Weekly Trivia File

• Sacha Baron Cohen suffered serious burns after using strong chemicals to bleach his body hair. In his attempt to look ‘all-over hairless’ for his new Bruno film, he suffered an allergic reaction to the bleach and broke out in a painful rash, which needed hospital treatment. A source said: ‘Shortly after having the procedure done he felt a burning sensation and it grew steadily worse. He had a bad allergic reaction to hydrogen peroxide. It was so severe around a certain part of his anatomy that he couldn't sit down for three days.’

• Entomologists have named a newly discovered species of Venezuelan diving beetle after US comedian Stephen Colbert, giving it the Latin name Agaporomorphus colberti

• Some of Frank Skinner's hair was auctioned off for £1,000 on Absolute Radio. 'I can't believe you bought my hair,' said Skinner in a letter to the successful bidder 'It would be a fun time-killer to separate the grey from the brown - a bit like a jigsaw puzzle.'

• Spotted at the launch of Arthur Smith’s memoris, My Name Is Daphne Fairfax, at Jongleurs Battersea last night: Nigella Lawson deep in conversation with Angus Deayton.

• Cute. A five-year-old doing stand-up at school:
  

• Food-loving Dom Deluise always had a battle with his weight, at one point topping 23 stone. He said he got his love of food from his mother: 'She was always ready to cook at a moment's notice,' he said. 'She carried around two meatballs in the bun in her hair.'

• How's this for hobnobbing with rap royalty? Russell Brand sat next to P. Diddy at the junior welterweight title boxing clash between Ricky Hatton and Manny Pacquiao in Las Vegas at the weekend. The pair were later joined by Jay Z. Brand, of course, Twittered from the fight, saying: 'Ok. Sat next to @iamdiddy at the Hatton fight. It's an undercard bout and one of the boxers and Diddy just winked at each other. He's down.' And later: 'I don't think I'll attend boxing again- it makes me feel a bit sad. Endless love to dear Ricky, he's a beautiful bloke.'

• Meanwhile, Russell Brand is the man the worst celebrity hair, according to the latest pointless survey, with BBC business editor Robert Peston being voted the best.

• BBC creative director Alan Yentob pops up in the first episode of the new series Ideal, which airs on Monday. He plays himself making a documentary about the band Silicon Valets – occasional visitors to Moz’s flat – for his documentary strand Imagine, and winds up handcuffed to Johnny Vegas’s small-time drug dealer. An insider on the show said: ‘He's very funny.’

• Armando Iannucci managed to trick his way into the US State Department to research In The Loop with little more than a cack-handedly faked BBC pass. He said: ‘I had a terrible, amateur BBC identity pass, with basically my face printed off Google and my name under it. A child could have produced it in twenty seconds. Receiving a tip-off from a journalist I wandered up to the front reception of the State Dept and said, “BBC. I'm here for the 12.30.: They showed me in. I spend an hour wandering round the building with my camera taking photos for our designer. Part of me thought it was fun; another part thought it was probably international espionage.’

• Isn't Wikipedia great? How else would we know that Stephen K Amos's favourite soft drink is 7-Up.

SOURCES: The Sun, Science Daily, Daily Express, Chortle, YouTube, Washington Post, Daily Mail/Twitter, The Sun, Chortle, Huffington Post, Wikipedia

Published: 8 May 2009