Catwoman still rules

Julie Newmar – the original Catwoman and an enduring cult pin-up – has penned a piece for us this week about lasting beauty and how women can retain a sense of self. Age does not wither – she’s 80 and this sizzles.

More great writing to wander into this week…

Our Letter To My Younger Self is with Tony Parsons. He is surprisingly tender about love, loss of parents and how he wants to cling onto the moment as his daughter grows up and away.

John Bird considers Piketty and Capital, the huge expense of keeping the poor poor and the necessity of comedy. John is back on the road with his stand up tour at the Leicester Square Theatre on Wednesday.

Delighted to have Dawn O’Porter contributing this week. She considers the value – or lack of value – in Twitter opprobrium, especially in the teeth of the schoolgirl kidnap in Nigeria.

I have no doubt you’re familiar with Passenger. His track, Let Her Go, has been watched over 250 MILLION times on YouTube. He has spent the last week touring Britain playing pop-up busking shows as fund and awareness raisers for The Big Issue. He’s a genuinely great chap. Thousands of fans turned out, there was lots of action on social media, an exclusive diary here on bigissue.com and there’s a round-up in the magazine. Hats off too to our boy Andrew Burns who has overseen the entire to-do.

Hollywood heavyweight Ron Howard tells Steven Mackenzie about his new project with Jay-Z, a forthcoming one with Moby Dick and about the difficulties that even he has getting funding for movies.

Our featured vendor telling their story in My Pitch is Jim Hannah, working in Norwich. He’s had a time of it, is still sleeping rough but is finding a way through with the support of a growing band of regular customers.

Finally, Eamonn Forde talks to Mark Ellen about Live Aid and being in Tony Blair’s band; there is a competition for over £3,000 worth of Gibson guitar gear; impress your kids with knowledge of Minecraft after reading our interview with a chap who makes his living making videos about the game; and Sam Delaney returns with another column that is loosely about TV, but is a must-read.

And don’t forget – Vote early, vote often at the PPA Awards. Tell your friends…