Charles shuns Brandreth's big night on the Fringe

According to reports - widely believed to be leaked by Brandreth himself - in at least one paper of record, Prince Charles and the Duchess of Cornwall had booked tickets to see the former Tory MP turned royal biographer strut his stuff at the Assembly Rooms. Sadly, it turns out that the Prince was furious that his plans had been published, and is now refusing to go after all.

Brandreth was reluctant to comment on the whole matter when Pandora called yesterday, but his reputation among the House of Windsor couldn't really get much lower. Now at work on a biography of the Prince, which is to be published in October, he has found himself without much co-operation from "senior royal sources", since his last royal tome alleged that Prince Philip has had an affair.

A Palace spokesman yesterday left little room for doubt. "There are no plans for the Prince to attend the play," I am told. "I don't mean any disrespect to Giles Brandreth, but he and the Prince have no relationship whatsoever."

* As the theatrical world holds its breath in anticipation of Sir Ian McKellen's revival of the role of Widow Twankey, in the Old Vic Christmas pantomime, there is news of a more exciting prospect still.

In February, McKellen has agreed to star at the Donmar Warehouse, in a new play by Mark Ravenhill, who wrote Shopping and Fucking.

"The play is a study of evil, and Sir Ian will play a torturer," Ravenhill tells me. "He's doing a lot at the moment and we are very lucky to have got him."

It's certainly going to require different skills from Sir Ian's recent popular turn as Gandalf in Lord of the Rings, but Ravenhill reckons it's all connected with that success.

"I think he's got caught up in the excitement of being Gandalf and has simply decided to take the opportunity to do all the things he's always wanted," he adds. "The same goes for all these film projects: I think he's also doing another X-men."

* The actor Alan Davies doesn't much like talking to the press. Hacks up in Edinburgh, where Davies is currently performing, are warned not to approach him for fear of prompting vulgarity.

But he has condescended to give a few short words to the Festival's free news handout, Three Weeks.

"I don't really read reviews. They're just rude. Ignorant and rude," he says, politely. "And if they're complimentary, so what? The audience like the show."

Some critics have been audacious enough to suggest that Davies trademark unkempt hair is inappropriate for his current role. He doesn't appreciate that sort of comment either:

"I asked my girlfriend and she said 'no', so that's it."

Nice of him to chat, anyway.

* Here's a tale to worry people concerned with lofty matters like freedom of speech. A composer called Keith Burstein is attempting to bring a legal action against the London Evening Standard because it gave his opera, Manifest Destiny, a bad review.

Writing in the Standard, critic Veronica Lee said - in a brief review - that it was "a trite affair" and "depressingly anti- American". Burstein believes that he has been libelled.

"He feels it's libellous to say that he glorifies suicide bombers in the opera," explains his spokesman. The fact that the review barely touches on the question leads others to speculate whether he has other motives.

"The show got bad reviews in other papers and he isn't suing them," I'm told. "He's annoyed about the Evening Standard because it could harm his chances of taking his show to the West End."

* Following Pandora's revelation some weeks ago that Tony Blair was wearing this summer's "must have" Vilebrequin swimwear, there are more photographs of his holiday coming to light.

These show his strapping son, Euan, to be sporting a certain amount of "bum fluff" - or the early stages of beard and moustache growth.

How dashing; but how old Labour. Time was when Peter Mandelson, Geoff Hoon, Alistair Darling, and Stephen Byers wore facial hair, but no longer.

A Downing Street spokesman would only say that it is "a work in progress". But what the Republican-run House Rules Committee will make of it, when Euan pitches up for his internship in Washington in January, is yet to be seen.