Circling us silently, like sharks, are three figures with cameras. Their lenses scrutinise us — weird, glassy black holes that we try to ignore, dilating as one of us says something funny, coming in close so that our skins shiver.
Production assistants watch intently, making notes on clipboards and whispering to each other. The air throbs with a vibration I haven’t sensed since leaving boarding school at the age of 15.
Why am I here? A complicated question that may take a little time to answer.
There’s a lady named Emma Freud. She’s married to a man called Richard Curtis, who’s the wunderkind of the British film business.
Curtis, for anyone who doesn’t know, was to Blair’s Britain what Leni Riefenstahl was to Hitler’s Germany. He wrote and produced Notting Hill, a grim, lifeless romantic comedy starring Julia Roberts and Hugh Grant.
As for Emma, she’s the impeccably connected daughter of Clement Freud, the niece of Lucian and the great-granddaughter of Sigmund. Her brother is the official diabolical nuncio: the PR Matthew Freud, who’s married to the daughter of Rupert Murdoch, our recently deposed puppet-master.
All these people live very close to power. And, not surprisingly, they’d always avoided me, and I’d avoided them.
Until, that is, Robbie Williams asked me to compère his swing concert at the Albert Hall a few years ago, as well as sing a track with him. It sounded like fun. When I found out Richard Curtis was the director, it sounded even better.
Richard was preparing the film Love Actually at the time. My brain went into overdrive: maybe, during the Robbie rehearsals, I could grab the leading role from the jaws of Hugh Grant.
Yes, I’d be more amusing, more debonair — and Richard would turn to Emma in bed one night and say: ‘I think I’ve had enough of Hugh. Rupert will be my new muse.’
Well, at first it all went according to plan. I sat with Richard and Emma during rehearsals. The show was a great success, and afterwards Richard came into my dressing room.
‘You were absolutely marvellous,’ he said.
‘Thanks, Richard,’ I replied, pinching myself to make sure I wasn’t dreaming. ‘I hope we see each other soon,’ I ventured hopefully.
‘Yes, that would be lovely. Here. Let me give you my number.’
Images of renewed Hollywood stardom burst across my brain like fireworks. ‘And the winner is . . . Rupert Everett for Love Actually.’ I could hear the applause.
Similarities: Rupert Everett thought Alan Sugar closely resembled Sid James, right
‘Oh, hello, John,’ said Richard, pleasantly. ‘I did so enjoy Love Is The Devil.’
John cracked a smile as huge as the Cheshire cat’s. ‘Why, thank you, Richard,’ he replied. ‘But look at your own achievements.You’ve single-handedly destroyed British cinema.’
Richard’s pupils dilated slightly, and the tip of his nose flushed. I broke into a sweat. John took a generous gulp from his glass and waited for the ball to be lobbed back, but Richard just looked at his watch.
‘Well, let’s be in touch. All the best.’ And he left the room.
Needless to say, I didn’t get a part in Love Actually — or anything else, actually.
So when Emma Freud called me at the end of 2006 and asked me to take part in a charity version of The Apprentice, I should have just said no.
‘It’s not for a couple of months. There’s a task,’ explained Emma, ‘and it’s made for you. It’ll be a doddle. Only four days’ work.’
Four days in two months’ time was a dot on the horizon, so I said yes. I didn’t have a television and had never even seen The Apprentice, but I imagined it was something along the same lines as The Avengers, and thought no more about it.
I should have asked: what kind of task would be a doddle? What is a doddle in the Curtis–Freud world?
The evening the show began, a lady arrived to drive me to the secret venue where I was to meet with the rest of my team, and the other team, and, of course, Alan Sugar. All news to me.
Alpha-male: Alastair Campbell, pictured, 'glistened with testosterone'
‘You don’t know Alan Sugar?’ ‘No, I don’t. Is he a singer?’
‘No. He’s the star of The Apprentice.’
‘Aha,’ I said knowingly.
Eventually, we arrived at a kind of disused warehouse, where I was taken into a dimly-lit space. Twelve celebrities were gathered in the gloom. The walls were black and it felt like being in a gigantic aquarium.
The women’s team — which included Susannah Constantine, Cheryl Cole and Jo Brand — were huddled together, and I wished I were one of them. The men’s team — among them, Alastair Campbell, Piers Morgan and Ross Kemp — glistened with testosterone: it oozed from their every pore like sap.
Each had a suitcase in his hand, as if he were about to get on the train to boarding school. In fact, the whole thing reminded me of school.
Here were the same rugger b*****s and bullies I’d escaped all those years ago, wearing the same slouchy sixth-form clothes. I could think of one thing only. Escape.
Emma Freud sidled up to me, and I had to restrain myself from breaking her neck. A camera swept in with her.
