Category Entertainment News

Although Martin Kemp and his wife Shirlie have been married for 37 years, some friends and family members were against the couple’s decision to tie the knot in Saint Lucia, which the couple have visited since then.

View 4 Images

Shirlie Kemp has admitted she “upset a lot of people” by opting for the wedding she “wanted” before marrying husband Martin Kemp. The famous pair have been wed for an incredible 37 years, though their choice to exchange vows on the Caribbean island of Saint Lucia reportedly didn’t sit well with certain friends and relatives.

Shirlie and Martin, who is currently appearing on I’m A Celebrity…Get Me Out of Here!, wed in 1988 and are parents to two children – son Roman, a TV and radio host, and daughter Harley Moon. The pair were both used to the spotlight – Martin as part of hit 80s group Spandau Ballet, and Shirlie performing as a backing vocalist for Wham!

The couple decided to get married by themselves on a clifftop on the sun-drenched island with views over the Caribbean because of this. Although she acknowledges that it upset “a lot of people,” Shirley says she still believes it was the “wedding I wanted” because of how she recalls it as one of her most memorable experiences.

Chatting on the Travel Secrets podcast, the mother-of-two explained: “It was the wedding I wanted. I had a big fear of weddings and all the attention and to wear a big dress. I think maybe because you’re in the band, in the limelight, that’s enough, that’s really fed my soul,” reports the Manchester Evening News.

View 4 Images

“I had a big fear about getting married, so I didn’t need to be the show’s star.” With just Martin around, I would be on my own. Many people were upset by me. Because it wasn’t practical and because we were frequently traveling for work at the time, it’s a beautiful memory.

Shirlie revealed she was inspired to select Saint Lucia as their wedding destination by her bandmate Helen ‘Pepsi’ DeMacque, whose parents emigrated from Saint Lucia to the United Kingdom during the 1950s. Martin described the stunning location for their ceremony on the podcast, which took place with just a single witness in attendance.

Following a “traumatic” visit to China, Martin revealed how his wife Shirlie sought his assistance. As a vocalist for Wham, Shirley traveled to Beijing and Guangzhou. in 1985.

View 4 Images

Wham! marked a culturally significant milestone for China. became the nation’s first Western pop band to play.

Shirlie calls the trip to China “the most shocking experience” however. One of the new Seven Wonders of the World, the backing singer recalls being ensnared by China’s enormous Great Wall.

According to legend, hundreds of thousands of people died while the wall was being constructed, making it known as “the longest cemetery on Earth.” On the Travel Secrets podcast, Shirley revealed, “Everything just upset me in a way, I thought, “Who built this wall?” Building’s loss of lives was a culture that I was deeply saddened by.

She also mentioned that there was “something quite traumatizing” that transpired while on the trip.

View 4 Images

The Spandau Ballet star and former EastEnders actor, Martin, ended up paying for his wife’s therapy because the costs of the trip “mounted up.” He admitted that Shirlie’s return from China cost him a lot of money in therapy. The truth is that.

His then-girlfriend begged for another vacation after returning from the Far East. She demanded, “Martin, take me to Florida, I need to go somewhere brand-new.”

The trip to Florida was not just the therapy, according to Martin, but it was also. Everything was “mountaining up.”

How the “Stranger Things” star and the woman who wrote Lily Allen’s revenge song may have quietly reconnected behind the scenes, from steamy sauna sightings to secret set visits.

3 images to be seen

It sounds like a plot twist worthy of Stranger Things, but the drama surrounding David Harbour’s love life has officially moved from the Upside Down to the frozen north of Canada.

Just weeks after his estranged wife, Lily Allen, dropped her explosive ‘divorce album’ West End Girl – featuring a track dedicated to a mistress she names only as “Madeline” – the actor has been hit by fresh claims that he may have gone back to the very woman at the centre of the scandal.

While Allen’s lyrics ask ‘Who the f*** is Madeline?’, Natalie Tippett, the costume designer Harbour first met on the set of 2023 film We Have a Ghost, has confessed that it is indeed her. And if reports are to be believed, the pair are very much back on.

READ MORE: Katie Price shows off enormous new tattoo telling fans ‘I’m a work in progress’READ MORE: Freddy Brazier says he ‘tried to end it all’ and spent 18th birthday ‘in a psychiatric ward’

3 images to be seen

According to an insider, the pair have kept in touch and may have even grown closer as a result of the song’s controversy. “We know that he and Natalie have been together recently,” a source told the Daily Mail.

But what else has fuelled the chatter? Here, The Mirror explores the ‘evidence’ that fans say suggest they’re back on…

When Tippett shared images of herself apparently at the Winnipeg Thermea Spa Village while Harbour, 50, was in town filming the sequel to his action film Violent Night, her tongues wagging.

