“I think people know it’s not Idris out there picking the grapes and pressing the wine. All the same he’s very conscious that if he puts his name to something, he doesn’t want it to be considered some kind of joke, or just be another lifestyle venture.”

Who is Idris Elba’s daughter Isan, fashion icon and mental health advocate?

Barbara Drew, master of wine at brokers Berry Bros. & Rudd, says it’s easy to see why celebrities might want to get involved, even without the prestige still attached to wine, or the potential for profit. “The fact is that the wine world is fascinating, and great fun to delve into, so it’s no surprise at all that celebrities are everywhere in the world of wine,” she says.

But is celebrity involvement any good for the wine business at large? Guy Heywood, founder of specialist online retailer The Celebrity Drinks Collection, argues yes, and not just because celebrities have the means to pour an often make-or-break investment into small producers. Wine-making, after all, is a process that can take years before any return is seen.

25 years on: where is the cast of HBO’s Sex and the City today?

“I think it can encourage drinkers to explore different wines, encourage non-wine drinkers to try wine, and make wine that much more relatable – especially if the wine suits each celebrity’s own fan base,” he argues. “That’s why it makes sense for, say, Leonardo DiCaprio to be involved with a biodynamic wine, and for Kylie Minogue to have an alcohol-free sparkling wine.” Last year DiCaprio invested in Champagne Telmont, while Kylie Minogue Wines was founded in 2020. Likewise, Cameron Diaz has co-built Avaline, a multimillion dollar “clean” wine business, tapping the crossover between luxury and wellness with its claim to be completely organic and additive-free.

John Malkovich’s Les Quelles de la Coste label is a case in point, while Brad Pitt remains more in the shadows as owner of Miraval, consistently named one of the top 100 roses in the world. Likewise Sting’s association with the Tuscan Il Palagio estate he owns pops up in somewhat subtle marketing efforts – of course, it has to have a wine called Message in a Bottle.

8 beauty brands founded by male celebrities, from Harry Styles to Brad Pitt

Reach matters – as Schaafsma notes, major celebrities have a social media punch way beyond that of most wine brands – because part of his interest in working with celebrities is to better explain wines too. “The wine world has long played to the interests of makers, not consumers,” he says. “Most people have not gone to a winery, never met a winemaker. They just wander down the aisles hoping they don’t pick a bad wine.” Celebrity cuts through the chatter in the way a new wine brand cannot. “Yes, the consumer might buy a bottle of wine the first time because of the celebrity name on the label,” he stresses. “But they won’t buy it a second time if it’s not any good.”

Ultimately then, it’s the taste test that counts – because certainly there are more cynical marketing ploys that see the likes of The Rolling Stones and Kiss lend their band names to bottles, too. Last year a wine critic showed how easy it is to launch a “celebrity” wine – despite not being a celebrity himself, it took him just two months to get his “own” label wine from inception to the shelves. The celebrity wine world only looks to get more lucrative for those cashing in, but for fans it pays to read a few reviews – of their wines, not their albums or films – before uncorking a bottle.