Confessions of a Showbiz Reporter

Bodyguards

Waiting around for celebrities might be part and parcel of my job, but no one has it as bad as bodyguards. A celebrity bodyguard needs to have the patience of a saint. Security men are meant to be on hand at all times to protect megastar X from any unwanted hassle or attention, but at the same time they have to be steadfast and invisible. In other words, they have a huge responsibility with none of the rewards. I encounter these boys all the time in my line of work – silent man-mountains who stand outside hotel-room doors or hover a few steps back on red carpets. Whatever is thrown their way, they display no emotion. As the owner of probably the worst poker face in the business, I never cease to be impressed by bodyguards.

Admittedly, even in all my years in the business, I’ve never actually seen a bodyguard have to do anything vaguely approaching combat. There has been the occasional moment where a bodyguard has had to spread their arms out wide to hold back the paparazzi or a bunch of hormonal teenage fans, but in all honesty, it seems that most of their time is just spent standing around, looking ‘hard’. And, unless bodyguards have some kind of zen-like meditative strengths, they must be bored out of their minds. It certainly doesn’t seem as exciting as Kevin Costner and Whitney Houston made it out to be.

Having security in one’s employ appears to have become less about safety and more about status for celebrities. Katy Perry or Rihanna having a bodyguard is one thing, but I’ve seen random, mid-level male actors with them too – having a bodyguard as a mark of importance instead of for protection. There’s a story that this is exactly what rock legend David Bowie did when he first went to America in the early seventies; Bowie supposedly hired an entourage of brutes to make him look like a superstar in a country where he was virtually unknown. With Bowie’s famous theatricality that kind of works – he taught Lady Gaga everything she knows – but a boring B-Lister in need of an ego boost is something else altogether.

It was one of these B-Listers who became the subject of the only story I’ve ever wheedled out of a bodyguard. This lone security man was on hire 24/7, and one day found himself accompanying his ‘celebrity’ client on an all-night drinking session around the booze dens of London without, of course, being able to touch a drop himself. He stood and watched in bar after bar, all the while maintaining the appearance that he was ready to pounce on any crazed fan that might throw themselves on this star, even though he knew that was highly unlikely to happen. I got talking to the big man before a junket the next morning while he stood in a hotel corridor and, while not exactly talkative (getting bodyguards to crack a smile is difficult enough, let alone persuading them to talk), he was so exhausted that his normal reticence was certainly less on show. His charge was in his hotel suite, he told me, pointing to the door behind him. In a bid to recover from his long night of partying this Hollywood-nearly man was getting a rejuvenating massage and plentiful room service. All my burly friend had to prepare himself with was a black coffee and a muffin, hardly fuel for another long day of standing outside a hotel room, looking tough. ‘I spent all bloody night playing gooseberry,’ he said, his stony face finally cracking under the strain. ‘I just had to loiter in the background as he snogged the face off some girl he picked up. And the worst thing is, he wants to do it all again tonight.’ I got the story of the young Lothario into a couple of papers the next day, but I couldn’t feel guilty – it made a pretty boring actor sound like a real stud, so I was probably doing him a favour.

As for the bodyguard … I salute you. You might think that being paid to essentially do nothing sounds like the greatest job in the world, but as my beefy friend will tell you, even doing nothing is tough when all you want is your bed.

Sources

It’s two in the morning and I’m in a cab heading north after a night out in Soho, drunkenly watching the pounds on the meter going up and up and up. I make the same mental note that I always make in this situation, a worryingly regular occurrence: next time, Holly, just get the last train home.

Thankfully, my friend Daisy is in full swing:

‘He likes both – girls and boys. Quite handy really. He’s got this image of being a ladies’ man – y’know, sells his films on it and everything – and the fact is, that’s true. You can’t argue with it. It’s just that he also secretly bats for the other team too. Once you know about it, I actually think it’s pretty obvious. Have you seen how much he hangs out with his mum, ha ha ha?’