Prior to Lily’s new album’s release, Harbour is said to have been resident of the Canadian city until October 15 when she was alleged to have spent nine days there. Tippett posted a carousel of photos with the caption “lately” on September 5. A campfire photo that appears to be in line with the Therma Spa Village’s outdoor relaxation areas was also included in the collection.

Meanwhile, several guests told the Mail that they’d seen Harbour in the spa’s sauna on numerous occasions. One fan wrote on Facebook: “It’s a good thing for stars like David Harbour that you can’t have your cell phone with you at Thermëa Spa. He was sitting right beside my wife and I in the sauna! He’s in Winnipeg shooting a movie.”

While Harbour was away for work, Tippett, a single mother from New Orleans, was not in a formal relationship with the production. There is rife with rumors that she was visiting him only because of her apparent presence in the Canadian city, which is thousands of miles away from her New Orleans residence with her two-year-old daughter.

3 images to be seen

It comes after Tippett admitted she had heard the song but demanded privacy to protect her young daughter in an interview that she had identified herself as the woman behind the pseudonym. I’ve heard the song, of course. I need to protect my family. For me, it’s a little scary,” she said at the time.

Madeline, Lily Allen’s new song, exposes her version of events and accuses her husband of breaking the law in their open marriage. The lyrics begin with “I know none of this is your fault… but you’re not a stranger, Madeline,” as they say in reference to deciphering incriminating texts.

No one has yet formally stated the status of their relationship, excluding Tippett and Harbour.

READ MORE: Shark slashes £100 off its build-your-own air styler in early Black Friday sale

Fans praised the similarities between the two women as they paid a giddy tribute to their daughter Bessie on her 19th birthday, including Lucy Benjamin, the star of Albert Square, who also portrayed Lisa Fowler.

View 4 Images

Walford Square icon Lucy Benjamin shared a snap of her daughter Bessie Taggart on Saturday as she celebrated her 19th birthday – and fans were quick to point out the similarities between the teen and her famous mum.

Former EastEnders star Lucy, 55, who shares Bessie with her ex-husband Richard Taggart, posted a carousel of pics of her eldest daughter on Instagram to mark her special day, beginning with one where she could be seen dining al fresco on holiday.

Another photo showed Lucy’s lookalike daughter Bessie in a selfie, before another photo showed her as a young teen pulling a silly face at the camera, and another photo showed her posing with her actor mother when she was a young child.

READ MORE: ‘Beautiful bamboo pyjamas’ shoppers are buying in all 12 colours now £18 off

View 4 Images

Bessie was the first to joke jokingly under her mother’s proud grid post, posing as embarrassed, asking, “Why do you hate me?” Then, a fan wrote, “Oh Bess, Darlin, she loves you so much.”

One follower quickly discovered the family likeness and remarked, “Bessie gets her beautiful looks from your mother. One follower praised “Wow! A natural beauty is inspiring to see. Nothing here is false. Happy birthday, everyone. Another person wrote, “She’s beautiful Lucy!”

Back in May 2006, it was one other than Sharon Osbourne who accidentally revealed that Lucy, now 55, was pregnant with Bessie, during the first episode of The X Factor: Battle of the Stars.

When host Kate Thornton said, “I don’t think you wanted that announced tonight, did you? “, Lucy chuckled.

View 4 Images

Lucy and Bessie’s father, Richard, who has been married since 2006, ended their union, saying it had “gone its course.” Richard met Lucy on a flight to Dubai and recognized her as a TV star.

According to a source at the time, Lucy and Richard attempted to make things work, but in the end decided to split up.

Lucy previously opened up about her split to , confessing, “It was weird the way it just came out as it was quite a long time after we’d actually separated. But people didn’t really pressure us and there was no big shebang about it. We were kind of left alone, which was lovely.”

The actress is famed for playing Lisa Fowler on Albert Square, appearing on EastEnders from 1998 to 2003, and was part of the show’s now iconic Who Shot Phil? Storyline, but has gone on to play other TV roles, including as a police officer in Paramount crime thriller curfew, in 2023.

View 4 Images

She acknowledged that it almost became an EastEnders reunion when describing that role at the time. According to Lucy, the loosely based book After Dark, which deals with men being locked up between 7 p.m. and 7 a.m., is loosely based on the book.

It’s a bit of a conversation starter about violence against women, not advocating for men’s locking, but it’s a sci-fi exploration of a parallel universe. What if that were the case, it asks?

‘It was bizarre at the readthrough, I was sitting opposite Anita Dobson. She’d gone by the time I left EastEnders. And Larry Lamb I’d met through working on New Tricks.’

Rebecca Ritters, age 41, played Hannah Martin in the hit television series Neighbours before joining for seven dramatic years in the 1990s.

5 images to be seen

She’s a Neighbours legend who shot to fame starring in the Australian soap during its golden years in the 1990s.

