Louie Spence Reveals Life On Tour With The Spice Girls

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0:43I did the Five Girls World Tour, chatting to Madonna, bumping into print, running away from Michael Jackson. Why'd you run away from Michael Jackson? Honestly, it would... Dancing on ice, celebrity big brother, celebs on the farm. Anything with phleb on it, I was there. Just weird out the gay with the high kick and the speech impediment. Get him on there. When I was young on the council estate, it would have been my mum convincing my dad to remortgage. So I could go to London to a stage school. We had a great childhood, but I was having anxiety. I remember I couldn't go to bed until my parents were home because I thought they were going to die.

1:16Then what would I do? I became famous in 2010. It was really intense. I imagine being in the street where people are, Oh, my God, I love you. Do the splits of lifting your leg up. But inside, you're feeling it. I'm going to pass out and something's going to happen. My mum was an alcoholic. She had damaged the liver. We went to the hospital. She's got this mask on, the oxygen, they put it on. She's a bit in and out of consciousness. And then, I swear to God, she sat bolt upright, took the mask off and said within 20 seconds, she was dead. It's really hard because you think she chose that over my dad, over me, over my siblings.

1:53I'm just sad. There's so many joyous things that have happened since she passed. I mean, I've never spoken about this anywhere before, but... Hey, right before I go in, I just want to say this. We absolutely love shooting this podcast and we need your help. So hit subscribe. That's how you can help us.

2:20Louis Spence, we need to talk. Fabulous. Let's go. All right, let's do it. Now, what I find interesting about your childhood is most parents sacrifice for their children, but it feels as if your parents made additional sacrifices for you. Yeah, 100%. Would you say that is the case? Yeah, 100%. How so? Well, I mean, we were from a very working class family in a council house on a council estate, which was fabulous. Where I was always dancing around and flipping and, you know, I was always very active. And I went to a dance school there in Essex. And then when I was 12, the dance teacher said, you know, he needs to go somewhere else.

3:03He needs I can't do no more with him. Interesting. Because you were so talented, really. Well, I had a natural ability. You know, it was kind of very natural to me. So I said, yeah, you could call it a talent. So I auditioned for a stage school in London, which was really expensive, like going to a private school. And there wasn't a grant system, really. Or, you know, we tried to get a scholarship or a grant, but it just wasn't there. and you know my parents had just bought their council house this scheme coming in the 80s with Margaret Thatcher where you had a chance to buy your houses you know at quite a low price anyway my parents took this up unbeknown to them I was going to want to go to this school and we didn't have the money we just did not have the money it was impossible and I think my mum it would have been my mum, convincing my dad to get to remortgage.

4:02Wow. So already he had taken on this huge debt in them days. You know, it was, you know, lots, it was new to everybody because when you come from that background, you didn't have the opportunity to get on the property ladder. But because what Margaret Thatcher did, bought up all the council houses, that's why there's none left anymore. But anyway, it was a great scheme at the time. So he'd already taken on a huge debt. I mean, my parents worked really hard, both of them. My mum would work cleaning up the school. She'd work nights in a chicken factory, packing chicken pies. But my mum was a nightmare as well because my mum would just spend money.

4:36So her money, she'd sort of spend it and lie to my dad and we'd have beans on toast for a week. Do you know what I mean? And pretend that she had bought the shopping when she hadn't. She'd bought a new dress or she'd bought a new sofa. So she was terrible. But, you know, I'm very much like that. But I have a question just on that. Is that so at a young age, you were aware of this? Oh, God, yeah. Absolutely. I mean, I was like, I was my mum's best friend. I was her cover. I was her cover story. I would say that, you know, we'd gone to do something. I was her backup. You know, when my dad would say, oh, well, and I, oh, or mum would say, oh, well, you know, especially when I was at school.

