Essex Boy: My Story (15 page)

I brought him to the club all the time, originally as a pull, but then that became irrelevant – I wanted him down there as a mate.
We would spend hours chatting, and I really trusted the
guy.

One evening we were chilling in Sugar Hut, and he said to me, ‘Kirk, I love this money, this club, this lifestyle.
I keep having an idea for a TV show, but I just don’t know if
it’ll work.’

‘Go on, try me – what do you mean?’

‘What do you think if we filmed what we’re doing?
I think people would want to see it, to see this Essex lifestyle.
Do you not think it would be a laugh?’

I thought it might be funny to give it a go, so I said, ‘Yeah, why not?’
and we discussed who would be good people in the area to follow as part of the show, characters who were
popular and very Essex.
He knew Mark Wright and said he thought he would be good, and I suggested Amy, of course!
I wasn’t being biased, though – she was really popular, and summed up
what Essex girls – at least the well-off, glam end – were about, and I knew she would be great viewing.
I also mentioned Sam Faiers, who was a regular at that club by then, and a school
mate of Amy’s, and I imagine Mark must have talked about her too, as at that time they were working together at Embassy nightclub, up in London’s West End.

So Brian went away and, along with his manager Adam Muddle, organized filming for a pilot for a possible show called
Totally Essex
.
For my part, I just had to talk to camera about my
money and my lifestyle.
I didn’t think too much about it at the time, and I didn’t expect it to lead to anything – it was more like a bunch of mates messing around with a video
camera at home.
You can still see the video on YouTube, if you want a laugh!

And that seemed to be the end of it, so I just got on with my normal life.
In fact we had something much more pressing to deal with at that time – Sugar Hut caught fire.

It was September 2009.
An electrical fault out the back started a blaze, and the structure survived but on the inside the place was completely destroyed.
We had to start again from scratch, and
the club was shut for eleven months before we got it up and running again.

It really ate into my dad’s business.
We had just got the club to a place where it was making good money, and then that happened.
It was pretty heart-breaking, especially as the insurance
company refused to pay out on a technicality.
Dad had to put £2 million into revamping the place.

Sugar Hut finally reopened again in August 2010 with a big launch party.
We wanted so badly for things to pick up where they had left off the year before, and keep getting stronger.
But other
clubs had sprung up in the meantime and people’s loyalties had changed, so we knew we had our work cut out to get them back.
Dad was pumping lots of money into it to get it going, and we were
constantly trying to think of ways to make it happen.
It put a lot of strain on him, Daniel and me as a family, because we are all very opinionated about the best way to do things, and with the
added financial pressure, we were mentally stretched to our limits.

About nine months after we had done the pilot with Brian, I got approached about a possible show in Essex, this time by a company called Lime Pictures.
It was to be called
The Only Way Is Essex
, and it seemed like this really was going to happen, because these were big bosses, not just a mate of mine who I was having a laugh with.
Also, it was being lined up
to go on ITV2, which meant this was serious stuff.

At this point I stopped and thought, ‘Do I really want to be on TV and be famous?’
It was a hard one.
I am not someone who has gone looking for fame.
In fact being put in front of a
crowd of people and being judged is one of my worst nightmares, as I have already said.
So to choose to put myself out there, on a national scale, was a genuinely scary idea.
But at the same time
there was another part of me that did like the idea of being on TV.
There must be a bit of us all that would like it – everyone on TV is an inspiration to someone, and I loved the idea of
being that person.

But that aside, I wanted to do it to help raise the profile of Sugar Hut.
The producers told me they wanted to film me mainly in the club, focusing on my life in there.
And as the venue had only
just reopened and hadn’t really picked up again yet, this seemed like the perfect opportunity for us.
We could buy radio adverts, place an ad in the paper, and all of that, but no marketing
would do as much as putting the club in a TV show.
So that was my main motivation, above all else.
And to add that little extra incentive, Dad didn’t want to be involved because he was
nervous about how the show was going to be perceived, and he was worried about looking shit, so he told me that for
TOWIE
I could pretend that I actually owned the club.

We decided I should go for it.
I was going to be one of
TOWIE
’s original founding cast members.
But sometimes I think now, if I could turn back time, I would never have done it; I
would never be famous in a million years .
.
.

The Only Way Is Essex

Filming for the first season of
TOWIE
started in September 2010, and it all felt a bit daft, but a good laugh.
We were supposed to just get on with normal life, and
then producers would talk to us about what we were up to and choose bits of what we were doing to film.
Of course it ended up being storylined in ways that I will explain in a minute, as that made
for more entertaining TV.

I was conscious of the cameras when they were there, and I can see now, watching myself in those early episodes, that at the start I did look uncomfortable with them.
The crew would sometimes
put crosses on the floor where we needed to stand, which makes it easier for the camera crew, and so I would walk along looking at the floor, then stop, and only then lift my head!
But I soon got
used to it all.

