Thou shalt not … what? - Hugh Grant's arrest for being with a prostitute - Editorial

National Review, July 31, 1995 by William F. Buckley, Jr.

Hugh Grant is having a hard time (``Within hours, the press the world over was trumpeting the news'' of his arrest by the LAPD -- People) and it is not a bit easy to synchronize all the perspectives. We learn (once again, People) that the world is ``shocked'' by what happened. What world? Well, the same world that fawns on Mr. Grant, who is a splendid talent with the most expressive face since Joe E. Brown. How did that world come to idolize him? It happened after his movie Four Weddings and a Funeral. A fun movie with a zany plot, but relevant here is that Hughie (that's what they call him at home) pokes several of the brides and bridesmaids, until he engages, permanently we are given to suppose, his one true love. So that it was as a charming satyr that his fans knew him, and in a sense he is now typed as such because in his next movie he worries a bit because he got his girlfriend pregnant. Oh yes, then there's his real-life girlfriend, Elizabeth Hurley, whom he has not made pregnant, though they've lived together for eight years and she is quoted as saying that she can't imagine reaching the age of forty without having a child.

Yesterday's paper reports that Elizabeth is so mad at Hughie that she is leaving him, but today's paper reassures us that they are patching it up. This against the counsel of some of her mentors, for instance Eileen Ford, the grande dame of the model world, who opines that ``If he were my boyfriend I would go out and get another man.'' That would not be a problem for Elizabeth, and certainly not for Hughie. The whole female world, one gathers, is prepared to throw herself at his feet, though, we have learned, some of these don't come for nothing. A recent market test came in at $80 for a quickie in the car. The ladies love him, and he loves the ladies. His witty quips on the subject are widely quoted, as in, ``I've always had a crush on cheerleaders. Catholic cheerleaders -- my double favorite.'' We come now to that Monday night when he was cruising home after dinner in his white BMW. So he saw the lady and eased over and made his advances. We will know very soon exactly what the verbal exchange was, because The Sun in London has offered $150,000 for an exclusive interview with the lady of the night, Divine Marie Brown. In any event, soon after the negotiations were concluded, the principals were, in the British phrase, having at it in the car, and along came the fuzz, presumably on a peaceful night in Los Angeles, else they'd have been picking up corpses, not Johns. But Hughie was arrested and, if found guilty, is exposed to six months in jail and a fine of $1,000. That is serious stuff, and he has hired the same lawyer who handled the little problem of Michael Jackson. The cash exposure is of course piffle compared to the legal cost of the defense, Los Angeles being the place where the Menendez brothers and O. J. Simpson establish the proper gait of justice. But then what will Hughie plead? He has already apologized, most abjectly and convincingly. Granted, it isn't absolutely obvious what he is apologizing for. Oh sure, he's apologizing for getting caught with a prostitute. Is he also apologizing for patronizing a prostitute? One observer remarked that if only Hugh had been willing to go the asking price, they could have repaired to a hotel room and had at it in absolute safety. That too brings up a point. Why were the LAPD so red-hot to interrupt this free-market exchange, done in the seclusion of a tree-shrouded street? If the idea is to discourage ``that sort of thing,'' wouldn't a more productive approach be to move in on the advertised ladies who will come to your home or hotel? No -- and we are approaching here the truly relevant insight. You must not engage in ``lewd conduct,'' so to speak, in public. In a car. Never mind that at that hour of the morning very few cars cruise by, and the chances are slight that passers-by will actually view the lewd act. No, the police are saying -- at one stage removed from what the Whole World is saying -- ``Don't do it on the street with a hooker, but anywhere else is not only okay, its A-okay.'' For instance in the movies, the more frequent the better. Hughie made his reputation, remember, while doing that kind of thing all over the place in Four Weddings. And the Whole World has zero objection to his having done that kind of thing with Elizabeth over a period of eight years, how often we don't know because The Sun hasn't gotten her to talk. So we summarize:

Fornication is okay at home, in a hotel, in front of a movie camera, but not in a car, certainly not in a car in Los Angeles. For the moral taxonomy of all of this, see the next edition of the catechism.