5:09Oh, I had to buy Louis something for school. She didn't at all. She got herself a new pair of shoes. But she, the thing is, you see, my mum was, my mum and dad got married at 17. They'd been together since they were 11. My mum had three kids by the age of 19, a nervous breakdown after each one. She was on uppers and downers since she was 11 because her mom had mental breakdowns. And my mom as a child suffered really bad, what was anxiety then. Okay. And my - But probably not diagnosed. No, absolutely not. So my nan, who was on uppers and downers, in them days, that's what the doctor gave you, it's uppers and downers.

5:45So something to bring you up, something to bring you down. She started giving them to my mom at 11. Goodness. So my mom was already addicted. so after each one of the births my mum had a nervous breakdown and she would just go on the uppers and downers so all through her pregnancy she was on uppers and downers like she'd my mum would literally pass out through anxiety so many so many things that I see in me and my siblings traits and I know they say with these things sometimes is it nature is it nurture um i think it's it's got to be genetic i think part of it is you know nurture the way that we were brought up but anyway so my mum would treat herself because that's what made her happy that was her reward she needed that because the anxiety and the depression was so bad at times that that would give her a little pick up okay so now i'm older i understand why she did it obviously my dad knew what she suffered with but he was so focused on just paying the bills looking after three kids and everything so I was her cover my dad put himself in incredible debt which even once I'd left stage school he was still paying so I put my dad under immense pressure when I was a child which I didn't know and also you know the whole family structure I've got three other siblings you know I've got three sisters who you know may want to go on school trips exactly all these kind of things which no one went no one went on the skiing trips there was no money was the family aware that all the money in essence was going to pay for your your schooling um I don't um I don't I don't think they did because they also had what they wanted because like I say my mum would always find a way this is the thing and me and my sisters talk about this we were loved but we were never shown love so we had everything we wanted and needed, my parents worked every hour God sent we had a beautiful home, like on the council estate we had one of the best homes, you know we had like new windows and like you know, not bifolding doors, like French windows at the back you know weird and my dad bit of brick wall around the front on the council estate you know we're the only one with a brick wall with pillars loved it you know so we had all of all of this and we were there's nothing we wanted for and there's nothing we couldn't speak to my parents about whether it be sex drugs um whatever you know my parents were very young parents and but we were we were never shown love okay and what do you mean in particular we were never we were never cuddled there was no affection there was no physical affection there was no um and also there was no it didn't really matter what we did like when i went to stage school then i i was in the west end when i was 13 or 14 in bugsy malone my parents were proud of course but it wasn't it wasn't anything they would because they had to get on with their life they had to get on with paying the bills, looking after my three sisters, going to work.

9:01So, yeah, it was great, whereas you'd have these showbiz parents who would be there every day at the stage, you know, with their kids and that. And not that I wanted it, because I didn't. I didn't want that. I was very independent. I didn't care whether – this is the thing. I didn't care whether they come to see me in it or not. I didn't care. Do they ever say, I love you? No, not when we were children. Not when we were children. So when you reflect back now, right, and you look at Louis as a child, Do you feel as if you missed being shown love? I think subconsciously I do. Like I say, don't get me wrong, we were loved immensely.

9:40But, you know, like sometimes when I'd watch films on TV and I'd see parents cuddling their children or just if I'm out and I'll see, you know, a dad or a mum cuddling their children. We never had that. And I just sit there and I look at it and think, God, I wonder how that must feel. I wonder how it must feel. Whereas my husband's Spanish, very Latino family. He's constantly cuddling his nieces and nephews. His sisters are arm in arm. They cuddle, they kiss, they, you know, and he's very much like that. And for him, it's really difficult living with me, apart from all of my other, you know, things that go on in my life and the way I am with anxiety and depression, you know, that alone.

10:28you know, we went to this shop once, and you put some money, it was an Ann Summers shop, and you put money in a machine, and you get this thing out, what you're like, a little thing. Mine come out, it said cold fish, and he's never forgot that, and so, you know, that's what he calls me, a cold fish, because he's very affectionate, very loving, just the warmest, most incredible person, kind, just, he's just an incredible person, and he very loves to cuddle and I'm like a cold fish. I don't have the ability sometimes. It's like he cuddles me and I actually physically can't, I can't do that. I just can't.