‘So you know the task?’ she giggled. ‘Everyone else does.’
‘No. No one told me.’
‘You’re going to love it. It’s made for you,’ she said.
Now Piers Morgan emerged from the depths towards me. ‘You’ve got to call Madonna,’ he boomed. ‘What’s her number?’
At the word Madonna, the camera lens dilated and looked at me questioningly.
‘Madonna,’ I blustered. ‘I don’t know if I have her number.’
Piers was definitely not afraid of the camera. He’d been itching to get in front of it for years. This may have been a charity event but it was also a diving board: he was going to bellyflop into the water and splash around until he got what he wanted.
‘Come on!’ he said.
‘Well, she’s not really talking to me at the moment,’ I said, looking guiltily at the camera. [Madonna — who co-starred with Rupert in The Next Best Thing — was apparently unimpressed when he described her as an ‘old whiny barmaid’ in his 2006 autobiography.]
‘Ah!’ mimicked Piers unpleasantly. ‘Where’s your phone?’
I produced my battered old Nokia with its smashed screen, and waved it hopelessly. ‘What am I going to tell her?’
‘She’s got to give us a lot of money.’
‘She won’t like that.’
Meanwhile, Alan Sugar was waiting for us in the next room like the Wizard of Oz. ‘Have a fabulous time,’ said Emma, blowing a kiss, as I filed through with the others.
Imagine my surprise when I saw Sid James sitting on one side of a large table. ‘Isn’t that . . .?’ I whispered to Piers.
Not happy: When Alan Sugar made unpleasant remarks about Ross Kemp's divorce, he 'went purple'
Our two teams sat opposite him. Sid was flanked by Hattie Jacques and some other Carry On character. Both flunkeys regarded us severely.
Alan introduced himself to each of us, with that blunt insolence peculiar to all barrow-boy billionaires. Then he laid into poor Jo Brand for being too fat.
She couldn’t have cared less: rummaging in her bag, she extracted a giant bar of Fruit & Nut and threw it at him.
Next, Sid made some unpleasant remarks about Ross Kemp’s recent divorce. They dripped with innuendo, but were all way above my head. Ross went purple.
Alan Sugar was quite vain, I noticed: a little girl popped up from under the table to adjust the hair that was like beige carpet cord and to powder down the klaxon nose.
His delivery really was sheer Sid James. They could have been twins. In fact, I’m not at all sure, to this day, that the whole Lord Sugar phenomenon is not one great big heist.
Maybe the whole Carry On team have been made Labour peers without us knowing it. Barbara, Duchess of Windsor.
Anyway, whether he was Alan or Sid, he was pretty unpleasant to everyone; and if that wasn’t enough for one day, he then explained the task. We were to organise a giant funfair for 1,000 celebrities that was to take place in three days.
We had to raise a certain amount of money, and each group had to set up sideshows, bars and hot-dog stands, parking, security, publicity, everything. My heart sank. I looked for signs of rebellion among the other contestants but their smiles were glued on.
‘Any questions?’ growled Sid James. No one answered.
We were dismissed and taken to a bar to get to know each other. I sat on a sofa in the corner with a glass of wine and wished I were dead.
Finally, our very own scoutmaster appeared out of nowhere. ‘Gather round, everyone!’ said Mr Curtis.
We jostled in, eager scouts and cubs. Richard Curtis was rather like a big blond schoolboy; he had that confidence one loves in the school’s most popular prefect.
‘Now you all know the form,’ he continued, arms akimbo. ‘It’s going to be tough. But a lot of fun, I think. I believe you’re going to the hotel now, and the sooner you all get started the better. Any questions?’
I wanted to ask when dinner was, but didn’t dare.
‘Well, good luck, everyone. Have a smashing time.’
Confident: Piers Morgan was 'definitely not afraid of the camera'
It was already 9pm. Alastair and I were squeezed on to the back seat while two camera sharks squatted at our feet. We scrolled through our phones, pretending to look for people to call and ask for money. I tried to think of some ingenious way to escape, because I knew I couldn’t spend four days with these people and their cameras in our faces 24/7.
And here I was, sitting in a car with the man who sexed up the dossier that took us to war in Iraq. Actually, he was rather nice in person, but so apparently was Hitler.
He seemed world-weary, like a retired gym teacher, and his sad eyes looked medicated. Maybe taking us to war had exhausted him.
Finally, we arrived at some West End hotel, where we found Piers and Ross lobbing chit-chat back and forth in a large, private sitting-room.
Thank God for the painkillers I’d stolen from my mother’s bathroom — and the large vodka in the bar on the way up. The flooding panic began to subside. Sort of.
