We've seen a string of your documentaries now and I'm sure this is always something you're asked, but what is it about the investigative journalistic world you enjoy so much?
Credit: TLC
The main thing is being able to make a difference. The shows that I make, some of them are more light-hearted than others and they're quite fun, but the heavier ones like Jodie Marsh On... Virgins where I explore FGM and child sex trafficking, I think we are taking really, really important issues that matter to the whole world and effect the whole world, and we are putting them out there and educating people, or putting them out there to an audience who wouldn't necessarily already know about stuff like FGM, but also we're educating and informing people on these topics.
So to me, I think I'm doing a really, really, really important job because I'm tackling and taking issues that the likes of Panorama, Dispatches and Unreported World would take, but I'm reporting it to a whole new audience that wouldn't necessarily know about that kind of stuff. So that's what I love about it and that's why I think it's so crucial and important.
Your documentaries for me are on the level of the likes of Louis Theroux and people like that - do you draw influence and inspiration from people such as Louis for your shows?
Thank you, very much! (laughs) It's amazing to be compared to the likes of him because obviously he's so well-known for what he does. I always said I want to be as good as Louis Theroux or Ross Kemp, and now people are saying I am like them and it's kind of hard to comprehend that - I always saw myself as being 'I want to be like them'. But now people are saying 'you are that but you're a female', it's mad!
And then, on the opposite scale of that, not to sound nasty, but Louis Theroux, I think his documentaries are amazing, the content is amazing and the access he gets is amazing, but I think he's really, really sarcastic and I don't like how sarcastic he is, and I've always strived to never be like that. So yes I wanted to be like Louis Theroux, but I wanted to be my own version of that. I never wanted to be like him, I wanted to make documentaries of a similar vein and similar subject matters in terms of stuff that's important and mean something to the world, I wanted to inform and educate people but I wanted to do it in a true and real way without being sarcastic, or without taking the piss out of the subject matter. I'm not there to laugh at them, if I do laugh I'm laughing with them. So yeah. I hope all that makes sense! (laughs)
Do you think you've shocked people and changed public perception for the better with these shows? They've certainly shown a different side to you than is or was put out in the tabloids in the past.
Yeah definitely I've shown a different side, but I think what's really interesting about this whole dynamic here is the person you see on the screen now making these amazing documentaries - that is the person I've always been, it's just that I'm an older, classier version of that person. Obviously I'm older and with age comes wisdom and knowledge and class, which you would hope is the case for anybody, because when I was going out at 23-years-old in a skimpy outfit to a nightclub, and the newspapers were all over me for that... what people forget is, I was only 23 and every 23-year-old girl was doing that, it's just that they weren't being splashed all over the papers, whereas I was.
Yes, I was crazy, I was a bit of a wild child, I was outrageous, I was uncontrollable at times. Anything went. I was a bit of a lunatic, I was! But, like I say, I think they were my crazy clubbing days and everybody foes through crazy phases. The person I am inside has always been the same and never changed. I've always been a really caring person, I've always been a very diplomatic person, I've always been a peace-keeper or peace-maker, I've always been very caring and considerate towards others, I've always had lots of empathy towards other people and I've been that way since I was a child.
So it's kind of a weird thing. I suppose the answer to that question is yes, the public are seeing a different side to me now and yes they're shocked and: 'oh my God, she's so nice and so good at this', people are like: 'I love her', but for me, I'm like: 'I've always been this person, it's just that you've never seen it'.
It is a bit weird, you know? Because people seem to be so shocked at what they think is a transformation, when in my mind I'm like: 'But nothing's changed! I'm the same person I've always been'. It's just that I've grown up and I don't wear skimpy outfits and go to nightclubs anymore! (laughs) I'm really boring and wear granny clothes now!
How have you found public response to your documentaries so far?
Amazing. Amazing, amazing, amazing. Everywhere I go I'm getting nothing but respect. It's amazing, I've never experienced anything like it.
I get, nowadays, where I only used to get young people coming up to me saying: 'I'm your fan', 'I love you' or whatever, now I get like middle-aged and even old-aged people coming up to me going: 'I've watched your documentaries, I think you're amazing, can I get a photo with you?'
It's just amazing. The response, it's completely overwhelming.
We've seen 'Steroids' 'On The Game' etc. - what have been some of your most challenging experiences making your documentaries so far?
When I made 'On The Game', filming with the prostitutes in Manchester where they were all addicted to heroin and were working out on the streets just to fund their heroin habit - that was absolutely heartbreaking, and I mean heartbreaking.
