Obama: the brother who lives in a shack

This could have been Barack. The youngest brother of the coolest politician in the world is posing outside his shack in a Nairobi slum. He has taken the front page of a local newspaper and pinned a photo of the rock star senator and presidential hopeful to his wall. At 26, George Hus-sein Obama is 21 years younger than his sibling, but an interview with Italian Vanity Fair contrasts their journeys through life as American dream versus African nightmare. The men share a father but have met only twice. In his autobiography Barack Obama described meeting a young George near their family home in Kogelo: he was a “beautiful boy with a rounded head”. The senator reported that George also had cautious eyes.

The scars on his face and ears are from defending himself. “I’m good with my fists,” George confirms. Life in Huruma, a shanty town on the outskirts of Nairobi, can be tough. In the violence that engulfed Kenya during the January elections George witnessed rioting, while six local people were hacked to death. He likes to keep his identity a secret. If anyone says anything about his surname: “I say we are not related. I am ashamed.”

So far his life has been little to boast about. After becoming estranged from his mother he lived rough on the streets for 10 years. But now, partly as a result of his brother’s campaign, he is trying to go straight, drinking less beer and buying cheap cigarettes only one at a time. For several months he has been studying at the local technical school to be a mechanic.

Until now George has lived an anonymous life. Clothes hang from the ceiling of his hut, a single bare bulb is the only illumination, while soft toys and a calendar of exotic beaches offer a few personal touches. “I live like a recluse, no one knows I exist,” he said.

That seems certain to change, although George insists that he will not be pestering his brother. The two are not close. George says that a brief introduction two years ago was “like meeting a stranger”. They talked for a few minutes but George claimed he did not receive an invitation to America and did not ask for one.

Despite this George says he takes inspiration from his brother’s achievements: “There was a long time when I was just taking a break, trying to find myself. Now I am focused on my future and it’s because of hearing what Barack is doing.”

Sinatra and Dylan were the big hits

He may have been 80, but Frank Sinatra left Kate Moss light-headed when he cornered her backstage at a concert, lunged in for a kiss on the lips and called her “little lady”. Or maybe it was just the effects of smoking his filterless cigarette. Talking to Interview magazine Moss agreed that she had met “almost everyone” but Sinatra and Bob Dylan were high points.

Bizarrely, the first thing the supermodel says she notices about a woman is her breasts: “I’m a tit man,” she confessed. Moss put down her own dour disposition on photo shoots to poor teeth. A half-filled root canal dropped out before a fashion show in New York. “Well, you wouldn’t smile in a Calvin Klein show anyway,” the interviewer said soothingly. “Exactly,” came the crisp reply.

Acting has lost some of its magic

Less the boyish wizard, more the tortured artiste. Daniel Radcliffe shared his doubts and aspirations with American Vogue in a meeting that found him brooding about how he is perceived.

He said he wished he could write poetry in the classical tradition. “Acting has confines, poetry has none,” he claimed.

The Harry Potter star also admitted that he shared the sadness, anger and loneliness of his character Alan Strang in the stage play Equus, in which he appeared naked with a horse.

“I think everyone has more in common with Alan than they would like to admit,” Radcliffe said, “although I’ve never put out a bunch of horses’ eyes of course.”

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