11:11Physical embrace. And it's the same with my sisters as well. Yeah. My sisters, we don't cuddle, me and my sisters don't cuddle. It's learned. Yeah. It's definitely learned. Can I ask you a question here because you're talking about a time because we're talking about the 80s. The 80s. Right. So I just recently went to go see a musical at the Royal Court. It was called After the Act. So it was about Section 28 that I was completely unaware of here. And you grew up during Section 28. Now, for anyone who doesn't know Section 28, let me just read this now. because it actually blew me away that this was just 2003 when the legislation was finally over here in the UK.

11:57So Section 28 was legislation that sought to prohibit the promotion of homosexuality. So this is Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, right? And she said at the time, children who need to be taught to respect traditional moral values are being taught that they have an inalienable right to be gay. Now, this was such a mind-blowing concept for me because what I realized, what Section 28 did is it, in effect, halted any discussion of gay, being gay within the school system. and it sought to punish those and ostracize those. So what it did is it kept people from coming out, kept people from discussing it, and it caused heartbreak and it actually caused death, right?

12:53Many people taking their lives. So you were growing up in this time, right, in the UK. So what was your experience? Well, I think what you just hit the nail on the head, I think for the people who were out of my age then, like in my early 20s, it didn't affect us as much because we were already out and celebrating who we were and we were that's it you're not putting us back anywhere i think like you say for the educational system for the people what weren't and we're learning this through the education system or conversation in the house yes we're not coming so that is the pressure on them pushing them down whereas we were already well we're not going back in you know we're out so i was in a really a safe environment when i was young on the council estate i never felt bullied or when i went to my schools i was in the environment that was yeah you're safe i never experienced it and even you know even on the streets of london you know i was always lived in central london so like zone one you know and even walking through the streets.

14:00I was always in central London, like around the West End, around like Covent Garden, Compton Street. So it was a safe environment and I never felt targeted. You know, I know how many people are and how traumatic it is for them. But for me personally, and I never tamed it down. Never felt that way. So it was a worry and there was a lot of fight for that within the community. But also we had a really big issue of HIV AIDS. There was people dying. You'd see them one week and the next week they were gone. It was so rapid. It was so severe.

14:52It sort of halted your youth. your way I mean you know people because of my personality and the way I am and everything people you know presumed a lot of people presume that I was the right slag that I took loads of drugs one I never took drugs because I was the person what would die my anxiety wouldn't let me take them um I had very few sexual partners um I mean literally I was in a relationship for seven years and I could count on one hand the amount of people I had sexual relations with and that wasn't intimate sexual relations because the fear of hiv aids was so strong and having seen so many people die and i mean we're talking young fit healthy men yes these people who are like adonises and then a few months later you would see them skeletal and then a few weeks that you hear they're dead you know it was like it was so frightening it's like that was a bigger issue for me I think and how I was dealing with the community then at that time because you know lots of people I knew died or became very ill um so yeah section 28 was an awful thing but in saying that where are we today where are we today I'm not a political gay at all I'm not so if you were to compare Louis the 80s to today do you feel like that we have advanced, stayed the same, or gone back with regard to gay rights?

16:25Well, I think as it stands out, we're definitely advanced because we can marry, we can have children. So, you know, there's all these things. The awareness of HIV AIDS is so much broader. People have so much more knowledge of it. Are people trying to take us back? Absolutely. I'm not into politics. I'm as knowledgeable as most everyday people when you watch the news and see the things that, you know, Trump wants to do with, you know, immigrants, with gays, with any minority, you know, obviously all the things he says, I don't support, you know, they're just awful. So they're trying to take us backwards.

