Skipper

Having read The Observer up to page 15 I had almost forgotten about the date and so began to read the article about Blair naively unaware. On the face of it, it was not an unreasonable story-that Blair had been persuaded by Kevin Spacey to play a role in Arthur Miller's The Crucible at the Old Vic.

We all know Tony was a gifted actor at Fettes and his recent Comic Relief sketch revealed he had lost none of his thespian timing and relish for the grease paint. Playing a substantial but not major role also seemed to make sense. But being asked to appear in a Christmas Only Fools and Horses began to sound suspect and, even though I could not elicit 'April Fool' from the names of the article's author or assistant author, the pay-off paragraph about a cabinet minister concerned that Tony had welcomed an ambassador to Number 10 'dressed like a Puritan, waving a crucifix in the air and shouting about chasing out the devil' gave the game away. Nice try though.