Bono admits stylist saved him from ‘Nana look’

BONO yesterday admitted he looked like singer Nana Mouskouri before Lola Cashman — the stylist at the centre of a High Court battle with the band — joined the U2 team.

The singer told Dublin’s High Court he hired Ms Cashman to bring some coherence to the band’s look as it toured in America.

As Bono faced a second day of tough cross-examination, he also came face-to- face with some of the band’s prized possessions which have landed him in the courtroom.

He maintained Ms Cashman’s apartment could be like an Aladdin’s Cave, as it was only in recent years they realised how much memorabilia she had taken.

The U2 frontman spent three-and-a-half hours in the witness box fighting to get his belongings back from his former stylist.

The rock star, whose real name is Paul Hewson, was giving evidence at an appeal hearing brought by Ms Cashman against a court order demanding she return their belongings.

The band had last year successfully sued for the recovery of Bono’s trademark Stetson hat, a pair of metal hooped earrings, a green sweatshirt and a pair of black trousers, which they said she took without permission.

Ms Cashman claims she was given the items, estimated to be worth €5,000, as gifts during U2’s Joshua Tree tour in 1987.

In 2002, Ms Cashman put some of the items up for sale at Christie’s. She claims two letters sent to the auction house from U2 lawyers seeking their return were defamatory.

She has since started proceedings against the band in the High Court in London and maintains the band’s claim was brought to stop the defamation case.

John Rogers SC, for Ms Cashman, said his client maintains she was gifted the items and that while Ms Cashman was clearing out the band members’ clothing she filled black sacks to be disposed of. “They shouldn’t have been binned,” said Bono, who wore a black suit, black shirt, black rosary beads, a grey tie and rose tinted glasses.

Bono, 46, said it should have been an early warning sign to all of the band that something was amiss when Ms Cashman asked Larry Mullen for a pair of trainers — which she was given.

He maintained he never handed over items from his wardrobe to the stylist at the end of the tour, especially his iconic Stetson hat which had been his idea to use when promoting the album.

Other members of U2’s wardrobe staff also took the witness box and said they had never seen gifts being handed to anyone.

“They were like theatre costume,” said Judy Reith, one of the band’s stage wardrobe team.

When questioned if she ever asked for their belongings, she replied to Paul Sreenan, SC for U2: “Not at all. It would be like asking you for your wig”.