Robbie Williams has exposed the dark rarely seen side of fame after recalling how a hitman was once hired ‘to kill’ him.
It’s well-documented that the Angels singer has experienced some wild times since rising to fame as a member of Take That in the ‘90s, but news that someone put a hit out on him is a first.
The pop star opened up about the shocking ordeal on The Past Week podcast, and said: ‘I’ve never, ever said this, but I had a contract put on me to kill me. I’ve never said that publicly before.
‘It went away. I have friends. That stuff is the unseen stuff that happens when you become famous.’
The 47-year-old went on to explain how achieving meteoric levels of fame contributes to mental health problems.
‘Extreme fame and extreme success meets with anxiety and depression and mental illness. There’s a few levels of fame and what it does to you. The first one is “f**k”,’ he revealed.
‘There’s a couple more I can’t remember but the fourth one is acceptance. You sort of rally against your privacy being taken away from you and you rally against it by trying to be normal, trying to be normal but also I’m gonna be small so people don’t beat you up. Like, “I’m a d**khead, don’t hurt me”.’
Robbie added that it ‘takes a while’ to reach a place of acceptance that it’s impossible to go to certain places out of fear that someone might want to ‘kill’ you.
Perhaps the hitman ordeal will be depicted in Robbie’s upcoming biopic, which was announced last year. Titled Better Man, the film will explore Robbie’s humble beginnings, rise to fame in Take That and demons as he battled substance abuse.
The Greatest Showman director Michael Gracey, who will helm the project, previously revealed he spent several hours speaking to Robbie to get a feel for the direction of the biographical movie.
Gracey told Deadline: ‘As for how we represent Robbie in the film, that bit is top secret. I want to do this in a really original way. I remember going to the cinema as a kid and there were films that blew me away and made me say as I sat there in the cinema, “I’ve never seen this before”.
‘I just want the audience to have that feeling.’
Better Man is described as a ‘fantastical story’ and it was reported that Robbie will be portrayed by a CGI monkey, with the movie boasting a budget of $100million (£73m).
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