‘ Nikolai promises to get clean to save relationship with Kate’
LAST MONTH, GRAZIA reported that Kate Moss had ended her relationship with Nikolai von Bismarck as a result of his hard partying, with friends fearing she would ‘get back with him out of habit’. Now it appears that Kate’s resolve has already weakened, with the super said to have given her aristocratic boyfriend another chance – on one condition.
‘Kate has told Nik they can give things another go if he cleans up his act,’ said one associate of the couple. ‘They had crisis talks the night before she flew to Japan for a recent work trip, and he agreed that things had to change.’ Since Kate threw Nik out of her North London home in October, he’s been lying low at his mum – and Kate’s friend – Debbie von Bismarck’s house in West London. He’s also thought to have attended rehab sessions.
Kate was previously reported to have ordered Nik to a treatment centre in May, after he hallucinated, jumped through a window and attempted to chase a statue in the grounds of her Cotswolds home. ‘Kate’s made it very clear that this is his last chance,’ continued the source. ‘She hoped that throwing him out would be the wake-up call he needed and her ultimatum seems to have worked. He’s kept out of trouble and is doing what he can to get clean.’
Last week, the couple were pictured kissing while out with Kate’s daughter Lila Grace, with whom Nikolai is said to have a strained relationship. They also celebrated Halloween together at KX restaurant, spa and private members’ health club in Chelsea. ‘Kate wants the relationship with Nikolai to work, but the only way that’s going to happen is if he sticks to his word,’ added the source.
‘I’M MY OWN WORST ENEMY,’ announces Professor Green. ‘A divorce is on the cards if I don’t get my arse in gear… I’m asking for it. A b***ard ain’t I?’
So goes the rapper’s comeback single One Eye Onthe Door. It tells the story of 61 missed calls from his wife after staying out too late, furious rows, an apparently dull sex life and the fear of being kicked out of his own home.
It’s his first single since 2014, but a lot has happened in that time. Chiefly, his marriage to – and divorce from – the Quality Street heiress Millie Mackintosh, a match so unlikely that it inspired widespread fascination.
Then there is his burgeoning side-career as a documentary-maker. Last year, he released Suicide And Me, a moving film based on his father’s suicide when he was just 24. Its success led him to Parliament, where the story was shown to MPS to raise awareness of the epidemic of suicide among young men.
Two more documentaries, an autobiography detailing his difficult Hackney upbringing, activism on mental health, and two further films to be completed by Christmas have solidified Professor Green (real name Stephen Manderson) as one of the most interesting talents in UK music. Not to mention rumoured flings with the socialite Kate Rothschild and the chef Gizzi Erskine since his divorce in February.
But back to that song. The single has been widely interpreted as referring to Millie. Other choice lyrics include, ‘Me and the Mrs, we are getting along ’til I do something wrong and it’s another domestic’ and ‘People wanna know what my life’s like… what my wife’s like. It gets crazy in bed – we watch a couple episodes of a box set and then it’s night night.’
Despite the candid wording, he has hit back at claims that the song tells the ‘explosive’ inside story behind his divorce. ‘This is not a break-up song,’ he tells Grazia. ‘It’s about a situation that occurred in a relationship, not the breakdown. It’s about that feeling when all of a sudden it’s six in the morning and I’ve stayed out longer than I said I would. It’s about the paranoia and the guilt, and knowing you’re gonna get it in the neck.’
Did he feel at odds in Millie’s well-heeled environment? ‘Mate, I never moved into that West London world,’ he scoffs. ‘I have the same morals and values anywhere I go, and I have the same circle of friends that I’ve always had. It’s what keeps my world normal.’
It may have been a difficult few years, but I believe him when he says he’s happy. ‘I’m content and I’m just enjoying all of it,’ he continues. ‘It feels pretty good putting music out again and the response has been amazing.
‘I haven’t just had a turbulent couple of years. My turbulence has been my entire life. But the end of my marriage has taught me that’s there is no permanence in life.
‘You have to accept that most things are temporary and there’s a real positive to be drawn from that. These days, I’m just happy.’ Professor Green’s single ‘One Eye Onthe Door’ is out now. Green will take part in Southbank Centre’s BAM – Being A Man festival on 27 November
DIVORCE? THESE DAYS I’M HAPPY WORDS HANNAH FLINT
WHEN SANJIDA WAS 10, she was playing in the street near her house when an older girl from a nearby village drugged and kidnapped her. She was taken to Haryana in the north of India, 2,000km away from her home in Assam, and kept as a slave for four years.
‘ I was made to do all the work in the house and was treated like cattle. I cried for a year,’ she says. ‘I was desperately unhappy. I couldn’t run away or bring my life to an end. There was no one I could ask for help.’
When she was 14, her traffickers sold her into marriage and, by the time her frantic father found her, she was already three months pregnant and unable to leave. If she had gone with her father she and her baby would have been ostracised by their community, as raising a child
I CRIED FORAY EAR. I COULDN’T RUN AWAY. THERE WAS NO ONE I COULD ASK FOR HELP
without a husband is seen as bringing great shame on the family.
Sadly, her plight is all too familiar in one of India’s most patriarchal states. In Haryana, a preference for male babies – leading to feticide and infanticide – has created a severe gender imbalance. The shortage of women has led traffickers to kidnap and sell young girls as slave brides to men who are desperate to marry.
‘It’s about an extreme lack of value for girls,’ says Poonam Muttreja, a government adviser on family issues in India. ‘Men could marry their boys to girls from other parts of the country in the normal, respectful way, but it’s the lack of respect for women that means they turn to slave bride trafficking instead. They treat them as commodities that can be recycled and resold.’
Muklesha’s story is equally shocking. When she was 12, her aunt sold her to be married to a man in his seventies and she gave birth to their child aged 14. A year later, her husband died and she was sold once again, this time to a man who was so violent towards her she’s too traumatised to tell the police where she’s from. She is now in a safe house away from her husband.
India’s slave brides are the subject of a documentary, which is due to be broadcast on Al Jazeera this week. In the film, Mary Ann Jolley meets the young women in Haryana who have been snatched from their families and trafficked as slaves for marriage. Speaking to Grazia, she explains how emotional their stories were. ‘We heard the same tale of appalling abuse over and over again,’ she says. ‘It’s almost impossible to imagine what it must be like to be taken from your family as a child and married to a man decades older and treated with unbelievable cruelty. These women have no one and suffer alone. It’s amazing they survive and keep going.’
Sanjida, now 24, is considered one of the lucky ones. Remarkably, her husband has treated her kindly. Fourteen years on from her kidnap, she has four children and is determined to help other slave brides. She now works for a local NGO to empower trafficked women, stating, ‘No one should have to go through what I did.’
The Indian government is drafting its first ever anti-trafficking laws, but Poonam thinks that it’s social norms that need to change. She believes it’s the lack of respect for girls that is behind India’s slave bride trade – where few women live happily ever after.