Robbie Williams interview for The Times by Polly Vernon
“Look! Down there!” he says. We’re standing, Rob and I (I’ve been told to call him Rob, not Robbie), on the balcony outside his bedroom; he points down the garden, past the tree into which a couple of handymen are hoisting a chandelier, to a plot of land beyond. This is where he intends to build a third house. “I’m going to put my art in it,” he says. Not his art collection – his own self-produced art, examples of which are strewn all over house No 1, hanging on walls and leaning up against skirting boards, punctuated by the occasional Banksy print. Banksy is Williams’s inspiration. Well, sort of: “I watched Exit through the Gift Shop and thought, ‘I can do that,’ ” he says.
Robbie Williams is as entitled and arrogant, and also riddled with self-doubt, as any human you’re ever likely to meet. “I was going through my I Don’t Want To Be A Pop Star Any More phase. I think that’s a phase everybody goes through. Chris Lowe from the Pet Shop Boys told me he did the same thing.” The I Don’t Want To Be A Pop Star Any More phase kicked in two years ago, and it begat the Artist phase – “I bought a load of canvases and a load of paint and I stayed in the garage until something looked half decent” – but then, Robbie Williams decided that he did still want to be a pop star after all, and in July 2010, he rejoined Take That, the boy band that had made him amazingly, confusingly and conflictingly famous in the first place.
The fluctuating fortunes of Robbie Williams are well documented. He’s 37 years old, and he’s been famous for nearly two decades. In the early Nineties, Williams became famous as the youngest and most wayward member of Take That, the band he joined following an open audition when he was a 16-year-old schoolboy from Stoke-on-Trent. Then, in 1995, he became famous as the one who walked out of the band while it was at its height of teenage girl mania-inducing, million-pound-spinning success.
In the late Nineties, Williams became famous as an extremely successful solo artist, whose defining anthem Angels is one of the most played songs at funerals across the land, and whose private life generated at least as much press as his singing career. Through much of the 2000s, he was famous as an LA-dwelling Howard Hughes-ish recluse, as a has-been whose faltering musical fortunes and somewhat questionable fascination with alien abduction played out against the backdrop of Take That’s rebirth, a pop resurrection so assured and well received that it eclipsed the heights reached by the band the first time around.
Now, of course, he’s famous for being the one who went back to Take That, who reunited with its four existing members (Mark Owen, Howard Donald, Jason Orange and Williams’s one-time nemesis turned friend, collaborator and supporter, Gary Barlow) for 2010’s multimillion selling album Progress, and 2011’s instant sell-out stadium tour.
But, back to the art. Williams is proud of it. He holds a piece or two up for my inspection. It’s not half as bad as you’d imagine. It is wordy and bold, large stencilled declarations or visual puns (by Williams’s own admission, “I can’t paint. Or draw”). I am particularly impressed by one, a pastiche of the Little Chef sign. Williams has changed the wording so that it reads “Little Thief”, and if you look closely enough at the illustrated chef logo, you’ll see it bears a resemblance to Gary Barlow.
“I did the Little Thief one for Gaz,” Williams says. “He’s here, been here all week, working on songs for a new album.” The album may not happen, but yes, Gary Barlow is here – sunbathing by the pool, wearing shorts which are later described to me, by an eyewitness, like this: “If they weren’t actually Speedos, they were definitely very short, and very tight.”
“I did two more paintings last week,” Williams says. “Wrote three songs. Did a radio show.”
None of this has anything to do with Farrell, the menswear line Williams has launched, and the reason he’s granted me an interview. I am under strict instructions to question him at length about it, but Williams doesn’t really want to talk about that. He is still wayward, you see. He knows what he is supposed to be doing and he is choosing not to do it.
Oh, he goes through the motions for five minutes or so. Headlines: Farrell was named after Williams’s maternal grandfather Jack “the Giant Killer” Farrell, the man who, according to my Farrell briefing, semi-raised Williams, whose father left the family home when he was 3. Or did he? “No. Well, kind of. He was just a big friendly giant killer. Who wanted me to be a man.”
The collection includes duffel coats and military coats and frock coats and herringbone pants – very much men’s wear, as opposed to skinny-jeany, baggy-vested trendy boy wear. Rob was “very involved” in the design process, although he won’t say how, exactly, beyond suggesting that shirt collars were shorter and stash pockets sit here, and generally, “being finicky”.
What do you want from Farrell? Do you want it to be very successful?
“Yeah. I’d love it to be really really successful. Yeah! I’m seeing flagship stores. I’m seeing it in Savile Row. I’m seeing Singapore. I’m seeing out here.”
Do you want it to make lots of money?
“Yes. I really like Liam’s [Gallagher] clothes. I really like Pretty Green. But I remember him doing an interview and saying, ‘I’m not doing this for money.’ I was thinking, ‘Why not? You get paid. That’s great, innit?’ ”
I presume designing clothes wasn’t something you’ve burnt to do, from childhood on? “No. But singing wasn’t.”
And finally: he doesn’t like the people within the fashion industry. “They’re w***ers.”
Then, bam! Robbie Williams tires of promoting the thing he’s supposed to, and changes tack dramatically.
“What research did you do for this interview?” he asks.
Um… I read a lot of recent interviews, but honestly, I’ve been researching this piece for 20 years. I’m a Take That fan.
“Are you? Ha. You know who else is a Take That fan? Rose West!”
Really?
“Yes! Somebody sent me a link! Rose West is in jail, humming along to Take That songs!”
Which ones?
“I don’t know which ones!”
How does that make you feel?
“Proud!”
And he’s off, on vast rambling conversational departures that have nothing to do with anything much, but which take in his favourite websites, his inability to sleep in the big bedroom in which I interview him (“I grew up in a boxroom. I can’t sleep if there’s too much space.” Shame given how rich you are, I say. Must be problematic. “Not really, babe. No”); his speculations on the future of print journalism and the nature of modern celebrity, and his motivations for making the move to Los Angeles 11 years ago (“I came here for the women”).
What I really want to know, though, is this: is Robbie Williams bonkers? That’s the big question, isn’t it? From a distance, anyone observing his behaviour, and the twists and turns of his life to date, might wonder. He’s often seemed more than a little broken; brokenness has been interwoven into his public profile. Even at his most successful as a solo artist, Williams’s lyrical USP has been to hint at how lost he was, how angry about Take That and the band’s overbearing Svengali of a former manager, Nigel Martin-Smith (Williams’s 1998 single No Regrets is devoted to that), how he’s incapable of loving any woman other than his mother (for whom he wrote Angels). He has never struck me as especially happy.
