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Has former Doctor Who actor Christopher Eccleston hopped in the Tardis and gone back in time to rewrite his own history? The actor, who is currently starring in Antigone at the National Theatre, has a biography in the programme notes of the Greek drama that conspicuously fails to mention the show that brought him to wide public attention.

While listing his other theatrical and televisual achievements, Doctor Who, in which he starred for one series in 2005, is notably omitted. The National Theatre says it is not responsible.

“He looks through his biography and chooses what he wants in or out,” says a spokesman. Given that Eccleston would be hired in part for his profile, wasn’t the National surprised at the omission? “Sorry, I’m just answering that question,” replied the spokesman.

Eccleston, who has since acted in the supernatural drama series Heroes and noir thriller The Shadow Line, left Doctor Who abruptly after just one season. Last year he said this was because of internal wranglings. “I could not get along with the senior people,” he said at an acting masterclass in Haymarket. “I left because of politics. I did not see eye to eye with them. I didn’t agree with the way things were being run. I didn’t like the culture that had grown up around the series. So I left, I felt, over a principle.”

Nor will Eccleston be appearing in the 2013 episode being put together to mark the 50th anniversary of the show, to which surviving former Doctors including David Tennant have been invited to participate.

Neil’s not shy about his old boss

What is all this omertà? On Sunday, the New York Times ran an article on Wendi Deng, which said that she and her husband Rupert Murdoch “have grown to live largely separate lives”. Remarkably, this hasn’t been leapt upon by those revelling in anti-Murdoch schadenfreude.

One of the few to mention it is Andrew Neil, a former Sunday Times editor, who asked on Twitter: “Has Rupert Murdoch more to worry about than just hacking?” and linked to the New York Times article.

Neil has so far not troubled himself with having a wife.

*There was some lively banter on the Today programme this morning between presenter Evan Davis and BBC football correspondent Jonathan Legard about Radio Five Live’s coverage of England’s Euro 2012 game against Ukraine tonight. “But you have not mentioned that ITV is showing the game,” said Davis. “I’m sure people would rather see it on television.” Legard hit back. “Maybe I should mention Daybreak. I’m sure people would rather watch that than listen to Today.” Ouch.

Tatty Becks is in royal company

Country Life has named David Beckham as one of its five gentlemen of 2012. The magazine, which compiled the list to promote its new book, Gentlemanly Pursuits, has picked the former England football captain for his good manners. Also on the list are actor Colin Firth for self-deprecation, the Duke of Edinburgh for a stiff upper lip, Nelson Mandela for quiet dignity and Boris Johnson for quiet apologies.Even though Beckham now looks like an advertisement for a tattoo parlour, Country Life says this doesn’t disqualify him from gentleman status. “Tattoos were all the rage among gentlemen, including royalty, so Beckham’s passion is bang on trend,” says the mag. “Although the Royal Enclosure at Ascot may take a different view.”

Baddiel is now David who?

David Baddiel is a sensitive soul. The side-effects of being well-known are so distressing that he has decided to retreat from fame, he told a 5 x 15 audience at the Tabernacle last night. Routinely savaged by columnist Julie Burchill, and his football anthem Three Lions torn to shreds by Q magazine — which hoped time would “erase the memory of David Baddiel singing, just as history has erased the memory of corpse robbers during the Blitz” — Baddiel is now content to be “not as famous as I was”.

“People say horrible things about you, and that is traumatic,” said the comedy writer, who was beaten in a 2006 magazine poll of “sexiest Jews” by Sir Alan Sugar. “People assume that fame has given you up but becoming less famous was a decision I made — though no one believes me.”

Boris’s London is pure poetry

Dame Tessa Jowell was a guest at the Southbank Centre to the launch of its summer culture bash, Festival of the World. Hosted by Jude Kelly, Jowell was congratulated by all and sundry for her Queen’s birthday honour. Other guests included musician Julian Lloyd Webber and Simon Armitage, who is in charge of bringing poets from 200 countries to the Southbank next week. “We’re calling it a Poetry Parnassus,” he says. “We’re getting a helicopter with 100,000 poems written on paper to be dropped next week on Boris. To be more precise, on land Boris has beside the Thames, just near the Thames Big Wheel.”

*Armando Iannucci was keen to show there was no love lost between him and Alastair Campbell — his muse for Malcolm Tucker in The Thick of It — at a preview of his new HBO comedy series Veep in the House of Commons yesterday. Asked about their recent Twitter spat over Iannucci’s acceptance of an OBE in the honours list, in which Campbell cried hypocrisy, Iannucci said: “I woke up and wrote two tweets and he’s still going on about it on TV. Alastair has a half life of 300 years. My mum called me on Sunday worried about it.”

Gettys grow to love their glass pavilion

The spectacular steel and glass Garsington Opera at Wormsley pavilion, built last year at the Getty family estate in Buckinghamshire, has found a lasting home.

Originally it was planned that the building, designed by Robin Snell and set in a deer park next to the late Sir John Paul Getty’s cricket ground, would be dismantled and reconstructed each season.

“It’s here to stay,” said general director Anthony Whitworth-Jones after last night’s opening performance of Offenbach’s La Perichole, starring Naomi O’Connell, pictured, in the title role. It’s thought the Gettys were not at first keen on the pavilion but now seem to like it as much as their famous thatched cricket pavilion.

*Historian Niall Ferguson clearly subscribes to the Dr David Starkey school of modesty. Giving the first Reith lecture, broadcast on Radio 4 this morning, Ferguson paid tribute to Lord Reith, whom he called “a Scot greater than me”. Note no mention of “much” or “very much” .

Take heart from Hart’s legacy

Josephine Hart is gone but her poetry tradition lives on. Last night the British Library hosted a reprise of her Poetry Hour to mark the anniversary of her death, with readings from actors Joanna David, Felicity Kendal and Mark Strong. Author Polly Samson and literary agency boss Caroline Michel were among those in the audience. The night ended with an award for Best Performance of a Poem by an Actor, given to Edwin Thomas, a finalist at Guildhall School of Music and Drama. He hobbled on to the stage with a stick, having had keyhole surgery on his leg just hours earlier.