The Sunday Times Magazine - 21 August 2022

62 Pages·2022·19 MB·English

CRYPTO INFERNO
August 21 2022
How more than $2 trillion went up in flames
B Y D A N N Y F O R T S O N

8
26
21.08.2022
5 Sarah Ditum 40 Food and drink
The most terrifying pizza ever Tom Kerridge’s speedy
suppers; Marina O’Loughlin
6 Relative Values visits Solstice in Newcastle;
AYNES The attorney general, Will Lyons flies the flag for
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S A R A H D I T U M
I really wanted pizza —
but why did I risk my life for it?
A
couple of Wednesdays ago I was in the The first bad omen, though, was that the man in charge
audience at Madison Square Garden, — who was also the man on the phone, and the chef,
New York, for Rage Against the Machine, and in fact the sole member of staff — demanded a kiss
screaming out the words “I won’t do what from me. I just have to get the pizza and get out, I thought
you tell me” along with 20,000 other people. as I submitted, every fibre of my Englishness recoiling
I mention this because, even while I was under the forced intimacy.
yelling it, I knew it wasn’t true. After that he ignored us for half an hour. “He’s never
Travel back to the preceding evening and actually going to serve us,” my husband whispered, at
you’ll find me in a Brooklyn pizzeria, where which point our host whipped his gaze onto him from
for several hours a large Sicilian man held me, across the kitchen and asked whether he was the one
my husband and our friend Dave captive for who’d been phoning. “Maybe someone really was prank
two hours with nothing more than the iron shackles of calling him and he thinks it was us,” Dave said, in an
social awkwardness. even quieter whisper, once our captor was distracted.
It had all started weirdly but not alarmingly. We tried I’d started to believe nothing about our relationship
to order pizza for delivery. The restaurant cancelled the with the man in the pizza shop had been true from the
order and then called us back. We could (we should) start. The delivery form on the website? A lie. The
have given it up as a bad job at this point. But this was mysterious caller who wasn’t us? A lie. The pizza?
when, terribly, I decided to stop slumping indolently Very possibly a lie. Sure, this place looked like a
on the sofa allowing the dinner plans to be someone neighbourhood restaurant, with its appealing bare-
else’s problem. I decided that I was selflessly going to brick walls and rugged wooden tables. Really, though,
fix this for everyone. it was a trap: entice punters with the promise of food
Time freezes. Life divides. The path not taken drifts — and torture them with awkwardness.
helplessly away. I took the phone and heard an And still we couldn’t leave. We wanted to leave.
animated male voice demanding: “Why d’you keep We agreed, with significant glances and coded
calling me?” We don’t keep calling you, I replied, comments, that we were going to leave. But just as
uncertainly; we’re just trying to order some we were about to stand up, three bottles of lager and
pizza, from a pizza restaurant — something that a plate of mortadella sausage appeared in front of us,
once seemed a banal endeavour and now seems and our chance had passed.
like a portal to confusion and suffering. Having ensnared us with hospitality, the
There was a bit more inexplicable chatter pizza man started vamping about with a large
and then the man on the phone knife, laughing, “What am I gonna do? Kill
concluded: “I like your accent. Come in, you?” Which did indeed seem like what he
I’ll give you a beer, make you the pizza.” was going to do when he went to close the
And all was lost. Somehow getting this metal shutters with us inside. “You need to loosen up!”
pizza, from this restaurant, had become he boomed, and then went to the back of the shop to
the only purpose to our evening. Maybe the only find a bigger blade to play with. And still, even once
purpose to my life. Around 8pm Eastern Seaboard he’d blessedly put the shutters back up, we didn’t just
Time, all my interests and ambitions had throw down some cash for the drinks and bail.
MY narrowed to a thin and blistered circle of dough. We didn’t bail because we didn’t want to be rude to
A
AL All the same, I wasn’t going in without a man who was joking about stabbing us and showed
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MES looked like a reassuringly typical NYC pizza joint: we sat there and took it. Which is, of course, exactly
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HE S (The pizza was fantastic, though perhaps not “worth
OR T fearing for your life” levels of fantastic.) “Thanks so
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O radiantly, feeling inside myself the undeniable truth:
N J a man who was joking about
WA make me uncomfortable enough and not only will
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The Sunday Times Magazine • 5
R E L A T I V E V A L U E S
Suella Braverman and Uma Fernandes
The attorney general and her mother, a former councillor and nurse
Suella
family and part of my identity. There’s a camaraderie
When Russia invaded Ukraine I got a call from my and a brotherhood. Every few years our house would
secretary at 2am to say the prime minister had called a turn into a campaign centre with maps of the polling
5am cabinet meeting. I rang Mum at 3am and said: “I’ve districts on the wall and piles of leaflets. People still
got to go.” And she said: “No problem, I’m coming.” come up to me in parliament and say: “Are you Suella
The children [George, three, and Gabriella, one] were Fernandes? I campaigned for your mum in 2003.”
at nursery that morning as if nothing had happened. I’m immensely proud to be supporting Liz [Truss].
