Latest news with #JoanneHarris
Telegraph
16-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
Original Big Brother champion Craig Phillips: ‘My advice for anyone going on the show? Don't'
'Over the years, people would stop me in the street and say, 'I've applied for Big Brother; what advice would you give me?'. And I would look at them and go, 'Don't do it!'' Twenty-five years ago, 28-year-old Liverpudlian builder Craig Phillips was the most famous man in Britain, becoming an overnight sensation after winning the first series of Big Brother. It changed his life, and he has no regrets, but, he says, 'I wouldn't do it again.' No one could have foreseen how that show would shape the future of reality television, with every wannabe in the land hoping for an instant springboard into show business. In those more innocent times, Phillips, now 53, was running a successful building company in Shropshire and blissfully unaware of the eventual benefits – and pitfalls – being on the show would offer. 'I was content with the direction I was going in,' he says down the line from his home in Majorca, where he lives with his wife Laura and children Nelly, six, and Lennon, four. 'At the time, I was helping raise money for little Joanne Harris, a Down's syndrome girl who needed £250k to take her to America for a heart-lung transplant. I'd seen a documentary about a programme in Holland called Big Brother and they were contemplating doing it in England.' Phillips rightly deduced it could be an effective way of raising both money and publicity for Harris's cause, and wrote to the production company, Endemol, asking them to bear him in mind should they ever bring the series to the UK. Then he promptly forgot all about it. Months later, they got in touch, and, after a tortuous interview process, he found himself down to the last 50 out of 45,000 who had applied. But 12 days before the show was due to start, he still wasn't sure if he was in or out. With his business on his mind, he issued the producers with an ultimatum – let him know within 24 hours or he would pull out. An hour later, he got the call. 'There was relief and excitement and panic,' he recalls. 'I don't think I slept that night. I was thinking, 'Am I doing the right thing?'. I'm neglecting my business. I'd signed quite a strict confidentiality agreement and couldn't tell anybody. So, I had to break the rules and let some of my customers know, because one day I'm doing a big extension and the next I'm appearing on TV.' On July 14, 2000, Phillips and nine other contestants – including ex-nun Anna Nolan, city broker Nick Bateman, assertive Melanie Hill and chicken-phobic Darren Ramsay, none of whom had met before – entered the house in Bow, east London, watched by host Davina McCall, a small audience of friends and family and a few thousand via a choppy livestream online. Ladbrokes tipped Nolan to win, and gave the longest odds to Bateman, Ramsay and Phillips. Four days later, Channel 4's TV coverage began, as the housemates became acquainted – for better or worse – doing nothing much but boredly parading about in swimwear and getting on each other's nerves. 'When you're in that environment, it's surprising how much things bother you,' says Phillips. 'Caroline [O'Shea], for instance; she'd be drinking a cup of tea, then put it on the very edge of a table. And I'd be looking at it, thinking, 'You're going to knock that off…' That used to grate on me.' But viewers couldn't get enough, and the programme became the talking point of that summer, while, inside, they remained blissfully unaware. On day 35, Phillips famously confronted Bateman – immortalised as ' Nasty Nick ' in the tabloids – for passing covert notes to housemates encouraging them to nominate certain people for eviction, and the country came to a standstill. 'It didn't feel that big because we had confrontations pretty much every day,' remembers Phillips now. 'I personally just felt very let down by Nick. We were developing good friendships that were hopefully going to last forever, because we're all in this unique experiment. We felt betrayed.' Although Bateman was removed from the show, the two remained friends, with Phillips even having a key to his London flat. On day 64, Phillips emerged from the Big Brother house as the series' champion, winning £70,000. 