by A. J. Crofts
‘Fantastic parts, though.’ I couldn’t believe we were actually having this conversation. I was turning down parts in West End shows because my agent didn’t like the characters? How weird was that?
‘And they’ve asked if you and Luke will present an award at the next Brits Awards ceremony.’
‘That would be so cool.’
‘I told them,’ she continued as if I hadn’t spoken, ‘that you would only do it if you and Luke got to perform a song of your choice.’
My God, Dora was turning into Colonel Tom Parker before my very eyes.
‘Perform at the Brits? Are you sure? If they thought Michael Jackson was a sell-out, what are they going to think of the winners of something as naff as Singing for their Fame? They’ll boo us off the stage, won’t they?’
‘I don’t think so. You are both very popular at the moment, and you’re selling a fuck of a lot of records. Do you think Luke would be up for it?’
‘I’ll ask him.’
I knew bloody well he would be up for it. It was just the sort of credibility he craved, putting him right back where he was before the group split, but I thought it was only respectful to ask him first. He was just as excited as I’d expected.
‘I think we should do something other than “Summer Wine”,’ I suggested.
‘But everyone loves it,’ he protested.
‘I know, but they’ll be bored of it soon. Let’s do “A Little Time” and camp it up a bit.’
He wasn’t hard to persuade and, to my amazement, nor were the record company or the Brits organisers. I couldn’t get my head round the way that everyone was happy to do whatever I asked for. I didn’t notice it at first, but once I had noticed it I saw it all the time. It started out being really nice, but then it began to get on my nerves a bit. I think that was why I liked being with Luke’s family and Dora, because they treated me like I’d always been treated. I wasn’t comfortable with being pandered to, like I was a star. I was still the same person who had been washing dirty dishes a few months before, being shouted at by a load of sweaty chefs. One of the main reasons why I wasn’t comfortable about it was because I could see it was really pissing off the other cast members at The Towers, and I could completely understand their point of view. None of them minded me doing publicity stuff, because they all got to do that from time to time, but, when it was known that the production staff were consulting me about developments in Nikki’s character, the whispers really started.
Actors on soaps look like they’re getting all the glory, with their red-carpet moments and the features in magazines and all the rest, but actually they’re pretty low in the pecking order at the actual television companies. Really distinguished actors can find their characters killed off without any warning and anyone protesting too often about some lines they have been given, or some piece of business, will soon find themselves called into the office and dressed down like a naughty school kid. I’d never had it happen to me because basically I’d been doing exactly what I was asked, but I knew several who did.
When things went wrong for the actors in their personal lives, the company would make all sorts of statements about us being one big family and all sticking together, but actually they were only interested in ratings. If an actor pissed off the press by two-timing his wife with a hooker, his days were numbered – which was what made it strange that no one was cross with me about the squat revelations. There seemed to be some double standards at work here. Because I was young and considered a bit sexy, I was allowed to get away with things that would have ended the careers of some of the older men. Thank God for it, of course, but it didn’t make any of us feel too secure. We all wondered when the tide of public sympathy would turn against us.
‘It’s the public who decides our fate,’ one old hand told me early on. ‘If they decide they don’t want to see you any more then you’ll be out faster than any politician. If the powers-that-be believe you’re putting bums of seats, then they’ll be crawling up your arse morning, noon and night.’
They seemed to think I was putting bums on seats, which was nice to know, but I didn’t like the idea that the others might think I was getting above myself.
Performing at the Brits was like a dream come true. Luke said it was like the first time the West End Boys went on Top Of The Pops. There were so many stars backstage I just walked around with my mouth hanging open, forcing myself not to ask for autographs. They all said ‘hi’ so casually it was like I was one of them, like we had known each other forever. I swear to God half of them wouldn’t have known me from a hole in the ground, probably thought I was some groupie who had managed to get past security. I was given this incredible dress by Stella McCartney. Stella McCartney, for fuck’s sake! It was all so weird.
