Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie’s bodyguard was fired from the SAS for moonlighting when his regiment commander spotted him pictured with them in the pages of Hello! magazine.
Former SAS soldier Mark ‘Billy’ Billingham says he took the call from his furious commanding officer as he sat at the Hollywood couple’s Chateau Miraval in the South of France, having taken a fortnight’s leave from the Army to earn some extra money and do a favour for a friend.
After shouting a string of expletives, his SAS boss eventually calmed down and asked him whether after 27 years’ service in the Army, his new job made him happy, to which Billingham replied that it did, and with that, his exit papers from the regiment were arranged.
Billingham, 57, who is now chief instructor on the TV series SAS: Who Dares Wins, first started off moonlighting as a bodyguard to supplement his meagre SAS wages. He earned £10,000 a month – three times what he was earning in the military.
He also made the extraordinary revelation that in his first few days working for the couple, he realised that other Hollywood stars’ guards had been lying that they were also former SAS soldiers.
Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie’s bodyguard was fired from the SAS for moonlighting when his regiment commander spotted him pictured with them in the pages of Hello! magazine
Angelina Jolie and bodyguard Mark Billingham in 2007
Speaking to an audience at the Forum in Bath, Somerset, about his experiences, Bellingham describes a visit to the Hotel Du Cap-Eden-Roc in Antibes with the couple. ‘Brad gives me the thumbs up that it is time to leave,’ he says. ‘I get up to walk through this hostile crowd of bodyguards. As I get up they are all smiling at me and pulling chairs out of my way.’
After they left, Bellingham asked a fellow guard, who was a woman, ‘What just happened then?’ He recalls: ‘She said, ‘Well, I said to them all [sarcastically] Why don’t all you SAS guys have a beer with a sergeant major from the SAS? And they all went, ‘Oh, f***’. That’s when I realised that every one of these bodyguards [had been claiming] to be in the SAS.
‘But I was the only one that was. The big bear on the door couldn’t even spell SAS. He was Italian. And this is the situation I was now in. Everyone I was meeting in the bodyguard community was reputedly in the SAS but not one of them were.’
Actress Ellie Nunn says her recent West End theatre trip with Harry Potter star Helena Bonham Carter got people talking.
Ellie, the daughter of director Sir Trevor Nunn and actress Imogen Stubbs, went to see Stephen Sondheim’s Old Friends at the Gielgud Theatre.
‘What a date. I think everyone thought we were launching our new relationship,’ says Ellie, 32.
Helena, 57, who has two children with film director Tim Burton, lives with Rye Dag Holmboe, an art historian 22 years her junior.
Hitting a Royal eco-note
Composer Sarah Class revealed she became friendly with King Charles after making an effort to contact him.
Class, whose piece Sacred Fire was performed by soprano Pretty Yende at his Coronation, tells me: ‘I sat down to write him a letter because environmental issues are very close to my heart.
Composer Sarah Class revealed she became friendly with King Charles after making an effort to contact him
‘I found his Clarence House address, sent the letter and forgot all about it. Then in six weeks, I got a lovely reply from him saying, ‘His Royal Highness would like to talk to you about this further’. I was delighted.’
She was asked to compose a piece for his Terra Carta project at the Cop26 summit in Glasgow in 2021.
Her Christmas carol The Saviour In The Shawl is released on Friday.
The memorial service for theatre producer Bill Kenwright is being arranged by Everton Football Club, of which he used to be chairman.
In Merseyside’s sectarian tradition, Everton was considered the Roman Catholic counterpart of Liverpool FC, but the service, planned for early December, will be held at the city’s Protestant cathedral.
Bill would not have minded. The Anglican cathedral is an enormous place. He always liked a big stage.
Princess Di’s niece puts her best glove forward
When it comes to style, luxury fits Lady Amelia Spencer like a glove.
For an awards ceremony at the Dorchester hotel in Mayfair, Princess Diana’s niece, 31, wore a pair of ornate diamond bracelets by Boodles, which cost a staggering £30,600.
Princess Diana’s niece, 31, wore a pair of ornate diamond bracelets by Boodles, which cost a staggering £30,600
Her pleated black dress by Versace cost £3,520, and she added a Boodles necklace and a pair of black, croc-effect Versace leather opera gloves.
The South African-born model, whose father is Earl Spencer, was married earlier this year to Greg Mallett, a fitness coach.
The Royal Family owns the world’s largest private art collection, including works by Leonardo da Vinci, Rubens and Caravaggio.
Now, the Royal Collection Trust – the charity that’s overseen it since the Windsor fire in 1992 – is seeking an image officer to look after its more than one million objects.
‘You’ll help co-ordinate daily photographic programmes and support various projects, from the next exhibition to new publications and online curations,’ explains the advert.
Based at St James’s Palace, the job pays £28,000 per year.
Panto’s a headache at Strictly
Oh, yes, there is… trouble behind the scenes at Strictly Come Dancing.
Craig Revel Horwood is annoyed by the sound of fellow judge Anton Du Beke rehearsing his forthcoming pantomime lines in the next-door dressing room.
Sighs Craig: ‘Anton has been practising his panto lines next door. All I can hear through the door is: ‘Hiya, kids!’
‘It’s an endless stream of panto learning. Why can’t he do it at home?’
Craig adds hastily: ‘It’s just as well he makes me laugh so much.’
Edward’s tie is bananas
Prince Edward was once keen on a career in the arts, working as a production assistant for Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Really Useful Company.
Prince Edward was once keen on a career in the arts, working as a production assistant for Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Really Useful Company
He even masterminded the royal family’s disastrous It’s A Knockout TV show in which he wore a pantomime Elizabethan costume.
And it seems King Charles’s youngest brother still likes to monkey around. I hear that during his visit to New Zealand, the Duke of Edinburgh, 59, wore a Hermes tie printed with monkey images.
He donned it for a meeting with officials at Government House, in Auckland, where delegates gathered to mark the 60th anniversary of the Duke of Edinburgh international award.
Let’s hope they didn’t keep him hanging around.