Bez goes into the big house

Bez has been sent to prison after refusing to accept a community service sentence. He'd tried to throttle his partner because... well, there isn't any justification, but he thought she'd taken money from him.

Reacting to his original sentence - which also included an order to pay £450 costs - he said: "I'm not doing it.

"Bothered. I'm going to appeal and take this to a real court."

After being told he would go to jail instead, he shouted "Victory is in my grasp" as he was handcuffed and led away.

He reacted to a sentence by saying "bothered"? Although he isn't a fifteen year-old girl living in 2005? No wonder he was thrown into jail.

Still, on the plus side for Bez, it does give him a watertight excuse for not being part of Ultimate Big Brother.

Striking long, long after the iron has cooled

Chanelle Hayes. Reach back into your mind, and you might remember her from last year's Big Brother. Now, she's capitalising on that fame (alright, capitalising on that slight flicker of recognition) by launching a career as a pop singer. Or, rather, launching a reality show about her launching a career as a pop singer. She wants us to know that, despite having made money as a Victoria Beckham lookalike, and following Victoria Beckham about, and copying Victoria Beckham's hairstyle, that there's more to her than a Posh wannabe:

"I know that people think I'm talentless, but I've played the violin since I was seven and then I did music at A Level. I want to have a go at it and show people that I'm not just a miserable cow walking around with a pout on my face."

Dismissing claims that she is attempting to copy her idol's music style, she said: "Yeah, we wear similar clothes because I choose to but she sings one way and I sing another. I don't sound like her when I speak and I'm not trying to sound like her when I sing."

Aha. It's similar clothes, as in "I came out and would you believe it, to my surprise Victoria Beckham was wearing the very same dress yesterday".

Still, at least she's not copying Beckham's music - she's not that stupid.

"People love to hate, and if people don't like it - fair enough. I've got a CD with my name on it that I can give to my mum and she'll be dead proud."

Yes. You have a CD with your name on. Money can't buy that. Well, actually, it can, but you know what we mean.

There's more, much more to Chanelle:

"I just want to show that I can pose on the cover of a magazine or newspaper but I can also do academic things as well."

Mmm. Good luck with winning the Regis Chair Of Being On A VH1 Programme At Oxford, Chanelle.

When worlds collide: Ziggy and Chanelle

When we first heard that Ziggy and Chanelle are limbering up for a run at Eurovision, we thought the idea was for them to do it together. We could just about see that - a marvellous, campy, sniping-at-each-other, Anything You Could Briefly Do I Can Do Better type affair. Obviously, since in the UK they can barely manage a downpage in the middle of New! magazine, the whole thing would be spectacularly pointless beyond Dover, but at least it would have some coherence.

But it turns out they're planning two separate tries. Chanelle has, at least, convinced her mother:

"Chanelle’s very good at music. She’s an A* student and plays the violin at Grade Seven. She is always singing at home."

Even that, actually, sounds more convincing than Ziggy's pedigree:

He sang with the group Northern Line between 1998-2000 and had three top 40 hits.

... which nobody alive can remember.

[Once again, thanks to Michael M]

Another heartbreaking story of celebrity loss

The uncoupling of Chantelle and Preston is proving tricksy, as Preston is now demanding his share of the kiss-and-tell cash:

A source close to her said: "Preston claims that without him and their marriage she wouldn't have had anything to talk about it.

"But she thinks that's ridiculous and he is being completely unreasonable. She can't believe how bitter he is being and is furious. Their marriage was miserable - now the divorce is going to be just as bad."

We reckon this story in the People will be worth another fifty quid to Preston's claims, then.

Hang on, though, Chantelle has found something to talk about that's nothing to do with Preston. Her breasts:

Before the op Celebrity Big Brother winner Chantelle, a natural 32B, said: "I'd love to be a cup...

That's what the People says - Chantelle wants to be a cup. Rather than a mug, we suppose. Still, at least her breasts give her something to talk about other than Pre... oh

"... Preston didn't want me to get them done. He said that fake boobs were grotesque but now I can do what I want."

Apparently, even her breasts are controlled by her relationship with Preston.

Still, she does have a life beyond him:

After splitting with Preston, whose biggest hit was Boys Will Be Boys, Chantelle dated Chris Neal who dumped Big Bruv madam Nikki Grahame for her.

But Chris, 26, a pal of Jade Goody's ex Jack Tweed, is now out of the picture.

Does everybody she know have some sort of Big Brother connection? Have these people actually been put on an island away from everyone else?

Showbiz Zoe: the biggest of scoops

This could be the smallest lead story every to run in a proper newspaper column, from today's Sunday Mirror Showbiz Zoe column:

I'm worried about Jennifer Ellison, who lost it with Big Brother's Charley Uchea after she caught her chatting to her ex Tony Richardson in Embassy.

Now, fair dos to Zoe for not just making something interesting up, but... Jennifer Ellison and reality TV's Brian Blessed? As your big story? Couldn't they have found a CarpetRite advert or something to fill the space?

That sound is the rapid evaporation of goodwill towards the BB twins

Just because something is inevitable doesn't make it any better when it happens. So it is, with little surprise, we discover that Samanda, the Big Brother borg-goes-to-Tammy-Girl twins unit aren't very good at singing. Not that it's stopped them covering Barbie Girl.

