Adios Australia ... Mel B /
Pic: Channel 7 Source: The
Daily Telegraph
Annette Sharp, The Daily Telegraph, reports
Did you spot the photographs of all Mel B's fans thronging to the international airport last week to weep as Scary Spice left our country? No?
That might be because no one did - not one person ... although that's
likely because no one knew that Melanie Brown, who does most things with
maximum fanfare, was quitting these shores having maximised as many commercial
opportunities on these shores as one ageing Spice Girl can.
Weep not for Mel B. She made a lot of money out of Australia through
television contracts and weight-loss associations and, like so many
international stars before her, she has successfully used our local industry as
a launch-pad to re-establish her career.
Thanks to our remote little television industry, Scary is now the second
hottest Spice Girl in the world next to Posh, aka Victoria Beckham and her
popularity is on the rise again following Thursday's news that she has signed
on to replace outgoing judge Sharon Osbourne on America's Got Talent.
It wasn't an earlier guest judging role on the UK version of X Factor
that won her the gig, it was the Australian series of the program, pure and
simple.
Before coming to Australia, it should be pointed out, Scary was arguably
one of the least popular Spice Girls - this was partly due to her crass
mouthiness and partly due to her dashing Spice Girls' fans reunion dreams in
1998 by saying of Geri "Ginger" Halliwell's departure: "We are a
better group now that she's left, we don't need her anymore."
The messy paternity suit with Eddie Murphy didn't help her any either.
But in 2010 Australia welcomed Scary with open arms just as we welcomed
Don Lane in the 1960s, Marcia Hines in the 1970s and more recently Brian
McFadden and Leo Sayer.
What is it exactly, that we will miss about Scary?
Will we miss the photos of her lounging in a bikini on a boat on Sydney
Harbour with her stay-at-home husband Stephen Belafonte? Probably not, though
she may if rumours that Brown cut a deal with a local pap agency to pose up and
profit from the pix are to be believed.
Will we miss her bawdy and non-G-rated banter on Dancing With The
Stars? Not this mother and viewer who will no longer have to explain
Brown's inappropriate comments to her five-year-old.
Will we miss her annual declarations that she is set to snap up a Sydney
property and make our city her permanent home? Can't say I will nor likely the
real estate agents from whom she attempted to negotiate "celebrity
discounts" last year in the belief Sydneysiders would want her as a neighbour.
It's also probably fair to say the Vaucluse neighbours who watched
gleefully as Belafonte packed up their rented apartment in Wentworth Ave last
week also won't be sorry to see them go.
"You could hear them squabbling with each other while they were
exercising," said one.
And so to LA they return and we sincerely hope they are welcomed back
with open arms.
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