ALISON BOSHOFF: When in Rome… Harry will get over heartache

Pop icon Harry Styles has been getting over his heartbreak with a Roman holiday.

The former One Direction star, who split up from long-term girlfriend, actress Taylor Russell, in May, has been living quietly — or as quietly as you can if you are Harry Styles — in the eternal city for a couple of months.

He’s been spotted doing ­shopping at the local Co-op, pausing for coffee and browsing for bargains at a flea ­market, where footage shot by a fan suggests he was checking out some knock-off ­Converse shoes.

In late May he was seen out to dinner with his close friend, the Valentino designer Alessandro Michele. 

Sources indicate that Styles, 30 — who had been ­living in his large house in Hampstead, North London, with Russell — is not just on holiday but actually owns a home in Rome.

I’m told it is in the same neighbourhood as Michele’s place. That’s the Palazzo Scapucci, a wonderful ­medieval palace complete with a square tower — and a legend involving a monkey.

Once upon a time, the story goes, the monkey — a family pet — climbed to the top of the four-storey structure, carrying a baby girl in its arms. 

It was ­eventually persuaded to clamber down, with the help of a whistle, and the Scapuccis subsequently set up a shrine, with a statue of the Virgin Mary and a light that never goes out, in ­gratitude for their answered prayers and the safe return of their daughter. 

History does not relate what became of the monkey.

Michele lives there with his ­partner, the urban planning ­professor Giovanni Attili.

Maybe Styles was drawn to Rome because of his close friendship with Michele. 

They have been besties since the designer’s reign at Gucci, with Styles first wearing some maximalist retro suiting in 2016.

They were memorably pictured together at the Met Gala Ball in 2019; and Styles also collaborated with a collection for the brand.

Michele said at the time: ‘Harry has an incredible sense of fashion. Observing his ability to combine items of clothing in a way that is out of the ordinary … I came to understand that the styling of a look is a generator of ­differences and of powers — as are his reactions to the designs I have created for him, which he has always made his own. 

‘These reactions restore me with a rush of freedom every time.’

Apparently the texts between them are always signed off ‘Hahaha’ — a reference to their initials. Cute!

Our view is better than yours…

Gabby Logan says the BBC have beaten ITV hands-down in at least one aspect of their Euros coverage. 

‘Our view is of the Brandenburg Gate, but ITV have got a kind of side view.

‘It’s like when you go on holiday and you get the sea view, and it’s not quite the sea view — that’s what they’ve booked. 

‘They’ve got the kind of angle where you’ve got to put your head out the corner and look round.’

And there’s more. ‘We’ve been on air, finishing a show, while they’ve come on air … so they’ve got to angle their studio so they haven’t got a bit of BBC in the background.’

With a cast including Helen Mirren, Pierce Brosnan, Sir Ben Kingsley, Celia Imrie and Richard E. Grant, the film adaptation of Richard Osman’s Thursday Murder Club is shaping up to be a very starry affair.

One late addition to the line-up is actress Ingrid Oliver, who is a less familiar name… but also happens to be married to Osman (who is executive producing the movie for Netflix).

She will play Joanna — who fans of the books will know is the daughter of former nurse Joyce (Celia Imrie). 

Her husband added that it was ‘not my idea, but [writer/director] Chris Columbus’s’.

Chef Sydney’s cooking with gas! 

Yes Chef! The Bear’s Ayo Edebiri is the main dish in a new film, rather than standing in the shadow of Jeremy Allen White’s Carmy Berzatto.

Edebiri, 28, is the star of After The Hunt, directed by Luca Guadagnino, which went into production in London this week. She plays a student who levels an accusation against a college professor (Chloe Sevigny). 

Julia Roberts plays Sevigny’s colleague.

Edebiri, named best supporting actress at the Emmys in January for her role as chef Sydney Adamu, is certainly in the big leagues now. 

We’ll see if this indy film can match the buzz of Guadagnino’s last movie, Challengers, starring Zendaya, Josh O’Connor and Mike Faist as tennis players and lovers.

The Italian director is certainly ­keeping busy. He is due back on the Lido for the Venice Film Festival to promote Queer: an adaptation of the William S. ­Burrough’s novella.