17:01So I can understand why the young gays now are far more militant. But like I say, I just feel with the younger generation, with Instagram and TikTok and so much information and misinformation. Yes, and disinformation. And disinformation, that's what I meant. Sometimes I feel as though they're losing the joy of being gay. And being gay, we are a community who are very joyous and celebratory. And we have fun. We say things to each other in our community that you couldn't say. But we can say them to each other. like within your community of like you know if you're with a group of your black friends you may say things that if a white person was to say or you're in a situation it wouldn't be acceptable but when you're in that environment you can take the piss out of each other and say these things i'm not going to give examples but there's some really dark places dark humorous places me and my friends go to you know when we're together but i just think sometimes we need to have other ways of you know educating yeah yeah so like I say I'm lost in my own community sometimes I think to even help us all understand how you got to this place let's even unpack your career right because I think that's that lived experience has shaped who you are today so you mentioned that you were once you got out of school West End you hit West End I got a job in the original cast of Miss Saigon.

18:31It was, you know, we didn't know it was going to be such a massive show. Yeah. And that was incredible because I went from school with young theatre people, you know, we're all like thinking we're fabulous, into massive West End hit in the centre of London in Jury Lane in this beautiful theatre, surrounded by these incredible theatrical people who were singers dancers actors um the humor the the the camaraderie just the joy of what they they love doing it's a it's a crime that there's so many talented people that just haven't had that exposure or that luck because they would piss over most of the people who are on tv who are comedians um singers, you know, all of the...

19:25But they just haven't got the break. They just haven't had that moment. I was surrounded by those people, and I learned so much from them. And then after that, I went and did lots of commercial stuff. When I say commercial, it's like with pop bands, like Take That, E17. These are groups in England. And what were you doing with those groups? Back in Dance. Back in Dance, okay. And then I did the Spice Girls World Tour. We have to talk about that. Which was incredible. So then at that age or in that period of your life, was that your goal? Your goal was, OK, I want to be a backing dancer or was it anything else?

19:58No. I mean, I was very fortunate that I could go from doing a West End show to doing a commercial show, because sometimes there's dancers who are just really sort of more West End based, as in tap, modern ballet. You know, it's more of that, you know, where they couldn't really sort of get down and, you know, they didn't have the, you know, the club dirt, that kind of thing. They didn't have the thrust. Yeah, they didn't have that. They just looked a bit ballerina going, you know, with a straight back. Whereas I was fortunate, I could do both. I come from a very musical family, as in we always had song music on in the house.

20:36My mum loved to dance. My mum was a great dancer, like a club dancer kind of thing. And in the 60s, the music come on, the things she would do, she was a great dancer. Anyway, so we always had music in our house. So we were all my family loved music. We loved to dance and, you know, really get down. So you were versatile. You could go, you could do it all. So it was never that I thought that's what I want to do. Obviously, a job like the Spice Girls World Tour comes up. Every dancer in the land wants to do it because if you think about it, we always had American artists coming to England with dancers, whether it be Madonna, Janet Jackson, Michael Jackson.

21:13And they would bring their dancers from. Of course. And for the dancers, they would be like, oh, my God, they're amazing. But how many British artists went to America with dancers? So a dance act. Yes, you had the Beatles in the 60s. I can't think of any other British group, pop groups, or solo artists that went there with dancers. You can think of lots of Americans that come here. It didn't happen. That's true. So that particular... It was once in a generational thing. That's, you know, even now. Well, now I can't even think of, oh, Dua Lipa maybe. Yes. Now she has dancers. So Dua Lipa sort of broke America.

21:51So this particular tour, and I have some stats on this, and this, you probably know this better than me, but this particular tour, so this was the 1998 Spice World Tour. Yeah. 2.1 million people saw this tour. The Spice World Tour was the band's first large-scale, multi-continent tour. It covered Europe and North America with 97 shows, all the way from February to September 1998. And it was the highest earning concert tour by a female group. So this was bigger than big. So you had to audition, I would imagine, for this. And once you found out that you had gotten it, what was the thought? Well, it was amazing because also my best friend got it.

22:36The most joyous thing about it was they treated us like, I say you're a backing dancer, you're a backing dancer. is very rarely you got treated really well. Not because the artist's fault, because the artist had lots to do. They were doing press and, you know, for other groups. They can have time to see if you're okay, whatever. Do you know what I mean? It wasn't their fault, but sometimes the management and the, they didn't really give a shit about you. You know, you would just, just get on and do it. And the incredible thing as well was they were in control of this tour, them five girls. They were the bosses.

