James Graham’s fantasy dinner: Victoria Wood, Marcus Rashford and David Bowie

Nothing manifests my imposter syndrome quicker than hosting a dinner party, so like a government that has run out of ideas I am outsourcing almost every element of this evening to third parties. That way it’ll stay a memorable fantasy and not a nightmare to be recounted to future therapists.

Even the words “dinner party” trigger a social anxiety in me that probably comes from being a 1980s kid growing up in the post-industrial “red wall”, where dinner was something you had in the middle of the day (my grandma was a school dinner lady in the bish-bash-bosh, don’t-complain vein). We ate our “tea” in the evening (5.30pm, no later) on our laps in front of the TV, only extending the kitchen table at Christmas. But now I’m a poncy London playwright and I enjoy (other people’s) dinners, so I’m taking this seriously.

As it will be a night of glorious faux pas, I thought I’d go in hard and host my night at Gore Vidal’s house without inviting him. I think he’d have loved that. He himself didn’t care who he upset, such anecdotes being the meat and veg of his own infamous parties. I recently wrote him as a character in a play and was seduced by his merciless analysis of people — so much so that I imagine if I’d ever met him, he’d have seen right through me and torn me apart. La Rondinaia, where he lived with his life partner Howard Austen, perched atop the clifftops at Ravello in Italy, is an almost mythical place in literary circles due to the guests he invited: Truman Capote, Mick Jagger, Lauren Bacall. The bar is set.

I’d ask the comedian Victoria Wood to arrive early to give me some tough love, check I’m tucked in at the back and that my collar’s straight. I’m hoping Scottish writer Iain Banks isn’t far behind, as he’s bringing the whisky (about which he wrote so passionately in one of my favourite books, Raw Spirit). I’ve asked him to prepare a roll call of whisky cocktails — from Old Fashioneds to Manhattans — which, as a single-malt purist, he baulked at but he is being a good sport.

I imagine Marcus Rashford and John ­Maynard Keynes arriving together — possibly one gave the other a lift — sharing their passion for activism outside their day jobs. David Bowie completes the set, and we enjoy our first John Collins on the terrace with the sun setting across the Tyrrhenian Sea.

The gong is sounded by our chef, Alexis Soyer, the French cook who arrived in Victorian London to become history’s first celebrity chef. I’ve given him free rein but told him not to censor his social conscience, of which I think Rashford approves. The first course is his ingenious stewed beef soup, designed during the Great Irish Hunger for those with access to only the ingredients around them, but with potatoes and leeks it’s filling and delicious.

I’d ask Victoria Wood to arrive early to give me some tough love and check that I’m tucked in at the back

This gets an eye roll from our sommelier, Kim Philby, who revelled in fine food and wine despite being a communist double agent. I want him to give me tips on being a good host — his charm is one of the reasons the upper classes never spotted he was a spy. I tell him about the time I spent hours cooking a Polish soup for my neighbours only to, seconds from serving, sieve it one final time over the sink but without a saucepan underneath, and see it all wash down the drain. He says that’s one of the most embarrassing things he’s ever heard, until I remind him that he sold national secrets to the Russians.

I don’t know how to pair wines. Instead, I’m pairing Bowie’s alternative egos and he’s agreed to change for every course, in reverse order (starting smart with The Thin White Duke before heading into the anarchic androgyny of Ziggy and Aladdin Sane). Soyer serves his “whitebait feast” followed by rich grouse salad and his Lamb Chops Reform.

Pausing before his spotted dick, I point to the piano in the corner. Bowie stands up but I say it’s for Wood. We all sing “The Ballad of Barry & Freda”, with Keynes really getting into the lyric “Beat me on the bottom with the Woman’s Weekly”.

Retiring for more whisky, I listen to Keynes talk to Rashford about the founding of the Arts Council after the second world war, and about how arts and sports for all can sit happily alongside a thriving economy. Soyer joins us and reminisces about his days as chef at the Reform Club, where food and politics would meet and they all thought they’d change the world. We say goodnight. I stay to wash up, so I get to hear Gore Vidal crash home later. He yells some brilliant abuse at me as he heads up to bed, and I walk out into the night, beaming.

James Graham is the author of the plays ‘Ink’ and ‘This House’ and the TV dramas ‘Brexit: The Uncivil War’ and ‘Quiz’

Follow @FTMag on Twitter to find out about our latest stories first