Daniel Craig plays a gay drug addict, obsessed with a much younger man (Drew Starkey). Guadagnino promises a story of ‘exorcism and possession’.

Andrew Lloyd Webber has had a house in Chester Square, Belgravia, for more than 30 years. 

But word is that he’s decided to sell up. 

He and wife Madeleine live mostly at Sydmonton Court, their estate in Hampshire, these days. 

They also have a holiday house in Sandy Lane, Barbados. 

A spokesman for the impresario declined to comment.

Grandad’s happy for Del Boy to stay away 

Sir David Jason still hasn’t seen the stage version of Only Fools And Horses — and star Paul Whitehouse  is rather hoping he keeps it that way.

‘To his credit, he told us he thought he would put too much pressure on the cast if he came to a performance,’ says Paul, who plays Grandad in Only Fools And Horses: The Musical, which begins a UK and Ireland tour in September. 

‘I also think it would cause uproar,’ he added. ‘The audience would go crazy if he were in attendance, like The Messiah returning. 

‘We had Dame Barbara Windsor at one of the early performances and she brought the house down and got more applause than me and the rest of the cast.’

The tour begins in Bromley on September 23 and will be in residence at The Hammersmith Apollo, in London, over Christmas.

Ruth Jones will doubtless be much in demand, once she has finished work on the last ever episode of Gavin & Stacey to be broadcast at Christmas 2024, but she’s ruling out getting involved with The Archers — despite being a life-long fan of the radio drama, and despite approaches from the BBC.

‘Over the years, the possibility of being in The Archers has been mentioned to me but I could never do it,’ Ruth said. 

‘I couldn’t possibly be in The Archers, or write The Archers, because to me it exists. Ambridge is a place, those people are real and I don’t want to go and talk to them — either as the writer of an episode or as one of their acting colleagues — in a radio studio.

‘I have my own idea of what Ambridge looks like and I don’t want that ever to change.’

All’s fair, as gladiators prepare to clash

They fight with net, ­trident, sword — and, of late, press release, trailer and rap music.

Just as TV’s megabudget Roman gladiators series Those About To Die prepares to launch (it starts streaming next week), Gladiator II, ­Ridley Scott’s controversial sequel, drops a lengthy trailer to steal its thunder.

On Wednesday, with timing which may be pure coincidence, Paramount released a three-minute nine-second trailer showing Paul Mescal as the lead in the new film, which follows on from the 2000 original starring Russell Crowe. 

It will come out in late November.

Unusually, 24 hours after its release, the trailer had racked up more negative than ­positive feedback (122,000 thumbs down, versus 97,000 thumbs up, which seems strangely appropriate for a film about gladiators).

Those commenting on YouTube mostly took issue with the rap music — No Church In The Wild by Jay-Z and Kanye West — which plays over much of the trailer.

Some also complained that the promo was too long, and gave too much away.

In the picture, Mescal plays Lucius Verus, grandson of Emperor Marcus Aurelius and nephew of ­Commodus, played respectively by the late ­Richard Harris and Joaquin Phoenix in the original.

Gladiator II was filmed almost at the same time as Those About To Die (which was shot in the famous Cinecitta studios in Rome).

The ten-part TV series, directed by Roland Emmerich, features Sir Anthony Hopkins as the Emperor Vespasian and Iwan Rheon, of Game Of Thrones and Wolf infamy, as his games master.

Tom Hughes, of ­Victoria, is also in the cast, alongside former Grange Hill star ­Dimitri Leonidas.

Both projects feature spectacular renderings of action in the Colosseum; and both include scenes in which the gladiators do battle in a flooded arena. 

Those About To Die has crocs in the water. Gladiator II has sharks.

Those About To Die streams on Peacock from July 18 and Prime Video in the UK from July 19.

Unflappable Sky News star Beth Rigby wasn’t always so composed. 

She says: ‘When I first started, I was chasing a Cabinet minister down Whitehall. I was off-camera and dropped my phone. 

‘Because I’d just started on telly, I didn’t realise if I wasn’t physically on camera that I could still be heard. 

‘So I said: ‘Oh sh*t, I’ve dropped my phone!’ 

My colleague Adam Boulton immediately said: ‘I’m sorry if you heard a member of the public swearing’ — when it was me! 

‘That was the first and last time I swore on TV.’