‘Am I doing your make-up?’ one of the girls in the Make-Up department asked as I sat in her chair.
‘Yeah, is that all right?’
‘Of course. I just thought you’d have your own people. Most of the stars come with an entourage of stylists and make-up artists and all the rest.’
‘Nah,’ I replied, not sure what the correct response was. Was she suggesting I was a star? I assumed she was talking about people like Madonna, J-Lo, Gwen Stefani and the rest, not someone from the cast of The Towers. I wasn’t sure if she was sending me up or not. As we chatted I realised she wasn’t being horrible or anything, just speaking her mind. She was really nice and offered to put me in touch with all sorts of people if I needed them. I couldn’t quite imagine what I would do with my own personal stylist, any more than I’d know what to do with my own personal butler; still, it was a nice little fantasy to indulge in for a bit.
Luke was such a gent, introducing me to everyone like he was at some cocktail party. They all seemed to know each other; maybe it’s some sort of rock star club they all belong to. The organisers had agreed to our doing ‘A Little Time’, and had given us dancers and backing singers and the whole bit. It was a big production and I decided to treat it like an acting master class. Luke looked a bit embarrassed when I did more than just stand there and sing, but he could see the production people liked it and so he didn’t complain. It worked OK with him singing it straight and me stamping back and forth around him, being really girly about the whole thing. It was cute. It felt good and the crowd whooped and yelled for more – but then they did that for all the numbers, being hyped up on a mixture of drink, drugs and encouragement from the management, who wanted the whole thing to look like a really happening event, not some dry industry thing.
After our set everyone backstage became even more friendly, like I had passed some sort of initiation test, become a member of their exclusive club. Luke was high on adrenalin, bouncing about like a kid in need of Ritalin. It was such a high. He had some coke, which we used when we got to a club afterwards, and then we danced through the night, the centre of attention, feeling like we owned the whole world.
Luke and his management were bubbling with plans. They wanted us to go on tour together, break America, become the next Carpenters. The music in the club was so loud I hadn’t the energy to talk back or do anything except throw my arms round Luke’s neck and cover him in kisses. I didn’t want to be the one to break the mood with practicalities like my contract with The Towers and wanting to do the acting and all the exciting plans Dora had for me.
I even got to meet the famous Quentin James, although I can’t say I warmed to the guy in his sharp blue suit, Hermès tie and shiny white shirt. To be honest, there seemed to be a whiff of sulphur in the air when he was around. Everyone else was treating me like I was one of them, but he seemed to be talking to me like some sarcastic old schoolmaster. I might have taken more offence if I hadn’t noticed he did it to everyone.
‘You need to cash in now,’ he told me, leaning close in order to shout over the noise. ‘I could make you a couple of million if you want to sell your story in the next few weeks.’
‘Nah, I’m all right, thanks,’ I shouted, wanting to be polit
e because he scared me a bit, but keen for him to piss off and leave me alone.
‘Leave it too long and I can’t promise I’ll be able to get you anything. The public have short memories.’
‘That’s what I’m hoping,’ I joked, but he didn’t laugh, just looked irritated. He was so immaculate I just wanted to ruffle his hair, or make a smudge on one of his white cuffs. It looked to me like he was wearing some sort of foundation, which made him appear a bit orange, but maybe it was just a carefully applied tan. He had definitely had his teeth fixed – they looked like they would glow in the dark.
‘It’s up to you.’ He shrugged, like he didn’t have time for such foolishness. ‘I can’t make you do the right thing, I can only advise.’
‘Thanks for the advice,’ I said, snuggling up close to Luke, who seemed to be a bit in awe of the man but put his arm round me anyway as Quentin just walked off without so much as a goodbye.
‘What a wanker,’ I shouted into Luke’s ear.
‘A useful man to know when you need a few quid really quickly,’ one of the other girls at the table said. ‘Everyone ends up in his office eventually.’That was the second time someone had said that to me.
It was a great night and I wanted to indulge myself, and Luke, to the hilt. I was living the fantasy, riding the wave, dancing on top of the world till my thighs ached.
