As Amanda Holden tries to conquer US television, has she got steel behind the botox?

By Alison Boshoff

Holden on: Amanda is known for her determination


A week-day afternoon at Daniel Galvin's London hair salon. Amanda Holden is having her highlights refreshed and toenails painted.

She is holding court, a stream of chatter diverting her hairdresser Lino and the other stylists, who giggle at her jokes and bring her cups of tea.

'I want to be buried with a mobile phone, just in case I'm not dead,' she chirrups, to general amusement.

Later, she holds forth on the subject of the credit crunch. 'My mortgage rate is keeping me in shoes,' she says. 'I know you're supposed to save up for two years' time when it's going to be 12 per cent, but Christian Louboutin's doing a massive trade out of me.'

Some might think it tactless to talk about buying £800 shoes when so many are going through genuine hardship, but they all love Amanda at Daniel Galvin's.

She has been going there since she was married to Les Dennis, so there is considerable loyalty to this 38-year-old blonde, who has become a household name surprisingly late in the day.

But, as her latest show lands flat on its pert behind, you start to wonder if, for the rest of us, the joke is beginning to wear a bit thin.

Amanda Holden's Fantasy Lives, which involves her trying her hand at unusual careers, started on ITV1 last week with poor ratings and a hostile reception.

Despite the release of promotional pictures of Holden wearing very little(she was trying her hand at being a showgirl in Paris), it attracted just 2.48 million viewers on its first outing.

One critic wrote: 'My fantasy would include Amanda disappearing from TV forever.' Another observed that she had little to offer, 'apart from an weirdly immobile face and a cackle like a drunk auntie . . . It's a televised retraining package, allowing Holden to learn new skills so she won't flounder when the public rises up and bans her from television'.

Her previous big project was a turkey called Big Top, which pulled in 3.3 million viewers for BBC1, falling to just over two million.

So what is going on in Amanda's world? And, as she once again sits on the judging panel for Britain's Got Talent, the question is: how much longer will she be able to work her charms on her boss, Simon Cowell?

All of her friends say she will be all right: she has a cockroach-like determination to succeed and seems to have something of that creature's invincibility, too.
Her father, Frank, was a Naval petty officer who left her mother, Judy, when Amanda was four and her sister Debbie was three.

The family lived on a housing estate in Bishop's Waltham, Hampshire, and Judy worked as a secretary, barmaid and fruit picker.

When Amanda was five, Judy met Leslie, a handyman, who became the girls' stepfather. Amanda keeps in touch with her father once a year, at Christmas.


Dazzling: Determined Amanda wowed the crowd as she took to the stage as a showgirl in Paris


Though her home life was not starry, she decided at the age of eight that she wanted to be an actress and, with a ruthlessness that typifies her, has never been deterred from pursuing this career.

'There has never been anything else,' she says.

She joined the Bishop's Waltham Little Theatre company when she was nine. Angie Blackstock, who ran the group, remembers the defining moment of Amanda's life, when she performed in Babes In The Wood.

'She didn't like the part she was given, but when she heard the applause, her eyes glittered. I said: "She's going to be a star, that girl."

'Amanda found out everything about the theatre and worked at it like you would not believe.'


Taxi! The actress hails a cab back to her hotel as she darted around New York last year while on a media blitz on behalf of show Britain's Got Talent


She went on to study at the Mountview Academy of Theatre Arts in London and then wangled a cameo appearance in EastEnders and appeared on Blind Date.

A year after she graduated, she met Les Dennis. They were introduced at a party and she caught his interest when she told a very dirty joke - she has a repertoire of filthy stories and loves nothing more than a glass of wine and a gossip. She calls everyone 'Darling'.

At the time, Dennis was in a vulnerable state: his mother and father had died, as had his comic partner Dustin Gee. He had also got divorced. In his 2008 autobiography, he recalls that he told her: 'I'm 39. You're 22. There's no future for us.'

But he was captivated by her beauty. By his own account, he spent much of the relationship in tears over his somewhat pushy, flirtatious wife, who had told him she had rehearsed her Oscar acceptance speech at the age of eight.

They set up home in London's Primrose Hill and she would play the perfect hostess when he brought around his TV contacts, who were all charmed by her. She inevitably became more successful than he was.


In perfect shape: A slimline Amanda Holden arrives at the Edinburgh International Television Festival


In 2000 came the bombshell: her affair with Neil Morrissey. Dennis begged his wife to come back with no strings attached. She did, and refused to apologise for the affair.

The union finally unravelled in 2002, after his misery- soaked appearance on Celebrity Big Brother. To her credit, the announcement of their split spoke of an 'amicable parting' with 'great sadness' on both sides.

But Amanda could not hide her relief. Who can forget the pictures of her whooping it up in Spain with a bunch of girlfriends?

She instantly got together with record producer Chris Hughes, a friend since the start of her relationship with Dennis. They married in 2008 and have a daughter, Lexi, now four. What moved Amanda's career to the top level was Britain's Got Talent.

It was a delightful surprise to her - and to some viewers, who grumble that an actress whose career includes the corny Wild At Heart has little business in picking the next big recording star.


Golden girl: Amanda sits demurely between the out-size egos of Piers Morgan and Simon Cowell on the judging panel of ITV1's Britain's Got Talent

But I understand that Simon Cowell had nursed a crush on Holden for nearly five years before the chance came to give her a break. He read about her split with Dennis and asked a friend if he could introduce them as he'd 'love to date her' now she was single.

A year later, he mentioned in an interview he liked only brunettes, but would make an exception for Holden, saying: 'I bet she's really filthy.' At the time, he was finding fame as a judge on Pop Idol.

Cowell finally got to meet Amanda at the Baftas in 2006. She flirted with him, even though she had recently given birth and was at the awards with her husband-to-be ('I'm a flirt, I've always been a flirt! It's in the genes,' she demurs).

The following year, Cowell persuaded Cheryl Cole to be on the Britain's Got Talent panel, but she pulled out at the last minute as she needed an operation on her foot.


Chic: Amanda Holden arrived at the 'Britain's Got Talent' Manchester auditions last week


Cowell immediately turned to Holden, who fully realised how very lucky she was. He has a thoroughly odd relationship with the trophy women on his shows - ever so slightly creepy and proprietorial, with obvious thumps of lust.

He told Amanda in the first week of filming that he didn't want to see her looking plain.

'Something dies inside of me when I see you without your make-up on,' he told her.

She was mortified. He relies on Amanda to look gorgeous, to flirt with him and exchange 'dirty' banter while they are not filming. 'He's filthy, but I love him,' she says.

She has just landed a top job on the U.S. network CBS's Early Show. The irony for her is that, back when she was with Dennis, she used to go to Hollywood for auditions, but never got anywhere. Now she is close to having a transatlantic TV career, just like Cowell.

'People like that she admits to having had Botox and has not been tempted to do too many commercial deals,' says PR guru Mark Borkowski. 'But she is a smart girl and knows how ruthless Cowell is. Amanda realises this will not be for ever.'

She certainly does. 'I would do that show for nothing. Simon says that he can see my tail wagging every time I'm on it. I've been so lucky. For as long as it lasts, I'll enjoy every second of it.'

Lucky? Undoubtedly. But behind Holden's Botoxed brow and vacuous giggle lies a core of steel. She's risen almost without trace - and she's determined to stay there


source: dailymail