I cried for about a week after that. When we left Manchester, the night that we left, I basically - my film crew was all male, I was the only woman on the crew - and when we left Manchester, we were driving home in this kind of mini-van thing, and I couldn't speak in the van.
All the guys were chatting away having normal chat and banter in the car, and one of them at some point turned to me and said: 'You're really quiet, are you alright?'
And I just went: 'I'm really sorry guys but I just, I can't talk to you at the moment. I just need to have quiet time'.
I think it was at that point I really genuinely hated men so much from what I'd seen in Manchester, because every single one of these girls that was addicted to heroin and was a prostitute - all of their problems had started with a man. It was a man that forced them to take heroin, or it was a man that forced them into prostitution, or it was a man that stole from them, or beat them up, or raped them. And all these horrors that I saw in Manchester, they all started with a man hurting a woman.
So I just, oh my God, I just went through this period where I couldn't even talk to my film crew because they were male, and it was very, very, very challenging. I spent a long time after that being quite depressed about life in general because I wanted to do more to help the prostitutes and I knew I couldn't. There was nothing I could have done. So yeah, it was very difficult.
What should we expect from Jodie Marsh On... Women Who Pay For Sex this coming March?
Exactly what it says on the tin! It's like... (laughs) Women Who Pay For Sex is probably the funniest show I've made so far.
It's absolutely outrageous. It is obviously what it says - it is women who just can't get enough sex and want sex and are willing to pay for sex, and who do pay for sex.
It's crazy, it's outrageous, it's full of nutters. I meet lots and lots of women who happily pay men half their age to come round and give them a good seeing to, and I meet women who have spent upwards of 80 grand on one man where she's so obsessed with him.
It's crazy. It's crazy, crazy, crazy, crazy... It's the funniest show I've made so far. It's the first time I've really been able to be myself in a show in the sense that because it's not too serious, and it's not too emotional and too hardcore and too gritty, you see me really having a laugh and really being myself and laughing with these women, and laughing with the prostitutes. It's just hilarious, absolutely hilarious.
Can you understand why some of these women pay for sex? There's different ladies isn't there. There's the first lady who goes on a date to have a night with this man, there's another lady who spent money and says that Nick has done a lot for her confidence...
Yeah, they've all got different reasons for paying for sex. A lot of them I think, certainly the slightly older ones, I'm talking - they're not old but in their 40s - they are successful women who have got money and for whatever reason can't get a boyfriend or have lost faith in boyfriends or men - it could be something like they've been cheated on or they've been hurt in the past or whatever - and they obviously still have sexual urges and desires, so they find it a lot easier now to have sex with men, no strings attached.
Literally, these women act like men in the sense that they can happily call one up, have a really good shag and then pay him and get rid of him. They're quite cold about it but in a good way - they're emotionally detached from it and that's what they want. They know what they're doing, they know what they want, and that's it, they use it as a service as men would use female prostitutes as a service.
But then you get other women who use them for lots of different things. Some women genuinely want just some company - they've got maybe not many friends or whatever.
There was one woman whose husband had died and she used him as a way of having sex again after her husband died, because she put on lots of weight, she was really unhappy because she was massively obese, and she had no confidence, she hated herself and she couldn't possibly imagine going to bed with anybody. So, she started paying this guy to come round and keep her company, and he helped her lose weight as well because he was a personal trainer as well as a male gigalo, so he gave her tips and advice on how to lose weight and then next thing, she's spent 80 grand on him and been seeing him for two years or whatever. She swears blind by him because she says: 'If I spent 80 grand on therapy, no-one would bat an eyelid because my husband has died, but I've chosen to spend 80 grand on him instead and he's been better for me than therapy, because he's helped me lose weight, he's given me my confidence back, he's taught me a load of new tricks in the bedroom, and now I can go and sleep with another guy because I've got the confidence to, whereas before him I would never have had the confidence.'
She actually said she thought she might be dead by now if she hadn't met him, because she reckons she might have eaten or drunk herself to death, because she was drinking lots of alcohol and binge-eating at the time. So, she puts her whole recovery down to that guy.
I think women use prostitutes for all different reasons.
Which avenues would you like to go down in the future with anymore potential Jodie Marsh On... shows?
Oh there's loads! We're talking at the moment. There's loads I want to do. I like doing the heavier stuff, the more gritty stuff, the stuff that educates and informs people, even though Women Who Pay For Sex is none of those things, it's hilariously funny and it's one of my favourite docs we've made so far because it's just so funny, I laugh so much every time I watch it.
