Ooh! What a Lovely Pair: Our Story Read online

  Ooh! What a Lovely Pair

  Our Story

  ANT McPARTLIN AND

  DECLAN DONNELLY

  WITH ANDREW MILLIGAN

  MICHAEL JOSEPH

  an imprint of

  PENGUIN BOOKS

  MICHAEL JOSEPH

  Published by the Penguin Group

  Penguin Books Ltd, 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

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  Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  www.penguin.com

  First published 2009

  Copyright © Anthony McPartlin and Declan Donnelly, 2009

  For further copyright permissions see page 358

  The moral right of the authors has been asserted

  All rights reserved

  Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book

  ISBN: 978-0-14-193180-7

  Prologue

  Picture the scene. It’s a cold and wet November in 1993 and two young men are stood in the cramped and smoky manager’s office of Tokyo Joe’s, a nightclub in Preston. It’s six o’clock in the evening, and they each take a pair of extremely baggy jeans and an ill-fitting Day-glo shirt out of their Head sports bag.

  They make their way towards the dancefloor, where a grumpy and overweight DJ is introducing them as the star attraction at the Tuesday-afternoon under-18s disco. Hidden behind the DJ booth, the young men take a quick peek at their audience. It’s predominantly made up of thirteen-year-old schoolgirls, some of whom have dragged their boyfriends along. The intrepid performers step out on to a sticky dancefloor and spend the next three and a half minutes miming to their one and only single, while dancing as best they can in shirts and jeans made for men twice their size. For the entire performance, the assembled schoolgirls let out ear-splitting screams, while their boyfriends offer a slightly different response: they hurl ice cubes and ashtrays – and, when they’ve run out of them, start spitting at the two young men.

  Exhausted from the effort of dodging such missiles while lip-synching, the two retreat to the manager’s office to get changed. One of them turns to the other, and says,

  ‘Why the hell do we do these things?’

  ‘Look on the bright side,’ the other one replies. ‘It’s one for the book.’

  Well, those two young men were us – Ant and Dec.

  And this is that book.

  Before we go any further, we should explain one thing: when you see words in italics, that’s me, Ant.

  And when you see them in bold, that’s me, Dec.

  So that’s Ant – italics.

  And Dec – bold.

  Got it? Good.

  This year, 2009, is the twentieth year the two of us have spent working together and, for the last two decades, whenever something embarrassing happens, whenever something we’re proud of happens, whenever something pinch-yourself-unbelievable happens, we turn to each other and say, ‘One for the book.’

  Whether it was attempting to do the Junior Great North Run in Newcastle dressed as Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, swinging punches at each other in a Torremolinos hotel lift, trying to talk our way out of singing a cappella in Indonesia, chastising John Lydon in the middle of an Australian rainforest, or pretending not to be drunk in front of Victoria Beckham and Eva Longoria, sometimes it seems like we’ve been saying ‘One for the book’ on a daily basis. In fact, we realized we’d said it so much, it was about time we actually wrote that book – so here it is.

  Chapter 1

  I lay on the sofa, and I just kept thinking the same thing:

  ‘It could have been me.

  It should have been me.

  I should have been the Geordie Racer.’

  What am I talking about? Well, picture, if you will, a little fella called Declan Donnelly. You’re thinking about how I look now, aren’t you? But I mean a smaller Declan Donnelly. Nope, smaller than that. That’s better. Think of a child who was desperate to be an actor. Well, in 1987, that was me, and that was when I went for my very first audition – for a children’s drama called Geordie Racer. It was part of the BBC schools programme Look and Read, which, as those of you who grew up in the eighties will recall, featured a strange floating figure called Wordy. If you didn’t grow up in the eighties, you’ll have no idea what I’m talking about – look it up on the internet. Not now though, you’ve only just started the book – honestly, what’s the matter with you?

  The hero of Geordie Racer was Spuggy Hilton. Apparently, ‘Spuggy’ is short for ‘sparrow’, and young Spuggy kept pigeons. I know, sparrows, pigeons, it’s not exactly The Bourne Ultimatum, but what can I say? It was the eighties – a time when stories were basic, tastes were simple and pigeons were at the heart of an entire drama.

  At the audition, I got down to the last two, which meant the Geordie Racer would be me, or… someone else. Then I got the phone call every actor dreads – the phone call telling me the other lad had got the part. I can’t remember his name now, I never met him, but if he’s reading this, well done for being a better pigeon-fancier than me.

  Not getting Geordie Racer broke my little heart, I don’t mind telling you. I cried for days – yes, days. You know what actors are like – and if you don’t, let me tell you: neurotic, insecure and self-obsessed. In short, I was born for it.

  Although, looking back, I think it was destiny I didn’t get the part of the kid who kept pigeons.

  Yeah, because every actor should experience rejection.

  No, because I’m terrified of birds – I don’t know what I was thinking; to this day I still can’t go near the ostriches during the Bushtucker Trials on I’m a Celebrity… Get Me out of Here! God knows how I would have managed to spend days on end surrounded by pigeons as a mere child.

