Lady of the manners

Dear Hettie,

When Gerard Butler and Patrick Dempsey signed up to model for L'Oreal, it was all 'oh yes, well of course - they're totally worth it' but when I decide to give it a go, noone takes me seriously. What's wrong with a slightly dishevelled, rugged sort of chap moisturising daily? I am a Hollywood star, after all - my face is my fortune... Oh crumbs, has living in La-La-Land turned me soft? Am I selling out?
Yours, Hugh Laurie*

And they said the celebrity advertisement was dead. Fools! There hasn't been a signing this canny since Smash found a spaceshipful of genuine aliens to advertise its powdered mashed potato. As Dr House you magically transformed overnight from a bumbling upper crust clown into a bonafide A-list Hollywood heartthrob hottie; you even managed to make the name Gregory seem sexy. If you can do that, then persuading millions of men to take blackhead control seriously will be a walk in the park.

Frankly, who cares if you've sold out? Not me. The way I see it, having notched up 115 and a half hours of viewing pleasure as the 21st century's answer to Mr Darcy, you've earned as many multi-million dollar modelling contracts as your schedule will allow - and as thousands of blogs and online chatrooms attest, I'm not alone. At this point, so long as they don't make you shave, brush your hair or have your teeth capped, you can stand around in paper pants extolling the virtues of all-over waxing and we'll all be right behind you.

As long as they don't make you shave or have your teeth capped, we'll be right behind you

*Hugh Laurie's quandary as imagined by ES