For reasons I can only partially articulate, I have always loathed Emma Bunton (formerly baby spice).
I think it is a combination of the stage school manners, the fake wide-eyed, “what, little old me?” posturing and the “I am a dedicated mum because my pop career has tanked so I’d better find something to keep me in the limelight” facade which barely conceals the awful truth: she would cheerfully sacrifice her first born if she thought it would get her back on the telly. Red in tooth and claw, that one.
Does anyone remember when she was pretending to have copped off with Justin Timberlake? This was YEARS ago, after the spice girls had broken up, maybe 2004 or something. Anyway Timberlake was in town and was turning up in clubs with his entourage. Photos of him would appear in the papers and magazines, and always, right at the edge or practically photobombing behind him, would be Emma Bunton, wearing a steely-eyed look of grim determination. Magazines would sometimes carry filler where they’d ask her a few questions and she’d always allude to Timberlake. I suspect that she’d got her PR person to drop a few stories with Heat or whatever alongside one of those photos, so that poor desperate old Emma could look a bit arch (actually, she’s probably not clever enough for that) and hint that she’d got off with a hot pop star (I use the word ‘hot’ with reservations, meaning the most famous male pop singer of the time). I wonder if they ever spoke or whether it was just desperate Emma hanging onto the edge of his crowd?
whatever it was, she still sets my teeth on edge.