Beyond that: is he sober, or on the brink of a relapse? Williams has battled drug and alcohol addictions publicly and questions about the progression of his recovery were raised following his last attempt at a solo comeback, when he performed very shakily indeed at a 2009 X Factor live show. He looked wild-eyed and crazy throughout, and he’s said that it was this experience that served as a catalyst for his I Don’t Want To Be A Pop Star Any More phase. He’s admitted to depressive periods, to injecting testosterone to deal with that; his weight has fluctuated, and he’s had a series of very public feuds with other celebrities – this summer he had a spat with Noel Gallagher that revolved around Williams’s alleged man boobs.
In 2008, Williams got caught up in alien abduction theory when the journalist Jon Ronson made a documentary about a pilgrimage he and a bushily bearded Williams took to the Nevada desert in search of the truth. Plus he’s already told me he hasn’t left this house once in the four weeks or so since he came off the Take That tour – although he has shipped many other people in. He is, he says, an excellent host.
Are you happy, Rob?
“Yeah. I was just saying. Things have never looked so up. There’s contentment, and… just recording a new [solo] album. And knowing that it’s really strong. And I’ve got a few other things on the horizon. Things feel very complete. Things feel very do-able.”
He pauses.
“I get it a bit more.”
Are you depressive, still?
Another pause.
“Yes.”
Do you think depression will always be part of your life?
He pauses again. He is less garrulous now.
“Yeah.”
Williams has said in past interviews that he thinks he triggered his own depression by taking too much Ecstasy when he was younger, and that this depleted the levels of serotonin in his brain. Does he still believe that?
“I don’t know what it was. It was there before. I think pills and drugs were my medicine. And drink. I chose that, to try to ease it. To medicate the problem that was already there. Which exasperated [sic] it and turned it into something worse.”
Following stints in rehab, he says he is now sober, and there is nothing about him that suggests otherwise. He is very present, engaged, considered. I can’t see evidence of man boobs lurking beneath the Farrell check shirt he’s wearing. He smokes more than anyone I’ve ever met, mind you, lighting one Silk Cut after another after another.
“Do you smoke?” he asks.
No, I say.
“Sorry, darling. Sorry,” he says, and he puffs on.
How do you deal with depression now you’re off the booze and drugs?
Williams doesn’t answer.
Is it just… less of an issue?
“Much less of an issue. And… I’m on stuff that stops it.”
Antidepressants?
“Yeah.”
They do the trick?
“Have you taken them?”
No.
“Right. They do do the trick, but, I think that the pharmaceutical companies are as bad as drug dealers. Because I don’t know what it is that I’m putting in my system. I don’t think it’s 100 per cent great for you. I think there’s poison in there. I think it depletes your natural ability to do it for yourself. But you’re in a Catch-22 situation, because when you try to come off it, you get sick…”
Then, there’s marriage. It would suit Williams – who can talk about “invisible strings in the universe” and “beautiful stories”, and invoke emotional journeys and pleasing narrative arcs as well as any modern celebrity equipped with a basic grasp of pop psychology – to say that he’d been saved by love. But the fact is, he probably has been a bit saved by love. Until Ayda Field, there was no one, really. Endless one-night stands, some of whom would trot off to the tabloids afterwards; rumoured liaisons with Rachel Hunter, Spice Girl Geri Halliwell, Tara Palmer-Tomkinson… Then came Field, a TV actress best known for a role on a US soap opera, with whom Williams has been in a relationship since 2006. He proposed to her live on an Australian radio show in 2009, a gesture that was presumably designed to be as headline-garnering as it was romantic; they married, in a small ceremony held at this house, in August 2010.
Williams references Field constantly and incidentally, in the style of anyone who is besotted and a little dependent. Field flits in and out of the interview apologising for the intrusion, saying she must find such-and-such. Williams says, “It’s my wife! Come here, wife!” He tells me he’s teaching her to swear with a Stoke accent. When Field catches Williams telling me about his past life, the drugs he did and the women he slept with, she says, “Boosie!” in mock admonishment.
“I did, Boo. I did. I did drugs. I slept around,” he says.
Are you a good husband?
“Yeah! Yeah yeah yeah!”
What makes you so good?
“I don’t cheat on her. That’s the main one. That was the main worry that I had.”
Monogamy hasn’t been your thing, has it?
“Well, I haven’t had to. I haven’t had to monogamise.”
So you didn’t know if you were capable of it?
“I didn’t want to be capable. All the way through my twenties, I wanted someone who would fix me. Then I wanted a maid. But I didn’t even find them! We’re fed a load of bulls*** about love, from the day we arrive on this planet. Through films and music and literature. And you hold it in such high esteem, put it on this pedestal… And the guilt! The guilt! I knew I wasn’t going to be able to do what a woman needed me to do! So I went, ‘Right! I’m going to be single.’ ”
You didn’t think you were capable of a relationship?
“I didn’t want one. I think up till now, with relationships, I’ve played it well. I waited till I was well into my thirties, I did what I needed to do, I got here without any kids. Now I’m a bit older, a bit more mature, kids will come.”
You want kids?
“Yeah. I do.”
How many?
“She wants a football team. I want two. A boy and a girl.”
Have you got names for them?
“Yeah.”
What?
“Should I? Is that something that I should do?”
Yes!
“Woody! Woody and Sonny! Cool, eh?”
Is this… imminent?
“Next year. Next year! She wants to get on it now, but… just got back off tour. There’s a stretch from now till Christmas… and then, we’ll do some practising.”
Then: “Do you want to see my dressing room?”
Of course I do.
It is huge. Bigger than the ground floor of my entire flat. It’s reached through a big, marble-clad bathroom; it has windows along one side and endless, Savile Row-ish wooden portals and wardrobes. Clothes are folded and hanging neatly, everywhere. So many clothes. Williams strokes T-shirts and jumpers and dates them, tells me when they were acquired, when he wore them: “This one [emblazoned with the legend I Love Blackpool] is 1998, and this…” He unfolds a sweater with a ghastly Christmas design on it. “Two thousand and… ten.”
He says he loves clothes.
