The creepy things that Russell Brand did when I dated him that I now see as huge red flags: BRYONY GORDON

About twenty years ago I was sent to interview a little-known comedian that the editor at the time had heard he had to see.

I went to a cafe in North London, blissfully unaware of the bizarre spectacle I was about to witness, as a strange man with hair so matted it had turned into dreadlocks started telling me how beautiful I was. He was not a street bum, but my interviewee.

With a flourish he told me that my eyes were beautiful. Could he kiss me, he asked, before I even had a chance to sip my coffee.

‘No!’ I screamed. But he kept asking and even walked me to the station when our interview ended, begging me to plant his lips on mine all the way there. When I got back to the office, my editor said I looked like I’d seen a ghost. I could only reply that she had sent me to interview a madman.

Half an hour later my phone rang. The comedian had gotten my number through his PR. It was the start of a bombardment – ​​twenty calls and texts a day, until I agreed to go out with him.

I mention this now because that man was Russell Brand, the shamed star who conveniently turned to Christianity, just as the police hand over their sex abuse allegations files to the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), as they did last week.

I have resisted bringing up my encounters with Brand since the allegations were made. My skin crawls when I think about his predatory behavior – and how I felt the need to make light of it when it happened. But his continued insistence on social media that only God can judge him is what prompted me to write this piece.

Brand denies all allegations. But when they were first made, in an episode of Channel 4’s Dispatches just over a year ago, I experienced a wave of nausea.

It’s a feeling that became familiar to so many women who were young in the 1990s – when the prevailing culture forced us to reject behavior that we now know was deeply problematic.

I briefly mentioned my encounter with Brand in a book I wrote ten years ago that was about the general awfulness of my twenties. Perhaps the phrase “every time I said no” should have raised alarm bells [to him asking to kiss me]it just made him ask me more.” But I saw it as little more than a funny anecdote that symbolized the chaos of my life. Here I was, on a date with a guy, because it seemed easier than getting a restraining order.

Brand and I had lunch on Sunday and then went to see the movie Proof, which was about math and starred Gwyneth Paltrow. It was all pretty old fashioned, if you ignored the endless questions about whether or not I liked him, and his strange insistence that I drink alcohol (he was already sober at the time; I wasn’t).

After begging me to kiss him, he insisted I gargle with mouthwash before it actually happened — a strangely offensive detail I later read happened to another woman he’d been intimate with.

I saw him a few times, but quickly got the impression that I wasn’t the only girl he was begging to kiss. I was relieved when he lost interest and presumably turned his laser-like attention to someone else. As I wrote in my book in 2014, “There were hundreds of girls with a Russell Brand story.”

I had no idea some of those stories were quite dark.

There was the 16-year-old he had a three-month relationship with in his early 30s, who he apparently called “the kid.” (She claims he became increasingly controlling, as well as emotionally and sexually abusive.)

There was a woman who claims that Brand raped her in his Los Angeles home in 2012.

Another woman, whom he met at an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting, claims he pinned her to a bed and put his hands down her pants after she told him, “I don’t want to do this.” But the one thing that really surprised me about last year’s Dispatches investigation was that it had taken so long for a news organization to conduct it.

Yet, compared to the stories I read about, my story seemed insignificant. So I kept it to myself, because I know what happens when women speak publicly about things that happened to them in the past. It is Brand’s born-again religious passion that has driven me to write now.

Let me be clear: I believe people can change. I believe in the power of forgiveness. I even believe in God. But I have no time for people who believe they are God.

Forgiveness and change require responsibility and repentance. Brand showed neither. There is no hint of apology for the way he behaved towards women when he was, in his own words, ‘promiscuous’. Instead, it seems he has wanted to portray himself as a victim of smears from the ‘mainstream media’.

Conspiracy theorist turned born-again Christian, he cynically appeals to America’s Bible Belt, who have just voted for president a man found guilty of sexual abuse.

He leads his 11 million followers on X, formerly Twitter, in prayer sessions and baptizes people in rivers as if he himself were the second coming. None of that would matter so much if you got the sense that he was actually open to redemption. Instead, Brand has said that his baptism has allowed him to “put the past behind him.”

To do that, he must first confront the British criminal justice system – and whatever is in the files the CPS just handed over to the CPS.

It would never be good if Kate looked so dirty!

It is not for me to comment on Prince William’s continued emphasis on wearing a beard and moustache, as seen in South Africa this week.

What I’m saying is that it’s quite distracting from the impassioned speech he gave about the “disturbing reality” facing the planet, and the need to tackle the illegal wildlife trade.

And if his wife, the Princess of Wales, showed up with even a hair out of place, you know that’s all we’d hear about!

Why would anyone host a dinner party?

According to a new poll, one in six people admit to serving food that has fallen on the floor, while almost a third of us have knowingly served a meal that has passed its expiration date.

I find these statistics strangely reassuring, as they confirm my belief that dinner is the worst way to spend an evening. What’s wrong with going to a restaurant? Let this research give us all permission to leave the dreaded “supper party” where it belongs: in the kitchen sink.

Cornwall has itself to blame

I love Cornwall and enjoy visiting its beautiful countryside several times a year, despite the constant talk of ’emmets’ (that’s Cornish slang for ants or tourists) and the graffiti on road signs urging visitors to turn around and go home . But last week, two tourist attractions suddenly had to close their doors.

Both Flambards theme park in Helston and Dairyland, near Newquay, had been around for almost 50 years, but falling visitor numbers forced them to close shop permanently.

Now that it’s cheaper to go to the Mediterranean for a week than to spend a weekend near Padstow, locals may be wondering whether they shouldn’t have been more careful about what they wished for.

Trust clinic

It’s been 50 years since Britain made its first streaker: at half-time of a rugby match in England in 1974. That was also the year a naked man ran past David Niven as he presented the Oscar for best film.

The anniversary has reminded me that there is nothing more liberating than running around alone in your birthday suit, as God intended…even if it is just in the privacy of your own home!