23:08Okay. They were the bosses. It was them, you know. So for that reason, I don't know. that's why we stayed in five-star hotels we got paid really well which you didn't have time to spend because you're always on tour you ate in the venues um you stayed in these hotels bed and breakfast is included um they were wonderful to us considering you've never i you know up to that point i'd never seen anything like it the madness around them but i'd never seen five people not have a minute i swear to god they would be having their makeup done doing interviews they would be there'd always be somebody wanting something from them it was exhausting to watch they were they were flying if we were in paris say doing a show we'd have that day to rest they'd be on a private jet going to london to do an interview then going to belgium and then that they'd be and then come back and do the show i mean those girls worked incredibly incredibly hard and they were so um they were so generous with generous with us dancers they treated us so well and i think it's one of the what is the that and another job is the best thing i've ever done and also you know through it i gained a really good friend in emma in baby spice um we had a very similar upbringing um there was like i think there's eight years between us in age, but we had very similar families, as in closeness, the same kind of humor.

24:43And we became very close and we still are to this day. You know, we, she, well, I mean, you know, I mean, yeah, she's just, she's just a very unique, incredible soul. She's a beautiful, beautiful person. And yeah. When you look back on that tour, since it was so impactful for you, what's the moment of that tour? What is a moment? that you'll just replay in your mind over and over again? There's so many of them, like, you know, chatting to Madonna, you know. Not bad. How was Madonna? She was fine. You know, she was just walking down the corridor going to see the girl said hello. Bumping into Prince, you know, when we were in Minneapolis.

25:26Running away from Michael Jackson with Emma. Why did you run away from Michael Jackson? Because Emma doesn't like big things like planes. the sight of the plane she don't like it like you know and not the michael jackson the size of the plane um but we we were in a hotel in germany and he was in the same hotel and we he i think if i remember he was sort of approaching we had a mask on and did it and she didn't like the look of it so she fucking we run so we run away from michael jackson because like literally he was all you know masked up and everything she was like we just ran so yeah so lots of lots of you know lots of there's i mean there's so many situations of that year of my life that were incredible and um i got to see the world in style yes i got to see the world in style um but in saying that i got to see the world but i didn't see anything because i chose not to because of my anxieties so I only felt safe in the hotel room um I didn't know where I was going I didn't know you know so my anxiety stopped me from you know going to clubs or you know I did it if we went with the girls and it was safe and we were getting the car or the van both all of that yes but yeah that I do look back on that and regret the fact that I didn't enjoy that experience the stage side of it I did but I didn't enjoy all these countries around the world because I was too anxious to explore on my own I wouldn't do it another thing as well when you're on tour you think you're going around the world imagine me you know I was single imagine how many people you could sleep with not one not one not one not one and I'd had five-star hotel room of our own we didn't share no i was like one i was too still i was a bit insecure about myself even though when i look back now i look fucking amazing you know i literally had an eight pack i was like that you know i had an ass like two hard ball bags in an anchor chief you know i was i look great but i didn't have that confidence in myself and also there was that whole once again hiv aids thing I just it just you know it just it's you know that did not ruin my sex life but it stopped me from having casual sex and now at the age I am now I'm with my partner we've been together 25 years we've been married since 2007 like I say the most wonderful person in the world but I've said to him you know like i never had that sexual freedom experiences of different partners i never had it so do you regret yeah having it yes i do not for the fact that you know my husband isn't my husband my husband is gorgeous i mean believe me everyone falls in love with him i lucked out but it's just it there was such a like i say there was such a stigma about sex when i was young and I that's part of my life that I can never get back the youth do you know the spontaneity yeah I can't get that back it's too late I don't I don't want to do that now but it's definitely something I would have liked to have a lot more variety I would like to have seen and but sexually what do you think you have missed out on just sex just literally sex just casual sex like when people um like you know other gay friends of mine i mean maybe they went through a bit too much do you know what i mean i'm not talking i want to go a hundred like that right but i mean maybe more than five or six okay and as a gay man that's almost like literally putting me in a monastery do you know what i mean so it's i think it's just not knowing it's that not knowing of what would that have been like with someone like that or and i say not loving them i don't it's not about love it would have just been about sex where my friends would say oh god you know and i'd be like i'd palpitate for them thinking oh my god were you safe did this and you know and are you going to go and get tested you know straight away i would be thinking oh my god what what if they didn't and what if yes you know and so no i just won't do it and so i didn't so and now you know now the kids they're just on prep for them they don't even know that experience because they can just take a tablet before they have sex and continue taking it so instead of the people who are on combination therapies to actually you know sort of bring this virus right down so they're non-detectable and can't transmit even if you're not hiv you can choose to go on prep where you can just take a tablet every day and go and have i think it's like very very high percentage of like 97 you know there's still a risk i think yes but so these kids now for them they don't have it doesn't have that feeling so they can be more liberal so because of my anxieties which i suppose i was constantly constantly battling all the way through my career to getting on a plane um to getting in a car with someone who drove that i didn't know i didn't feel safe crowded spaces places that are too bright like i've never been to a concert i've never been to a concert where i'm either not in the pit or been on the stage because i can't even now and i'm a lot more i'm i'm so much better with my like anxieties um that it's still something I choose I I could I could put myself through it but I there are some things I suppose what are still avoidance that I choose not to and I suppose it is me saying I'm so much more advanced I can actually do those things now but really I suppose deep down in the back of my head I know that I'm still avoiding so the thing absolutely you know can we spend a moment on anxiety.