“Love getting dressed, love feeling when you leave the house that you’ve got your armour on, your magical suit that will see you through.”
Have you always loved clothes?
“Always.”
“Um… Have a look! I think we were all given, like, £30 to go and buy stuff from [clothes emporium] Afflecks in Manchester. And I think, in the early days, Jason Orange was very much the stylist. So if you want to ask questions about lycra and leather jackets with studs and tassels on them, Jason’s your man.”
I wonder how he is dealing with the ageing process. He was a pin-up, a much-fancied pretty boy whose particular variety of fame meant that he was as objectified and lusted over as much as any girl. He is still good looking – surprisingly tall, with a big, open face, which is largely wrinkle-free, so I’m wondering about Botox – but of course, he’s also older, less dewy. You’re doing well for wrinkles, I say, suspiciously.
“Mum’s got good skin. Dad’s got good skin.”
You hair’s staying. Congrats.
“It’s got thinner though.”
Would you have surgery?
“Yes! Yeah. I don’t know why people lie about it.”
Have you had anything, yet?
“No. But I would.”
What?
“F***ing everything. I’ve been watching Celebrity Big Brother. Did you see it? And Darryn Lyons with his sculpted abs…”
Darryn Lyons, the publicity-friendly owner of the Big Pictures picture agency, became briefly famous this summer after displaying, in the Celebrity Big Brother house, the results of abdominal surgery on his naked torso. Williams was impressed.
You’re thinking about it?
“I am thinking about it. I haven’t had abs since I was 17.”
You had great abs.
“I did.”
Do you look at pictures of yourself from then, and think, I was gorgeous?
“Do you want to see one?”
He takes me into the studio beyond the dressing room, where middle-aged men who look a bit like Pete Waterman are twiddling with guitars. Williams shows me a set of three close-up shots of his face, taken when he was in his late teens, swaddled in a hoody. He is beautiful. Terrifyingly young, wondrously fresh-faced, with bruises of shadows beneath his eyes.
“Seventeen. Backstage at Wembley,” he says.
You were – perfect, I say.
“Yes,” he says.
When was the last time you felt handsome?
He pauses for a long time.
“Years ago.”
Really?
“Yeah. It’s not something that I generally feel.”
But… you’re a pin-up.
He lights another Silk Cut.
“Yeah, but… when you put weight on, go up and down… stay awake for three nights on the trot, get your picture taken looking f***ing horrendous… all of that… The image of me isn’t the one that you see, and it isn’t the one Ayda sees, but… I really enjoy Ayda’s version of me.”
What is Ayda’s version of you?
“She really digs me. She thinks I’m amazing.”
So, ultimately, I am forced to conclude that Robbie Williams isn’t especially bonkers at the moment – unusual, certainly, but not certifiable – and that he might even be quite happy. Although he does still believe in aliens. “Absolutely. Although I am also open to the fact that it is all bulls***. Same goes for God.”
He rambles on. He tells me how great the Take That reunion was. He tells me how great the prospective solo album is shaping up to be, and how brilliant it’s been, working with Barlow (“I’m kind of in love with Gary Barlow”).
He tells me he loves LA. “Because it’s basically desert energy. Mixed with a load of d***heads. If you throw a stone from here, you’ll hit one. But I don’t do that any more. They’re not keen on that, in the housing association.” And he tells me that Charlie Sheen has a house a little down the road, and that when Sheen is really kicking off, the sky fills with helicopters and it all gets rather thrilling.
Eventually – just as he’s telling me how rich he is (“Really really rich. It’s unfathomable”) – the PR from Farrell calls time on us, and the interview ends. He seems sorrier even than I am. Rob(bie) Williams does like a chat.
“Can I show Polly my land?” he asks Josie, his manager.
“No Rob, you can’t,” she tells him.
“Sorry, Poll,” he says. “Can’t show you my land.” He hugs me goodbye, and I leave him calling for Gary Barlow.
Farrell, a collection devised by Robbie Williams, is available now exclusively at House of Fraser and very.co.uk; farrell.com
"Guarda!Laggiù" mi dice.Siamo io e Rob (lui mi ha chiesto di chiamarlo Rob nn Robbie) sul balcone fuori dalla sua camera da letto;lui indica verso il giardino,oltre l'albero in cui due operai stanno sollevando un candeliere,verso un pezzo di terra.Lì è dove intende costruire la terza casa."Ci metterò la mia arte dentro"dice.Non la sua collezione d'arte ma i suoi quadri che ora si trovano sparsi in tutta casa,appesi o appoggiati al muro intervallati da qualche stampa di Banksy.Per Rob Banksy è una specie di ispirazione "Ho guardato Exit dal negozio di regali e ho pensato,posso farlo questo".
Robbie come ogni essere umano è un misto di sicurezza e arroganza insieme ad insicurezza e tanti dubbi su se stesso."Ho attraversato la fase 'Non voglio più essere una popstar'.Una fase che tutti passano,credo.Chris Lowe mi ha detto che lui ha passato la stessa fase.Io l'ho attraversata circa 2anni fa dopo l'esibizione di X-Factor e generò la fase da artista,ho comprato tante tele e colori e sono rimasto chiuso in garage fino a che non è uscito qualcosa di decente" - Ma poi ha deciso di voler essere ancora una popstar e si è riunito con i Take That nel 2010,la band che lo ha reso famoso.
Ha 37 anni ed è famoso da due decenni.Negli anni 90' divenne famoso come il più giovane e ribelle membro dei TT,la band ha cui si unì quando era un ragazzino di 16 anni di Stoke on Trent.Poi nel 1995 divenne famoso per aver lasciato il gruppo all'apice del successo.
Dalla seconda metà degli anni 90' ebbe un enorme successo come solista,la cui vita ha riempito pagine e pagine di giornali ed Angels è diventata l'inno più suonato ai funerali di tutto il paese.
Ora si è riunito agli altri 4 membri dei TT per un album che ha venduto milioni di copie e un tour di enorme successo.
Ma torniamo alla sua arte,mi lascia vedere un paio di quadri,ne va molto fiero.Non sono brutti come ci si aspetterebbe.Sono pieni di parole e audaci,sono dichiarazioni fatte a stencil o giochi di parole visive (lui ammette"non sono molto bravo a disegnare o dipingere").