But now, Rebecca Ritters, who played Hannah Martin between 1992 and 1999, is almost unrecognisable in a completely different career which has taken her to some of the world’s most dangerous places, including war zones.

Rebecca, now 41, was only eight years old when she first started playing Hannah on Ramsay Street. She participated in a number of significant storylines over the course of her seven years, including the death of her mother.

Hannah’s name continues to appear in fans’ lists of the all-time most annoying Neighbor characters, a testament to young Rebecca’s acting prowess, without a doubt. According to The Herald Sun, Hannah is regarded by many as “the most annoying character ever on soap.”

5 images to be seen

In the same way, Hannah’s profile was detailed in Sky’s 2010 celebration of Neighbours’ 25th anniversary: “The majority of plots revolved around one of three scenarios: either Hannah was crying because no-one liked her at school; or Because of her conflict with Debbie, Hannah was crying. or that Hannah was crying because her father, Phil, was on a date.

After leaving Neighbours in 1999, Rebecca briefly returned in 2005 for the show’s 20th anniversary, but her acting journey didn’t end there. She appeared in other TV shows, including Coronation Street as Jules Robinson, and even toured Europe with the British Shakespeare Company in productions of Romeo and Juliet and A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

5 images to be seen

However, she switched from acting to journalism, which was the big plot twist. Rebecca began her career in news production after earning a degree in politics and international relations in 2015 at Deutsche Welle (DW) in Berlin, Germany.

Far from the gentle world of soap sets, she now reports from some of the most dangerous places in the world, including war zones in Ukraine and Afghanistan, as a foreign correspondent. More recently, she spent two years in Jerusalem, covering the Israel-Palestine conflict.

5 images to be seen

In September 2024, she shared a moving post about the experience on Instagram. She posted an image showing her in protective clothing with debris burning behind her

She continued, “The experience was profound in ways that I could not have imagined.” It was actually life changing, despite how cliche it sounds. Many of the outstanding local colleagues, many of whom became close friends, were a result of our efforts. and to the numerous non-work friends that were present.

5 images to be seen

Thanks, though, to the numerous strangers who had faith in me when they faced the most difficult circumstances. ”

Her DW colleagues have acknowledged that they were Neighbours fans when they were younger and are shocked to see them working alongside their pre-teen on-screen hero.

Rebecca herself claims that having spent more time with Neighbours helped her develop her storytelling skills. The fame, however, was challenging to comprehend.

She stated, “My happiest memories are with the wonderful cast and crew, and I had a great time on the show.

Up until 1999, I spent seven years on the program, which completely altered my life. Neighbours deserves a lot, but it was also challenging.

The Loose Women actress has emphasized the need to be more aware of a crippling condition.

View 2 Images

Ruth Langsford has opened up about a ‘hard lesson’ she learned about her parents amidst their struggles with a debilitating condition. The star’s 94-year-old mother is battling Alzheimer’s – the most common form of dementia – just 13 years after Ruth’s father died of the same disease.

Although their symptoms, including memory loss, have certainly been challenging, Ruth said she is now better at caring for her mum than ever before. Speaking on Loose Women, the 65 year old said she learned from ‘all the mistakes’ she made with her dad and stressed the need for increased awareness about the disease.

“I am so much better looking after my mum and being with my mum because of all the mistakes I made with my dad,” Ruth said in a recent episode of the ITV show. “Because there was so little awareness, and there needs to be more, but we are more aware now.

And so it was when my father would say things like, “Oh, I’ve been here before, haven’t I?” and I would say, “No, dad, you couldn’t have been here before,” as if I had imagined helping him remember. And I used to say, “Dad remember, dad remember when, remember remember.”

She continued, “And now I look back and believe he didn’t remember.” He was unable to recall. I don’t do any of that, my mother. And if she says, “Oh, I’ve been, I’ve sat here and done this show,” I’ll just go, “Yes, that’s nice. There is no stress because it is completed. However, you are aware that it was a difficult lesson to learn.

On the surface, telling white lies to a person with dementia may seem unfair, especially when it appears easier to correct them or simply tell the truth. However, official advice from the Alzheimer’s Society suggests it’s much preferable to lie if ‘doing anything else would cause the person significant physical or psychological harm’. This is often referred to as a ‘therapeutic lie’.

“We instinctively want to lean towards the ‘whole truth’ end of the spectrum, but we also want to minimise any distress our response causes to the person with dementia,” the society’s advice reads. “But these aims often contradict, leaving us to seek a balancing act or a ‘least-bad’ trade-off. (We should not forget our own well-being either, as we don’t want to end up feeling bad about ourselves.)”

View 2 Images

The society goes on to say that “the entire truth here could mean repeatedly disclosing the death of a parent as if it had just happened, over and over again.” What could possibly be crueler”?

Joan, Ruth’s mother, lives close to the star’s Surrey home. Joan can’t remember what she had for lunch or breakfast, according to Ruth, who said in August.

