blair) teased the Gee-Bees (supporters of Brown) that Brits would never embrace a man whose mouth pointed downward, whose teeth were mossy and whose suits resembled crumpled paper bags. Recently, however, there's been an extraordinary transformation: Mr. Brown got some snazzy outfits and a modern haircut, and his teeth seem distinctly whiter. (On the political front, no disasters so far: My friends' trust funds are still intact, and there are encouraging hints about an imminent withdrawal from Iraq.)
Blair adored the high life and turned off his BS detector to justify holidays with the Berlusconis and late nights with PR mogul Matthew Freud and Sun newspaper editor Rebekah Wade. He even swam in the Tuscan pool of Lord Lambton, the Tory minister who lost his job when a newspaper printed a photograph of him in bed with two prostitutes and smoking a joint. (Sometime after Blair's swim, the noble Lord Lambton died, but there is no suggestion of any connection between the two events.)
Unlike his predecessor, Brown doesn't swan off to Barbados and pose on the back of a speedboat wearing the latest Vilebrequin swimming trunks. He spent his holiday this year in wet and windy Dorset, and in the past has been spotted playing tennis in Cape Cod along with Messrs. Alan Greenspan and James Wolfensohn.
As our new prime minister settles in, everyone's asking, "Who's in Gordon's court?" Most assume the answer is, "Nobody very interesting," since Brown is a serious chap who maintains that he spends his free time reading books—or writing them—and that his inner coterie includes like-minded Scots. However, if you listen hard, you can detect the odd rustle of silk among the hair shirts.
The new power couple is Sir Ronald Cohen and his wife, Lady Sharon Harel-Cohen. Sharon is a distinguished film producer (Gosford Park) whose father was the commander of the famous Holocaust survivors' ship Exodus. Ronald came to London at 11 as a penniless exile from Egypt. He got first to Oxford, then to Harvard Business School, then to venture capitalism, and later founded the private equity fund Apax, which had a market capitalization of $35 billion plus. In his time, Sir Ronnie has donated more than two million dollars to the Labour Party, which might partly explain his knighthood.
Another prominent F.O.G. (friend of Gordon) is the Oscar nominee Paul Greengrass, director of two films in the Bourne series. Perhaps Sharon Harel-Cohen should develop a blockbuster called The Brown Supremacy as a tribute to her friend Gordon, and enlist Greengrass as director. Another close F.O.G., J.K. Rowling—recently declared even richer than the Queencould write the script. If Gordon is looking for a publisher, it might help that his wife, Sarah, is a close buddy of Wendi Murdoch's (wife of Rupert). Sarah, whose father was also a publisher, used to run the PR firm Hobsbawm Macaulay and is no stranger to spin. These days she devotes her time to the couple's two young sons (a daughter died shortly after birth). Her new home, Number 10 Downing Street, looks tiny on the outside, but the private quarters sit atop a rabbit warren of more than 100 offices. In one room you can still find George III's throne, and if you go down into the basement, you'll see the remains of Charles I's indoor tennis court.
