Is there a future for showbiz journalism? Here's how fun (and exhausting) awards season used to be...

Ye olde days of celebrity journalism were relentless, but fun. So, what do new showbiz writers need to do to keep the industry alive and thriving - especially during awards season? Let's discuss...

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Right, I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. There’s very little – if any – joy being a showbiz reporter in 2024. Do you really want to spend your life writing about what happened on Instagram the night before? Nope.

The truth is showbiz reporters now have very little to no contact with the really big talent themselves these days. They also hold very little power unlike yesteryear. So many titles are closing, so many fewer opportunities arise for writers and the talent themselves prefer to do a lot less interviews. The biggies will launch an album with ONE interview (hello, British Vogue) and then stick to live performances only.

But this hasn’t always been the case. In fact, just ten years ago - and during the 15 years before that - I was in the throng of the showbiz world as a columnist, interviewer and red-carpet whore.

I did it ALL. From the frontline of every British film premiere to the Vanity Fair bash at the Oscars and all the events few and far between. Then there was the sit-down interviews with celebrities and sifting through the hundreds of requests from publicists to talk to their global talent - not to mention attending endless award ceremonies around the globe.

Crucially, back then - between 2000 and 2015 when I was still writing – there was still money in the industry…money that nowadays has pretty much dried up.

In reflection, there’s no doubt as showbiz hounds we had the best job known to man.

Personally, I basically fell into celebrity journalism. I couldn’t write for shit when I started. I got lucky in some ways and the drive I had got me my big break at the Mirror.

I had one desire that propelled my entire thirst for the industry. One day I wanted to meet Madonna. As you can see from above - I DID IT. Sure, it was only a five-minute cocktail with the Queen of Pop at Claridge’s for the premiere of her W.E. directorial effort. But who gives a shit - it was a moment I’ll never forget (organised by Claudia Winkleman’s hubby who was producing W.E.)

This week I’ve seen the start of awards season and images emblazoned across the online press (I rarely read print these days) from the big fat red carpets. The reporting has been so tired. Simple gags about bad outfits, PDAs and picture captions and generally lame takes on the live show. Zero good gossip.

The Emmys just took place and we will soon have the Globes, Spirit Awards and finally the big one - the Oscars. As well as lots of random little awards show inbetween.

Some years I barely react to the glitz and the glam of awards season but this week, maybe something to do with having some head space as I’m away, I sat daydreaming on the beach about the fun I had and what a fucking epic few years I had whizzing around the world to all these major events. And it lead me to think – what the hell is good about being a showbiz reporter in 2024?

The role I had was so much fun and I wouldn’t change the timing of my years on that journey in any way. I was being paid well to meet my idols, travel around the world and interview famous people for all sorts of tabloids and magazines. Not to mention the fact I got to know lots of crazy people and sources along the way. Many have left my life - and I’ve moved away from the exhausting schedule nowadays - but some of the faces I got to know back then have become some of the most important people in my life.

The one thing that’s not often mentioned about this elongated fun life I once held is just how effing hard it was. The role of a showbiz columnist wasn’t for the faint hearted.

You had to spread your butter so thin across a range of contacts, work colleagues, celebrities and family all at the same time. I often described my old life as being a professional juggler. Back then, throughout my twenties, I was so busy I would often have to meet up with my friends at work events and take them as my plus one. It was the only way we got to spend quality time together. Two weeks ago I met up with one of my old school pals, Luci. We just walked to the pub locally to me and shared a bottle of wine together and caught up.

In ye olde days I’d be constantly looking over her shoulder to see who was walking through the door, asking her to head to the ladies loo to snoop on a celeb or generally she’d be following me around a nightclub whilst I grabbed the gossip and said hello to a million people. She was one of my favourite plus ones and having somebody from the ‘real’ world on my side definitely kept me grounded.

It was also extremely hard back then for me to go anywhere without bumping into somebody I knew – which made it hard to work a room at speed.

These days – in full Grandpa mode - if I’m heading on holiday there are two remits. I want to go somewhere where I won’t know anybody or bump into somebody and ideally somewhere not frequented by British tourists. This usually works. But still to this day I often fail on my mission. On the beach in Goa. Going through a tiny tropical airport. On a tour of Venice. My past has a way of coming back to haunt me when I least expect it.