I had got my mum involved in the show, too, as I figured if they wanted the real me, then she was one hundred per cent a part of that.
I love looking out for her, and I wanted people not just to
see me in the club, but also to see the relationship I have with my mum – how we are there for each other and have a real bond.
And viewers did see that – in my very first scene I am
pulling up at my mum’s house to drop off some shopping for her, and then in my second scene I am talking about Amy with her, and getting her advice on my feelings.
And that is how it
continues in series one – you see her as my friend, my mum and the person I talk to about everything.
And that is exactly how my life was off the camera.

Because
TOWIE
is filmed with the aim that it is as close in time to real life as possible, I think we had only filmed about two episodes before it hit the screens.
And, wow!
Despite
everything the producers had told us they were hoping for, the reaction was still unbelievable.
The first show got over a million viewers when it aired on a Sunday, and I couldn’t believe it
– I don’t think I’d been aware of how much hype there was.

The next morning, going to work as normal, I called in to the bakery across the road from Sugar Hut.
The same bakery that I had been going to for a year, every morning, for my breakfast.
The
same bakery where no one who worked there had ever spoken to me other than to ask my order.
Not that Monday morning.

‘Kirk!
How are you doing?’
the guy behind the counter said to me.
‘What can we get for you, the usual?
Don’t worry about queuing, skip it – you are one of our
regulars, after all!’

I just looked at them and thought, ‘Wow, how shallow are you?
Just ’cos I was on TV last night, you’re treating me like this.
The fact that I have been a customer for a year
doesn’t count – one night on the TV, and I’m the best.’

And while other people might have loved it, I hated it.
Of course it was a positive in some ways, because I got my breakfast more quickly!
But I wasn’t comfortable with it, and could feel
everyone else in the queue staring at me.
The reality was it put a bit of a downer on my first day of TV fame.

One thing I did immediately change after that first episode was the number of sunbeds I was having.
Up until that point, I’d only had them now and then, to stop myself
looking too pale, but on-screen – well, it wasn’t enough!
I still looked really pale, especially as everyone else on the show was so tanned.
So I started going once a week at least, to
get some serious colour going.
And after a while the salon started to become a bit of a social thing.
Everyone in there knows each other, and now I can hardly ever go without seeing a mate and
having a good catchup with someone!

A lot of my scenes at this stage were with Amy.
Although we weren’t properly dating when the show started, we were in our usual on/off set-up, where we didn’t commit, but still
couldn’t stay away from each other.
The producers saw the potential in the chemistry between us and told us, ‘You two are brilliant together, the viewers love it!’

And they weren’t lying – they did!
We were one of the things about the show that people were discussing more than anything on Twitter, Facebook and other online forums.
They really
got into the dilemma of my jealousy, and her worrying I wouldn’t be faithful to her.

What I didn’t know at the time was that Amy was seeing two other guys outside of the show.
She loves being spoilt by her boyfriends, and she had these two blokes on the go, both of whom
were proper wining and dining and looking after her.
They were Joe Hurlock, who she eventually openly dated after we split on the show, and another guy called Ben.

On the other hand, I was single, apart from Amy.
By then I actually would have been up for a proper exclusive relationship with her, but she wasn’t ready to put in the effort.
At the same
time, whenever I flirted with anyone in Sugar Hut and it was filmed, I was made out to be the bad person, because no one knew Amy was seeing other people!
Amy was very good at getting inside my
head and playing with me.
I guess because by then I wanted to give things a proper go, she held the upper hand.
And she did make me think I was the one for her.

Then she asked me to get a tattoo of her name.
I wasn’t up for that, but I was already planning to get a tattoo on my leg of Bettie Page, the famous 1950s pin-up girl.
So I decided to make
it look more like Amy, as a bit of a tribute to her.
It was so weird the day I showed it to Amy – she turned up in this red dress, with red shoes and lipstick, and even two gold bangles
– exactly like my tattoo!

Amy loved the fact the public thought she was this sweet girl who was being messed around by me, and were really getting on her side.
It wasn’t fair because I knew what the public
didn’t — that she wasn’t fully committed to me but for the rest of the series Amy and I continued our same crazy on/off relationship.
I couldn’t stay away from her, but she
wasn’t prepared to do what was needed to make it a proper relationship either.

So at one point during the first series, when I was sick of Amy leading me on and then going back to the other guys, I knew I had to turn my head away from her.
I was talking
to one of the extras (ha!!!), Maria Fowler, and I said to her, ‘I’m sick of being single.
I need to find a nice girl, but someone more mature, not a young girl like Amy who
doesn’t know how to behave properly.’

She said, ‘Well, my mate is looking for someone, so I could set you up with her: Lauren Pope.’

And she looked at me expecting me to know who Lauren was.
I didn’t, but I asked around a few of my mates, and they did know her – she was famous as a Page Three model as we were
growing up, but I hadn’t really noticed all that.