31:37So I have a, I have a, it might be more. I have a very good friend of mine who literally, uh, sent me a message yesterday and she just suffered. Uh, so she's in her thirties. Uh, she just suffered her first panic attack and she's completely freaked out by this because she was driving. Uh, and, and that's where she suffered the panic attack. And, and we were exchanging some messages and I told her, I said, this is interesting. I'm getting ready to interview someone who has long suffered from anxiety. But on top of that, I have now interviewed multiple people, Nadi Hussein, Perry Edwards, et cetera, who have suffered not just anxiety and anxiety disorders, but panic attacks and high level of anxiety.

32:25And what I found is that it comes from this combination of things. It's part genetic, it's part circumstantial, it's part you know um are you exercising have you slept enough etc but when you think about the origin of your anxiety where do you believe it's come from i think it definitely is partly it was nurtured from my mom um and looking back now to see the times i you know all the time she was anxious and having anxiety and her anxiety would then be put on us so we couldn't do things because it would make her anxious so she would stop us from doing things like say we we had a great childhood but there were certain things that you know we couldn't do because it'd be too much of a worry for her thinking that we were there or there she couldn't cope with that and then I remember my mum used to go out every Wednesday night to this club with her friends and i would wait until she literally as like an eight nine year old child i remember waiting until she was home i couldn't sleep i'd be at the window waiting for the lights of her friend had this car and it had square lights the headlights and i knew those headlights when they come down the road i couldn't go to bed until she was home so there was them kind of things that And how was that, Louis?

