Stacks had popped his cowboy boots live on air on Davie’s first show. What. A. Nightmare.
The studio had descended into chaos; paramedics had been summoned, all to the soundtrack of Carmella Cass screaming at Jizzo to wake up. At the beginning of the show, the ratings were good. By
the end, there wasn’t a late-night viewer in the country who wasn’t watching, alerted by a social-media buzz so loud it could have woken the dead. Except – oh, the heavenly irony
– Jizzo. He remained very firmly on the other side.
It was one of the things that Sarah found hard to stomach about living here. Every wail of human pain and tragedy was a story, played out in the media as if it were the Lifetime movie of the
week instead of someone’s actual life.
And yes, she realized that was hypocritical, having spent five years on a UK tabloid crime desk, working for the
Daily Scot
, door-stepping victims and reporting carnage in all its
bloody grime and glory.
Somehow, that was OK there. That was reporting the facts. Here, everything was so wrapped up in drama and ulterior motive that it was difficult to separate the real from the performance. And
that was never more obvious than in Davie’s life.
What were they now? Lovers? Yes. Exclusive? Absolutely. But they weren’t in an open, official, publicly acknowledged relationship. The reticence was all on her side, but she suspected that
was largely to do with the fact that Davie was used to getting everything at the snap of his TV-mogul fingers. He was definitely a live-in-the-moment, go-for-it, why-wait-for-anything kind of guy
who needed the world to be his and he needed it now. And he had the cash to pay for it.
She’d never be comfortable with that level of fame and power, and she wasn’t sure she wanted to be. It was only six months ago that she’d moved here from Glasgow, after coming
over initially to chase down a story on the relationship between Mirren, Davie and Zander. The last thing she expected was to fall for Davie Johnston, quit her job and move here, but that’s
what happened. It would have been the easiest thing in the world to move in with Davie and live the Hollywood dream of fame and fortune – it was certainly what he wanted – but in truth,
the thought made her skin bristle.
She wanted to make it on her own. On her terms. And whether he liked it or not, that had to happen before she became nothing more than Davie Johnston’s other half.
The freelance work, fluff pieces on the size of Kim Kardashian’s arse or Charlie Sheen’s legal bills (both of which appeared to be comparatively huge), paid her rent, allowing her to
concentrate on the stuff she really wanted to write. Beneath the glitter and the glitz, there was a darkness, a downward spiral of a city that survived on drugs, spin, hype and manipulation.
Nothing was real here. Nothing. And it fascinated her. There had been hundreds of Hollywood bios done before, but Sarah was writing hers from an outsider’s perspective, one that wasn’t
swayed by personal experience or lust for fame or power. She just wanted to tell the story, to look behind the Hollywood curtain and explain why a beautiful girl like Chloe Gore, born to wealth and
privilege, could end up dead at eighteen. She wanted to explore why the industry supported twenty-one-year-old brats who thought their music success gave them an unlimited platform of entitlement
and invincibility. And why fame-seekers in a reality world that was based on zero talent were prepared to – literally – exploit and risk their own lives for another million
‘likes’ on Instagram or Facebook.
It was a warped world, and the biggest irony of all?
In loving Davie Johnston, she was dancing with the devil. He had been the biggest manipulator of all, the king of reality TV and the Pied Piper to legions of wannabes who would do anything to
achieve the fame they craved.
Last year, Davie had been accused of plotting with one of his young reality
The studio had descended into chaos; paramedics had been summoned, all to the soundtrack of Carmella Cass screaming at Jizzo to wake up. At the beginning of the show, the ratings were good. By
the end, there wasn’t a late-night viewer in the country who wasn’t watching, alerted by a social-media buzz so loud it could have woken the dead. Except – oh, the heavenly irony
– Jizzo. He remained very firmly on the other side.
It was one of the things that Sarah found hard to stomach about living here. Every wail of human pain and tragedy was a story, played out in the media as if it were the Lifetime movie of the
week instead of someone’s actual life.
And yes, she realized that was hypocritical, having spent five years on a UK tabloid crime desk, working for the
Daily Scot
, door-stepping victims and reporting carnage in all its
bloody grime and glory.
Somehow, that was OK there. That was reporting the facts. Here, everything was so wrapped up in drama and ulterior motive that it was difficult to separate the real from the performance. And
that was never more obvious than in Davie’s life.
What were they now? Lovers? Yes. Exclusive? Absolutely. But they weren’t in an open, official, publicly acknowledged relationship. The reticence was all on her side, but she suspected that
was largely to do with the fact that Davie was used to getting everything at the snap of his TV-mogul fingers. He was definitely a live-in-the-moment, go-for-it, why-wait-for-anything kind of guy
who needed the world to be his and he needed it now. And he had the cash to pay for it.
She’d never be comfortable with that level of fame and power, and she wasn’t sure she wanted to be. It was only six months ago that she’d moved here from Glasgow, after coming
over initially to chase down a story on the relationship between Mirren, Davie and Zander. The last thing she expected was to fall for Davie Johnston, quit her job and move here, but that’s
what happened. It would have been the easiest thing in the world to move in with Davie and live the Hollywood dream of fame and fortune – it was certainly what he wanted – but in truth,
the thought made her skin bristle.
She wanted to make it on her own. On her terms. And whether he liked it or not, that had to happen before she became nothing more than Davie Johnston’s other half.
The freelance work, fluff pieces on the size of Kim Kardashian’s arse or Charlie Sheen’s legal bills (both of which appeared to be comparatively huge), paid her rent, allowing her to
concentrate on the stuff she really wanted to write. Beneath the glitter and the glitz, there was a darkness, a downward spiral of a city that survived on drugs, spin, hype and manipulation.
Nothing was real here. Nothing. And it fascinated her. There had been hundreds of Hollywood bios done before, but Sarah was writing hers from an outsider’s perspective, one that wasn’t
swayed by personal experience or lust for fame or power. She just wanted to tell the story, to look behind the Hollywood curtain and explain why a beautiful girl like Chloe Gore, born to wealth and
privilege, could end up dead at eighteen. She wanted to explore why the industry supported twenty-one-year-old brats who thought their music success gave them an unlimited platform of entitlement
and invincibility. And why fame-seekers in a reality world that was based on zero talent were prepared to – literally – exploit and risk their own lives for another million
‘likes’ on Instagram or Facebook.
It was a warped world, and the biggest irony of all?
In loving Davie Johnston, she was dancing with the devil. He had been the biggest manipulator of all, the king of reality TV and the Pied Piper to legions of wannabes who would do anything to
achieve the fame they craved.
Last year, Davie had been accused of plotting with one of his young reality
Similar Books
