No collision of dates in Marr’s big bang diary

We knew Andrew Marr was influential, but does the great man really have the power to delay the end of the world? According to our mole in a lab coat, the big switch-on of the Large Hadron Collider, the most ambitious and expensive civilian science experiment in history, was postponed for a week because Marr was still on his holiday.

He will play a starring role, guiding listeners through the Radio 4 Big Bang Day, from the CERN control room, during the particle mash-up. The dates initially proposed by the project’s guardians, however, apparently clashed with the presenter’s August sojourn in Devon. So the collider will sit idle until September 10, allowing Marr to nip in before the political conference season. A BBC spokesman says: “The scientists chose the launch date. It is fortuitous that it coincides with Andrew’s return from holiday.”

The BBC did have a Plan B. The science unit fired off an e-mail to Madonna, after hearing that she had an interest in particle physics. As yet, the Material Girl has still to reply.

John Cleese plans to liven up the notorious goldfish-eating scene in the stage musical version of A Fish Called Wanda . “A fish on stage – it’s far too small. Otto can eat a mouse, a rat, a rabbit and even bite the head off a kitten,” he told the ITV Loose Women show. “People are going to love it.” Not the RSPCA, though, which called Cleese’s improvements “highly irresponsible”. Spoilsports.

Lembit Öpik hopes to get arrested on Tuesday, to the relief of many. The now Cheeky-less MP is staging a Westminster protest designed to legalise the usage of low-carbon Segway personal transporters on British streets. Öpik is “prepared to break the law” to save the planet. We’re not sure we trust him with a bicycle, let alone an “electrically powered self-balancing vehicle”.

Tempers boiled over on the usually sanguine ITV1 Alan Titchmarsh Show , when the gardener criticised his guest, Carol Thatcher, for revealing all about her mother’s fight against dementia in her book, A Swim-on Part in the Goldfish Bowl . “Why did you have to go into so much detail?” asked Titchmarsh, who is a friend of Baroness Thatcher.

Ms Thatcher headed for the exit during an advertisement break. “I didn’t storm out,” she says. “It was a very aggressive line of questioning and I felt unable to get across my point that the book had to be honest. I should have brought my handbag.” The Fly morphs into an opera

The Face - David Cronenberg

The Canadian director David Cronenberg’s 1986 film The Fly has undergone a metamorphosis to join the likes of Tristan und Isolde, Tosca and Carmen in the opera hall of fame.

The Fly: The Opera, retells the story of a love triangle between a journalist, Veronica, her love-struck editor, and Seth Brundle, a scientist who is gradually turning into a giant fly after a botched teleportation attempt (and let’s face it, who hasn’t been there?)

Cronenberg, who is known as the King of Venereal Horror, said that the opera, which he directs, breaks new ground. “To redo the film would be boring,” he says. “[The opera] is its own creature.”

The show will premiere in LA this Sunday and the libretto-warbling pest may pay a visit to Cronenberg’s home town of Toronto before winging its way across the Pond. Be afraid. Be very afraid.

Postscript

A silver lining for the canoe couple John and Anne Darwin – the convicted fraudsters have been nominated for the Loaded magazine comedy awards in the Joker category. The “sorry we can’t be with you” video message should be a highlight. The triple Olympic gold medallist Chris Hoy is inseparable from his bullion. “ I just wear them in bed,” he told Smooth Radio. Apparently, “Sara [his girlfriend] loves it”.

— The cult comedy writer/director Seth Rogan, (Superbad and Knocked Up) discloses the key to his success. “I exclusively make movies that will damage my career,” he says. The actress Susan Sarandon says she would turn down the role of Hillary Clinton if it were offered to her. “She has turned into such a blamer and whiner,” she says. “I don’t respect her enough to want to play her.”

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