  After that crushing rejection, I made a momentous decision: that was it – I was going to retire from acting. I was eleven.

  Then, something happened, something that changed my mind and enticed me back into the world of showbusiness. I got a letter. As you can imagine, it was exciting enough just to get a letter at that age – no one really writes to kids, after all. And this was no ordinary letter; it was from Sue Weeks, the producer of Geordie Racer. She wrote that, even though I hadn’t got the part, she thought I had something, that I could make it as an actor and that I should stick at it. She said I should try again if another part came up. That letter made a huge difference, someone had shown faith in me, and I made my second momentous decision: I was coming out of retirement. I was still eleven.

  He may have been sensitive enough
to have his heart broken by rejection, but Dec’s story fails to mention one thing – he’s a complete and utter show-off, and always has been, which is why he was desperate to have the part. When it came to performing, I, on the other hand, wasn’t always so keen, and that’s because I like to think I’m a much more balanced individual. I’m probably not, but I like to think I am. Don’t get me wrong, I still performed as a child and, by the age of eleven, I had a complete set of impressions and jokes that went down a storm with the whole audience… of my mates… in the playground. Despite that, when it came to showing off in front of people I’d never met, things weren’t so easy. I was a bit like an old car – I needed a bit of a push to get going.

  That push came from my drama teacher, Lynne Spencer. Obviously she was Mrs Spencer at the time, but you can use teachers’ first names once you’ve left school, can’t you?

  I used to love drama lessons, and Lynne constantly encouraged me, praised me, and then put me up for an audition without telling me. It was my first ever audition, and I beat one other kid to get the part.

  I knew it – you were the Geordie Racer…

  No, I wasn’t the Geordie Racer.

  My audition was for the BBC kids’ show Why Don’t You?, although I don’t think Lynne actually said, ‘Why Don’t You… audition for… Why Don’t You?’ That would’ve been silly and confusing. The producers went round schools all over Newcastle looking for kids to cast over the summer holidays, and so, when they arrived at my school, Rutherford Comprehensive, I decided to go for it. Or, to be more precise, Lynne decided I should go for it. As I stepped on to the stage in the assembly hall, I felt nervous, but at the same time I thought it was just a bit of a laugh, it wasn’t going to lead to anything. Plus, there were other people on the stage, so it wasn’t like everyone was looking at just me.

  For the audition, we had to improvise a scene for the producers, and the theme they gave us was transport.

  Reading this, you’re probably thinking, ‘Transport, eh? I wonder what the young Ant McPartlin did with that – was he the captain of a ship, perhaps? A racing driver maybe? Or even an airline pilot?

  Guess again.

  I was a drunk.

  What’s a drunk got to do with transport? You might well ask, but that was the genius of my performance: I was a drunk on a bus.

  Much to my surprise, I got the part. I’m not sure if the producers were drunk as well, but they gave me the job on Why Don’t You?, and suddenly my career was on its way.

  Along with the other kids in Why Don’t You?, I spent the summer filming on a double-decker bus, although I never once got to pretend to be drunk on that bus, which seemed a shame after my audition. But it was brilliant: I learnt lines, I performed to camera, and I felt like I’d well and truly arrived, which – being on a bus that constantly moved around – I often had.

  I was convinced I’d found my calling; I would perform for the rest of my life. Then, one earth-shattering event changed all of that. I went back to school.

  On Why Don’t You?, I’d often been the butt of the jokes, and had been portrayed as a bit of an idiot, and that didn’t help when I was back in class. The other kids were jealous, and they teased me. A lot. They’d call me a knob, or an idiot, or say they’d ‘seen me acting like a tit on the telly’. To be honest, it put me off the idea of performing. It’s that thing that’s happened to us all at one time or another in our schooldays: you get teased for something – it could be a stupid question you ask a teacher or a pair of trousers you’re wearing – and you grow to hate that thing, it makes you want to make sure you never do it again. Well, that was how I felt about performing. So I stopped going for auditions.

  Meanwhile, I was doing slightly more low-key gigs although, by this point, it has to be said, I was a hugely experienced performer. I had a CV that included dancing on stage at the Tyneside Irish Centre, singing on stage at the Tyneside Irish Centre and even telling jokes on stage at the Tyneside Irish Centre. I don’t know if I’ve mentioned it, but my parents ran the Tyneside Irish Centre.

  In fact, while I’m here, why don’t I give you a bit of autobiographical information about the Donnelly family? After all, if you can’t be autobiographical in an autobiography, where can you be?

