The stolen getaway car

WELSH actor Rhys Ifans has had his car stolen by burglars who fished his keys through his letterbox.

Ifans, 32, fell victim to thieves who used a fishing rod to hook his car keys off a sideboard in the hallway of his London home. They made off with his £20,000 top-of-the-range Mini Cooper, police said.

The actor was said to have been asleep upstairs at the time.

A police spokesman said, "It's never safe to leave keys and valuables in plain sight and close to a letterbox or other opening."

Rhys lives in Notting Hill - the area of London which was the setting for the hit film of the same name in which Rhys played Hugh Grant's Y-front-wearing flatmate Spike in the film.