Rimango colpita da uno in particolare,una riproduzione dell'insegna di Little Chef (Piccolo cuoco) a cui ha cambiato le parole in Little Thief (Piccolo Ladro) e se lo guardi da vicino si può vedere che il cuoco assomiglia un pò a Gary Barlow."Questo dipinto l'ho fatto per Gary,che ora è qui in casa,c'è stato tutta la settimana per lavorare alle canzoni del nuovo album".Infatti Gary sta prendendo il sole a bordo piscina con dei mini calzoncini.
"Ho dipinto altri 2 quadri la scorsa settimana,scritto 3 canzoni e fatto uno show radiofonico"
Non abbiamo ancora parlato della sua linea di moda Farrel,il motivo per cui ho ottenuto l'intervista,ho avuto precise istruzioni a riguardo,ma Robbie nn sembra di volerne parlare.
E' ancora il ribelle,sa quello che deve fare e sceglie di non farlo.
Ma ora entriamo in argomento:La linea Farrell si ispira a tuo nonno materno Jack che ti ha fatto quasi da padre quando il tuo se ne è andato?"In un certo senso,lui era il gigante buono che voleva che diventassi un uomo".
Immagino che disegnare abiti nn sia un sogno che coltivi da quando eri bambino?"No ma neanche cantare lo era".
E finalmente:A lui non piacciono le persone che lavorano nell'industria della moda "sono dei c***oni"
Poi Bam!Rob cambia argomento e mi chiede che ricerche ho fatto per questa intervista e mmm bè ho letto un pò di riviste,ma sono 20 anni che faccio ricerche essendo una fan dei TT
"Lo sei?Ha.E sai chi altro lo è?Rose West".Davvero? "Si,qualcuno mi ha mandato un link.Rose West in carcere che canta le canzoni dei TT". Come ti ha fatto sentire?"Orgoglioso".
Parliamo di tante cose,ma niente in particolare,come i suoi siti preferiti,la sua incapacità di dormire nella camera da letto grande,nella quale lo intervisto("Sono cresciuto in uno sgabbuzino,nn riesco a dormire se c'è troppo spazio"),le sue speculazioni sul futuro della carta stampata e della natura della celebrità moderna e dei motivi che lo hanno spinto a trasferirsi a LA 11 anni fa ("Sono venuto qui per le donne")
Quello che voglio veramente sapere è 'Robbie Williams è pazzo?'.Chiunque osservi la sua vita e i suoi comportamenti da lontano può chiederselo.La sua fragilità appare anche dal personaggio pubblico,dai suoi testi traspare la solitudine,la rabbia.l'incapacità di amare una donna al di fuori della madre.Non mi è mai sembrato particolarmente felice.A parte questo è sobrio,ha ammesso pubblicamente la sua depressione e le iniezioni di testosterone per superarla,le sue fluttuazioni di peso e le sue schermaglie con altre celebrità.
Nel 2008 si è interessato alla teoria del rapimento alieno quando Jon Ronson ha fatto un documentario sul loro viaggio nel deserto del Nevada alla ricerca della verità.Mi ha anche detto che nn esce di casa da quattro settimane,da quando è finito il tour,ma invita molte persone,mi ha detto che è un ottimo padrone di casa.
Sei felice Rob?"Si,stavo dicendo.Le cose nn sono mai andate così bene,tante soddisfazioni.Sto registrando un nuovo album e ho la certezza che sia davvero forte.Ho diverse altri progetti all'orizzonte,che prendono forma e sembrano quasi fatti." Fa una pausa "ho capito molto di più"
Sei ancora depresso?"Si"
Poi c'è il matrimonnio.Soddisferebbe Rob - che parla di "fili invisibili nell'Universo" e viaggi emozionali - dire che l'amore lo ha salvato e un pò è vero.Prima di lei aveva solo storie da una notte.La nomina sempre anche involontariamente come chi è infatuato e un pò dipendente.Lei interviene nella conversazione più volte scusandosi per l'introsione,dicendo di dover trovare questo o quello.Williams dice"E' mia moglie!Vieni qui!" Dice che le sta insegnando a dire le parolacce con l'accento di Stoke.Quando lei lo sente parlare del suo passato,delle droghe e delle donne con cui ha dormito lo ammonisce scherzosamente dicendo "Boosie!" "L'ho fatto,Boo.L'ho fatto.Mi sono drogato,ho dormito con tante donne"
Sei un buon marito?"Siii!" Cosa ti rende tale? "Non la tradisco.Cosa più importante e di cui ero più preoccupato" La monogamia non faceva per te prima,vero? "Bè,non dovevo,nn ne avevo motivo.Non volevo.Quando avevo 20 anni cercavo qualcuno che mi desse stabilità,poi ho cercato una cameriera,ma nn riuscivo a trovarla!Dal giorno in cui nasciamo ci vengono raccontate tante bugie sull'amore,attraverso i film,la musica e la letteratura.Finisci per mettere l'amore su un piedistallo..e la colpa!Sapevo di nn essere capace di dare ad una donna ciò di cui aveva bisogno da me,perciò credevo di dover rimenere single per sempre.Non volevo una relazione.Ed è stato meglio così per me,perchè ho atteso fino ai 30,ho fatto quello che avevo bisogno di fare,senza fare figli.Ora sono un pò più vecchio,più maturo,i figli arriveranno"
Vuoi dei figli? "Si Quanti? "Lei vuole una squadra di calcio,io due,un maschio e una femmina,e li chiamerei Woody e Sonny!"