'It was like coming up for air,' he says. 'I came out to fireworks, and it was all very overwhelming. Joanne was there and I told her I was giving her the money, and everyone was calling my name – it was bonkers.' But being at the vanguard of a cultural phenomenon is not necessarily a pleasant experience. 'As soon as the live finale finished, I was driven away to a hotel with a police escort, as the press were chasing me. But no one was telling me what was going on. I felt like I was being kidnapped.' In his suite, around 25 people were waiting for him – including Brett Carr, the show's psychiatrist, who told him he was now the most talked-about person in Britain. He had yet to see his own family. 'It was terrifying,' he says. 'My knees were shaking. I felt vulnerable and panicky. It was not what I was expecting. All the things he was telling me were not sinking in. Then my cousin Steven arrived, and we sat up drinking until 8am. From there, it was straight to a press conference. Every time I moved, 50 flashbulbs went off.' Unknown to the contestants, they had all been signed to agent Keith Woodhams. 'On the night I won, we were all up on stage, and one of the other housemates, Tom [McDermott], put his hand over my mic and said in my ear, 'F--k Keith Woodhams off'. I didn't know who he was talking about.' He soon found out. Woodhams wanted this new star to commit to a long-term contract, but Phillips was sensibly reticent. 'He kept pressuring me almost to the point of threatening me,' he says. 'I'd only been out of the house a week and was really enjoying the life – every famous person wanted to be my friend – but he was telling me it would all end tomorrow if I didn't sign. 'Davina had said to call her if I ever needed anything, so she put me in touch with her agent, John Noel. In the meantime, I had Max Clifford telling he'd make me a millionaire, but John understood what I needed.' Everyone wanted a piece of him, and after his exit from the Big Brother house, Phillips didn't go home for 97 days. For half a decade, he forged a career in DIY TV shows. Now, over 2000 television appearances later, that's taken a back seat. 'My fame, obviously, has declined,' he says candidly. 'I always expected it, and I'm not upset about it. Most stuff I've been offered over the past seven or eight years, I've turned down. The money didn't justify me doing that work. As Barbara Windsor once said to me, 'Television is a fantastic industry to be in – when you don't need it. Don't get to a point where you do.' Always with a strong work ethic – he started working in a butcher's shop at 13 after the death of his father – he makes his money today as he always did, in property. He's also a brand ambassador, an after-dinner speaker and has a lucrative YouTube channel (Mr & Mrs DIY). While many of the cast of series one turned their backs on the limelight, Big Brother quickly returned to TV, opening the floodgates for fame-seekers and show-offs with little to offer. Meanwhile, the original BB villain, Bateman, moved to Australia when he proved unable to shake off the Nasty Nick tag at home. 'We were very naïve,' muses Phillips, who's only occasionally in touch with a handful of the housemates today. Although he says he didn't follow subsequent series, he is aware of some of those who had an adverse experience on the show, including Jade Goody who, in the 2007 series, was part of a confrontation with Shilpa Shetty that saw her being branded a 'racist bully' by the Daily Mirror. 'She wasn't a racist,' asserts Phillips, 'she was just poorly educated. When she got angry, she'd go over the top'. As for the original cast from series one, Phillips says, 'We'd gone in not really expecting much, but we all got a lot from it. There was no social media then. But today, you need to be strong enough to accept you could come out very badly from it. It's a dangerous position to be in.' 'Fame and fortune do not go hand in hand.'
