Gemma Collins has been a mainstay on TV screens for over a decade, perhaps best known under her guise as 'The GC' – but now, she’s ready to let those walls down.
In a new eight-part series, Gemma Collins: Everything. All At Once, Collins is bringing viewers on her journey of navigating her relationships, her family and her hopes for the future.
The series was initially titled Gemma Collins: Four Weddings and a Baby, as she and her partner Rami prepared for their wedding and hoped to start a family. And, as Collins put it, "life was all rosy and dandy, and unicorns, and marshmallows".
But as filming went on, "things were starting to bubble a bit", as Rami faced his own challenges which tested their relationship, Collins embarked on her fertility journey and sadly, she faced the devastating loss of her mother, Joan.
Earlier this year, Collins shared the sad news on Instagram, writing that it was a "privilege" to be Joan’s daughter, adding: "Until we meet again, I will carry your love with me. I will look for you in the sunrise, in the flowers, in the birds singing, and in the quiet moments when I need you most."
"I was like, 'Oh, no. Can I get this back to where we was two years ago?' But obviously, time is something you can't change. You can't go back. You can only ever go forward," Collins told Radio Times in an exclusive interview. "So the show came and said, 'Right. Let's go. Let's start filming.' And I think for about the first week, I was trying to keep everything together. And I was like, 'Do you know what? I'm not gonna be able to do this.'"
She continued: "But I've realised that they were so good when I spoke to them, and they was just so supportive. And I just said, ‘Look, this is all going on in my life right now. I don't know what to do. Do you wanna see this? Shall I carry on with it? You know, what do I do here?’ And they was like, 'We're just gonna run with it.'
"So I don't think any of us really knew what was gonna happen, but I think seeing the reaction and the support and the love, and I was even number one on Sky, has just taught me, and I hope others, one thing, that in being vulnerable, in maybe your life not being so perfect, everyone can relate to it, and that's what's made the show a success."
The series does not hold back in showing those emotional moments, with the cameras capturing Collins at her most vulnerable time – but it’s something she wanted to show no matter what.
Collins told : "I think one of my good points is that I don't hold back, in a sense of life has been hell for me the last two years, and it was just I'm gonna show everyone what I'm going through. What's the point in being glossy and perfect Instagram, TV lifestyle, when actually this is real life? And I think as well [that] we have become so confused to seeing this perfectly edited stamp that everyone's creating on social media, when actually I bet 99.9 per cent of everyone that's creating all this perfect life is probably going through something themselves, you know?"
She added: "And I just think it has become so powerful, this TV show because of its realness, its rawness, the emotion. And I just let the cameras in and showed them what I was going through, and it wasn't the glossy, shiny four weddings and a baby. It was everything but."
Collins admitted that she had a lot of self-doubt while filming the series, thinking to herself: "I don’t think people are gonna watch this. I don’t think they’re gonna want to see this. Is it gonna be boring? [But] actually I think it’s the most powerful show I’ve ever made."
While Collins went through "a terrible time", she wants audiences to know that "terrible times don’t last forever".
"However bad something’s getting, however bad you feel, if your life is falling apart. Just hold on in there, because it’s not gonna be bad forever."
Gemma Collins: Everything, All At Once is weekly on Sky and NOW.
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