Li farai presto? "Il prossimo anno,il prossimo.Lei li vorrebbe subito,ma...ho appena finito il tour.C'è un pò di riposo fino a Natale poi faremo un pò di pratica"
"Vuoi vedere il mio armadio?" Si,è enorme e ci si arriva attravero il bagno in marmo,ha le finestre su un lato,e armadi di legno in stile Savile Row.E' pieno di abiti tutti piegati ordinatamente e me ne mostra alcuni spiegandomi dove li ha presi e indossati."Questa felpa (Con il disegno I Love Blackpool) è del 1998 e poi mi mostra un maglione con un orribile disegno natalizio"L'ho preso nel 2010"
Dice di amare i vestiti. "Mi piace vestirmi,la sensazione di uscire da casa con la tua armatura.Ho sempre amato i vestiti"
Avevi uno stilista quando eri nei TT? Lui incredulo "mmm..Dai un'occhiata!Avevamo 30£ per andare a comprare qualcosa da Afflecks a Manchester.Penso che Jason fosse lo stilista in quel periodo,perciò se devi fare domande sulla lycra e giacche di pelle con borchie e frange,lui è il tuo uomo"
Mi chiedo come affronti la vecchiaia.Era un ragazzo sex-simbol adorato dalle ragazzine.E' ancora bello,sorprendentemente alto,un viso aperto senza rughe,perciò mi chiedo sospettosa come faccia ad avere una pelle così bella "Sia mia madre che mio padre hanno una bella pelle"
Ricorresreti alla chirurgia plastica? "Si,nn so perchè la gente menta a riguardo,nn ho ancora rifatto niente ma mi piacerebbe fare tutto.Dopo aver visto Darryn Lyons con i suoi addominali (Risultato di un intervento chirurgico) ci sto pensando,io nn ho addominali così da quando avevo 17 anni"
Guardi mai una foto di quando eri più giovane pensando 'Quanto ero bello'?
Lui mi porta nello studio dietro l'armadio e mi mostra 3 foto del suo viso in primo piano di quando era poco più che adolescente.E' bellissimo "Avevo 17 anni,ero nel backstage a Wembley"
Quand'è l'ultima volta che ti sei sentito bello? Dopo una lunga pausa..."Anni fa,nn mi ci sento generalmente.Quando il peso oscilla in continuazione,nn dormi per tre notti di fila,nelle foto sei orrendo..l'immagine di me non è quello che vedi tu o Ayda,ma mi piace la versione che lei ha di me... lei pensa che io sia meraviglioso"
Crede ancora agli alieni "Ci credo anche se ho un mentalità aperta alla possibilità che sia una bugia.Lo stesso vale per Dio"
Divaga un pò raccontandomi di quanto sia stato bello riunirsi con i TT,di quanto grande sia il nuovo album e quanto sia bello lavorare con Gary "Sono un pò innamorato di Gary Barlow"
Ama stare a LA "Perchè fondamentalmente è un deserto di energia,mista a parecchie teste di c****o.Se lanci un sasso da qui ne colpirai una.Ma nn lo faccio più"Mi dice che Charlie Sheen ha una casa lì vicino e quando è un pò fuori di testa ci sono diversi elicotteri che sorvolano la zona ed è emozionante.
Propio mentre mi dice quanto sia ricco "Veramente,veramente ricco.E' incalcolabile" Josie ci dice che l'intervista è terminata.Lui sembra dispiaciuto,gli piace chiaccherare.
Mi abbraccia e mi saluta,lo lascio mentre chiama Gary.
Robbie Williams lives in a big (but not huge), luxe (but not decadent) gleaming white house built within the security-guarded confines of a gated community off Mulholland Drive, Los Angeles. It’s got wet rooms and walk-in wardrobes, the largest of which has been annexed by Williams: “The missus [32-year-old American actress Ayda Field, Williams’s wife since August 2010] very kindly gave me the bigger one.” It’s got room-to-room intercoms which constantly buzz (“What’s going on with the wi-fi?”; “Ayda’s not here, babe”), and it’s got a lot of staff. It’s got balustrades and it’s got dogs (of which Robbie Williams has nine). It’s got views of blue skies and high-drama canyons, and of Robbie Williams’s other house, which looks like a smaller version of this one, and which stands a little further up his personal Beverly Hill, just next to his private football pitch.
“Look! Down there!” he says. We’re standing, Rob and I (I’ve been told to call him Rob, not Robbie), on the balcony outside his bedroom; he points down the garden, past the tree into which a couple of handymen are hoisting a chandelier, to a plot of land beyond. This is where he intends to build a third house. “I’m going to put my art in it,” he says. Not his art collection – his own self-produced art, examples of which are strewn all over house No 1, hanging on walls and leaning up against skirting boards, punctuated by the occasional Banksy print. Banksy is Williams’s inspiration. Well, sort of: “I watched Exit through the Gift Shop and thought, ‘I can do that,’ ” he says.
Robbie Williams is as entitled and arrogant, and also riddled with self-doubt, as any human you’re ever likely to meet. “I was going through my I Don’t Want To Be A Pop Star Any More phase. I think that’s a phase everybody goes through. Chris Lowe from the Pet Shop Boys told me he did the same thing.” The I Don’t Want To Be A Pop Star Any More phase kicked in two years ago, and it begat the Artist phase – “I bought a load of canvases and a load of paint and I stayed in the garage until something looked half decent” – but then, Robbie Williams decided that he did still want to be a pop star after all, and in July 2010, he rejoined Take That, the boy band that had made him amazingly, confusingly and conflictingly famous in the first place.
The fluctuating fortunes of Robbie Williams are well documented. He’s 37 years old, and he’s been famous for nearly two decades. In the early Nineties, Williams became famous as the youngest and most wayward member of Take That, the band he joined following an open audition when he was a 16-year-old schoolboy from Stoke-on-Trent. Then, in 1995, he became famous as the one who walked out of the band while it was at its height of teenage girl mania-inducing, million-pound-spinning success.
In the late Nineties, Williams became famous as an extremely successful solo artist, whose defining anthem Angels is one of the most played songs at funerals across the land, and whose private life generated at least as much press as his singing career. Through much of the 2000s, he was famous as an LA-dwelling Howard Hughes-ish recluse, as a has-been whose faltering musical fortunes and somewhat questionable fascination with alien abduction played out against the backdrop of Take That’s rebirth, a pop resurrection so assured and well received that it eclipsed the heights reached by the band the first time around.
Now, of course, he’s famous for being the one who went back to Take That, who reunited with its four existing members (Mark Owen, Howard Donald, Jason Orange and Williams’s one-time nemesis turned friend, collaborator and supporter, Gary Barlow) for 2010’s multimillion selling album Progress, and 2011’s instant sell-out stadium tour.
But, back to the art. Williams is proud of it. He holds a piece or two up for my inspection. It’s not half as bad as you’d imagine. It is wordy and bold, large stencilled declarations or visual puns (by Williams’s own admission, “I can’t paint. Or draw”). I am particularly impressed by one, a pastiche of the Little Chef sign. Williams has changed the wording so that it reads “Little Thief”, and if you look closely enough at the illustrated chef logo, you’ll see it bears a resemblance to Gary Barlow.