NZ Herald
15-07-2025
- Health
- NZ Herald
Off-lead dog on Ōrewa Beach sends fatal car crash survivor back into surgery
She was soon vomiting and by Monday was rushed by ambulance to hospital. Her bowel had burst after becoming knotted and blocked, she said. She was taken into emergency surgery, with doctors cutting 80cm from her bowel, having warned her she was a high-risk patient because of her previous injuries, she said. 'If it happened to me three years ago, it likely would have killed me,' Harris said about the dog's impact from her North Shore Hospital bed. Losing 10kg on her liquid diet, she recovered enough post-surgery to go home, only to end up infected and back in hospital last week, she said. Joanne Harris was back in North Shore Hospital last week with an infection after saying her bowel burst after an incident with an off-lead dog on Auckland's Ōrewa Beach last month. Photo / Supplied That led a friend to post on the Torbay, Waiake, Long Bay, NZ Facebook page calling for the owners of the white dog to come forward. Off-lead dogs are allowed on Ōrewa Beach during winter, but Harris claimed the white dog – while friendly - had been totally out of control, with its owners unable to catch it. Just before turning and running at Harris, it had also forced another beach-goer to pick up their small dog and try to get away, she said. She wanted the dog owners to come forward and accept accountability. It comes as Auckland Council considers dangerous and roaming dogs a top priority and is 'throwing all the resources' it has at the problem. It received 16,730 reports about roaming dogs in the past year, plus 1341 reports of dog attacks on people and 1523 reports of dog attacks on other animals. Joanne Harris said doctors had to drain toxic material from her stomach after her bowel burst. Photo / Supplied Auckland Council released a statement yesterday calling on the Government to give councils stronger powers to penalise dog owners and enforce Dog Control Act laws. 'Too many dog owners think it's okay to let their dogs have a wander. It's not,' Auckland councillor Josephine Bartley said earlier in the month. 'We have kids scared to walk to school and people living alone who don't want to leave their homes in case they get bitten.' Harris said she owns an English bull terrier and an American bulldog, and has taught them not to jump on people. While dog owners might think their loose animals wouldn't cause harm, they needed to remember the injured and vulnerable, Harris said. What if it 'were an elderly lady" that the dog jumped on, she asked. Harris said her trauma doctor from 2016 had visited her and said her old injuries wouldn't have caused her bowels to knot. She had been regaining her health over the past three years and starting to walk again in public. Joanne Harris is anxious to get out of hospital and back to her son and daughter. Photo / Supplied She said that on the day the dog jumped at her, she had gone out for one of her first coffees and beach walks since the accident. It was another painful setback coming through no fault of her own. In 2017, the Herald visited Harris along with Dr Marcus Chan – the man who had saved her life aboard an Auckland Rescue Helicopter. Harris said at the time that she had been driving over the Dome Valley Hill near Warkworth in north Auckland in 2016. She recalled seeing a van overtaking the cars in front of him and heading straight for her. She wondered whether to speed up or brake but realised she could not avoid the crash. She let go of the steering wheel, flinging her arm up to protect her face. 'I remember watching my hand ... fly across off [the] steering wheel and literally snap off my wrist in front of my face.' Joanne Harris owns an American bulldog and English bull terrier, which she says she has trained to never jump on people. Photo / Supplied Chan said Harris' crash injuries were 'immediately life-threatening'. She had no blood pressure and was screaming from the pain. The rescuers cut off the top of her car and moved the engine off her leg. Without Chan and the Auckland Rescue Helicopter arriving quickly, she likely would have bled to death. The helicopter was the only one at the time to carry emergency trauma doctors on board, and that meant Chan was able to give her lifesaving blood transfusions. She woke a month later in hospital having been in an induced coma. Her body was riddled with broken bones and she had suffered serious internal injuries, including lacerations to her lungs and liver. Her baby – who was at 34 weeks' gestation – did not survive. Harris said in 2017 she considered herself lucky, given she had been told that nine out of 10 people died from the types of injuries she suffered. Nevertheless, she's frustrated to be seriously injured again. It has cost her a long-planned trip to Great Barrier Island and yet more time in already hard-fought recovery. 'I would just not want my dog to cause this type of injury to anybody.' Sign up to The Daily H, a free newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
Telegraph
09-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