Who's Ken, you might be wondering?

Samantha said: “We didn’t need a Ken, we just got a voiceover and left men out of it.”

Amanda added: “We could have had Brian as our Ken but how tacky would that have been?”

Yes, you wouldn't want an all-pink cover version of a novelty single by people off a reality show to get tacky, would you?

From Big Brother to popstars?

According to this morning's Sun, Sam and Amanda - the Big Brother twins - are "set to become the next Cheeky Girls".

Really? Or is this just a made-up story based on them having sung for yesterday's task?

The blonde twins, 19, are being lined up for a music deal targeted at the teen market, according to BB insiders.

A source said: “They are cute and fun — and appeal to teens. They could do a lot better than the Cheeky Girls.”

The twins sang dressed as glamour girl Jordan in a BB task at the weekend. Brian wigged up to play Jordan’s hubby Peter Andre.

Ah. So it's just a made-up story, then. The key detail, of course, is that during the singing yesterday, one sang very poorly, and the other was much worse. Even The Cheeky Girls were able to carry the odd note.

B list squared

Professional half-wit Lee Ryan has, apparently, managed to have half a date with Chanelle who walked out during Big Brother. Most humiliatingly for Lee, the Sunday Mirror reports this as if 'failed game show contestant' was pulling out of his league.

Lookalike won't like a look at lookalike

The Sun gets quite excited this morning that Chanelle, the Victoria Beckham worshipping clone off of Big Brother, flew to LA to, erm, not get to meet Beckham:

WAG wannabe Chanelle ditched a chance to go back into the Big Brother house and jetted to LA this week in a bid to meet her idol.

Chanelle even tried to make a splash by turning up at LAX Airport in identical clothes to those worn by Victoria when she arrived early last month.

The ex-housemate was greeted by a few photographers — a far cry from the hundreds that turned up for Posh and hubby David’s arrival.

Yes, a newspaper did think that 'paparazzi don't turn out for a lookalike's arrival' was some sort of snub worthy of coverage.

If the paper's interested, there was a David Beckham lookalike round our way who failed to get picked for the England team. Hold the front page, everyone.

Oh, no Big Bruvver...

Thus far, attempts by Big Brother's performing bears to spin a musical career out of their time in the house: Craig from series one released an album before he found a new career wearing dungarees on higher-numbered satellite channels; the rumoured reverse-engineering of an actual pop star out of fake pop star Chantelle never took.

Now, though, Kate Lawler is trying her luck with a single. Although, strictly speaking, she's remixing rather than actually making her own record - It's Love (Trippin'), to be precise.

Good luck competing with The Twins' cover of We Are The Cheeky Girls, Kate.

The reality TV gene pool

At last, 18th century farming villages can point to somewhere and say "you think we're incestuous". Reality TV is such a small pool, the News of the World is reporting this morning that Kerry 'I'm A Celebrity' Katona "romped" (their word) with Ziggy off Big Brother. What brought them together? Why, largely-forgotten ITV reality show Elimidate, of course.

Kerry really has had a tragic life, hasn't she?

The trials of those who would be famous

Stupid comedy hats off to the Guardian's Organ Grinder blog for describing latest Big Brother inmate Seany as [looking like] Goldie Lookin' Chain employed Mick Hucknall.

Meanwhile, Sky News is suggesting that Seany's support for Michael Jackson during his child abuse trial was a "skeleton in his closet", although seeing as he was talking about it - with a sense of pride - in his pre-entry video, it's not exactly much of a skeleton, nor, indeed, deeply inside a closet.

Still, they have managed to track down an interview with the man after the doves of innocence were released:

"I am so relieved because Michael Jackson was persecuted for crimes he didn't commit.

"He has touched everyone through his entertainment and has given every person a happy memory. He's a martyr - but the thing to remember is he's still alive."

Where did Sky get the quote from? Erm... a BBC interview. So, that's coverage of a Channel 4 programme relying on reportage from the BBC. Rupert must be delighted at his investments working so well for him.

Prince and the peepshow

We're filing the big splash in The Sun today that "Prince is going to play a surprise gig in the Big Brother house in our big box of "oh, really, and why would he want to do that?

A source said: “Prince is a huge fan of Big Brother. He has tuned in to every series of the show so far and loves the concept.

“His management are in discussions with producers Endemol to arrange a gig.

“Prince is hoping it will be an unforgettable moment that goes down in BB history.”

Oh, really? Prince has "tuned in to every series so far", has he? I know we live in an age of wonders and instant global communications, but who actually believes that Prince has spent the last seven summers trying to get a signal for Channel 4 in Minneapolis, making transatlantic phone calls to Get Grace Out?

If these negotiations are even happening, it's probably got less to do with Prince "loving the concept" of Big Brother and more to do with there not being a Top of the Pops or Wogan to promote new albums on to a mainstream audience any more. And that's a big if in the first place.

"Some people might recognise me..."

Oh, this is hilarious - Ziggy, the man they're throwing into the Big Brother house, used to be in Northern Lights. And he actually thinks there might be people watching going "oh, of course..."

We wonder if they're going to bring in all of Two Thirds at some point?

Of course, this could actually be a very cunning play on what they did on the last Celebrity Big Brother but one, where Chantelle was pretending to a person from a band nobody had ever heard from as well.