“I did the Little Thief one for Gaz,” Williams says. “He’s here, been here all week, working on songs for a new album.” The album may not happen, but yes, Gary Barlow is here – sunbathing by the pool, wearing shorts which are later described to me, by an eyewitness, like this: “If they weren’t actually Speedos, they were definitely very short, and very tight.”
“I did two more paintings last week,” Williams says. “Wrote three songs. Did a radio show.”
None of this has anything to do with Farrell, the menswear line Williams has launched, and the reason he’s granted me an interview. I am under strict instructions to question him at length about it, but Williams doesn’t really want to talk about that. He is still wayward, you see. He knows what he is supposed to be doing and he is choosing not to do it.
Oh, he goes through the motions for five minutes or so. Headlines: Farrell was named after Williams’s maternal grandfather Jack “the Giant Killer” Farrell, the man who, according to my Farrell briefing, semi-raised Williams, whose father left the family home when he was 3. Or did he? “No. Well, kind of. He was just a big friendly giant killer. Who wanted me to be a man.”
The collection includes duffel coats and military coats and frock coats and herringbone pants – very much men’s wear, as opposed to skinny-jeany, baggy-vested trendy boy wear. Rob was “very involved” in the design process, although he won’t say how, exactly, beyond suggesting that shirt collars were shorter and stash pockets sit here, and generally, “being finicky”.
What do you want from Farrell? Do you want it to be very successful?
“Yeah. I’d love it to be really really successful. Yeah! I’m seeing flagship stores. I’m seeing it in Savile Row. I’m seeing Singapore. I’m seeing out here.”
Do you want it to make lots of money?
“Yes. I really like Liam’s [Gallagher] clothes. I really like Pretty Green. But I remember him doing an interview and saying, ‘I’m not doing this for money.’ I was thinking, ‘Why not? You get paid. That’s great, innit?’ ”
I presume designing clothes wasn’t something you’ve burnt to do, from childhood on? “No. But singing wasn’t.”
And finally: he doesn’t like the people within the fashion industry. “They’re w***ers.”
“What research did you do for this interview?” he asks.
Um… I read a lot of recent interviews, but honestly, I’ve been researching this piece for 20 years. I’m a Take That fan.
“Are you? Ha. You know who else is a Take That fan? Rose West!”
Really?
“Yes! Somebody sent me a link! Rose West is in jail, humming along to Take That songs!”
Which ones?
“I don’t know which ones!”
How does that make you feel?
“Proud!”
And he’s off, on vast rambling conversational departures that have nothing to do with anything much, but which take in his favourite websites, his inability to sleep in the big bedroom in which I interview him (“I grew up in a boxroom. I can’t sleep if there’s too much space.” Shame given how rich you are, I say. Must be problematic. “Not really, babe. No”); his speculations on the future of print journalism and the nature of modern celebrity, and his motivations for making the move to Los Angeles 11 years ago (“I came here for the women”).
What I really want to know, though, is this: is Robbie Williams bonkers? That’s the big question, isn’t it? From a distance, anyone observing his behaviour, and the twists and turns of his life to date, might wonder. He’s often seemed more than a little broken; brokenness has been interwoven into his public profile. Even at his most successful as a solo artist, Williams’s lyrical USP has been to hint at how lost he was, how angry about Take That and the band’s overbearing Svengali of a former manager, Nigel Martin-Smith (Williams’s 1998 single No Regrets is devoted to that), how he’s incapable of loving any woman other than his mother (for whom he wrote Angels). He has never struck me as especially happy.
Beyond that: is he sober, or on the brink of a relapse? Williams has battled drug and alcohol addictions publicly and questions about the progression of his recovery were raised following his last attempt at a solo comeback, when he performed very shakily indeed at a 2009 X Factor live show. He looked wild-eyed and crazy throughout, and he’s said that it was this experience that served as a catalyst for his I Don’t Want To Be A Pop Star Any More phase. He’s admitted to depressive periods, to injecting testosterone to deal with that; his weight has fluctuated, and he’s had a series of very public feuds with other celebrities – this summer he had a spat with Noel Gallagher that revolved around Williams’s alleged man boobs.
In 2008, Williams got caught up in alien abduction theory when the journalist Jon Ronson made a documentary about a pilgrimage he and a bushily bearded Williams took to the Nevada desert in search of the truth. Plus he’s already told me he hasn’t left this house once in the four weeks or so since he came off the Take That tour – although he has shipped many other people in. He is, he says, an excellent host.
“Yeah. I was just saying. Things have never looked so up. There’s contentment, and… just recording a new [solo] album. And knowing that it’s really strong. And I’ve got a few other things on the horizon. Things feel very complete. Things feel very do-able.”
He pauses.
“I get it a bit more.”
Are you depressive, still?
Another pause.
“Yes.”
Do you think depression will always be part of your life?
He pauses again. He is less garrulous now.
“Yeah.”
Williams has said in past interviews that he thinks he triggered his own depression by taking too much Ecstasy when he was younger, and that this depleted the levels of serotonin in his brain. Does he still believe that?
“I don’t know what it was. It was there before. I think pills and drugs were my medicine. And drink. I chose that, to try to ease it. To medicate the problem that was already there. Which exasperated [sic] it and turned it into something worse.”
Following stints in rehab, he says he is now sober, and there is nothing about him that suggests otherwise. He is very present, engaged, considered. I can’t see evidence of man boobs lurking beneath the Farrell check shirt he’s wearing. He smokes more than anyone I’ve ever met, mind you, lighting one Silk Cut after another after another.
“Do you smoke?” he asks.
No, I say.
“Sorry, darling. Sorry,” he says, and he puffs on.
Williams doesn’t answer.
Is it just… less of an issue?
“Much less of an issue. And… I’m on stuff that stops it.”
Antidepressants?
“Yeah.”
They do the trick?
“Have you taken them?”
No.