33:57Because I thought she was going to die. And I thought if she died, then what would I do? Because my world would end. So I was always frightened of her dying and my dad. I was always frightened. Whenever they went out anywhere, I'd find they'd have a car crash. And this is at a young age of like seven and eight. You know, and it just continued, you know. So I always thought that they were going to die, that something was going to happen to them. And then, you know, then what would I do? You know. I think lots of kids experience that. I don't know. maybe I'm saying that I don't know um and then as I got older my anxiety manifested in very physical anxiety I would get the um complete you know the body rush I could feel my balls shrinking going inside me so that's when I knew it was kicking in because the adrenaline would take my balls inside me so that's when I knew it's really coming bad then I'd get the dry mouth the tingly tongue and then I start to lose my eyesight like that then I couldn't see and then I couldn't breathe and then I couldn't get my breath in like this and then and then this is happening like this then I'm gonna die my heart's going 100 miles an hour I can't see I'm dizzy um I've got numb fingers I've got numb toes I've got pins and needles in my tongue you know literally is this never gonna end it does end you know but the first one like say for your friend that is the worst one because then unless you're really strong you're waiting for the next one exactly then you're in the cycle exactly see and my cycle okay my cycle has lasted from when i was eight until now apart from i can tell you the last six months i've been physically anxiety free apart from one night about four weeks ago where I had the heart racing but apart from that the last six months have been really good and this is how you know when you suffer with physical anxiety or anxiety because it's every day it's every moment of your day and I have a I have um this thing it's like a heart monitor thing you can see it on tv it's a you put your fingers on it like this and it shows you an ECG okay so I got that because I'd been to the heart specialist for the last 16 years once a year convinced you know never even though convinced there's got to be something wrong because I wake up at night literally or just before I go to sleep my heart would go to 140 150 beats and I have it on the I you know I could show you I've got the thing and I showed it to the heart doctor so you imagine being at you know my resting heart rate is in between 55 and 65 so all of a sudden from nowhere boom my heart literally not even I get a little bit of a warning like I say I get this little little feeling the adrenaline's going around my body and then I'm like fuck it's here and they say you know just let it happen just go through it just you know don't don't fight it You try not fucking fighting when you feel like you're going to die and your heart is going to burst out of your chest.

37:06You can't breathe. Literally, you're in a cold sweat. Right. Literally. And you're completely relaxed. You're just about to go to sleep and then literally. So what does someone do? In particular, what does my friend do? So she's had this one. She's now fearful it's going to happen again. She's scared to drive. Right. How have you been able to? I haven't. You haven't? I haven't it's just part of my life it's just part of who I am I I manage it and that's it I've had psychotherapy acupuncture um cranial osteopathy I've had everything and then I went on when I was 45 I think it was I went on prescription medication because I got to a point where apart from the physical anxiety I suffered really bad depression really dark I mean it's like when When people say a dark cloud, it really does feel like that.

38:03It's just like a darkness sweeps over you. It's just like you're in mud and everything around you. People can't get in. It's just a mist. Like my husband would, and I would be like, I couldn't care if he was there. I couldn't care if he left me. I couldn't care if I was on my own. I just couldn't care because I'm in such, I'm in so deep in this hole. I can't get out and I'm in my head, in my body. I'm trying to get out. I'm trying to get out of it and in my head I'm saying come on get out of it you can get out of it you've got out before get out of it but it's in my head it's like it's like there's two two people talking the one which is trying to be rational and the one what's got control yes anyway it got really bad when I was about 45 my mum had died in 2013 I became famous in 2010 it was really intense which was you know a whole nother story um my life had completely changed financially um imagine being something anxiety being well known and that you're known for being really open and gay and camp and loving everybody where you can't even get on a train go through a tunnel go to a concert go into a supermarket before that so now imagine that you're in this environment let's say i go to a tv show i'm fine like here this is my safe space now i know i go out of here i've got a car to get in that gets me home you know yes so but the unknown so now imagine being in the street where people are, oh my god I love you, do the splits for lifting your leg up.