The next morning, when we woke up in a suite at the Covent Garden Hotel, I didn’t feel half so good. In fact, I felt like complete crap. If I had stuck to the coke it wouldn’t have been a problem, but in my euphoria, believing I could handle anything that life might throw at me, I’d also siphoned in an explosive mixture of free cocktails – pink ones, blue ones, crystal-clear ones – with no idea what was in any of them. It felt like someone had buried an axe between my eyes.
Luke must have been drinking water or something all night, because he was sitting on the other side of the room eating a cooked breakfast and reading the papers. If I felt bad when I woke up, I felt a fuck of a lot worse once he’d showed me the pictures of myself coming out of the club in the middle of the night. I had no memory of any of it, but it was definitely me, even though I looked more like Dad after one of his major benders, the ones that left him in the gutter outside the pub, waiting for Mum or one of us to scrape him up and stagger home with him.
Even though I was in too much pain to see the funny side of it myself at that moment, I did think Luke might at least crack a smile as he showed me, but he looked furious, like I’d let him down or something, shown myself up for the drunken slapper I really was. Worse still, he actually managed to make me feel guilty, made worse when I had to rush to the bathroom and get rid of the remains of the cocktails still swilling about in my stomach. Hauling myself up from where I was, kneeling on the floor, I stared blearily into the mirror, shocked by the smeared make-up, crushed hair and deadly pallor that glowered back at me. I locked the door quickly and ran a shower, determined to improve things before I represented myself to the love of my life, who was looking so spruced up and clean living.
Eventually, having managed to at least get rid of the smell of sick, even though I hadn’t managed to find any mascara to make my eyes look like they actually existed, I ventured back out, grabbing a pair of Ray-Bans he’d left on the side and ramming them over my eyes before sinking into the chair opposite him and accepting the cup of tepid black coffee he passed over. Finally he seemed unable to keep up the angry schoolmaster act any longer and cracked a grin.
‘You look well and truly fucked,’ he chuckled.
‘Thanks.’
‘I’ll order some fresh coffee. You need your wits about you because we need to make plans.’
‘Plans?’
‘We need to think about the tour and everything else we talked about last night.’
Vaguely, through the haze of pain, I could recall snatches of the previous night.
‘OK,’ I said, a bit doubtfully. ‘But we need to talk to Dora because she knows everything I’m going to be doing this year acting-wise.’
‘Listen, babes,’ he said, ‘you are going to have to put the acting on hold for now. After last night we are really hot and you have to strike at moments like this. If we wait even six months we will lose the momentum. Believe me, I know this business. It’s all down to timing. You can go back to acting any time.’
I probably should have taken things a bit more slowly and tactfully at that stage, but my stomach was bubbling back up towards my throat again and I just didn’t have the time for it.
‘I’ve told you,’ I said as I struggled back to my feet. ‘Singing is just a hobby. The acting has to come first.’
‘Don’t let me down on this, Steff,’ he said and I caught a glimpse of his face before I crashed back through the bathroom door. To look at him you’d have thought I’d just run him over with a truck.
Chapter Twelve
Since I hardly got to see Mum any more, at least not for long enough periods to really confide anything to her, Dora had become like my confessor. She seemed to be endlessly patient, just lighting one cigarette after another and pouring the coffee as I told her all about everything that had happened at the Brits and my worries about how it was getting out of control.
‘Now Luke wants to go on tour and God knows what else,’ I gabbled, a bit hysterical really. ‘But I don’t know.’
‘The record company want you to do some songs on your own,’ she said, as casually as if she’d just remembered a phone message she’d taken for me.
‘You’re kidding.’ I felt a strange mixture of buzz and dread. ‘He’d do his fucking nut if he knew that.’
‘You’re bigger than he is, Steff, and a better singer. Maybe he’s going to have to face up to that. Where would Cher be if she’d stuck with Sonny?’
‘Who?’
‘Exactly.’
