Paul Hollywood
TV’s favourite baker, Paul Hollywood, is back on our screens as The Great British Bake Off returns for a new series. He'll also be returning to a theatre near you this Autumn with his first ever nationwide tour.
Emily Horton caught up with him to talk stiff peaks, soggy bottoms and being a sex symbol
He’s been called the George Clooney of baking and it’s easy to understand why. With his brilliant blue eyes, easy-going charm and a name like ‘Hollywood’, it’s no wonder The Great British Bake Off (GBBO) judge has dazzled the tastebuds of a large slice of the British populace.
Attracting an audience of over 11 million for its fourth series finale last year, the show has been one of the most successful to be beamed into our living rooms in recent years and Paul – a master baker from the Wirral – has proved to be an essential ingredient alongside fellow judge, national treasure Mary Berry.
So, if you are enthralled by Mr Hollywood’s buns, you might like to know that you can see them first-hand this Autumn as the former Dorchester head baker heads back on tour, bringing his first solo nationwide tour – Paul Hollywood: Get Your Bake On! to a theatre near you.
As I’m sure you can imagine, with a twinkly yet tough reputation preceding him, I am a little nervous when he first answers my call. Was he going to be sweetness and light or as cutting as a bread knife? What could we expect from seeing him live, I managed to croak.
“The idea of the tour is to show my life in baking,” Paul explains, “from when I was a kid making pastries and cakes with my mum, to the first tentative steps into professionalism and then the media and where I am now.”
Part of the show will also include Q&A sessions. “Throughout the show there will be a roving mic so people can fire questions at me because I get bombarded regularly with baking questions.”
Given he and Mary have become such a double-act, I wonder whether he is nervous about his first major tour without his GBBO compatriots?
“I’ve done loads of solo demos over the past 12 years, but an official tour makes it slightly different,” he says. “I’m a little bit nervous, but I am very excited about it as well.”
When he visited Surrey earlier this year, his gig at Guildford’s G Live was sold out months in advance. Ticket sales for Reading’s Hexagon for November 7 are also selling like hot cakes. So how does he feel about this level of support from the South East?
“I’ve got a few friends round the area and they’ve probably been buying up the tickets!” he laughs.
Some of his Surrey pals, it turns out, include BBC chef Tony Tobin whose restaurant The Dining Room, in Reigate, is one of Paul’s favourites.
Friends aside, I think Paul – so-called the “silverfox stud muffin” by his adoring fans – is being a little modest about his ticket-pulling power. He has become a firm housewives’ choice and a quick scout of his social media pages reveals they are deluged with leading comments from candid admirers.
‘Paul, come and dry my soggy bottom and knead my dough please!!’ is among the more family-friendly pleas.
Is he prepared for such comments when he’s live on stage? “Oh yeah, they always get cheeky. Those sorts of questions I bounce straight back!”
Paul’s rise to stardom has been as spectacular as his bread. Before GBBO catapulted him into the public eye, his first taste of life in front of the camera was back in 1996 thanks to a chance encounter with a film crew.
At the time he was living in Cyprus where he met his now wife Alexandra. His natural flair for the screen must have been immediate as the production team encouraged him to pursue broadcast work upon his return to the UK.
“I just tried to be as normal as possible and pretended the camera wasn’t there. I’ve got this ability to zone that out and I’ve always done that ever since really.”
It was a method that was to bring him much success and landed him his first big break on the Good Food Channel.
“They said: ‘you should do TV when you get back home’ and I said, ‘oh yeah, whatever’. But they gave me a card and so I phoned them when I got back and I ended up doing a series with James Martin [Use Your Loaf].”
Then GBBO came calling in 2009 and well, the rest, as they say, is history. “Out of the blue I got a call saying would I like to get involved with this new programme and so I went up to the auditions – got the audition – got the job and that was the start of the big stuff.”
In his warm, smiley voice he makes it sound easy. Did he have an inkling of what lay ahead?
“No. I didn’t think that Bake Off would go the way it has. The team have smashed a lot of records and we’ve won two BAFTAS. It’s all happened very, very quickly. From zero to 120 miles an hour in the blink of an eye, so I think we’ve all had to adjust slightly.”
It has been an incredible journey, with highs and lows, including a brief fall from grace following the revelation that he’d had a relationship with Marcela Valladolid, his co-presenter on an American version of Bake Off.
There’s no doubt, though, that he has become a well-loved star in his own right and I congratulate him on this. “Thank you, it was easy to do – all I did was eat!” he chuckles.
But he is quick to applaud his co-presenters and the members of the public who make it happen.
“The contestants are the key people here. They are the ones who really crack on and do all the hard work and it’s to the benefit of everybody who watches it.”
He is also conscientious about his role as a mentor. “It’s constructive criticism we give to the contestants. They have to go on a journey, otherwise what’s the point of them coming along? They’ve got to get better and better – that’s the point of bake offs.”
It’s an approach that has won him and Mary many a fan, with The Guardian even crowning them the best reality TV judges ever.
“We try and keep it as genuine as possible and we are brutally honest sometimes. I know I am to the point where it can upset people and they can take it personally, but this is not personal. It’s a business and that’s what it’s all about.
“I won’t just say ‘rubbish, next!’ I’ll say it’s rubbish because what you should have done is this, this and this… Bake Off has been everything to me. I have always loved passing on knowledge and teaching. Whether I’m doing it through the medium of books, television or a live tour, the show has allowed me to do that and I’m very appreciative of it. I love doing it and I’ll always carry on doing it as long as they want me.”
Judging by tour sales, GBBO viewing figures and the adoration of thousands of fans that could mean a few years yet. But in the meantime, the nation’s willing students await…
I have one last cheeky question before I relinquish the dishy Mr Hollywood and I’m sure it’s one that has been on your mind, too. Will he be bringing out an exercise DVD to help counterbalance all those cakes, doughnuts and breads that he has us all baking feverishly.
His infectious laugh rings through the earpiece.
“I doubt it, no. I enjoy my food too much – I doubt it will ever happen!”
Which is a shame because I’m sure it would sell out in minutes.
The Great British Bake Off: BBC1, Wednesday, 8pm
Paul Hollywood: Get Your Bake On! for tickets and dates in the Autumn, visit paulhollywood.com
