In a scene at the start of In The Loop, the film adaptation of Armando Iannucci's political satire The Thick Of It, a politician and his aide travelling in a ministerial limo take simultaneous calls from satanic spin-doctor Malcom Tucker (Peter Capaldi).
As their smartphones chirrup and the same caller name comes up, they turn to each other and ask: "How does he do that?"
Right now I'm wondering the same thing about Iannucci himself: the Glasgow-born writer seems to be tweeting from the back of a London taxi at the same time as he's talking to me on his phone. Adding to the real-time strangeness of the moment is the fact my computer is also showing tweets from Alastair Campbell, widely viewed as the model for the potty-mouthed Tucker. The former spin-doctor is moaning about having to write his own jokes for the edition of Have I Got News For You? he has just finished recording.
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