I sat down. A little round make-up lady scuttled from a cupboard to powder me down and then ran back in, slamming the door behind her. Piers paced the room talking at length to [retail tycoon] Philip Green, while Alastair Campbell called Tony Blair’s office. I began to feel sick.
‘Tony’s going to try and come down,’ said Alastair. Cameras U-turned and screeched to a halt at our various faces to catch the ecstatic reaction.
‘Wicked,’ said Ross, making a thumbs-up sign. I swallowed hard and raised my eyebrows. Luckily, I could that month. [Rupert has confessed to using Botox].
‘OK,’ ordered Piers. ‘Let’s get organised.’
How much longer could I look constantly intrigued without having a stroke? My camera looked at me accusingly.
‘Philip Green is providing all the champagne!’ bellowed Piers.
‘Now. What about the hamburger stand?’ asked Alastair.
‘That’s not going to be easy,’ said Ross. ‘Ten thousand pounds’ worth of hamburgers! That’s 1,000 hamburgers.’
‘And stars don’t eat, remember,’ I ventured.
Suddenly, I saw a chink of light. ‘What about if I leave the show, and come back and buy one hamburger for £10,000?’
Everybody and their lenses turned to me.
‘You’re not serious,’ said Piers. It was a statement, not a question.
‘Deadly. I really don’t think I’m cut out for all this.’
‘For God’s sake, pull yourself together,’ boomed Piers. ‘OK,’ I replied meekly.
‘You can do it if you pay £100,000,’ was his generous last thought on the subject.
‘No, I don’t have that kind of money.’
‘Then stop whining and get on with it.’
I went to the loo, so the others could have a bitch about me. As I came out, I passed a small door. It was ajar. I peeked through.
Outside was a service staircase. I felt like the character from Midnight Express. I looked around. There was no one in sight. I slipped through and shut the door behind me.
I leant against it, my heart racing so hard that my vision throbbed. Did I dare? What would everyone say?
Someone walked past, talking loudly. Probably Philip Green had arrived with the champagne. F*** it.
I ran down that staircase three at a time. I crashed against the emergency door. An alarm screamed inside the building, and I ran across the road.
I’ve rarely felt so exhilarated in my life. I sprinted all the way to Piccadilly, crossed the street and nearly crashed into Richard Curtis getting out of a taxi.
Swerving into the Ritz Hotel, I looked back to make sure the scoutmaster wasn’t following and about to blow his whistle.
What a stroke of luck that I was wearing a suit! I straightened my tie, did up my jacket and breezed straight into the restaurant.
Conversation was hushed, delicate, and broken only by the sound of corks being drawn from bottles. Candles fluttered in the breeze from the waiters’ tailcoats. I called my agent.
‘Michael. I left. You’ve got to tell Richard. Say I’m sorry. I couldn’t take it.’
I had a delicious dinner and then went home. I’ve never slept so well in my life as I did that night. When I woke up, it felt like the first morning of the school holidays.
But when I took my bike out to get the newspapers, the lady who’d collected me the night before was waiting on the doorstep. Panic exploded through me again.
‘They want you to come back,’ she said.
I got on my bike. Another lady appeared. Christ, maybe they were going to abduct me. The second lady grabbed my handlebars.
‘Look. I’m sorry. I’m not coming back. Ever.’
‘They just want you to do a scene on London Bridge, with the others, of you leaving.’
‘Sorry.’ I took her hand from the bar, set off as fast as I could and didn’t stop until I reached King’s Cross station.
Now I knew what it felt like to be a spy on the run. I was seeing Apprentice folk everywhere. What should I do? How could I escape?
‘The train leaving from platform five is the 18.18 for Ely and King’s Lynn.’
There is a God! I could get off at King’s Lynn and cycle all the way to Burnham Market, where my grandmother lived. Then hide out until the storm blew over.
I jumped on the train. Looking out of the window as the station receded, I half expected to see the two lady producers burst on to the platform.
There was another man in the first-class compartment. He was older and dressed rather lavishly in a bottle-green corduroy suit, with a brightly patterned silk handkerchief gushing from his breast pocket.
His face was obscured by an extravagant black fedora. Two fleshy lips — framed by stubble — were all that could be seen under its rim.
After about three minutes, I nearly screamed. It was Clement Freud, Emma’s father. My life was turning into The Lady Vanishes. Any minute now, I’d disappear without trace.
We chatted cautiously during the journey and he left the train at Ely. I laughed all the way to King’s Lynn.
As I arrived exhausted at Burnham Market after 20 miles on my bicycle, I was still looking nervously over my shoulder. Thank God Norfolk is flat.
■ Extracted from Vanished Years by Rupert Everett, published by Little Brown on September 27 at £20. © Rupert Everett 2012.
To order a copy at £15.99 (p&p free), call 0843 382 0000.
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