We haven’t talked about Gary Goldsmith in over two years. Goldsmith is the Princess of Wales’ uncle and Carole Middleton’s brother. Gary is a piece of work, with multiple criminal charges under his belt (including domestic violence) and he still owns a place in Ibiza which he named Maison de Bang Bang. In 2024, he tried to become a reality star by appearing on Celebrity Big Brother, but he was kicked out in a matter of days. That same year, he gave several shocking interviews in which he said vile things about the Duke and Duchess of Sussex and Princess Diana. After all of that appalling, trashy behavior, I guess Carole finally muzzled him for two years. Now he’s back and there’s a big woe-is-me sob story from the man who declared that Meghan “isn’t going to be around forever, is she.” From the Daily Mail’s big exclusive interview with the Sober and Dodgy Uncle Gary:
He celebrated his 60th birthday without alcohol last year: The only concession to self-indulgence was his birthday meal – a feast of seafood and cake. The newly abstemious Gary had not only turned his back on alcohol, he’d also been on a quest to lose weight. Gary had jumped on the Mounjaro bandwagon and been using weight-loss jabs for the past year and lost 6st. So allowing himself a well-deserved pause in his strict regime had been the highlight of his birthday week.
A brush with death: Then, eight days after his birthday in April last year, the younger brother of Carole Middleton, mother of our future Queen, had a brush with death. ‘I’d fallen asleep on the sofa watching rubbish box sets,’ he recalls. ‘And when I woke up around 7am, still on the sofa, I started feeling terribly sick. I managed to stagger to the loo, where I was projectile vomiting blood. It seemed to go on for hours….I hate fuss and I hate being told what to do,’ he tells me, as he recalls that frightening episode. Nevertheless he did call Julie-Ann, 56, his wife, who was at home in London looking after their dogs, to inquire if she thought he really needed to go to hospital. She said he did and swiftly bypassed her husband completely, ringing Gino, his house manager in Ibiza, who drove him to the island’s private hospital.
Surgery in Ibiza: Within 12 crucial minutes, he was rushed through triage for life-saving surgery in which bands were tied around the veins in his oesophagus which had become enlarged as a consequence of liver disease and were threatening to burst. ‘If they hadn’t banded me I would have bled to death,’ says Gary, who spent the next 48 hours in intensive care. ‘There were people dying all around me. I find hospitals horrific so I checked out and went home. The doctors were pleading with me to stay. Gino was in tears. He rang Tallulah [Gary’s only child, from his second marriage to Luan Bettaney] who was absolutely furious with me.’
Carole weighed in on Gary’s health too: ‘Tallulah texted her to tell her how ill I was. She weighed in, wanting me to be more mindful of my age, to make sure I was getting enough sleep, eat more healthily, do more walking, stay active, drink less and take supplements. As she is ten years older than me, when we were kids, it was like growing up with two mums. She still has that maternal concern for me. We were raised in a really modest little house in Southall, Middlesex, and family meant everything to us. We looked out for each other. If I did something wrong, I got told off twice, once by Mum and then again by my sister.’
Carole, Gary & Kate: It is a combination of all these qualities – familial closeness, big-sisterly sternness and a steely stoicism – that still fires Carole today. It was typical of her that she endured privately and with dignity the cancer diagnosis of her eldest daughter. The news that Kate was in remission came just four months before Gary’s own health crisis. During his treatment and recovery, he had time to reflect on his niece’s illness and appreciate that, in the midst of his sister’s worries, Carole had made time for him, too. ‘I’m very conscious that your brother being poorly is one thing. Your daughter, suffering with cancer is massive,’ he says.
Gary on Resilient Kate: The way Kate has dealt with her illness – serenely and without fuss – has left Gary ‘awestruck’. He was ‘thrilled’ to see her take on the physically demanding Three Peaks challenge last month to raise money for London’s Royal Marsden Hospital where she was treated, proving – quietly and without fanfare – that she has recovered her fitness. Gary smiles. ‘It takes me back to her childhood when they would go to the Lakes,’ he says. ‘You put on your walking boots and off you go. For Kate, it felt like a return to nature, a return to her childhood.’
Sobriety: ‘My friends and I were probably drinking more than the average person because my business demanded a lot of entertaining,’ he says. ‘You just don’t expect your lifestyle to come back and bite you.’ He concedes now that his illness must be the result of 40 years of excess. ‘My body just said: “No. You’ve had enough.” They’re managing my bloods every few weeks. But I’m fitter than I’ve ever been.’
He’s written a children’s book: One night, he woke up with an idea for a children’s book, based on stories he used to make up for Tallulah. The book, 26 Perfectly Imperfect Tales From The Village Of Mishaven, follows a series of characters who are ‘perfectly imperfect’. ‘I think the book has a really cool message for kids – every person has flaws but they are brilliant the way they are.’ So, what are his plans? ‘I want five grandchildren. Tallulah doesn’t even know that yet. I would like to have a five-a-side football team.’
For what it’s worth, Gary makes no mention of working a 12-step program or any program at all. He does not use the language of recovery. It sounds like he believes to this day that he didn’t really have a problem with alcohol, he just liked to have a good time and his liver just went haywire for no real reason. While I’m glad that he’s not drinking, I’m struck by how superficial all of this – a two year absence after he made a horse’s ass out of himself repeatedly in 2024, then a secret health crisis, followed by a rebrand of Sober Gary, who wrote a book and drinks nonalcoholic beer and adheres to the Middleton party line about brave, resilient Kate.
Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, screencaps courtesy of Celebrity Big Brother.
