Why it's toff at the top for Hugh Grant (INDEPENDENT IE.)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D6NFj_HOXSA&feature=player_embedded

Saturday March 31 2012

If the British tabloids had it in for Hugh Grant before he became a star witness at the Leveson Inquiry, he's moved to the very top of their hit list since. And when the actor became a father for the first time late last year after a brief relationship with a Chinese neighbour, Tinglan Hong, the red-top knives were out.

In various hatchet jobs, Grant was portrayed as a reluctant, even indifferent father, and in an infamous Daily Mail column, Amanda Platell did a full-scale demolition on him. "Grant," she said, "has become a lonely, bitter man consumed with hatred of the media who helped make him a star. "In truth," she went on, "this great moral crusader is just another hypocritical celebrity who enjoys the money and fame that media exposure gives him, but who refuses to accept the accompanying responsibilities."

The "accompanying responsibilities", one presumes, include cheerfully accepting the mad pursuit of amoral paparazzi and the fact that your phone is tapped. But this fairly constant stream of vitriol is the price Grant is paying for taking on the tabloids.

Since uncovering evidence of phone tapping by chance in early 2011, Grant has become, perhaps, the leading and certainly the most articulate and fearless campaigner against press intrusion into people's private lives. He's become such a regular on Newsnight and other current affairs programmes that one could easily confuse him for a politician, and acting seems to have slipped down his list of priorities. Grant hasn't starred in a film in three years, and has only appeared in three since 2005.


READ MORE:  http://www.independent.ie/entertainment/film-cinema/why-its-toff-at-the-top-for-hugh-grant-3067126.html