COL OFF AFTER 30 YEARS TO STAR IN CALENDAR GIRLS
PRESENTER RETURNS TO ACTING TV’s Fern slams vicious online attacks on Loose Women host after live bust-up
Fern Britton says the trolling of Coleen Nolan after her fallout with Kim Woodburn on Loose Women is a “nonsense”.
The former This Morning host wasn’t impressed by the show or the reaction to it after the former Celebrity Big Brother housemates had a live spat.
It led to 53-year-old Coleen receiving a torrent of online abuse after being branded “trash” by Kim, 76.
The singer took a break from all upcoming work commitments, including a solo concert tour.
Fern said: “I’m going to be very honest and say that was a poorly executed item on the programme because it didn’t give either Kim or Coleen a clear route to reconciliation or conversation.
“Kim was still clearly very upset and Coleen as well, and so it was a mess. I mean we all have bad items on programmes, my God, I’ve done enough of them.
“But the worst thing about it is being attacked by the trolls online and so Coleen has had to pull her tour and petitions have been signed saying she shouldn’t be back on Loose Women and it’s all nonsense.
“The world is walking into bigger problems than this. Poor Coleen has suffered, Kim has suffered, just for something really that was a personal dislike of each other. That is blown up out of nothing and is so upsetting and hurtful and destructive for them and their families. It was bad.”
She added: “I only know things are bad because I have been there myself. I am not just going ‘they’re s*** and I’m great’. We all have bad times.”
Fern, 61, who left This Morning in 2009, has enjoyed an eclectic career since, writing a number of best-selling books, hosting shows including For What It’s Worth and Gordon Ramsay’s Culinary Genius and appearing on Strictly Come Dancing in 2012.
Her latest venture is Calendar Girls, which was inspired by the true story of a Women’s Institute group who posed naked for a calendar to raise funds for charity. It marks a return to acting after a 30-year gap and, after initially turning it down, she was wooed into taking the part by the show’s creators, Tim Firth and Take That singer Gary Barlow.
She said: “It is my first acting role in 30 years, which makes you wonder how good the last one was, doesn’t it? I did a couple of pantomimes, I was Dandini and Fairy Bowbells, then out of the blue this interest came last Christmas. Calendar Girls the musical was going on tour and they were interested in meeting.
“I said, ‘Oh no, they wouldn’t cast me, I’m not an actress’. The following week there was another message and I said ‘no, honestly’.
“Then the following week there was another message saying Gary Barlow
I’m going to be honest and say it was a poorly executed item on the show
would like to have a coffee with me. That was it, hooked.
“I had a meeting with Gary, Tim, the producer, casting director and the director of the show. I did a reading having said to them all, ‘ If this is s***, you have to tell me. Don’t pretend it’s OK.’ I was turfed out on the pavement, phoned my agent and said: ‘Oh dear, I think I’ve got the job.’ So here I am.”
The UK tour, which also stars Karen Dunbar, Denise Welch and Ruth Madoc, started in Leeds in August and will come to Edinburgh in October and Aberdeen in February.
Every day has been a schoolday for the presenter turned actress, who is mar r ied to chef Phi l Vickery and has four children.
She said: “I am thrilled to be a part of it and take on another challenge.
“I don’t mind being challenged, it’s been exciting. I’m still learning and the company have been extremely generous towards me. I am trying as hard as I can to step up to the mark for them.”
Fern is playing the role of Marie, the chairwoman of the WI group who does her utmost to block the naked calendar, which means she keeps her clothes on.
She said: “They are all gorgeous women but we are women of certain ages, llifef experiences andd childrenhld so our bodies aren’t fresh out of the package but they look wonderful. The reaction is incredible as are the messages that even I get from people saying how thrilled they were to see these women.
“One or two have written to me and said I can’t even put a bikini on, I can’t put a swimsuit on, I can’t let my husband see me without my clothes on. All these normal women. We’ve all got cellulite, we’ve all got breasts of all shapes and sizes and pertness – or unpertness – and it’s fine.”
The tour goes into next year and she is open to anything which comes her way if it interests her, although a return to This Morning when Holly Wi lloughby heads off to Australia as the co-host of this year’s I’m A Celebrity... is unlikely.
She said: “I know the answer has to be no because I am on tour so I wouldn’t be able to do it.
“I’m 61 now, I’ve had nearly 40 years in television and I’ve loved every minute of it and it’s not that I want to talk myself out of work.
“I don’t, but I also appreciate that there are very young, very good, new, talented people coming along and it is right to say to yourself, ‘I have had a good run at this’.
“My children are growing up and I want a bit more time for myself.”