11 November 2023 , 16:45
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When he's not entertaining his fans with his powerful voice and stage antics, Robbie Williams loves to have a bit of a giggle. But although he loves nothing more than having a laugh, even he admits he sometimes goes too far. While he was on tour with Take That and about to sing Back For Good, he made a joke about sleeping with four out of the five Spice Girls - and it has been hard to live down.
Amid the new Robbie documentary on Netflix, released on Wednesday, November 8, the Mirror takes a look at which Spice Girls Robbie did have flings with and which rumours have been proven untrue. Speaking about the 'joke', Robbie explained: "I was on stage and I was about to sing Back For Good and I said, ‘Ladies and gentlemen, I’m very fortunate I’m one of the only people in the world that can say they’ve been in Take That and four out of five of the Spice Girls’. And that was my joke. All right? So I do this funny aside but it has ramifications, real-world ramifications, for years.”
Robbie, who admits being a ladies man before settling down with actress wife Ayda Field, told The Sun: "For the record, I haven’t. I really haven’t. I said four out of five because it was good for the joke. I think if you check records everybody knows how many it was."
Mel C
As Angels rode high in the charts around Christmas 1994, Rob was also hitting the headlines for another reason - his budding romance with Spice Girl Mel C. According to reports at the time, things were looking so good that Robbie, Mel, her bandmate Victoria Beckham and husband David flew to Ireland for a Christmas getaway. But according to author Emily Herbert's book, Take That and Robbie Williams, everything went awry when he celebrated the success of Angels by falling promptly off the wagon with a 'very public marathon bender' at London's Groucho Club.
Years later, Mel finally admitted she had been seeing the troubled star, but confessed that she had been unable to 'tame' him. “It was nothing serious but we went on a couple of dates and it didn’t really work out," she told Star magazine. "It was just a chemistry thing really, sometimes there’s not a major reason. He was busy travelling all over the world and so was I. At the end of the day, you’re never going to get Robbie to settle down are you? You’re never going to tame that beast!”
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Geri Halliwell (fourth from left) went on holiday to France with Robbie Williams. (Getty Images)Geri Homer (Halliwell)
Tongues started wagging when Geri was spotted leaving the ex-Take That star's house at 1am in July 2000 before they went on holiday together in France the following month. The pair bonded over their mutual experiences of being the black sheep of a band, and Geri credited Robbie with helping her tackle an eating disorder and turning her life around. "Robbie knew about my bulimia... he told me to go to rehab and that possibly saved my life," she told Piers Morgan.
"I will always be grateful to him, always. I felt he was the only person on the planet who could understand me." Robbie even wrote his number one single, Eternity, about their bond but things reportedly went sour after a bitter row that prompted Robbie to cut Geri out of his documentary, Nobody Someday. He later claimed she'd been too intense, apparently telling The Sun: "She turned into a demonic little girl playing with dolls and a tea set. It was around that time I realised our friendship wasn't what I thought it was."
Geri, however, always insisted “she "didn’t really go out with him", while Robbie was forced to apologise in 2013 after joking that he'd rather have slept with Victoria Beckham. He told News Corp: "I have to make weekly apologies. I've got a Tourette's of things I wish I didn't say. That's one thing I wish I hadn't said. It's easy to get a cheap laugh. I'm very fond of Geri. She's great company. Absolutely bonkers but really, really good company. I think fondly of her."
Mel B
Mel B said that she definitely hadn't slept with Robbie, telling the Kyle and Jackie O Show last year: "He actually publicly apologised to me for all that mess... saying he had apparently gotten it on with all five Spice Girls. He wishes! I was the one he never did. He's a friend of mine... Yuck! He had been with my friends - I don't want sloppy seconds."
Mel B attends "America's Got Talent: Fantasy League" Red Carpet at Hotel Dena on September 20, 2023 (Getty Images)Emma Bunton
It was Robbie Williams' wife Ayda Field who hinted the former Take That star bedded Spice Girls Emma Bunton and Melanie C during his Lothario days. Yet it was Mel C who later insisted there was no truth in the claims that Robbie had bedded four out of five of the girls, telling Closer magazine: 'Victoria asked me about that and said "Well I know I've not slept with him. And I know Emma's not slept with him."
Emma Bunton was known as Baby Spice and hasn't slept with Robbie (ITV)Posh Spice
There may have been rumours whether one of the Spice Girls he said he'd slept with was Posh Spice but these were later put to bed. Robbie said: "I told a joke a long time ago and it sort of got out of hand. It was a joke and the joke went too far. I would like to apologise to all the Spice Girls involved and their husbands and boyfriends. I know a few husbands and boyfriends weren’t too happy with the joke."