Features Archives - Page 2 of 6

8th May 2020 Features

Chaps of the War

On the 75th anniversary of VE Day, a celebration of the most eccentric, daring, heroic chaps who fought on their own terms and displayed remarkable sangfroid in the face of the enemy DIGBY TATHAM-WARTER Formerly of the Oxford and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry, Major Tatham-Warter commanded the 2nd Parachute Battalion’s ‘A’ Company. ‘A’ Company were selected to spearhead the 2nd Battalion’s march to Arnhem bridge because Lt-Colonel Frost regarded Digby as a thruster, and not one to hang around – thereby making him the ideal choice to lead in an operation that depended on speed. Having captured the bridge and during… Keep Reading

5th May 2020 Features/The Chap Drinks

Whisky Galore

Olly Smith sings fulsome praises to the grandfather of all gentlemanly drinks, Whisky In John Landis’ 1983 comedy Trading Places, the villainous duo of Mortimer and Randolph Duke attempt to lure Eddie Murphy into their limousine by proffering a small bottle with the words “whisky – all you want!”. As a child, this always struck me as an intriguing gambit. Could any drink possibly be so good that one could be irresistibly drawn to it like a magnet tugging on the very metal of a robot’s brain? Some years later, I was taught never to resist the dram’s allure by… Keep Reading

4th May 2020 Features

Rev Leslie Skinner

“Caught up with RHQ at Enscheide by mid morning. Went down main street to see how things were going. Odd elements of German infantry being winkled out. Half way down main street firing broke out on both ends so I dived into a shop for cover. It was a barbers shop, so I had a haircut while waiting for things to simmer down.” Excerpt from the Rev Leslie Skinner’s war diary: 3rd April 1945 When Leslie Skinner landed on Gold Beach on 6th June, 1944, with the Sherwood Rangers Yeomanry, he had two missions: officially he was senior chaplain to… Keep Reading

20th March 2020 The Chap Travels

Jerez de La Frontera

“Everyone gets everything he wants. I wanted a mission, and for my sins they gave me one. Brought it up to me like room service.” Captain Willard, Apocalypse Now My mission was not to find a colonel in the Vietnamese jungle who had gone mad and to kill him, but to catch up with an old friend who had not been seen in Soho since the death of our own Colonel Kurtz, Sebastian Horsley. Shortly after the great dandy’s funeral in June 2010, Paul Lawford disappeared from Soho in a wisp of cigar smoke. His flat on Meard Street had… Keep Reading

20th March 2020 Features

Marilyn Monroe

One of the biggest challenges in writing about someone like Marilyn Monroe is that people have been writing obsessively about her for almost a century. Books on her famous lovers, confirmed or rumoured, are generally the first thing one comes across. Another focus is her impact on fashion. There’s rather a lot on her reputation for being difficult on set, her tragic life and conspiracy theories about her death. The first problem with writing on such a complicated person is having to leave so much out – Marilyn’s work in the Civil Rights Movement; how she pressured one of Hollywood’s… Keep Reading

14th February 2020 Features

Spearpoint Collars

The man’s shirt collar has been shrinking over the years. Not only shrinking, but also it’s been running away from the knot of your tie. You can see it clear as day; those collar points are spreading farther and farther apart. I believe part of this is caused by the erroneous notion that the “fashion elite” like to press on the public, that there are certain collars that work best with certain face shapes, and they have a ritualistic standard that is all you should follow. Now I’m not completely disputing that there is some balance between face shape and… Keep Reading

14th February 2020 Features

Ava Gardner

Ava Gardner loved drinking, staying up all night, sex, jazz, four-letter words, dogs, driving fast and Frank Sinatra. Her luminescent white skin, jet black hair, emerald green eyes, feline grace and dancer’s elegance was known to have stopped even the most hardened casting couch-abusing Hollywood producer dead in his tracks. She was thoroughly unimpressed with the movie business, considered acting not only silly but an embarrassing torment tolerated only to fund her extravagant lifestyle, was the prototype jet setting hedonist who, pursued by paparazzi, was constantly in the headlines for fighting and drinking and staying up all night. I’d say… Keep Reading

29th January 2020 Features

Trubshawe!

Michael Trubshawe’s entrance into the life of David Niven was as sensational as any of Niven’s stage or film entrances. Niven was stationed in Malta with the Highland Light Infantry between 1929 and 1931 as a very young officer. His reception by the other officers had been rather frosty – one refusing to speak to him all the way to Malta from Tilbury Docks. Once he’d acquitted himself on the cricket ground, things got slightly better, until one day: “Suddenly, an ear-splitting belch rent the air. I spun around and perceived a truly amazing sight. Trubshawe was approaching. Six feet… Keep Reading

27th November 2019 Features/Reviews

Kind Hearts and Coronets

“It is so difficult to make a neat job of killing people with whom one is not on friendly terms.” Such is the laconic lament uttered by Dennis Price in his guise as Louis Mazzini in Kind Hearts & Coronets, the Ealing Comedy Classic. Louis is the peerless peer (oft by his own hand) who methodically bumps off a variety of relatives (all played by Sir Alec Guinness) to secure a dukedom. In light of the 70th Anniversary re-release by StudioCanal, The Chap felt that a review of the film itself was in order. I have personally been enamoured with… Keep Reading

5th October 2019 The Chap Travels/The Chap Travels

Bohemian Paris

I still find the Eurostar really rather wonderful. You get on a train at St. Pancras and alight some two hours later at Le Gare Du Nord into a different world, where the attitudes, tastes, smells, people and culture are as different from London as sand is to salt. Undeniably, it is quite an anomalous experience – one that usually only a plane journey can really prepare us for – stepping off a train into this alien environment that’s both Paris and, due to French colonisation, Gambian, Moroccan, Tunisian, Sudanese and Algerian. It’s in all respects downright foreign. I have… Keep Reading

4th October 2019 Fashion/Features

Chap To The Future

Wherever you look in pop culture, you will see signs of our beloved Chap Fashion. Whether you are looking into a far-flung cyberpunk future or back to the romanticised past of fantasy worlds, there are clues and signposts all over the place to the classic influences that brought us here. Why have a few very specific time periods had such a large influence on our huge entertainment industry? Take my hand, oh dapper one, and let us go on a journey of discovery through the history of pop culture to find out. As a young person, I’m pretty sure that… Keep Reading

25th September 2019 The Chap Travels/The Chap Travels

Puerto Vallarta, Mexico

From the eleventh floor balcony of a hotel overlooking the Pacific Ocean, the horizon flashing with lightning, brassy wisps of Mariachi music wafting up from somewhere through the heat of the night, was the sense that we were definitely in Mexico. It had taken nearly 20 hours to reach this moment of Mexican awareness, though our sense of time had been hurled out of the window on the journey; it was either tomorrow or yesterday in England, the confusion of jetlag and 6-hour time difference loosening the mind from the shackles of the clock. Puerto Vallarta is a sprawling series… Keep Reading

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