No combination of letters could accurately capture Daisy’s laugh, a piercing Cockney cackle that’s potently amplified when lubricated with two bottles of wine. Be glad that you’re only reading this, and not listening to it. But Daisy’s great fun, and an even better source.

As a showbiz reporter you need to have a network of contacts to rely on for stories. It’s true that these days a lot of gossip magazines and websites just make things up and try to pass it off as a fact by writing ‘a source says’. And that’s fine if the celeb in question isn’t fond of taking people to court, or if they’re a reality star who, as a breed, are normally so desperate they’ll take any publicity they can get. In fact, they probably planted the story in the first place. For most of us, though, we need a source to get the facts needed for an article.

One of the few benefits of my dull journalist training is that I’m rigorous about my sources as a result. If a contact leads me to definite proof of a story, then their friendship is entirely worth the endless pounds I’ve spent on drinks and food in the bar cultivating it. Daisy is one of those sources; though we’ve become so close it thankfully doesn’t feel like a business arrangement.

Daisy is a stylist-to-the-stars and a fount of information. For many celebrities, their stylist is their best friend. Most celebs aren’t inherently chic. Sorry, but it’s true. While our daily routine might only boast things as humdrum as running for the tube and painting our nails on the bus, a star’s would include sessions with trainers and visits from manicurists and designers to make them look flawless. And it’s understandable; if my picture was going to be in every gossip mag and website going then I’d invest in looking close to perfect too. Since being preened and pampered is such a regular occurrence for celebrities, they’re often at their most relaxed around their team of beautifiers. The result? It’s the stylists who overhear stuff no journalist could ever dig up on their own, be it discussions with managers about schedules, catty comments about another star in the industry … or something even sleazier.

I met Daisy behind the scenes at an awards show and we’ve been friends ever since. She knows the deal. Her revelations alone are unlikely to end up printed word-for-word online, but the nuggets she feeds me often morph into bigger stories. I think she rather likes the playground superiority of being able to say ‘I know something you don’t’, and I know she likes the idea of being someway party to a world that isn’t her own – the world of journalism. Most importantly, though – and this is crucial for a source – Daisy and I like having a few drinks and a gossip together.

She tells me a lot of stuff, of course, that I can do nothing with. If a star she’s working with is secretly trying for a baby with her boyfriend then I’m not going to blow their cover. There’s no scandal there; it’s all too personal. If that boyfriend is actually a front, though, a cover for the relationship she’s having with another woman, but is too desperate for mainstream stardom to admit it? Well, I’m not so keen on letting people get away with lying.

One night over a bottle of red Daisy told me about a recent client – a slightly square middle-aged thespian renowned for his earnest acting – who spent his half hour of being dressed for a photo shoot making lewd suggestions to her. When he’d had enough of her rebuffs, he telephoned a mate and was even more crude about the teenage starlet he was currently starring in a film with. Thanks to Daisy, I’ve been closely watching this chap ever since. If the tip-off is anything to go by, he’ll have a sexual harassment case hanging over him within a year.

As well as a stylist, there are other ‘insiders’ it’s always useful to be friends with. Such as:

The hotel concierge. Trying to find out if a star really is in town? London might be a city boasting thousands of hotels, but in reality the rich and famous only ever stay at a handful. And I’m not talking about Travelodges or Holiday Inns. Having someone on the ground in Mayfair’s swankiest accommodations is always worthwhile, even if they often only answer my questions with a simple ‘yes’ or ‘no’. It was a ‘yes’ that I heard down the line when I asked a concierge contact at a top hotel if a certain pop star was staying there. Not a story in itself, perhaps, but it certainly gave credence to the rumours we’d heard that his wife had kicked him out of the marital home. As a renowned drinker and party animal, that was going to be one big mini-bar bill.