‘How can I be bigger than Luke? What about the West End Boys and all those platinum records?’
‘That was then. Just because the group was big doesn’t mean he can be a star on his own. You’re the one everyone’s in love with now. And you’ve got a real talent. That’s why he needs to be part of a double act with you. He had his chance on his own and it didn’t work.’
‘He’s still famous,’ I protested, a bit feebly.
‘Only because of the band. Your generation of girls will always remember because you were fans, but younger kids won’t have a clue who he is, any more than you could name the members of The Monkees or The Bay City Rollers.’
‘Really? Jesus, if Luke ever thought that, it would destroy him. Singing is his whole life. I’ve already insulted him by suggesting acting is superior in some way.’
‘He’s a big boy now.’ Dora shrugged. ‘He knows how the business works. He’s got to accept it.’
I couldn’t get my head round that; I mean, he’s Luke Lewis, for God’s sake! To me he was always going to be a pop god. So I changed the subject. ‘You ever heard of someone called Quentin James?’
‘Of course, why?’
‘He said I should sell my story. Said he could make me a couple of million.’
It was hard to believe I was even saying that. I mean, what sort of money is two million? It’s like gigantic wealth, isn’t it, and I was bandying the figures about like I was talking about a couple of hundred quid. Everything was going so weird.
‘He probably could,’Dora said, in exactly the same matter-of-fact voice. ‘He’s very good at his job. All the editors take his calls and he’s set up most of the big deals in recent years. Everyone ends up in his office eventually.’
That bloody sentence again!
‘Do you think I should do that?’ I asked.
She paused for a moment to light a new cigarette and give herself time to think. She likes her dramatic pauses, does Dora. ‘What you’ve got to ask yourself is: do the real stars sell their stories? I mean, the legends? Or is it just the little people? The big people may write their autobiographies, keeping control of every word
that goes out, but do they actually go to the newspapers with their hands out for cash? Or do they retain their distance and their dignity? Apparently, the Royal Family have a saying: “Never apologise, never explain.” You could do worse than take a leaf out of their book. Doing a deal with Quentin is like selling your soul to the devil. Once you’ve sold your story to one paper, all the others will see it as an invitation to discredit you in any way they can to try to get a slice of the cake. They’ll make stuff up if necessary, just to get back at the paper you’ve done the deal with. At the moment you still have your integrity and dignity intact. Is it worth two million to lose that?’
I have to hand it to Dora, she has a way of putting things. Did I want to sell my soul for two million quid? Not such an easy question to answer, really.
I decided not to mention her comment about going solo to Luke. I had no intention of doing anything about it anyway and it would just have upset him, but that decision proved to be a mistake because three days later there was a story in one of the tabloids about men who were overshadowed by the women in their lives – Prince Philip, Denis Thatcher, Guy Ritchie and poor old Luke among them. The journalist mentioned the rumour about me going solo as evidence that I was ‘eclipsing’ Luke. I then made my second mistake when I went round to his flat and he started raving about treachery and whatever.
‘I’m not going to go solo,’ I assured him.
‘So you knew about this?’
‘Dora mentioned it.’ I immediately knew I was in even more trouble.
‘And you didn’t think you should tell me? Thanks a lot.’
‘Oh fuck off, Luke. I didn’t think anything of it, and I didn’t want to hurt your feelings. There was no need because I wasn’t going to do anything about it.’
The more I said the worse it got, the hole growing deeper and deeper as I dug. I could see there was no easy way to get myself out of it now, so I tried going quiet and just being sweet, but he wasn’t having any of it. His manhood had been questioned, not to mention his talent, and it was more than he could handle. Every petty resentment that he had been building up inside against me – the record company, the business in general, the other members of West End Boys, their former management – all came pouring out. It was like everyone in the world was conspiring against him, trying to ruin his career. It was the sort of paranoid rant some junkie might go into on a bad day. I kept quiet for a bit, but it was like he was goading me, trying to force a reaction, make me say something terrible and eventually I did.