So Maria gave me Lauren’s number and we started texting.
She was older – I was twenty-two at the time and she was twenty-nine – but she sounded like good fun, and we got on
well.
In true Kirk style I said we should meet up, but then I didn’t know what to do for a first date.

‘What do you want to do?’
I asked her.
I was off to do a photoshoot in London the next day, so she said, ‘Shall we go to the cinema?
I can meet you at the O2 after your shoot
and we can go to the cinema there.’

‘Good plan,’ I said.
‘The only problem is if we meet after my shoot, a car will have picked me up in the morning so I won’t be driving.
This sounds bad, but do you mind
dropping me home after?’

‘No, that’s fine.
Shall I reserve tickets in case it gets sold out?’

And I told her, yes, and that was all good.
I went to my shoot, then on to the O2.
And I was standing there waiting for her, and I didn’t know what she would be like.
I had googled her, of
course, but no one really looks like their picture.
But then she turned up, and I thought, ‘Wow!’
She was in skinny jeans, a beige jacket and a sexy pair of sunglasses, and she just
looked unreal.
I was blown away, but I was thinking, ‘Fuck, this is definitely going to be our last date, because she’s going to take one look at me and I won’t be good enough.
She looks like a supermodel!’

But we went for a few drinks, and we got on really well.
She was great company and we had a laugh, and I instantly felt relaxed with her.
Then we went to the cinema, and she picked up our
reserved tickets.
I was gutted because I hadn’t realized her reserving them meant she had paid for them as well, so I felt really bad.
We were watching that Facebook film,
The Social
Network
, and right at the end, even though she had told me she didn’t kiss on the first date, I thought, ‘I’ve got to go for this,’ so I did, and she kissed me back,
and it all just felt right.

Then she dropped me home.
How bad does that sound?
I could imagine her friends asking, ‘How did your first date go?’
And she’d have to say, ‘Well, I drove there, I paid
for the tickets, then I dropped him home.’

They would have been like, ‘Bin him off!’
So in one way it wasn’t my ideal first date, but in another way, it was – because she was great.

And then we started seeing each other properly.
But of course as Amy and I were still seen together on the show I felt I had to see Lauren in secret, while working things through with Amy.
It
was all a bit of a mess.
I felt as if Amy was
TOWIE
’s princess, and it seemed to me that she dictated what was filmed.
But then Amy decided she didn’t want to be with me any
more on-screen anyway, so I said to the producers, ‘Can we please bring in Lauren, as she really is my girlfriend, and if this is supposed to be our real lives, she needs to be on it!’
They agreed, and after that
TOWIE
started to feel closer to my real life – as far as my love life went, anyway.

The other big thing for me during that first series of
TOWIE
was my boxing fight with Mark Wright, which was the biggest load of bollocks, and still makes me angry to
this day.
Writing about it, I can feel the rage starting to rise up in me again.

Basically, I never had a problem with Mark Wright.
I didn’t know him before Brian Belo was putting together his pilot, and he invited Mark along to that.
I thought he seemed a nice enough
lad, and we got along fine.
In my opinion, the problem was more on Mark’s side, because he wanted what I had.
At the time he was a club promoter, whereas my dad owned a club.
All club
promoters like to think they will own a club one day, that is their ultimate aim.
I’ve never wanted what anyone else has – I’ve been given my lot and I am happy with it, and I
know I am lucky to have it, but not so with Mark.

You could always see his frustration bubbling under the surface because he wasn’t the big club person on the show in series one – that was me.
So he was constantly being competitive
and trying to undermine me – like when he opened Deuces bar and tried to take my staff away, and told me it was a contest between Deuces and Sugar Hut, him and me.
I always took it with a
pinch of salt, and would just laugh and go along with it.
But the
TOWIE
producers loved it, and were forever putting us in situations that would exaggerate the competition between us.
I
didn’t mind too much at first, as it was just banter, but then it started to become annoying.

One day Mark came over to me, off camera, and said, ‘Have you ever boxed before, Kirk?’

‘Never in my life, brother,’ I told him.

‘Well, I’m supposed to be doing this charity boxing match,’ he told me.
‘But the guy I’m meant to fight, I’ve heard he’s a bit of a boxer, and I
ain’t got a clue how to box.
Can we do it instead – you versus me in the boxing ring?
It’ll be a good storyline for
TOWIE
, and we’ll have a laugh.’

‘Course, mate,’ I said.
‘Especially if it’s for charity.’

So I signed up to do it, and Mark and I agreed not to train or take it too seriously, but just to fight it out on the day, and we discussed it on camera so that people would know about it.
And
every day Mark would call me up and say, ‘You ain’t training, are you, Kirk?’

And I told him, ‘Apart from jogging every day to get my stamina up, as I know you’re a footballer, no, I’m not.’

‘Thing is,’ he said, sounding worried, ‘everyone keeps telling me you can fight, and I haven’t had any time to train.’