“Right. They do do the trick, but, I think that the pharmaceutical companies are as bad as drug dealers. Because I don’t know what it is that I’m putting in my system. I don’t think it’s 100 per cent great for you. I think there’s poison in there. I think it depletes your natural ability to do it for yourself. But you’re in a Catch-22 situation, because when you try to come off it, you get sick…”
Then, there’s marriage. It would suit Williams – who can talk about “invisible strings in the universe” and “beautiful stories”, and invoke emotional journeys and pleasing narrative arcs as well as any modern celebrity equipped with a basic grasp of pop psychology – to say that he’d been saved by love. But the fact is, he probably has been a bit saved by love. Until Ayda Field, there was no one, really. Endless one-night stands, some of whom would trot off to the tabloids afterwards; rumoured liaisons with Rachel Hunter, Spice Girl Geri Halliwell, Tara Palmer-Tomkinson… Then came Field, a TV actress best known for a role on a US soap opera, with whom Williams has been in a relationship since 2006. He proposed to her live on an Australian radio show in 2009, a gesture that was presumably designed to be as headline-garnering as it was romantic; they married, in a small ceremony held at this house, in August 2010.
Williams references Field constantly and incidentally, in the style of anyone who is besotted and a little dependent. Field flits in and out of the interview apologising for the intrusion, saying she must find such-and-such. Williams says, “It’s my wife! Come here, wife!” He tells me he’s teaching her to swear with a Stoke accent. When Field catches Williams telling me about his past life, the drugs he did and the women he slept with, she says, “Boosie!” in mock admonishment.
“I did, Boo. I did. I did drugs. I slept around,” he says.
Are you a good husband?
“Yeah! Yeah yeah yeah!”
What makes you so good?
“I don’t cheat on her. That’s the main one. That was the main worry that I had.”
Monogamy hasn’t been your thing, has it?
“Well, I haven’t had to. I haven’t had to monogamise.”
So you didn’t know if you were capable of it?
“I didn’t want to be capable. All the way through my twenties, I wanted someone who would fix me. Then I wanted a maid. But I didn’t even find them! We’re fed a load of bulls*** about love, from the day we arrive on this planet. Through films and music and literature. And you hold it in such high esteem, put it on this pedestal… And the guilt! The guilt! I knew I wasn’t going to be able to do what a woman needed me to do! So I went, ‘Right! I’m going to be single.’ ”
You didn’t think you were capable of a relationship?
“I didn’t want one. I think up till now, with relationships, I’ve played it well. I waited till I was well into my thirties, I did what I needed to do, I got here without any kids. Now I’m a bit older, a bit more mature, kids will come.”
You want kids?
“Yeah. I do.”
How many?
“She wants a football team. I want two. A boy and a girl.”
Have you got names for them?
“Yeah.”
What?
“Should I? Is that something that I should do?”
Yes!
“Woody! Woody and Sonny! Cool, eh?”
Is this… imminent?
“Next year. Next year! She wants to get on it now, but… just got back off tour. There’s a stretch from now till Christmas… and then, we’ll do some practising.”
Then: “Do you want to see my dressing room?”
Of course I do.
It is huge. Bigger than the ground floor of my entire flat. It’s reached through a big, marble-clad bathroom; it has windows along one side and endless, Savile Row-ish wooden portals and wardrobes. Clothes are folded and hanging neatly, everywhere. So many clothes. Williams strokes T-shirts and jumpers and dates them, tells me when they were acquired, when he wore them: “This one [emblazoned with the legend I Love Blackpool] is 1998, and this…” He unfolds a sweater with a ghastly Christmas design on it. “Two thousand and… ten.”
He says he loves clothes.
“Love getting dressed, love feeling when you leave the house that you’ve got your armour on, your magical suit that will see you through.”
Have you always loved clothes?
“Always.”
Did you have a stylist with Take That?
He snorts incredulously. “Um… Have a look! I think we were all given, like, £30 to go and buy stuff from [clothes emporium] Afflecks in Manchester. And I think, in the early days, Jason Orange was very much the stylist. So if you want to ask questions about lycra and leather jackets with studs and tassels on them, Jason’s your man.”
I wonder how he is dealing with the ageing process. He was a pin-up, a much-fancied pretty boy whose particular variety of fame meant that he was as objectified and lusted over as much as any girl. He is still good looking – surprisingly tall, with a big, open face, which is largely wrinkle-free, so I’m wondering about Botox – but of course, he’s also older, less dewy. You’re doing well for wrinkles, I say, suspiciously.
“Mum’s got good skin. Dad’s got good skin.”
You hair’s staying. Congrats.
“It’s got thinner though.”
Would you have surgery?
“Yes! Yeah. I don’t know why people lie about it.”
Have you had anything, yet?
“No. But I would.”
What?
“F***ing everything. I’ve been watching Celebrity Big Brother. Did you see it? And Darryn Lyons with his sculpted abs…”
Darryn Lyons, the publicity-friendly owner of the Big Pictures picture agency, became briefly famous this summer after displaying, in the Celebrity Big Brother house, the results of abdominal surgery on his naked torso. Williams was impressed.
You’re thinking about it?
“I am thinking about it. I haven’t had abs since I was 17.”
You had great abs.
“I did.”
Do you look at pictures of yourself from then, and think, I was gorgeous?
“Do you want to see one?”
He takes me into the studio beyond the dressing room, where middle-aged men who look a bit like Pete Waterman are twiddling with guitars. Williams shows me a set of three close-up shots of his face, taken when he was in his late teens, swaddled in a hoody. He is beautiful. Terrifyingly young, wondrously fresh-faced, with bruises of shadows beneath his eyes.
“Seventeen. Backstage at Wembley,” he says.
You were – perfect, I say.
“Yes,” he says.
When was the last time you felt handsome?
He pauses for a long time.
“Years ago.”
Really?
“Yeah. It’s not something that I generally feel.”
But… you’re a pin-up.
He lights another Silk Cut.
“Yeah, but… when you put weight on, go up and down… stay awake for three nights on the trot, get your picture taken looking f***ing horrendous… all of that… The image of me isn’t the one that you see, and it isn’t the one Ayda sees, but… I really enjoy Ayda’s version of me.”
What is Ayda’s version of you?
“She really digs me. She thinks I’m amazing.”
So, ultimately, I am forced to conclude that Robbie Williams isn’t especially bonkers at the moment – unusual, certainly, but not certifiable – and that he might even be quite happy. Although he does still believe in aliens. “Absolutely. Although I am also open to the fact that it is all bulls***. Same goes for God.”
He rambles on. He tells me how great the Take That reunion was. He tells me how great the prospective solo album is shaping up to be, and how brilliant it’s been, working with Barlow (“I’m kind of in love with Gary Barlow”).
