U.S. threat to kill off BBC's Sherlock: Hungarian-born socialite threatens legal action claiming she owns Arthur Conan Doyle character

Andrea Plunket claims she owns the character Sherlock Holmes, played on the BBC by Benedict Cumberbatch

Before Benedict Cumberbatch next dons his Sherlock Holmes deerstalker, the BBC may be obliged to start negotiating with an elderly Hungarian-born socialite.

Andrea Plunket claims that not only does she own the characters created by Arthur Conan Doyle but also plans to start legal proceedings to prevent the Corporation making any more episodes of its successful Sherlock franchise.

Cumberbatch and fellow actor Martin Freeman, who plays Dr Watson, are scheduled to film a further series next year.

But Mrs Plunket is throwing down a legal gauntlet to the BBC.

She insists she retains the copyright to the last ten stories from the Conan Doyle oeuvre in the U.S. More crucially, she claims to have registered as her trademark all the leading characters in the Sherlock Holmes stories and accuses the BBC of breaching her trademark.

‘No one has asked permission to use my trademarks and I am confident that if and when I go to court I will be able to prevent the BBC making any more Sherlocks,’ she tells me from her home in New York. ‘That is my wish.’

Plunket, 73, the former mistress of Claus von Bulow, who was twice tried with the attempted murder of his heiress wife Sunny, was previously married to Sheldon Reynolds, the Hollywood producer for whom she purchased the U.S. copyright to Sherlock Holmes stories.

After they divorced in 1990, she fought a legal battle to maintain ownership of the copyrights.



Cumberbatch and fellow actor Martin Freeman, who plays Dr Watson, are scheduled to film a further series next year but Mrs Plunket is throwing down a legal gauntlet to the BBC

The BBC’s Sherlock, a contemporary update of the Victorian tales, has sold in 180 territories, including the U.S. Mrs Plunket, who runs an upmarket inn in New York state, has reached agreement with Warner Brothers, which makes the Sherlock Holmes films directed by Guy Ritchie and starring Robert Downey Jnr and Jude Law.

‘I love Guy Ritchie,’ Mrs Plunket tells me. ‘But I am not enamoured of the BBC. No one has made any approach to me and they have no right to use my trademarks.

‘In the absence of negotiation, I will be forced to go to court to prevent any more Sherlocks being made or appearing in the U.S.’

A BBC source said last night that there were no copyright problems with Sherlock in Britain, adding: ‘Mrs Plunket’s contentions will be looked at.’

According to friends animal rights activist Tracy Worcester and her husband are rarely seen together

PARTY PIECES: The cocktail party launch for Nicky Haslam’s range at Oka, South Kensington — the homeware shop that is owned by Samantha Cameron’s mother, Viscountess Astor.

Arriving sans wedding ring, the Marchioness of Worcester had tongues wagging.

According to friends, animal welfare activist Tracy Worcester and her husband of 26 years, Bunter — heir to the Duke of Beaufort — are rarely seen out together.

PROFUMO SCANDAL: There was a fortuitous encounter at the do between Lord LloydWebber, who is writing a musical on the Profumo Affair, and Viscount Astor, who remembers the events of 1963 — he was then a schoolboy — which took place at his home Cliveden vividly.

‘Who’s playing me?’ he demanded.

A startled Lloyd Webber admitted he was not part of his script. ‘I used to make up the numbers at dinner parties,’ says Astor.

TENTS MOMENT: When cost-conscious Neil and Christine Hamilton decided to buy marquees instead of hiring them for a summer party for Ukip, it seemed a good idea.

But a month on from the bash at their Wiltshire manor house, they’ve only just taken them down.

‘It’s been hell,’ says Christine.

‘We took the last one down yesterday after struggling with it for hours. Never again. Now Neil’s got a bad back from an old accident when he fell down the stairs.’

Adds battleaxe Christine: ‘Nothing to do with me.’

Victoria Grant gets inspiration from her father's City livery company

Her outrageously sexy hats are worn by some of the world’s most beautiful women, but Victoria Grant tells me she gets inspiration from an unlikely source — her father’s City livery company.



‘I’ve done really eccentric hats for everyone from Katy Perry to Cara Delevingne, Kate Moss and Anna Friel, but they probably don’t realise I get my ideas from traditional livery costumes,’ Victoria tells me at a Coco de Mer party in Covent Garden.



Victoria’s father, Michael Grant, is Master of the Worshipful Company of Information Technologists, which got its Royal Charter from Prince Edward in 2010.

‘My dad’s emerald green and royal blue robes are very flamboyant, flowing with velvet tassels and gold chains, which give me lots of ideas.



‘Plus, I also use real padlocks like in some City insignia in some of my erotic designs.’

Steady!

The house where Dame Margot Fonteyn ignited her romance with Russian dancer Rudolf Nureyev is up for sale for £25 million. Fonteyn lived in the South Kensington home in the Fifties and Sixties with husband Dr Roberto Arias, Panama’s ambassador to the UK.



Although £25 million is beyond the reach of most, it comes with ambitious plans for a mega-cellar, which estate agents say will turn it into a ‘trophy house’ worth more than £45 million.



The ballerina, who died in 1991 aged 71, purchased the house after her husband’s appointment in 1955 and it was where she took in Nureyev after he defected from the Soviet Union in 1961.



The basement plans include a pool, bar, wine cellar and staff accommodation. Perfect for the Chelski set...

Economist Noreena Hertz has been plugging her new book this week, giving an interview to George Alagiah on the BBC World news channel and also having a ten-minute chat with Dame Jenni Murray on Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour.



Given that the tome is about how to cope with the vast increase in information in the modern world, it was somewhat ironic that the BBC failed to inform viewers and listeners that Professor Hertz is also known as Mrs Danny Cohen, wife of the Corporation’s £327,800-a-year director of television, who is tipped as a future director-general.

Prince William’s offer to host a football match at Buckingham Palace between the Civil Service FC and arch rivals Polytechnic FC has focused attention on these towering Corinthians of the amateur game. Sadly not all of it welcome, I learn.



Thieves have stolen the metal seats from Civil Service’s Chiswick ground, leaving fans with no shelter from the elements.



One disgruntled member of the squad tells me: ‘It’s going to be wonderful to play at Buckingham Palace in front of Prince William and hopefully other members of the Royal Family next month, but what we’d love is a sponsor to help us replace the stolen seats.’

P.S The champagne will be flowing to celebrate the launch of the Blenheim Palace literary festival tonight.



But when guests, including the Duke of Gloucester, National Trust chairman Sir Simon Jenkins, writer Robert Harris, and hosts the Duke and Duchess of Marlborough, raise their flutes, it will not contain one of the more famous marques.