39:31And you're trying to be, all right, but inside you're feeling it, it's going, you're like I need to, I'm gonna pass out and something's gonna happen. So then you're, I've got to go now girl, you know, I've got to go and do this, I'm gonna spin off, you know, and you've just got to run to a safe place. And I'd always not gone on medication because I always thought I could, I always thought I can beat this. I'm not, I was having a battle, I was always like you're not gonna get me, you know, I don't need medication i'd seen my mum on medication i'd seen my siblings on medication um anyway i finally succumbed to taking medication because i i look back on it now i look upon it as an intervention that's what it was it was either that or i don't know like i said when people say you get to that point you know they ask you are you suicidal i wasn't thinking about killing myself but i thought i'd be better off dead so i wasn't thinking about killing my i didn't i wasn't no plans right but i just thought i cannot live with any longer like this there's also that battle you have in the outside world you know and like why why why why can't i get through this because now i've got you know i own my own house i've got money i've i've got nice cars i've got rolex watches i've got nothing to worry about all those things you think are the things like most people their worries are financial mortgages paying the bills paying for the kids so that's taken away but it's still there so all these things were taken away and it was still there and then when I did take the medication I wouldn't I would say it resolved the place I was in because what it done it gave me nothing it gave me no emotion um I mean I didn't cry much before but I'm unable to cry no empathy no emotion didn't care literally someone could have dropped dead there and I would have stepped over and that could have been someone in my family it's inconvenient okay let's call the undertaker get them buried you know had no drive to do anything so i then i then i i did nothing i wanted to do nothing so that was great because i had a rest from this constant right you know having to perform not that but the constant anxiety oh okay no not just the con you know living with that it was constant at that point it was constant it was just a constant churn so it gave me it gave me a break from that now this adds up so so okay so can we go back coming off of the tour spice world this is massive yeah you then i would imagine continue to i went into cats for a year magical mr mistoffelees in the west end another huge win yeah then i decided then i decided that was it i can no longer i'm too old to dance behind back in you know be a backing dancer I don't really want to do the West End anymore I don't know what I want to do I'd done everything I wanted in my dance career in a sense I didn't want to be one of those old dancers still trying to like you know hoof it with the 18 year olds I was 28 at this point 29 you could still grow up I didn't want to and that's when I went to start to work at Pineapple so I was in an environment that I loved still surrounded by dance and the people I love you know I didn't care what people thought that I'd been like a Spice Boy you know leaded a West End show in Cats.

42:42Most often was one of the sort of mate had a big dance and everything i didn't care that didn't bother me at all i've never bothered what people thought but why would it sounds like you're saying that some people carried shame around that oh my god yeah absolutely you're now behind the desk taking people's money when they go in whereas before you were on the stage with them you were you know um so now you're sort of in their eyes some people wouldn't do that because they'd be like people kind of think that you know i'm a failure you know i didn't really care what people thought because I was I'd had everything I wanted and actually it was a really safe space for me and I felt really good working there and pineapple was an esteemed well it'd been going since 1978 I mean it was like you know all the West End shows rehearsed there like I said we had like you know Madonna Beyonce you know Spice everybody went and rehearsed there it was a great place it was a great place and I loved it I absolutely loved it then they did the tv show 2010 um you know it's going to be on sky I didn't have sky I was like how many people watch sky you've got to pay for it you know it's not on one two three four or five who's going to watch it don't care literally they filmed us it was no scripted absolutely not we had a cameraman with each person who like there was me the manager there was Andrew there was someone else they just follow and then they'd edit it all there was they'd never asked to create a scenario apart from we put dance routines in it which were choreographed obviously but apart from that everything was totally as it was the people coming in the camaraderie we had and it became a hit it was and then before i knew it i mean it started in february 2010 and then in april i was on jonathan roth as a guest um with Gwyneth Paltrow um who else was on it oh I can't remember anyway but like going for I was like what you know I found it funny you know and then it just went mad for three years two ten through thirteen just went mad.

44:41Louis I was going through how many television shows you've been on do you know how many tv shows you've been on? No. You have no idea I was okay so this this is uh I'm literally scrolling because this is how long the list is so okay you were on louis spence's show business right you were on this dancing on ice yeah celebrity big brother yeah uh the jump yeah celebs on the farm everything anything with celeb on it i was there just wheel out the gay with the high kick and the speech impediment get him on there he'll give us five minutes of something Anything with Celeb in it, yeah, I was there. You were on all of this.

45:21Yeah. So when you think about that period, okay, do you feel like you had to play a role or were you doing you? No, I was being me. Look, there's the sides of me, like I've spoken about a lot here, the dark side, which I think I'm not the only person. Lots of people suffer in silence, not in silence, but privately, you know, and especially in the industry we're in. Um... that person you see on Pineapple and they show, 100 % is me. That's just another side of me. That's when I'm in that environment. Like when I was coming in here chatting to the kids, I suppose that I am partly performing, but I like it because I can see them giggle or laugh or make say something a little bit uncomfortable.