The pressure in my job can be excruciating. In a We’ve fought on the same side inside government
hypothetical crisis situation it is the assessment of for Brexit delivery, justice for Ukrainians and against
evidence and legal advice given by the attorney general identity politics. She’s relentless in pushing back
that is determinative. That pressure makes you very against Whitehall orthodoxy.
vigilant. When you’re up close to the role of prime Serving in cabinet, running a department and
minister, you see how tough it is — and I thought I supporting the PM, it’s a big responsibility and you
could do it [Suella ran for the party leadership after Boris can’t do it alone. It is your family who remind you there
Johnson’s resignation, but was eliminated in the second are more important things than politics. I tried to
round of voting]. I have this bedrock of care at home that become prime minister. I didn’t succeed and I was
is unshakable — my mum, my dad and my mother-in-law disappointed. But you come home, you see your
[she married Rael Braverman, a manager at Mercedes, in children and you realise that nothing on earth is going
February 2018] — which meant I could run knowing the to beat kisses from your one-year-old.
children would be fine. They’re in this bubble of safety
Uma
and love and kindness and that won’t be disrupted.
First and foremost my mum is a nurse. As soon as It is quite hard to be close to someone who is taking
I walk through the door she asks: “Have you eaten?” on so much. I didn’t switch on the TV during the
When she came to Britain from Mauritius at 18 to do her leadership race because I thought if I start digging into
training, she thought she’d won the lottery, she grabbed that I won’t be any good for Suella. You have to have
life by both horns. Both my parents grew up under the
Empire. My dad arrived in 1968 from Kenya with no
connections, no money. I was raised in an environment “Suella used to come with me
where there were no limits on what you can strive to do.
doorstep canvassing. We had so
Mum was not a stay-at-home mother. She worked
full-time, did a degree in social care, served on the local
many temper tantrums”
council [Brent] and stood in local elections as well as
running our household. But in the middle of all this
my dad lost his job as an insurance broker. He was
unemployed for several years and his sense of identity
was shattered. It really broke him as a man. Mum
became the backbone of the family, financially and
emotionally, and that was a big epiphany for me.
I saw her working flat out, all hours — “stretched”
doesn’t do justice to it. It struck me when I was 11 that
she was killing herself to pay for my education and
that felt a massive responsibility on my shoulders. My
school [Heathfield School in Pinner] wasn’t posh — it
was full of kids with working-class aspirational parents,
a lot of them Asian, who were sacrificing everything.
A switch flicked in my mind. I felt I had to work hard
for Mum and Dad because I couldn’t let them down,
and that has continued to be a big driver for me. Main: Uma, 74,
Mum was a local councillor for 16 years. And she stood and Suella, 42,
for parliament twice [as Conservative candidate for at Suella’s home.
Tottenham in the 2001 general election and the 2003 Right: on holiday
Brent East by-election], so politics became part of our in France, 1988
6 • The Sunday Times Magazine
P O R T R A I T B Y J O N A T T E N B O R O U G H
faith. If this is what your child wants to do, don’t point S T R A N G E Lewisham, a pregnant 11-year-old. Suella rolled her eyes
out the difficulties, because fear is never-ending. You and said: “Mum, there you go again.” And off she went.
H A B I T S
say: “Go ahead, you have my support.” She studied hard too — she was determined to get to
I have never tried to stop Suella doing anything. My Cambridge — but she really enjoyed her life.
main concern was to relieve her of childcare. Sure, she Suella on Uma When I stood in the Brent East by-election she was
can stand for prime minister because her kids are happy She’s a big 23; she followed my campaign trail and brought all the
and enjoying themselves with Nana. There was a hoarder. She Cambridge Young Conservatives to help out. The press
passing thought, I hope she won’t find it too stressful, won’t get rid of followed us everywhere. It was vicious. Afterwards
but I never thought she couldn’t do it. clothes, books, I was so exhausted we drove home in silence. Suddenly
My husband says she gets her confidence from me. old jewellery for Suella said: “Mum, how do you feel being publicly
I got it from my mum. She wanted her daughters to love nor money rejected like this?” I said: “Suella, it’s an election. You
never need to rely on a man. This drive is hardwired in win some, you lose some, you just have to keep going.”
