The Big Smoke

2008 | 2007 | 2006

2008
Naomi Cleaver on Peter Ackroyd
'He likes a drink, doesn’t he? He had a very large glass of red wine in his hand'

Jodie Harsh on Phyliis Pearsall
'Before that, there were Ordnance Survey maps which were the size of a person'

Jeffrey Archer on Arthur Conan Doyle
'When I was a young man, before the 1956 Clean Air Act, you couldn’t see a yard in front of you'

Donna Leon on George Frideric Handel
'Like any entrepreneur, he just said, "Okay, why don’t I write oratorios?" ' Feature continues

Tom Courtenay on Harry Hill
'His next date was in Hull and I thought: Ah, he might struggle there'

Geri Halliwell on the Queen
'She’s never spazzed out and lost her decorum'

Julian Clary on Vanessa Feltz
'Men like Jon Gaunt do a phone-in and they just rant and it gives me a headache'

Norman Jay on Robert Elms
'He went Spandau Ballet – he gave them their name and would read poetry on stage before their shows'

Tommy Moss on Kenneth Williams
'I was talking like Kenneth in the playground and so were many of my friends'

Nat Coombs on Chris Morris
'Morris’s persona in much of his work is an excellent parody of a very familiar type of Londoner'


2008 | 2007 | 2006

Amy Winehouse

2007
Chris Addison on Sir Christopher Wren
'He didn’t really know what he was about till he was almost 30'

Don Letts on Amy Winehouse
'I’d describe Amy as a chicken-eating Camden girl'

John Harvey on Jack Warner
'When Jack Warner died in real life officers from the Metropolitan Police carried his coffin'

Kevin McCloud on Nicholas Hawksmoor
'There’s the impression that he was the right man at the wrong time'

Suggs on Ray Davies
'It had an extraordinary bar, very wide at one end and then it got narrower and narrower'

Mark Ronson on Charlie Chaplin
'You can trace the line from Charlie Chaplin to Tom Cruise'

AC Grayling on William Hazlitt
'I believed in ghosts, I would hope to meet him one evening, coming towards me across the street'

Ian Hislop on Robert Baden-Powell
'He’s continually warning boys against men with waxed moustaches'

Maggie Davis on Isabella Blow
'She was standing there in front of the serious suited-up buyers and ashen-faced fashion press in just a bra'

Alex James on Sam Taylor-Wood
'Jay and Sam are London’s Regency couple, aren’t they?'

Tobias Menzies on Jospeh Banks
'Banks became arguably the most influential scientist of his day'

Molly Parkin on Francis Bacon
'Lots of people say Francis couldn’t draw but I’ve taught enough people to know drawing doesn’t matter.'

Terence Davies on Dirk Bogarde
'Bogarde’s only a great cinema actor at his best. He can be very mannered, at his worst.'

Immodesty Blaize on Sir Peter Blake
'I loved how his collages show how one little object can signify a whole period in your life.'

Lulu Kennedy on Louise Wilson
'Intelligent, witty, and grumpy in the most charismatic way, she reminds me of my bloody minded rebellious grandpa.'

Amy Lame on Dusty Springfield
'If there is anyone that could be the number one lesbian icon in the world forever and ever amen, it's Dusty Springfield.'

Rafe Spall on Timothy Spall
'He personifies the city. He looks like London. He's got a London face'

Paul Heaton on Terry Venables

2008 | 2007 | 2006

Vivienne Westwood (© Elisabeth Blanchet)

2006
Gomez’s Tom Gray on JMW Turner
'He’s an incredibly modern figure, because everything about him resonates'

Roddy Frame on Marc Bolan
'A huge pop star who dressed like Hendrix, a tax exile who did all the drugs'

Alice Eve on Big Ben
'Big Ben really was the leader of the free world – the clock chimed for the hours of the free man'

Bill Brewster on Jeff Dexter
'I guess he’s like a Rob Da Bank-type figure, only more so'

Denis Lawson on Dan Crawford
'He had this incredible enthusiasm that was almost scary, jumping up and down'

Bob Stanley on Geoffrey Fletcher
'He was obsessed with London and believed that "a man can do everything better in London" '

Lucinda Hawksley on Kate Dickens
'She defied popular Victorian morality and did as she pleased'

Sandi Toksvig on Hannah Snell
'A lad, known as "Hearty Jimmy", announced that "he" was actually a "she" '

Bez on Kate Moss
'She’s a rock ’n’ roller, a proper working-class girl, and she knows how to have fun'

Laura Michelle Kelly on Vivienne Westwood
'She is the queen of fashion and we should be proud of her'

Serena Rees on Jane Birkin
'Serge Gainsbourg and Jane were really chic, effortlessly stylish'

Mark Powell on Bobby Moore
'He was immaculate: he always looked well groomed both on and off the pitch'

Richard Bacon on Mark Thomas
'Mark Thomas is more activist than satirist: he gets his hands dirty'

Kate Williams on Emma Hamilton
'Her dramatic story shows us eighteenth-century London in all its grandeur'

Stephen Harwood on Dan Farson
'He was charming and generous during the day, but an absolute bastard by nightfall'

Karl Pilkington on Samuel Pepys
'Pepys used to write down all the rude stuff he’d been up to in Spanish, French and Italian'

Griff Rhys Jones on Alfred Hitchcock
'He established the absolute essence of a talking film: where the camera is a character'

Stewart Lee on Evan Parker
'Evan Parker gigs are the ones I take sceptics to when I want to convince them that free jazz is worth the investment'

Howard Marks on Tracy Emin
'She wished guys would start sticking their hands between her legs'

Maggot on Michael Winner
'If I’m playing a gig on a Sunday, there’ll be a copy of the Sunday Times, open at Michael’s page'

Isabella Blow on Alexander McQueen
'He altered the way we walk. His influence is monumental'

2008 | 2007 | 2006