Lewis beard provokes licence fee boycott

The BBC came under fire this afternoon as furious licence fee-payers saw the beard Damian Lewis is to wear as Henry VIII in Wolf Hall and said as one: "Not in my name."

"As gingers go, he's probably the best of the lot," admitted viewer Thackeray Fatch. "I liked that thing where he played the man in the war who was good at the war and Dexter Fletcher shouted a bit.

"But adding a beard is aggressively ginger if anything. It's typical of the BBC, pushing their liberal agenda and shoving minorities in our face. This is like how Idris Elba is playing James Bond, or how they've made the Pet Shop Boys Chinese.

"Next thing you know there'll be a Greek reading the news."