  My mam and dad, Anne and Alphonsus, came to Newcastle from Ireland in 1958. My dad’s always been known as Fonsey, a bit like the character, Fonzie, in Happy Days, although he doesn’t wear a leather jacket and hang out in American diners, it’s just an abbreviation. I’ve got six – yes, six – brothers and sisters, and I’m the youngest. From the oldest down, they are Patricia, who was born in the Mid-Ulster Hospital, Magherafelt, Northern Ireland in 1961, then Eamonn, Martin, Dermott, Moyra and Camalia who, like me, were all born in Newcastle. Even though she’s the next up, there’s still five years between Camalia and me, which means I really am the baby of the family. We grew up in a council house in Cruddas Park in the west end of Newcastle, which had three bedrooms, and you don’t need to be a property expert or a maths genius to work out that three bedrooms and nine people equals a bit of a squeeze. The four boys were in two sets of bunk beds in one room, the three girls were in another, and my mam and dad had the third room – it was just like The Waltons, but in Newcastle.

  I had different relationships with each of my brothers and sisters: growing up, I annoyed them all in very different ways. As the eldest, Patricia was like a second mam to me, and she would always baby-sit. Eamonn took me to my first football match and, though Martin moved away to work as a joiner when I was quite young, he’s someone I’ve had a great relationship with since I’ve got older. Dermott was away training to be a priest, so I’d only really see him in school holidays, when we’d have a real laugh together. Later on, when I was about fourteen, I did briefly consider following in his footsteps, and the footsteps of my Godfather, Father O’Connell, and becoming a priest. Then I got the bus home from school one day and it was full of lasses from the local girls’ school, Sacred Heart. I knew right there and then that the priesthood wasn’t for me. Anyway, back to the family – I’m assured it’s just a coincidence that two of my three brothers left home when I was young, but I’ve got my suspicions. With Moyra and Camalia, I was the stereotypical younger brother, hanging around, annoying them when they had friends round and generally being a pain in the neck – it’s in the contract when you’re the youngest, isn’t it?

  You’d often find the Donnelly clan at the Tyneside Irish Centre on a Saturday night and so, as I say, that was where I had my earliest performing experiences. I’d usually get up on stage and do a bit of breakdancing – it was the obvious artistic choice for a kid from Newcastle in an Irish Club. I’d do my turn and then go round with an ashtray, which would get filled up with loose change. Yes, the customers of the Irish Centre would all pay good money to keep me off that stage.

  Fortunately, with so many brothers and sisters; I always had a readymade audience at home. My family would always encourage me, saying, ‘Do that dance again,’ ‘Sing that song,’ or ‘Watch out for the coffee table.’ You know that old cliché about the youngest in a big family having to shout the loudest to get everyone’s attention, being willing to do anything to get noticed and just wanting people to look at them? Well, I’d say that just about summed me up as a child. The showing off’s starting to make sense now, isn’t it?

  That desire to perform made me a bit different from the other children, or, as they’re known in the North-east, bairns. Growing up on a council estate in the west end of Newcastle in the eighties, it wasn’t normal for kids to try and hog the limelight, not unless you count playing football or jumping ramps on your BMX.

  There was a real sense of community in Cruddas Park. My uncle Frank and auntie Mary lived just around the corner, two doors down from us, with all my cousins. One of them, Ciaran, who’s a couple of years younger than me, was my best mate. He was the perfect friend – generous, a good laugh and, best of all, a couple of inches shorter than me. I still see him at fam
ily gatherings now, but we don’t get together as often as I’d like to. Maybe we should get a couple of BMXs and hit the streets for old times’ sake. Back then, there were kids constantly playing on the streets, and people would always be looking out for the bairns. Obviously I’ve got my rose-coloured spectacles on here, but I promise I’ll take them off soon. When we were kids, the summers seemed longer, there was always a game of British Bulldog or Headers and Volleys going on, and Cruddas Park was a great place to grow up. I honestly wouldn’t have changed a single thing about it. Which is just as well because, unless I invent a time machine, I won’t be able to.

  Although I didn’t have an Irish Centre, or an ashtray full of loose change, there are similarities in our childhoods – for a start, I also grew up in the west end of Newcastle, within about a mile or two of where Dec grew up. I spent the first couple of years of my life in a flat in Westerhope with my mam Christine and dad Raymond and, when I was two, my little sister Sarha (pronounced Sarah) came along. We needed more space, so we moved into a three-bedroom council house on a cul-de-sac in Fenham. My nanna and granda, Kitty and Willy, who were my mam’s parents, lived opposite us, and me and Sarha would always go to their house after school for a cup of milky coffee and, if we were lucky, a Tunnock’s tea cake. We were only allowed one, because, as any child knows, ‘any more would have spoiled our tea’. Nanna Kitty was Irish. She was a Liverpool fan, thanks to her Irish roots, but she loved Newcastle United too, and I used to love watching the football with her. As for Granda, when I was growing up, we used to play in his garage and garden all the time, and he was, without a doubt, the most honest, kind and genuine man I’ve ever met. One of my biggest regrets is that my granda never lived to see how things have turned out for me. Him and my nanna were great with me and Sarha – what is it about grandparents that means they never, ever lose their temper with their grandchildren? My nanna and granda never, ever had a cross word for me and our Sarha.