Radio 1’s Mollie
King tells Helen
Chandler-Wilde she
had to ask boyfriend
Stuart Broad to
explain the rules
Cricket? I didn’t have a
clue when I met Stuart
H
ow does a cricket widow
get through the Ashes?
Mollie King, whose
partner Stuart Broad is
playing for England,
insists she is a “very
proud girlfriend”. But the radio
presenter and former pop star admits
that as a newbie to the sport, she had
to ask him to explain the ins and outs
when their relationship began.
“There are so many rules, aren’t
there?” she says. “I’ve always been
very up front, like ‘Right, you need to
teach me how this works’.” Broad’s
coaching seems to be working: “I
mean, don’t test me, but I feel like I
could easily watch a game and know
what’s going on.”
The pair have been dating on and off
for 18 months and are secretive about
their relationship, never referring toWalking on air: Mollie King now co-hosts
the Radio 1 weekend breakfast show; below,
with boyfriend Stuart Broad at WimbledonRII SCHROER; GETTY IMAGESFEATURES
each other on social media or in
public. But today she’s happy to say
that life with Broad is “good, thank
you ... it’s really good”. There were
rumours the couple had parted ways
last summer, but they have been
spotted happily together since,
including at Wimbledon last month.
They live apart, with King’s BBC
Radio 1 show keeping her London-
based, while Broad plays for
Nottinghamshire. “I think if you want
to make it work, then you just do,” she
says. “We’re quite good at travelling to
each other on our days off, it’s just
about putting in the time.”
It’s the only point in our interview
where King is remotely bashful. When
we meet at the RSA in the West End,
where she is attending an event for
animal charity Born Free, of which she
is a patron, she is otherwise warm andgiggly, just as she is on the radio. She is
particularly effusive on the topic of
Strictly Come Dancing, where she
waltzed her way to the semi-finals of
the 2017 series and will be starting
again soon on the BBC. “Of course, Iwish I could do it again”, she says. If
she were asked to come back, she says
she would relax more. “On Strictly, if I
made a mistake on the live shows, my
face would show it. I’d be dancing,”
she says, lifting up her arms and
clutching at a ballroom partner madewhich she was diagnosed with at the
age of 10, and stands in for Holly
Willoughby on This Morning when
she’s away.
Like Willoughby, King is
infectiously giggly and warm, with
blonde hair and a passion for fashion.
Does she see herself as the next Holly?
“That’s a massive compliment,” is all
she will say. “Obviously Holly and Phil
[Schofield] are so loved by the nation
... I can’t imagine that they would
need me on there for a long time.”
In between her radio and TV
work, she focuses on other projects,
such as the one she is here to talk
about today. Born Free has launched
an online initiative called Raise the
Red Flag, where people can report
animal abuse they witness abroad.
The cause strikes a chord with King,
after an experience on a childhood
holiday when she saw whales and
dolphins performing at SeaWorld in
Florida. “Literally, the minute we
walked into the park all of us werelike, ‘This is just awful, this is so
terrible’,” she says. “It wasn’t until we
actually saw it with our own eyes
that the dream that we’d all had in
our heads just came crashing down.
“These are captive animals being
made to perform for our own
entertainment... I remember just
thinking, God, this has got to stop.”
She still needs to do some last
minute preparations for her speech
at the charity event, and says she is
nervous – something of a surprise for
someone who broadcasts to millions
of people every week.
“But it’s different when you can
see them!” she says.
King says she is unlikely to go back
to her brief career as a solo artist,
which was something of a flop: she
released two singles, one of which
peaked at number 90. “I realised it’s
not the same when it’s not with the
four other girls”, she says. “I felt quite
lonely doing it on my own.”
The Saturdays, who enjoyed global
fame between 2007 and 2015, are still
close friends, she says: “We have a
WhatsApp group called The Sats.”
She particularly keeps up with
Frankie Bridge, wife of the former
England footballer Wayne Bridge,
and sees her “all the time” since
King’s south London home is just
half an hour away from her.
I ask if they would consider doing
a comeback like the Spice Girls.
“Never say never,” she says. But
“everyone is just really happy doing
their own thing at the moment”.of air, smiling serenely, “then it would
go wrong”, she says and drags her
mouth into a grimace.
She hopes this season’s winner will
be Dev Griffin, a fellow Radio 1
presenter, who now hosts the
weekend afternoon show which she
shared with Matt Edmondson after
joining Radio 1 last year. Edmondson
and King have been moved to the
weekend breakfast show, a prestigious
slot previously held by Fearne Cotton,
Edith Bowman and Reggie Yates.
Edmondson and King have gained a
following for their on-air chemistry,
coming across like an older brother
and younger sister. She laughs
faithfully at his every joke; he teases
her constantly and remains straight-
faced and sarcastic – and their banter
is drawing in “record” listener
numbers, according to the BBC. King’s
performance gained her a nomination
for best newcomer at the radio
industry’s Arias awards last year. “The
[audience] figures have been amazing,
it’s just been so positive”, she says.
When I raise the issue of equal pay- despite some recent improvements,
this year just three out of the BBC’s top
ten best paid stars were female, and
they were at the bottom of the list- King says she does worry about the
issue and “of course” thinks salaries
should be equal for men and women
in equivalent roles. But she admits
Edmondson could well be paid more
than her since the pair don’t talk about
money – “I feel a little bit awkward
asking” – and “he’s been there for nine
years longer than I have”.
King became famous for being one
fifth of all-girl pop band The
Saturdays, but now hopes she might
follow a similar path as broadcasters
such as Zoe Ball, and enjoy a long
career at the BBC. “I think the BBC is
really good at taking you in and letting
you grow there and develop.”
She hopes to do more TV presenting
too. She filmed an forthcoming short
package for The One Show on dyslexia,
‘Singing wasn’t the
same without The
Saturdays. I felt quite
lonely on my own’
bornfree.org.uk‘Pay should be equal
... but I feel awkward
asking what my
co-star earns’
24 ***^ Friday 23 August 2019 The Daily Telegraph
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