us — it is in all women — we strive for our kids. When Uma on Suella When she stepped into Westminster for the first
I said I wanted to come to Britain to study nursing, my She almost never time just after she finished her law degree, she said:
mother didn’t see problems. I passed this on to Suella. picks up her “Mum, I felt so alive!” I used to come home from
She grew up thinking there is nothing she cannot do. phone. Calling Brent town hall with the same feeling. It’s almost like
She was nine when I stood for Brent council. Suella Suella on it is an addiction. When you step away you need your
used to come with me doorstep canvassing. We had so pretty pointless family to hold you together. Sometimes when she
many temper tantrums. After one road she wanted to go comes home she’s exhausted, but politicians in high
home. Her dad used to say: “Why do we bring this girl?” office enjoy the pressure. She wouldn’t be happy with
We were not very happy when she started going to a 9-5 life. Everybody asks me, how did you make her the
all-night parties when she was 14 or 15. She said: “OK, way she is? But it wasn’t anything I did, she followed
I’m not telling you anything else then.” We had some a path and I tried to smooth her way n
rows! I needed a lot of patience. I used to tell her
about my youngest patient when I was a midwife in Interviews by Caroline Scott
The Sunday Times Magazine • 7
GARY BARLOW
HAS TURNED HIS
LIFE STORY INTO
A ONE-MAN SHOW.
WHAT DROVE HIM
TO RELIVE THE
SOARING HIGHS
AND CRASHING
INTERVIEW BY
LOWS ON STAGE?
KATE SPICER
PORTRAIT BY
EDWARD COOK E
8 • The Sunday Times Magazine
“ I J U S T
W A N T
E V E R Y O N E
T O L I K E M E ”
The Sunday Times Magazine • 9
I
n his one-man theatre show, Gary Barlow previously written two musicals together and known
doesn’t shrink from the most painful each other since they met on the set of the BBC’s
moments in his life: public shaming; Young Songwriter of the Year in the 1980s. Heading
obesity; bulimia; the tragic sudden deaths home on the train that night, they discovered they
of both his father, Colin, and his baby grew up in the same northern town.
daughter, Poppy. Nor the petty ones, like They spent 18 months during lockdown batting
the jealous, two-decades-long conflict he emails back and forth, working material into a script.
had with his former Take That bandmate Barlow began buying props on eBay, and Dawn, his
Robbie Williams. A Different Stage is a wife of 22 years, sewed some of the early costumes
two-act monologue in which Barlow, herself. Then, somewhere along the way, he started
alone on stage, delivers a dramatised to worry the audience would think they weren’t
version of his life story. “THE AUDIENCE getting their money’s worth — and the production
“It scared the living daylights out of values and costs snowballed. “You gotta send ’em
me, I’ve got to stand there for two hours. home feeling like they’ve had a proper night out,”
IS SO CLOSE
I couldn’t see how I would work my way he explains.
through it all,” he says. “Initially we He ended up self-producing the show at a cost
thought it would be me and four or five I CAN ALMOST of “multiple six figures”. “It’s not a youth club
cast members, but the more we thought production. It’s expensive,” he says.
about it, the more it had to be me, sat in Compared with the 60ft-tall mechanical man
HEAR THEM
my bedroom.” So what made him decide used on Take That’s biggest-selling tour, the set is
to do it? “I love telling a story,” he says. modest. There is just a stack of specially customised
“All my friends know that but that side of me has BREATHING. IF flight cases concealing the crucial props of his life —
always been hidden from an audience because, albeit made by the A-list stage designer Es Devlin,
until now, the songs were everything.” who has also worked with Beyoncé, Adele and the
He lists Noël Coward, Willy Russell’s Shirley SOMEONE HAS Royal Opera, and recreated the streets of Compton
Valentine, Peter Kay’s stand-up and Carrie Fisher’s for this year’s Super Bowl half-time spectacular.
one-woman stage show, Wishful Drinking, as The sound guy Gareth Tucker’s last big gig was
A TEAR OR THEY
inspirations. Those are some big boots to fill. Hamilton. And the stage is lit by Lloyd Webber’s
Earlier this year I went to see its opening night favourite, Bruno Poet.
at the Brindley Theatre in Runcorn, Cheshire — LOOK SHOCKED, The production team were all milling around on
a ten-minute drive from where Barlow grew up the afternoon of Barlow’s first show. Notably absent
in the market town of Frodsham. was the man himself, who was staying up the road
The script was co-written with Tim Firth, the I CLOCK IT” at his mum’s home in Frodsham, where she fed him
writer of screenplays and TV dramas that include his favourite pie and mash for lunch. His security
Calendar Girls and Kinky Boots. The pair have guy of 30 years also spent the week residing with
10 • The Sunday Times Magazine