Pandora: 'Novice' taunt follows Miliband to the US

What with a plethora of prime-time television appearances, numerous East Coast social engagements and rumours of ticket touts outside his first lecture, Tony Blair (aka Yale University's latest celebrity professor) has taken to the adoring American public like a duck to water.

All the more crushing, then, for his banana-wielding young protégé David Miliband to be met with rather less effusive greetings in New York, where he was accompanying Gordon Brown to a meeting of the United Nations General Assembly.

Still, no doubt, somewhat deflated by the Prime Minister's post-conference revival, the Foreign Secretary agreed to address an audience of students at the city's prestigious New York University.

As his speech drew to a close, he opened the floor to questions, and what should come top of the agenda but – quelle horreur! – Gordon Brown. To be specific, Gordon Brown's fortune-reviving conference speech.

"Do you agree with Brown when he says that now is not the time for a novice?" piped up one NYU-regalia-clad youngster. "And would you interpret that as a slight on Barack Obama, since that's exactly what Republicans have been saying about him?"

Cue much huffing and puffing from a startled Foreign Secretary.

Eventually, the muttered response came: "Of course I always agree with everything the Prime Minister has to say.

"But I'm not sure that he was taking a side in your Presidential election." .

Joss leaves no stone unturned

Once again, Joss Stone is to broaden her horizons. Not long ago, the soul singer and Cadbury's Flake girl made her move into film with the yet-to-be-released indie-flick Snappers, in which she plays a bingo caller who embarks on a lesbian romance.

Now I understand that Stone is looking to become even more involved, after buying a modest stake in the film's production company, Devon Films.

"To be honest, it was mainly to help them out rather than to become an active co-owner," she tells me, "but I'd love to explore the film industry – especially looking at more acting roles."

She is adamant, however, that she has no intention of forsaking her music career.

"Anything like that will always be in conjunction with doing music," she insists.

Tamsin gets serious – well, sort of

The actress Tamsin Egerton, as with many a young starlet to reach fame aboard a less-than-esoteric rom-com, has one unfulfilled ambition: she wants to be taken seriously.

"I'm turning a lot of things down at the moment," she told me at this year's Berkeley Square Ball.

"I'm just sick of playing those comedy-slut roles. It's like once people see you do one thing well, they don't want you to do anything else. I want the chance to do more serious things."

One route she won't be taking, however, is the tried-and-tested old stint on a stage.

"I've just said no to some theatre, actually. I'd like to do it one day, but it's a case of the wrong thing at the wrong time. The last thing I need to do right now is something low-profile – I'd disappear from the radar!"

Resignation? What resignation?

Pirates of the Caribbean star Naomi Harris flies to South Africa this week, where she begins filming on her next, as yet unnamed, project. "It's actually set in Nigeria, and revolves around corruption in government," she tells me. What of South Africa's recent political turmoil? Has she been following the downfall of their own (now ex-) President, Thabo Mbeki? "Oh, I haven't heard anything about that. Sorry!"

Toby is well alienated

The director of How to Lose Friends and Alienate People may insist that its author Toby Young wasn't barred from the set of the film, but the man himself isn't buying it.

"It was all very unfair," he moans. "You know there is a saying in Hollywood that being a writer is like being a husband in a maternity ward. I wasn't even the husband, I was more like the husband's best mate. No consultation at all."

An f-word in your shell-like

Nice to hear top chef Angela Hartnett sticking up for her boss. Of the voluble Gordon Ramsay, she tells the Camden New Journal: "He's a gentleman, he's generous. Gordon may shout at you during service, but he'll always take you aside at the end of the night and explain what you did wrong." How sweet of him.