BLONDE AMBITION
By Alison Boshoff
SHE claims her many successes are down to ‘pure luck’. But — with the announcement of her latest role standing in for Ant McPartlin on I’m A Celebrity . . . Get Me Out Of Here! — few will believe that Holly Willoughby has ever relied on chance.
Indeed, it feels as if landing this €550,000 monthlong presenting gig is just another inevitable triumph in her takeover of daytime television.
For Holly, whose girl-next-door charms belie a fierce ambition, has now become the highestpaid woman on British TV.
Consider her rivals. While in her Weakest Link prime, host Anne Robinson was on €1.1million a year. Carol Vorderman used to earn €1m a year for Countdown. Daytime stalwart Lorraine Kelly, who has been at it for decades, is on €900,000.
Tess Daly earns around €450,000 and Claudia Winkleman around €550,000 for Strictly Come Dancing, while Sky News anchor Kay Burley is on about €330,000.
Holly Willoughby, though, trumps them all as TV’s €2.6 million-a-year queen. With I’m A Celebrity (€550,000), plus This Morning (€670,000), Dancing On Ice (€220,000) and Celebrity Juice (€170,000), she comfortably exceeds that — and that’s before you add in the huge amount she earns from endorsements, including Diet Coke, for which she is apparently paid €500,000, and Garnier, which pays a similar sum for her to promote its hair dye and BB cream.
How curious, then, that such a chorus of dismay greeted Holly’s latest announcement. ‘I’m sick of the sight of her,’ exclaimed one viewer. Another complained: ‘She is on everything. I fear her popularity is overestimated.’
BUT the naysayers had better brace themselves because, within weeks, she will also be launching her lifestyle brand, Truly. Based, it seems, on the preposterously lucrative Goop site run by A-list actress Gwyneth Paltrow, Holly’s version will flog everything from face cream and T-shirts to toasters, cushions and baby wear.
Backed by Holly’s pal Peter Jones, of Dragons’ Den fame, its launch is being wildly anticipated by her 3.9 million Instagram fans. It seems the era of Holly has dawned. But it’s curious that she appears so keen to expand her empire when, back in January, she gave one of her carefully controlled interviews in which she stated she was about to step back from her formidable workload to spend more time with her three children — Harry, nine, Belle, seven, and Chester, three.
‘I don’t really want to do more, I just want to pause everything and keep everything as is,’ she said. ‘Work is in a really lovely place.’
So, how did this ‘girl-nextdoor’ become so powerful?
DEVOTED FANS IN HIGH PLACES
HOLLY, 37, who grew up near Brighton, has been attracted to celebrity since she was a teenager. At 14, she was on a school trip to the Clothes Show Live when she was spotted by Storm modelling agency. A career as a teen magazine model followed.
She then had a short-lived spell on S Club TV. Talentspotted by Nigel Pickard, the former boss of CBBC who was running ITV, she was cast in the Saturday morning show Ministry Of Mayhem opposite Stephen Mulhern in 2004.
After two years, Pickard asked her to move to prime time to present Dancing On Ice alongside Phillip Schofield. She said: ‘I will be grateful to [Nigel Pickard] forever and a day. Why he did it, I have no idea. Mornings I could do with my eyes shut, but in that prime time arena, I was like a rabbit in the headlights.’
A well-placed source said: ‘Nigel gave Holly her big break, though some people couldn’t see the point of her.
‘Simon Shaps, then director of television at ITV, was desperate for her, too.’
FALLING IN LOVE WITH THE BOSS
HOLLY says she has had only three boyfriends, and married the third. He is Dan Baldwin, five years her senior.
They met in 2004 when he was the producer on Ministry Of Mayhem and spent six months getting to know each other at work. She said: ‘We had six months of having such a laugh. We had this real friendship. There was this day — everyone was in the bar having a drink after the show and saying “cheers” to each other. ‘I looked at Dan, said: “Cheers” and, you know when you hold that eye contact a little bit too long? I got really embarrassed.
‘I thought: “That’s weird. I feel embarrassed over Dan.” That was it. The floodgates opened and I was totally in crush, totally fancied him.’
They were married in 2007 and held their reception at Amberley Castle, West Sussex. Holly walked down the aisle to the theme from Disney’s The Slipper And The Rose. She said: ‘I’d fantasised about being married since I was a little girl and dressed up in my mum’s wedding dress.’
Holly idolises her father, Terry, a double-glazing salesman, who put her and her sister through private school while mum Lynne stayed at home. She hopes for a longlasting marriage like them.
In an interview, she said: ‘Dan would say the same thing. No matter what happens to us now, I would say absolutely that we’ll stay together.’
She added she would not be able to forgive infidelity.
Dan was executive producer on Celebrity Juice and now produces Holly’s game show Play To The Whistle via his independent media company, Hungry Bear. He will go to Australia with her for I’m A Celebrity. So will the children and tutors will help them catch up on a month of missed school. Recent accounts from her media company Roxy show she and Dan paid themselves just over €1m in 2017.