All my life I’ve felt really stupid – so I’m going to resit my GCSEs to prove I’m not a dumb-dumb, says Robbie Williams
AGED 16, he was plucked from the classroom and rocketed to superstardom.
Thirty-five years later, Robbie Williams is gearing up to go back to school — and sit his GCSEs.
If, that is, he can fit in his studies around a best-selling world tour and awards season.
Robbie — whose latest single Forbidden Road, from his new biopic Better Man, is up for Best Original Song at next month’s Golden Globes in LA — has been busy Googling home education options.
He says: “I’ve been wanting to set up a university but, actually, I wouldn’t be able to attend if and when I do, because I didn’t get any GCSEs.
“I got nothing higher than a grade D, and everything else I failed or I didn’t turn up for. I really want to go back and get them.
“I can’t remember my English teacher’s name, but I was thinking there might be an interesting TV show in it, where I have to go back to school . . . but obviously in an age- appropriate way!
“All my life I’ve felt really stupid because we didn’t know about dyslexia in the Seventies and Eighties in Stoke-on-Trent.
“I’ve got dyslexia, dyscalculia, ADHD, but we didn’t have those then, so I left school thinking I was a dumb-dumb and it’s taken ages to get over that.
“And now I just wanna go and prove a few people wrong — I’m not thick. Now that I’ve said that, I’m s***ing myself . . . maybe I am!”
‘It’s good, innit?’
For the record, Robbie Peter Williams is one of the brightest — and most talented — celebrities out there.
He may not have an A in trigonometry, but he’s literate, erudite and street-smart.
Earlier this year, he had his first solo art exhibition at the prestigious Moco gallery in Amsterdam, two years after his acclaimed exhibition with Ed Godrich at Sotheby’s — and now his track Forbidden Road is being feted in Hollywood.
So that’s his Art and Music GCSEs sorted, then.
Of the Golden Globes nod, he adds: “Yeah, it’s good, innit?” Which doubtless will delight his future English teacher.
Anything else to add, Rob?
“It’s so weird because you can be sort of cynical and judgey about award ceremonies . . . up until you have something that’s drastically important. Then it’s the most important thing ever.”
The star’s biopic has also received critical acclaim after its world premiere at Colorado’s Telluride Film Festival in September.
Directed by Greatest Showman ace Michael Gracey, it tells Robbie’s story in a way never done before — via a CGI chimpanzee.
The singer appears as the ape, and the film shows dad-of-four Robbie’s meteoric rise from his time in Take That through to solo success — but also everything in between, including alcoholism, drug addiction and his rampant womanising.
It’s just brilliant.
Heartbreakingly, the film also details his doomed early relationship with All Saints singer Nicole Appleton, showing the aftermath of the abortion she was encouraged to have by her record label at the time.
Today the pair are still firm friends — Robbie sent her the film script to make sure she was happy, and Nicole was on the red carpet for the London premiere last month.
Another person given an advance read of the script was Robbie’s old Take That pal Gary Barlow, but the reaction was . . . muted.
And Robbie invited his former bandmates to a special screening of Better Man but, alas, only Mark Owen turned up.
Robbie and Gary famously fell out after Robbie quit Take That in 1995, and Gary later claimed his younger bandmate was jealous of his solo career at the time.
But they later made up, Robbie briefly reunited with Take That in 2010, and they are now good pals.
Robbie said: “I sent Gary the script and, yeah, it was problematic.
“You have these tools to prolong your career and remind people that you still exist — you know, movies, books, documentaries. But part of that deal is talking about the past and how it felt.
“And it’s very difficult for Gary, and very difficult for me, because I have to tell my story authentically. I need to, I’m compelled to. But at the same time, in the film I speak and feel and think how I spoke, felt and thought back then. And I don’t think that way now.
“This will be triggering for Gaz and I feel guilty for that. But also I’d feel more guilty for me if I didn’t tell my story.
“Gary said that he’d come off worse than Darth Vader in the first Star Wars, so we changed some of the script. I hope it’s OK.”
Of the semi-shunned screening, a pragmatic Robbie simply shrugs.
Chatting in his dressing room at the BBC studios in West London ahead of a Graham Norton Show TV appearance, he adds: “So, Mark emailed me a few weeks ago.
“He said, ‘Hey, me and the lads are all in town. Can we go see the film?’. But only Mark turned up. He loved it, though. It’s all good, it’s all good.
“Seeing it will be tough for Gaz. Howard [Donald] won’t be bothered and [famously reclusive] Jason [Orange] is probably working for Mossad now.”
Close to Liam Payne
The Robbie of old may have been hurt, angry or bruised by Gary’s no-show, but 2024 Robbie is a whole different beast.
Sobriety for more than 20 years, nauseating happiness with his US actress wife Ayda Field, therapy, a blissful life in Los Angeles (and London and Switzerland), plus four delightful kids have made him, well, a better man.
Indeed, eldest daughter Teddy, 12, is with us during our chat and is a joy — politely saying she remembers meeting me at their home in Los Angeles last year.
No nepo-baby brat there.
Away from stage and screen, Robbie had a smash-hit four-part Netflix series out last year — and it proved he is genuinely one of the nicest men in showbusiness.
When, a couple of years ago, I mentioned my now ex was a super-fan, out of the blue he and Ayda posted a Christmas package including a bottle of Dom Perignon champagne, some chocolates, a handwritten card and three pairs of gym socks [clean!] from Ayda’s athleisure range.
(I’m at the same address, Rob, for all future bottles).
And after fellow singer Liam Payne died in October, Rob rang me to check in.
Really, it should have been me making sure he was OK.
Robbie, after all, was the late One Direction star’s mentor on The X Factor.
The pair were close, and Robbie helped the younger singer throughout his career, including when Liam tragically battled his own drink and drug demons.
He doesn’t want to detail how he helped, though, out of respect for the family.
Unquestionably, Liam’s death in Argentina, at the age of just 31, shook the Angels singer.
It was, as he says, a “sliding doors” moment.
He adds: “Any of those moments in my life where ultimate chaos was being achieved by me — because of the powders and potions and what I was putting into myself — it could so easily have been me so many times.
“I feel like I should do something in the way of mental health.
“I want to gather around some like-minded people in the industry and say, ‘What can we do?’.
“Progress is being made, though — because at least we’re talking about things and at least we accept that these things happen and they are real and not a figment of people’s imagination.
“I think the idea of safeguarding industries is all great when it comes to big institutions like the BBC or ITV or Channel 4.
“But there are more people at grass-roots level trying to make it than there are people who have made it.
“So that’s maybe where we can step in and do something.”
And if anyone is likely to do anything, my money is on Robbie.
- Better Man (15) is out on Boxing Day.