According to a previous Mirror report, Ruth said: “She wouldn’t remember what she’s had for her lunch or breakfast, and if I go and see her, when I leave, if you said to her was Ruth here today, she’d say no. But in the moment, she still knows it’s me – as soon as she sees me, she says ‘Oh, what a lovely surprise!’ like she hasn’t seen me for months.

Because of my dad, I’m much more knowledgeable about this than my mother, which is very difficult. When he got Alzheimer’s or dementia, we as a family were a little lost. With my dad, I received a lot of lessons.

Ruth also acknowledged during the interview that she occasionally wonders if she might be a victim of memory loss and that she occasionally gets anxious whenever she has a memory lapse.

READ MORE: Breast cancer screening update for people aged 40 as Government responds to public

She doesn’t intend to take any tests to assess her risk of dementia, though. I can feel the panic when she says, “Every time I forget something, those blank moments where you go, I’ve totally forgotten that person’s name, and I work with them every day.”

“And sometimes I look back and think, “I was tired that day,” but I’m thinking about it because both of my parents have dementia, and I’m aware of tests that can determine your level of vulnerability, but I don’t want to know.

There may seem a little childlike, but I don’t want to know because there isn’t a cure for it and I am aware of what it involves. I simply want to live my life. I get it if I want it. “I hope not,”

Alzheimer’s disease: what is it?

NHS figures indicate that over 944,000 people in the UK have dementia, including one in every 11 people over 65 years old. According to the World Health Organisation, Alzheimer’s disease is the most prevalent type of dementia, representing roughly 60 to 70% of cases.

Alzheimer’s is a progressive disease that gradually gets worse over time. The first symptoms of memory loss, typically include minor forgetting names or conversations, are typically less severe.

However, the NHS suggests that additional symptoms may arise as the condition worsens.

• Hallucinations
• communication, language, or speech difficulties
• difficulty making decisions
• confusion, confusion, or feeling lost in well-known locations
• anxiety and low moods
• Behavioral changes: growing suspicion or aggression
• Having trouble moving around unaided

There is no treatment for Alzheimer’s disease, according to the NHS’s guidance, but medications are available to treat some of the symptoms. Making changes to your home environment to make it easier to move around and remember daily tasks is one of the other options that can be used to help people with Alzheimer’s live as independently as possible.

“Psychological treatments like cognitive stimulation therapy may also be provided to improve your memory, problem-solving abilities, and language ability.”

Fans left screenings of the second instalment of Wicked gushing about being “distracted” by Arianna Grande’s major beauty blunder, but Arianna Grande reprised her role in the second instalment.

View 2 Images

Ariana Grande returned for an Oscar-worthy performance as Glinda The Good in Wicked: For Good, the second and final instalment to the Wicked saga which started with part one last year.

The film’s enormous success earned it record-breaking box office receipts, cementing its position as one of the most popular musical adaptations.

The greatest gift of my life was being asked to join this most amazing group of people on a most creatively and emotionally fulfilling journey, wrote Ariana in a heartfelt letter in response. More than anyone else has taught me about Glinda.

READ MORE: When will Wicked For Good be available to stream as film released to cinemasREAD MORE: Who is the scarecrow in Wicked as fans given ‘jump scare’ after huge transformation

But amid the praise, the same complaints have landed on social media since Wicked: For Good’s debut on Friday 21 November. One disgrunted fan took to TikTok in a video that has garnered over eight million views to ask: “Who is responsible for Ariana Grande’s strip lashes?!”

Fans couldn’t help but agree in the comments, with one saying, “Wood couldn’t do better than this, and the budget for wicked was 145 MILLION”?

Another actress claimed that her lashes caused her to lose focus, saying, “I could not pay attention because the strip lashes were THAT problematic.” Couldn’t we at least have employed a tech for this? “?

Some critics, however, responded to Ariana’s Glinda makeup, with one revolving the camera’s attention. The user typed “I can’t believe people have vexed about this…like did you actually care about the movie?”

Others claimed that Glinda’s real character was influenced by her makeup, which she was not at all good at.

View 2 Images

Isn’t that at the core of the point, then? One argumentation was made, and another added, “I kinda like that not everything has to be ‘perfect’.'” Glinda is all about the performance from a distance.

For Good’s many fans believed Ariana had created her own makeup. The changes in Glinda’s makeup were explained by Frances Hannon, an award-winning makeup, hair, and prosthetics artist who worked on both films.

“One of the changes that we chose going from Wicked 1 and Wicked: For Good was that we didn’t change her foundation or her eyeshadow but we framed her eyes much stronger within the density in the lashes and the stronger [lash] line,” she told @illumin_arty.

She continued, “Ari has really strong eyes, which really gave her a different quality. She matured, not it, but it did, in my opinion.