He tells me he loves LA. “Because it’s basically desert energy. Mixed with a load of d***heads. If you throw a stone from here, you’ll hit one. But I don’t do that any more. They’re not keen on that, in the housing association.” And he tells me that Charlie Sheen has a house a little down the road, and that when Sheen is really kicking off, the sky fills with helicopters and it all gets rather thrilling.
Eventually – just as he’s telling me how rich he is (“Really really rich. It’s unfathomable”) – the PR from Farrell calls time on us, and the interview ends. He seems sorrier even than I am. Rob(bie) Williams does like a chat.
“Can I show Polly my land?” he asks Josie, his manager.
“No Rob, you can’t,” she tells him.
“Sorry, Poll,” he says. “Can’t show you my land.” He hugs me goodbye, and I leave him calling for Gary Barlow.
Source:The Times
TRADUZIONE:
Robbie Williams vive in una grande (ma non enorme),lussuosa (ma non decadente) splendente villa bianca all'interno dei confini recintati della comunità di Mulholland Drive,Los Angeles.Ha grandi docce e cabine armadio,la più grande è quella do Rob:"Mia moglie è stata gentile a darmi la più grande".C'è un interfono in ogni stanza che emette un brusio(Che succede cn il wi-fi?Ayda nn è qui) e diverso personale.Ci sono balaustre e 9 cani.C'è una bellissima vista del cielo blu e dei canyon e si scorge anche l'altra casa di Robbie,una versione più piccola di questa vicino al campo da calcio.Dalla seconda metà degli anni 90' ebbe un enorme successo come solista,la cui vita ha riempito pagine e pagine di giornali ed Angels è diventata l'inno più suonato ai funerali di tutto il paese.
Ora si è riunito agli altri 4 membri dei TT per un album che ha venduto milioni di copie e un tour di enorme successo.
Rimango colpita da uno in particolare,una riproduzione dell'insegna di Little Chef (Piccolo cuoco) a cui ha cambiato le parole in Little Thief (Piccolo Ladro) e se lo guardi da vicino si può vedere che il cuoco assomiglia un pò a Gary Barlow."Questo dipinto l'ho fatto per Gary,che ora è qui in casa,c'è stato tutta la settimana per lavorare alle canzoni del nuovo album".Infatti Gary sta prendendo il sole a bordo piscina con dei mini calzoncini.
Che cosa ti aspetti dalla Farrell,vuoi che abbia molto successo?"Sii,vorrei davvero che avesse tanto successo.Vedo punti vendita a Savil Roe,Singapore,e qui"
Vuoi fare un sacco di soldi?"Si,Mi piace la linea di moda Pretty Green di Liam Gallacher,ma mi ricordo che in un'intrevista lui disse che nn lo faceva per i soldi e io ho pensato 'Perchè no?Vieni pagato,è fantastico,no?'"Immagino che disegnare abiti nn sia un sogno che coltivi da quando eri bambino?"No ma neanche cantare lo era".
E finalmente:A lui non piacciono le persone che lavorano nell'industria della moda "sono dei c***oni"
Pensi che la depressione farà sempre parte della tua vita?Fa una pausa,è meno loquace ora "Si"
In passate interviste ha detto che probabilmente l'uso di Ecstasy quando era giovane può aver causato un abbassamento della serotonina e causato la depressione.Ci crede ancora?"Non so da cosa dipende,c'èra già da prima e ho usato le droghe e l'alcool come medicina e questo nn ha fatto altro che aggravare la situazione"
Ora è completamente sobrio,attento e in forma,ma fuma più di chiunque altro abbia mai incontrato;si accende una Silk Cut dopo l'altra.
Come affronti la depressione adesso che nn fai più uso di droghe o alcool?..Williams non risponde..E solo un problema marginale?"Molto marginale,prendo degli antidepressivi che la eliminano.Funzionano,ma credo che le case farmaceutiche siano dannose quanto gli spacciatori.Io nn so cosa ci sia in quei medicinali e nn credo siano salutari,sono comunque veleni che inibiscono le tue capacità di farcela da solo a sconfiggere la malattia.Perciò si crea un circolo vizioso,se provi ad uscirne stai male...."Li farai presto? "Il prossimo anno,il prossimo.Lei li vorrebbe subito,ma...ho appena finito il tour.C'è un pò di riposo fino a Natale poi faremo un pò di pratica"
Dice di amare i vestiti. "Mi piace vestirmi,la sensazione di uscire da casa con la tua armatura.Ho sempre amato i vestiti"
Avevi uno stilista quando eri nei TT? Lui incredulo "mmm..Dai un'occhiata!Avevamo 30£ per andare a comprare qualcosa da Afflecks a Manchester.Penso che Jason fosse lo stilista in quel periodo,perciò se devi fare domande sulla lycra e giacche di pelle con borchie e frange,lui è il tuo uomo"
Ricorresreti alla chirurgia plastica? "Si,nn so perchè la gente menta a riguardo,nn ho ancora rifatto niente ma mi piacerebbe fare tutto.Dopo aver visto Darryn Lyons con i suoi addominali (Risultato di un intervento chirurgico) ci sto pensando,io nn ho addominali così da quando avevo 17 anni"
Guardi mai una foto di quando eri più giovane pensando 'Quanto ero bello'?
Lui mi porta nello studio dietro l'armadio e mi mostra 3 foto del suo viso in primo piano di quando era poco più che adolescente.E' bellissimo "Avevo 17 anni,ero nel backstage a Wembley"
Quand'è l'ultima volta che ti sei sentito bello? Dopo una lunga pausa..."Anni fa,nn mi ci sento generalmente.Quando il peso oscilla in continuazione,nn dormi per tre notti di fila,nelle foto sei orrendo..l'immagine di me non è quello che vedi tu o Ayda,ma mi piace la versione che lei ha di me... lei pensa che io sia meraviglioso"
Ama stare a LA "Perchè fondamentalmente è un deserto di energia,mista a parecchie teste di c****o.Se lanci un sasso da qui ne colpirai una.Ma nn lo faccio più"Mi dice che Charlie Sheen ha una casa lì vicino e quando è un pò fuori di testa ci sono diversi elicotteri che sorvolano la zona ed è emozionante.
Propio mentre mi dice quanto sia ricco "Veramente,veramente ricco.E' incalcolabile" Josie ci dice che l'intervista è terminata.Lui sembra dispiaciuto,gli piace chiaccherare.
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