The celebrities who attended State banquet thanks to French connection
The star-studded guest list for the state banquet hosted by the King at Windsor Castle was nothing if not eclectic. Footballers and artists, rock stars and actors, were among the 160-odd guests who joined senior members of the Royal family for the white tie and tiara event, held in honour of French president Emmanuel Macron and Brigitte Macron, the first lady. But they all had one thing in common – a unique link to France. Some of the most recognisable guests who donned their glad rags to join the King and Queen, and the Prince and Princess of Wales, for a feast prepared with the help of French chef Raymond Blanc were: Elton John Owns a villa in the riviera The singer owns a sprawling villa on the French riviera in Nice. Dubbed the Yellow Palace, it has played host to celebrities from Elizabeth Hurley to the Duke and Duchess of Sussex. Mick Jagger A frequent visitor to France The Rolling Stones singer was invited to the Palace of Versailles for a lavish state banquet held in honour of the King and Queen's state visit to France in September 2023. He owns a château in the Loire valley, near Amboise. Jagger, who is said to be fluent in French, spends considerable time there and has integrated himself into village life. Joanne Harris Dual national whose novels are set in France The author, best known for her novel, Chocolat, has a French mother. Although she was raised bilingual, with French being her first language, she chooses to write in English, although her novels are often set in France. Dame Kristin Scott Thomas A Frenchwoman brought up in England The actress once described herself as a Frenchwoman who happened to spend her childhood in England. She lives in Paris and holds French and British nationality, taking both French and English acting roles. Mary Earps Plays for Paris Saint-Germain The former England goalkeeper has played for Paris Saint-Germain since last summer, when she swapped Manchester United for life in the French capital. She has joked that the language barrier has proved a challenge, admitting that while she has a good understanding of French, it takes her 'five to 10 working days' to respond to team-mates. Frédéric Sirieix The French maître d'hôtel The French maître d'hôtel best known for his role on Channel 4's First Dates. Raised in Limoges, he moved to the UK in 1992 and lives in south London. Antony Gormley Created sculptures based in France The acclaimed British sculptor has several notable sculptures in France. They include Site, a cast iron sculpture installed in the La Grave valley in the French Alps, and Open Space in Place Jean Monnet, Ville de Rennes. He has proposed a series of iron sculptures off the coast of Brittany. Gormley, who has a German mother, applied to become a German citizen in the wake of the Brexit 'tragedy'. Sebastian Faulks Novels based in France The author is best known for his bestselling historical novels set in France. He has spent several periods living in the country and has described himself as a Francophile. Michael Holbrook Penniman Grew up in Paris The singer more commonly known as Mika spent his early childhood in Paris after his family fled war-torn Lebanon. His family moved to London when he was nine.
BBC News
01-07-2025
- Entertainment
- BBC News
100 anonymous art pieces for 100th exhibition
More than 100 postcard sized pieces of art by local artists have gone on display at Candie Museum to celebrate the 100th Guernsey Arts exhibition at the Greenhouse art is nameless to the public, which artist Louise Le Pelley said meant visitors would have no "preconceptions" of the display also included two "wildcard" entries from Chocolat author Joanne Harris and Sophie Tea, best known for her online series 'charity shop Friday'.The art was being auctioned to raise money for Guernsey Arts and is on display until 24 August. The artists who took part were asked to depict "what art means to them" to create their Le Pelley, who neither confirmed nor denied taking part in the exhibition, said she finds art a great way to communication "without words and across cultures"."We just said to these artists, 'go crazy', do whatever you want as long as it is authentically you," she said."What's interesting is there are some artists who like to work with ceramics and so they've interpreted it that way."The team at Guernsey Arts said they took inspiration for the "current landscape" of the arts."[We thought] of how a lot of creatives are under threat from AI being used as a tool to create art," Ms Le Pelley said."We decided to merge these two concepts together to create an exhibition and fundraiser auction, whereby the artists have very kindly donated their pieces and all the proceeds will be going to fund future art projects so we can continue supporting artists for another 100 exhibitions."
Deccan Herald
28-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Deccan Herald
A call back to cosier, quieter times
Joanne Harris's 'Vianne' revisits the beloved Chocolat universe, exploring the heart of what came before in this nostalgic tale.
