Gina

There are times when I look back on my life and think oh bugger that was a really bad idea. Gina, what were you thinking? That sickly feeling of embarrassment creeps up when I look at my wedding photos. Well my one wedding photo. A Polaroid of my Tom Cruise-esque (80’s Cruise, not the couch jumping Cruise) husband and I before our neon lit ceremony; holding shiny bottles of booze in our hands. My hair looks like a disintegrated shipwreck, lipstick is smeared across both our faces but we're too pissed to care. I was in Nevada at the time filming a low budget chick flick that actually turned out to be a soft-core porno. The experience taught me not to respond to casting calls through the internet but to be honest with you I wasn’t too bothered by it. I was starring in a movie whether my boobs were out or not, I was making it big time. The girls back in Harlow were jealous.

I could tell from the moment I walked on set that I had caught the director’s eye. He directed me with his slick and smooth American accent, making me feel like being from Essex was something exotic and sexy: “Oh baby use that voice of yours”. Before you knew it we were behind the trailer turning soft-core into pretty much hard-core and let me tell you it was great. “Oh my God that was Great!” he would say. At first I thought he just wanted the sex, I saw myself as a bit of a Marilyn Monroe, sleeping my way to the top. But our off-set adventures soon became a routine. He would call me up on my days off, drive me round the desert and he brought strawberries and cream on my birthday. That’s when I began to think: he might be in love with me. I was 19 at the time; I knew fuck all about love. Then again I wasn’t completely wrong, before the film wrapped up he announced to the crew that he wanted to marry me.

“Yes. Of course I’ll marry you. Of course.”

Despite the fact that I knew nothing about the man, nothing about his life outside the scorching Nevada desert I just kept clapping and giggling and asking him when, when WHEN? I made frantic calls back home, to the girls and to mum. They were all really happy for me, it was a shame they couldn’t be there but it was bloody expensive flying out so late notice. Two weeks after the proposal he took me into Vegas. We gambled all day and all night. Filled with champagne and jell-O shots we stumbled into a chapel. I was too drunk to care about the fact that I was a walking cliché, although I remember shouting out:

“But I’m not even wearing a wedding dress!”

“You’re fine, come on!”

We were met by a priest dressed in an Elvis suit. He did a quick number about holy matrimony and one – two – three

“You May Kiss The Bride Thank You Very Much.”

I turned round and expected a breathtaking snog where my hair would swish into the cool Las Vegas air but instead I looked over and saw my newly-wed husband crouching on the floor in fits of tears. My very own Tom Cruise was crying, shivering, shaking, having a fucking nervous breakdown. Elvis told us we had to leave; another couple was coming to see him. Then suddenly my husband ran out of the chapel, down the tourist infested street, straight into a telephone booth.

“What are you doing?”

“WHAT DO YOU THINK IM DOING! CALLING MY FUCKING WIFE”

“I’m sorry?”

“MY WIFE! MY WIFE”

“But I’m standing right here?”

“NOT YOU, YOU DUMB SHIT”

All colour drowned out of my face, my heart fell into a dark pit in my stomach where it stayed for a long time afterwards. There I was, leaning against a telephone booth in Vegas with my brand new husband pushing slot machine tokens into a pay phone. He was trying to call his wife, his real wife, who I later found out he had two children with. I turned round and spent the remaining nights alone, in a mouldy motel room until it was time to fly home.

The movie appeared on the Spice Channel last month. When the part came on where I seduce an anonymous bride on her hen night – I started to cry.