But yeah I'd like to do more serious, gritty stuff. I'm not scared of anything. You see people making documentaries where they're literally on the frontline in war zones, and I would go and do that. My aim ultimately is just to carry on making incredible shows that educate people, so it doesn't matter what the subject matter is, it matters that we're putting it out to a whole new audience that don't already know about it. That to me is what's important - finding the right subject matters and then getting the message out there, which is exactly what we did with FGM and the child sex trafficking and stuff.
There's loads of topics - I can't name specific ones because TLC will probably kill me! But there's loads of topics that I want to cover in the future.
You've become a big name in the fitness world, how big a part of your lifestyle is your health now?
Oh God, it's still everything to me! I train in the gym every single day, I eat really healthily. I don't diet all year round. To keep a six pack you have to be doing a very specific diet, and I don't stay in competition shape all round, but I keep myself or maintain it to a level where I'm always about four weeks away from competition level, so if I suddenly needed to get in that shape either for a competition or for a photoshoot, it would only take me four weeks to get back in that shape with a full six pack and everything. So that's how I kind of live my life there, I keep myself four weeks out from competition all the time.
What that means is all the muscle is still there. I've got a layer of fat over the top of the muscle which would take me three, four weeks to lose that fat to then show the muscle underneath. What it also means is that I can eat what I want - I'm very, very healthy but if I fancy a bit of cake or chocolate I can have it, because I don't like to deny myself the nice things in life. When I'm not competing I don't need to deny myself a piece of chocolate.
Every, single day without fail I take my own protein shakes - I've got my own range of protein shakes...
Can you tell us a little bit about that business?
Yeah, so I have my own range of protein shakes. They really are - I'm telling people this all the time and I feel like I'm showing off and I'm really not, I'm just stating the facts - but my protein shakes are the highest quality shakes on the market.
I do everything from protein porridge that you can have for your breakfast to protein soup that you can have like a cup of soup at work at your office, at your desk. I do meal replacements, I do a protein for recovery and repair after the gym, I do fat burners, I do collagen tablets that give you flawless skin, and I do all sorts of things like vitamins and minerals and joint care and stuff.
I do use all that stuff myself every single day without fail. Even if I'm not dieting, I will still take the fat burners every day, I'll still take the collagen tablets and the vitamins, I'll still have a couple of protein shakes a day, just because it's all good for you and it's what keeps my skin nice, it keeps me looking nice, it makes your nails and your hair grow and everything else. Yeah, I've gotta say I feel, even though I'm not in the best shape of my life at the moment, I'm still training every day and I'm really strong, and I feel absolutely incredible. I feel healthy and fit and great and strong and happy.
What advice can you give to us that want to feel the same and live a healthier lifestyle?
I would say that you absolutely need to start doing a bit of exercise every day, because exercise really does make you feel happier. It releases endorphins and you will not believe the change it would make to your life even if you did like half an hour a day.
For me I think the easiest form of exercise to do if you're short on time and don't know what to do is take a power walk. So go walking, it could be lunchtime near your office or it could be after work, or before work, you could walk TO work. Do a power walk, put some trainers on and do a power walk for half an hour or 40 minutes. Do that every day for five days or a week - I'm telling you now after the week's out, you will feel a hundred times better in yourself for doing that bit of exercise.
If you wanna get in really good shape, as in get a good body and tone up and get muscles - people always get it mixed up, they go: 'Oh I don't wanna get big and muscley, I just wanna tone up', well toning up is building muscle, because what happens is you burn the flabby fat away and you build the hard, tight muscle, then you get the look that's called 'toned', and people still don't understand it and I'm constantly having to explain it to people...
But to get that look you'd have to lift weights and you'd have to eat the right food, so it depends what you want to achieve.
You can lose weight without even going to the gym, because you can take my fat burners, you can have a meal replacement protein shake, you can have protein porridge for your breakfast or whatever and all of those things will make you lose weight and you will, but you won't suddenly get a super-toned body unless you lift weights.
Is there anything else you have going on at the moment that you can share some details about?
Just about to sign up with TLC to make a load more shows! We are in discussions right now as to what those shows are gonna be. Also been offered another show - a series - by another channel, which I'm quite happy about! But TLC are not happy about... (laughs) So they're fighting for me now, which I quite like! It's quite fun to have TV channels fighting over you, but yeah definitely I'm making more of these shows for TLC. This is my home and this is where I feel comfortable and happy and safe and this is what I wanna do, so I've got no plans to leave anytime soon!
Brand new Jodie Marsh On... premieres Wednesday, March 18 on TLC!