GET HELP BERNIE
GILLIES’ ADVICE TO TENNIS ACE
WHETHER you’re mad about her, she drives you mad or you think she’s stark raving mad, you can’t take the shine off Jackie Gillies.
Best-known these days for her roles in Real Housewives of Melbourne and more recently, I’m A Celebrity Get Me Out of Here, the professional psychic medium turned reality TV dah-ling has hit the road on a national tour that lands on the Gold Coast on May 27.
A first for Gillies, the Shine It Up show is more than a communal psychic reading – it’s a self-empowerment party Gillies hopes will inspire and motivate audiences to find their shine.
“Tony Robbins meets Ellen meets John Edward meets Oprah,” she says.
Gillies, the wife of Silverchair drummer Ben Gillies, is donating a percentage of all ticket sales from her tour to her I’m A Celebrity charity, the Moira Kelly Creating Hope Foundation.
She says her focus is to bring people together to share stories, gain clarity and restore their inner sparkle so they can – you guessed it – truly shine.
Sadly, her chance to help her I’m a Celebrity castmate Bernard Tomic find his shine in the South African jungle was cut short when the tennis ace quit the show after three days.
“Half the time during the day, I’m just depressed,” the troubled Gold Coast tennis player told Gillies before his dramatic exit from the show.
“I don’t want to spend half my time depressed here ... thinking about how I played last year and where I should be.”
Gillies says she made Tomic promise he’d get professional help for his depression as soon as he returned home.
“I found him very sensitive. I knew he was depressed,” she says.
“All he’s ever known is tennis. What made me cry was the fact this kid had never gone camping. He was depressed. The kid says some dumb shit.
“I told him to go get the help you need from a psychologist and get back on that tennis court and bring back the Bernard everyone knows you are – you’re f**king around.
“I know you need a break but you’re doing it the wrong way.”
Like most Tomic fans, Gillies was disappointed when she heard Tomic had returned home and hit the Coast’s nightclub strip instead.
“He doesn’t understand,” she says. “He came back and did the wrong thing. He thought the only way to get over a depressive state of mind is to go out and get drunk. I don’t want to be too hard on him.”
Of course, the good news for Tomic is it’s never too late to find your shine.
Jackie Gillies’ Shine It Up plays the RACV Royal Pines Resort on May 27.
Tony Robbins meets Ellen meets John Edward meets Oprah