The door whore. I will be eternally grateful to the guy who used to control the guest list at one particularly poncey club in Central London. It’s not that the place was even my scene – the drinks were overpriced and the decor was more S&M dungeon than classy lounge – but through a few visits with friends, I’d got to know him reasonably well and one night it paid off. A famous pop star had been strenuously denying he was marrying his girlfriend that week, but it was rumoured they would both be partying with friends down in this basement hangout for an impromptu joint stag and hen do. As I trotted up to the door, my friend with his clipboard ‘umm-ed’ and ‘aah-ed’ and generally became a drama queen for a few minutes, but ultimately he let me downstairs. Yes, he knew why I wanted to go down there, but he also knew that a bit of publicity about his club being the venue for such a rock ’n’ roll party wouldn’t do him any harm either. After spotting the happy couple in a corner, I sent a text to a photographer friend to wait outside for a shot of them leaving then went about the business of noting everything the duo were drinking, eating and dancing to. Combined with the snap of them coming out of the club at 3 a.m., the piece I wrote prompted more than one person to comment on it being ‘so detailed, it’s like I was there’. I didn’t have the heart to tell them it was because I was.

The clinic receptionist. When you work in a job where celebs take you into their confidence, it’s understandably difficult not to get carried away. You become party to some pretty juicy gossip – gossip many would pay you for – and it’s only human to succumb sometimes to temptation. That was certainly the case with one receptionist at a plastic surgery clinic who I had in my confidence. Camp as Christmas and eager to share his star spots, I always found out pretty quickly which megastar was having what done to their nose, eyes or forehead. When one of those ‘have they or haven’t they?’ articles is mooted at a morning meeting, I have all the names immediately to hand. And while we are careful not to state anything as ‘fact’ in a feature, there is no uncertainty in my mind as to whether those names have had work done or not. Every single one, according to my loose-lipped receptionist, will have passed through his doors in the last year. And to think they all put their beauty down to just having ‘good genes’.

The publicist. It’s assumed that publicists have to follow some kind of moral code, meaning that all their work is officially set up and planned – sit-down interviews for a magazine or studio photo shoots with a top snapper, for example. If only life were that innocent. Getting your client into the press is now a shame-free exercise and publicists are more likely to be heavily suggesting stories and angles to showbiz journalists than waiting for a more traditional promo opportunity to come up. The old adage that ‘no publicity is bad publicity’ is truer than ever, and publicists will tip off the paparazzi with something as pointless as their client walking down the road in a particularly skimpy dress. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve been spun the yarn that the good-looking but frankly talentless Mr X is in talks to go over to Hollywood and make a movie, but with an ever-increasing number of spaces to fill in magazines and websites, sometimes that kind of story – however tenuous – is just what I need.

Ten past two in the morning and the cab is dropping me off at my flat. I hand Daisy 20 pounds to cover my share of the fare and remind myself once again to get the train next time.

‘Bye darlin’, ha ha ha!’ Daisy shouts through the taxi window, apparently not caring about everyone trying to sleep. ‘Let’s do it again soon, yeah?’

‘Definitely,’ I reply, trying not to stumble up the kerb.

‘And make sure you remind me – I must tell you about this singer I’ve been working with. Was the face of a charity campaign and claimed to be all “right on” about it, y’know. Actually she was getting paid a fortune for it. She couldn’t give a shit about hungry Africans.’

My ears prick up, sensing a story.

‘Dais, you’re a star. Same time next week?’

Flirting

There was this one actor – a pretty boy who looked as if he spent more time than I did preening himself – who simply took my breath away when I met him. Wow was he beautiful. Puppy dog eyes, a Celtic accent, and bee-stung lips that looked even more kissable in real life than they did projected on to a 15-foot cinema screen – I was smitten. I suspect that he’d had one of those long, tedious days of promotion because, when I walked into the interview room I sensed immediately that he was up for some fun. ‘Chemistry’ is the kind of cheesy word used by dim WAGs talking about their latest footballer boyfriend, but there was definitely something scientific happening when he and I talked. Well, I say talked. We giggled. We flirted. Any talking we did was the kind of hilarious-at-the-time nonsense that’s more suited to a drunken pub date than a professional interview. Still, I left 20 minutes later buzzing from all the pouting and eyelash batting that had just taken place – and that was just from him.

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