Morgan and Grant have been engaged in a war of words over Rupert Murdoch. John Cleese has weighed in on a row between Piers Morgan and Hugh Grant over Rupert Murdoch, with the Fawlty Towers star calling Morgan “lazy” and “sloppy”. Heretic star Grant, 64, and broadcaster Morgan, 59, have been engaged in a spat on X/Twitter this week after the government ruled out a reopening of the Leveson Inquiry, which Grant has been leading calls for.
![[Grant and Morgan have been engaged in a war of words]](https://static.independent.co.uk/2025/01/24/10/Hugh-Grant-Piers-Morgan.jpg)
Defence secretary John Healey insisted that there will be no new inquiry or restrictions into the activities of the media in the UK despite The Sun paying damages to Prince Harry this week. In response to the government’s decision, Grant had told Radio 4’s Today: “I have some sympathy, when I’m in a generous mood, for politicians terrified of the Murdochs.”.
Murdoch owns News Group Newspapers (NGN), owner of The Sun and the now-defunct News of the World. Morgan then took to X to call Grant a “hypocrite”, claiming the actor had taken “many millions of pounds” from Murdoch to make films for him. Grant fired back 15 minutes later: “Bulls***. The last time I worked for a Murdoch owned company was in 1994. Which was long before I knew anything about his papers’ methods.
“Since then I have turned down every single job offer emanating from a Murdoch owned company.”. Hours later, Morgan replied: “UPDATE: Your movie Florence Foster Jenkins was distributed by Murdoch-owned (at the time) 20th Century Fox in the UK. #HypocriteANDliar.”.