One thing people probably don’t realise is just how hard it was to be a showbiz columnist. Sure, we got paid fairly well and had a long list of perks (those travel feature freebie trips being one of them – God how I miss those) but the reality was those years properly ground you down as a human being.

I would be in Chinawhite til 3 or 4am and then at my desk for conference for 10.30am. It didn’t help I lived in West London and work was mostly in Canary Wharf in the East for my Mirror years. That left four hours max for shut eye. At 21 I could just about manage to stay afloat on small amounts of rest.

Then don’t forget the reality of the job and how switched on you needed to be about your subject matter. I had to know every judge on every show, every guest performer, all the current pop stars – established and breaking through – legendary pop stars and rough history of their career. We had to be able to go on that red carpet and know two killer questions with a current news hook to get some sort of line for the paper and we couldn’t mess it up. You only got one shot.

Before you say it too – I totally appreciate the industry wasn’t working down a coal mine and on paper it seemed like we were getting paid to get fucked up and drink every night for free. Sure, that was one aspect. But it was so much more than that.

We had an on-going joke whilst I was at Closer magazine that we turned into showbiz robots.

When it came to celebrity children we all had encyclopedic knowledge of the off spring. Spellings of names, ages, children’s often different dads and relationship histories of the rich and famous. Imagine trying to keep up to date with Katie Price (above), Kerry Katona and Jade Goody’s love lives in the noughties. It was hellish. Then having to know the factual elements of their careers for the stories you had to write endlessly.

The only thing I truly hated was writing about names I couldn’t give a shit about or had zero respect for. Kerry being one of them. If I was writing a Madonna story at Closer it would take 20 minutes and be factually perfect and written well. If I was assigned a Katona story it would take two days to squeeze out a spread and I’d generally be in the biggest grump about being forced to write such drivel.

I couldn’t have been happier reflecting on when I left the industry in 2013 and the fact I departed just as reality TV shows like Made in Chelsea, Towie and all the rest exploded. God forbid shows like Love Island being around. YUCK. I literally couldn’t have coped with the sheer volume of muppets I’d have been forced to write about.

Those of you that read regularly will know I threw myself into the industry to write about real talent. Not reality TV sensations. I love the odd girl next door – hello Jodie Gibson, Abbey Clancy and Kelly Brook – but the thought of writing about some serial dating girl on Geordie Shore with a ‘serious edge’ was far too much for my brain to contend with.

Anyway, back to awards season. I guess I also wanted to highlight just how tricky these trips were too. It wasn’t a walk in the park or a ‘jolly’, as they were commonly known, at all.

Before going, you’d have to try and have as many events confirmed as possible before you even got on the plane. Often, you’d be offered red carpet positions only by ghastly US publicists. This was the worst. It meant you’d get generic quotes and get maybe one question to ask the talent. Often, the big names wouldn’t stop and they’d run straight past you. So, I’d have to try and get inside – usually blagging it or sweet talking the publicists when I was face to face with them. I’d have to threaten not to cover the event at all unless they slipped me in and offer them full plugs for the event and most of the time even with a sponsor mentioned. It was a fight to get into any event with the right access and hugely anxiety inducing with the newsdesk constantly pressurising you.

Take Oscars night for example. After a quick gym (or more likely a huge fat LA diner brekkie) I’d start the day by getting to the red carpet for Elton John’s AIDS Foundation benefit around 11am. You’d spend two boring hours waiting in a pen before two hours watching the affluent wannabes walk in posing for red carpet snaps on their iPhones. Elton’s party always had the weirdest guestlist because anybody could buy a ticket if they were rich and wanted to be part of the fundraising night. They raised such a huge amount of cash each year.

In short, the carpet was always appalling to work as a journalist. You might get a quick chat with somebody like Sharon Stone, Ed Sheeran might stop quickly or Eric McCormack would take pity on you. Often, you couldn’t even tempt a UK star like Leona Lewis to stop for the red carpet media line up. It was a good year if Simon Cowell was there and he took pity on you and came over to chat. But there was never a guarantee and you’d usually not get one on one time with him so competition like The Sun would have the same quotes. Sometimes even Elton would avoid doing media.

