What Marie Did Next

‘TIME was when you had to be over 60, retired and actually have done something memorable with your life even to consider pumping out an autobiography.

Marie’s fame predates colour photography

Not that that made them any more interesting – a combination of what you had for breakfast and whom you had for dinner does not make for a fascinating read.

An autobiography was a way of telling the world how much better a place it would have been if everyone had listened to you – and hopefully of making a few quid to cover the funeral expenses.

These days, if you’re not on your fourth autobiography by the time you reach 30, then you’re a nobody.

Not that being a nobody should stop you writing an autobiography, or indeed several.

Bookshop shelves are full of weighty tomes with titles like Joe Bloggs: The Womb Years and My Life, Vol VI (August 14 – August 18 1998) by AN Other.

And to those illustrious ranks we will soon be able to add the second volume of Marie Helvin’s autobiography.

Older readers (or those who read Catwalk, the first volume of her autobiography) may dimly recall Marie’s name – she was a model in the 1970s and married to photographer David Bailey.

And we have no doubt that the second volume, which will cover her relationship with Mark Shand (Camilla Parker Bowles’ brother) and friendship with Dodi Fayed, will be a real page-turner.

If you can’t wait until the book is published, however, Hello! is on hand to give us an insight into what it may contain.

We learn, for instance, that although Marie has lived in north London, Battersea and Pimlico, she really likes living in Chelsea.

Why? you ask. ‘Because, to be honest, it’s easy to blend in here,’ she says. ‘By that I mean no-one bothers you.’

Unlike in New Cross, say, or Dollis Hill where Marie can’t set foot outside her house without getting mobbed.’

Posted: 4th, August 2004 | In: Reviews Comment | TrackBack | Permalink