For a woman who is not yet 50, Katie Price has lived enough for several lifetimes. One of the original ‘Page 3 Stunnas’ in The Sun newspaper, she made her debut in 1996, when she was barely 18 years old. Back then she was known as ‘Jordan’, famous for her surgically enhanced assets, which took her from a 32B to a 32FF.
She was in stark contrast to the girl-next-door wholesomeness of glamour models such as Samantha Fox and Kelly Brook. They were sexy in a Carry On sort of way. But Price was not like that: she was far more brazen. She owned it, cultivating a racy image, with the lifestyle to match. Impulsive, outspoken, willing to push the boundaries of acceptable behaviour, she became a constant fixture of the lads’ mags and celebrity glossies of the day.
Three decades on and she is still making headlines, still for all the wrong reasons. Last week it transpired that she had acquired a fourth husband, a man called Lee Andrews, following a whirlwind romance.
The story goes that she and Mr Andrews ‘connected’ on social media, before meeting in Dubai and tying the knot just days after.
Andrews describes himself as a businessman and entrepreneur. He claims to be the CEO of a Dubai-based travel company and friends with celebrities such as Kim Kardashian.
The truth, it seems, is far more prosaic. The best that can be said of Mr Andrews is that he’s little more than a chancer, and not an especially clever one at that.
Not long after the happy couple announced their news, pictures emerged of him proposing to another woman, his ex, Alana Percival, in an almost identical setting and manner, with a suspiciously similar-looking ring.
Meanwhile, questions were being raised about his business credentials and celebrity connections. Then yesterday it emerged that he is accused of being a £1,000-a-night male escort – an accusation he has denied – who describes himself as a ‘sexy educated professional from the UK’ and offers ‘massage services’ to ‘discerning professional women and high-level clients seeking more than just companionship’.
Poor Katie Price. Hardly love’s young dream, is it? Posing with Mr Andrews (who also appears no stranger to the surgeon’s knife) and their matching hand tattoos, her Creosote fake tan luminous against her skimpy white dress, her tiny ribcage bulging with her fake breasts, the pair of them look like some demented AI version of Barbie and Ken.
Understandably, Price’s family are desperately worried about her, not least because in recent months she has been looking increasingly unwell following a spate of gruelling and entirely unnecessary plastic surgeries.
She herself has admitted she looks ‘ill’ and is having tests to ascertain the cause of her recent weight loss, which is notable.
It’s clear that something is wrong with Price, a once savvy, self-assured woman with a successful media empire. Life has left its mark on her. She now cuts a rather sad, vulnerable figure. At 47, she looks old for her years, despite the surgeries (or perhaps because of them).
All this comes just weeks after her break-up with her partner of two years, the affable reality TV star JJ Slater. By all accounts they had a decent relationship, and he is said to be ‘blindsided’ by her behaviour.
One feels for Mr Slater, but in truth this is textbook Price. As soon as her life starts to resemble anything vaguely functional, she immediately blows things up.
It’s a pattern she has repeated time and again over the years, from the moment she first got engaged in 1996 to Gladiator Warren Furman (aka Ace) to her turbulent marriage to singer Peter Andre, her subsequent marriage to cage fighter Alex Reid and her third husband, Kieran Hayler.
But men aren’t her only problem. She has twice been declared bankrupt, despite a hugely successful TV and commercial career, despite having had whole documentaries made about her, sold millions of copies of her books (she is in the top 100 bestselling authors for the Noughties), and even stood for Parliament.
On top of that there are the countless driving offences, for which she received a 16-week sentence, suspended for 12 months, community service and a ban. She is a slow-motion car crash in almost every aspect of her life.
Except one: her children. It’s fascinating, isn’t it: for a woman who – for whatever reasons, most likely as a result of a number of traumatic events in her life, including being raped in a park at the age of seven and subsequently by a ‘well-known British TV star’ early in her career – appears incapable of looking after herself, she seems to have done rather a good job with her children.
Her son Harvey, who has serious disabilities and whose father, the former footballer Dwight Yorke, has steadfastly refused to help, has been much loved and well cared for, and lives as comfortable a life as she can offer him.
Her two children from her marriage to Andre, Princess and Junior, seem remarkably well-adjusted; she also looks after her two youngest, Jett and Bunny, whose father is third husband Kieran Hayler.
If there is one aspect of Price’s life that is not an ongoing disaster, it’s her kids. But when it comes to looking after herself, it’s as though she just doesn’t care. It’s as if she has such little regard for herself, such low self-esteem, she almost wants things to go wrong. It’s like she’s punishing herself.
After all, Price is many things but she’s not stupid, as anyone who has ever heard her speak or watched her shows will know. Was she really so taken with Mr Andrews she failed to spot the obvious red flags? Or did she just jump in headlong, suspecting she was going to get burned but being too emotionally numb to care – and, of course, always chasing the next sensational headline?
Having always been valued for her body and her appearance, the idea that someone might love her for who she is rather than how she looks is clearly hard for Price to contemplate. Beauty is a gift, but it’s also a depreciating asset, one which is slipping through her fingers fast. And her attempts to reignite her career and generate interest only seem more desperate each time.
There is something almost Hogarthian about her progress from fresh-faced pin-up to middle-aged OnlyFans star. As for her constant, painful surgeries – again, they almost seem like a form of self-harm, a desperate cry for help from someone whose self-image is so warped they can’t face their true reflection any more.
But, reckless as she is, I can’t hate Price. On the contrary, I feel desperately sorry for her. She reminds me of Britney Spears or Jade Goody – young women who ended up being used by others to the point where they lost sight of who they really were.
It’s this, I think, that adds to the sense of tragedy around her. Others from her coterie have moved on: Kelly Brook is happily married with a successful career.
But Price seems stuck in an emotional doom loop, making the same mistakes over and over again, each time hoping things will finally go her way, each time ending up disappointed – or, in the case of her latest emotional escapade, horribly hoodwinked.