The carpet would finish and I’d usually head to a local Mexican on Santa Monica with Clemmie Moodie and we’d have a few drinks watching the Oscars with a gaggle of Drag Queens. Then suitably fed and watered we’d start the night by popping into the party at Elton’s, try and blag the door at Vanity Fair (which only worked ONCE and the following year it was like Fort Knox because we’d gotten in. HA) and if you were feeling bold you’d try to get somebody to take you with them to Madonna and Guy O’Seary’s private party. This was the one you could only dream of. To this day I don’t think I’ve ever heard of a journalist blagging their way into this.

I got to the Madonna party driveway with Melanie Bromley – who was then at the E! Channel – and we got turned away. Or maybe it was with Sara Nathan who was at the Mail back then. Oh the shame. Hilariously, I know one A List actress that wasn’t on the list one year and she hid in the boot of another star’s car to get in. It worked and she spent the whole night keeping a low profile and at one point running away from security.

This is just a low down of the one day. Please note, there’s no time allotted for filing your column or any news stories back to London. Guess when that took place? When you got home sozzled and it was 3am. You’d eventually get to bed around 5am if you were lucky.

Then, what about the rest of your short trip in LA? The trip would be beyond hectic – trying to squeeze in as much as humanly possible whilst you were in town.

Meeting Perez Hilton for a catch up (he once took me to The Abbey as he knew Britney was going to be there which was fun), hitting up Chateau with Baz Bamigboye (telling author E.L. James my Nan described 50 Shades as “50 Shades of Shite” was another highlight), seeing your actual LA friends for a drink or meal and then organising and executing some actual sit-down interviews. Not to mention all the CRAZY after-hours parties up in the Hills at private houses. Ooooof, the memories of those days. Going to gatherings where party favours were tens of jars of prescription drugs (“have you just got some ecstasy or any sort of normal party favours,” I overheard a Brit say once) and even going to the huge Beverly Hills estates where once an A-Lister racked up a line of coke on the ledge of a Henry Moore sculpture infront of me like it was the normalist thing to do. Lolz.

In short, you could always find an interesting party to crash back in those days and you’d usually garner an exclusive story of some sort from your adventures so the after-hours partying were essential to the success of your trip.

Working for a paper in Tinseltown would usually mean when you were just getting to bed the news editor would call throughout the night trying to get the lowdown on what gossip/trouble you managed to get into the night before.

Don’t get me wrong, it was a hoot of a role to have as a young fledgling journalist - I’m just trying to explain just how much skill, contacts, tenacity and knowledge was needed to be a showbiz columnist was back then. You’d come back a wreck from an abroad trip and guess what? You’d probably have an event the night you landed in London and you’d have to park your jetlag and hit the town; sometimes without so much as a bath.

It really isn’t any wonder that when I left the Daily Mirror at the fresh age of 22 I got into bed at my mum and dads house and spent close to 48 hours crying in bed with the curtains closed. I was physically and emotionally exhausted by 15 months in the job and the pressure that came with it.

But would I change what I went through as a celebrity journalist? Nope. I had a blast. I mean, maybe I’d have been even bolder when everybody was hacking their way to a showbiz exclusive and lifted the lid sooner on how effed up my colleagues were. But hey, that was their issue and their problem. Hopefully one that will come back to bite them on the ass. After all, karma is a bitch.

What I did on the showbiz scene was infiltrate it on every level. I hit the events, the parties, flew around the globe, had scope to come up with ideas and loved every second of how I handled my showbiz career. Sure, I was often the first at the after party and last to leave. I’m thrilled I didn’t end up in rehab. Many did and fell along the way. Fortunately, I’ve always known when to stop and when to go to bed and for that I shall be forever grateful.

I guess this post is more about giving a truthful account and celebrating the showbiz journalist of yester year. To those youngsters currently in that role, getting their own columns and starting upon that journey the message is clear.

Strive to immerse yourself in this world. Get to know people, get out there on the frontline, try not to have an opinion of a celebrity until you’ve sat down with them (because often you’ll be very wrong) and start from the ground and work your way up. It’s the only way you learn.

Showbiz isn’t dead. But as an industry it’s damaged by all forms of social media and we’ve got to find a way to keep showbiz journalism alive and not just a form of AI-esque journalism with no identity. Writing about Instagram the night before simply isn’t being a celebrity journalist.

It serves a purpose, sure. But get off your butt and get out there if you want to capture a slice of what we went through in the noughties. Cause trouble, meet people and don’t rely on writing picture captions for a living. That’s really rather lame.

Until next week, Kids.