The EU has never been adverse to shamelessly claiming the credit for other people’s hard work (remember *that* Olympics medal table) and this year’s Oscars have been no exception. This morning the European Commission put out a brazen statement congratulating itself for Olivia Colman’s Best Actress win at the Oscars. Not exactly the sort of bare-faced cheek viewers of The Favourite may have been hoping for…

The EU’s rationale for muscling in on Colman’s success was that The Favourite had received €50,000 of ‘EU funding’ for its development. The total budget for the film was $15 million, the EU’s ‘contribution’ was less than 0.4%…