For years, there was one person the bosses of Loose Women, ITV’s much-loved daytime programme, dreaded hearing from.
Whether it was a furious email or a thunderous phone call, once they saw her name, they knew there was drama on the way. For despite being the agent representing many of the stars of the Loose Women panel, Melanie Blake was despised at the network.
‘She was an absolute nightmare,’ said one insider. ‘She would cause so much trouble, unnecessary trouble, for us. Nobody wanted her around but she made herself busy causing drama after drama.’
Indeed, Melanie, who is known for posting what appear to be heavily airbrushed selfies on Instagram, once represented the likes of Coleen Nolan, Denise Welch, Carol McGiffin, Nadia Sawalha, Andrea McLean and Saira Khan – all of them Loose Women stalwarts.
More recently she looked after Coronation Street actress Claire Sweeney – though it was understood that Claire ditched Melanie, with the star telling friends she had dumped her. In what turned into something of a row, Melanie insisted that it was her decision to part company because she was ‘downsizing the agency.’
Nevertheless, they split and Claire no longer has any time for Melanie. I’m even told that she was ‘terrified’ of her.
In fact, almost every one of Melanie’s former Loose Women clients – as well as Claire – are now relieved they have cut her out of their day to day lives.
Perhaps for good reason. This week, Melanie, who used to work within the Urban talent agency, lambasted her ex-client, former weather presenter Andrea McLean, on Instagram, saying she ‘stabbed’ her in the back and didn’t send her or her team flowers when they parted ways. Hell, as they say, hath no fury.
Melanie Blake attends the TV Choice Awards 2024 at The London Hilton
In her scathing post, Melanie also revealed she is writing a book in which she promises to reveal ‘corruption’ at ITV. In another Instagram post, she laid into ITV daytime boss Emma Gormley who oversees Loose Women.
For their part, her former clients take the view that Melanie can give the book her best shot – because today many of them hate her.
I regularly receive messages from those involved with Loose Women in which they share unflattering anecdotes about Melanie.
In August 2020, she caused another storm when she called her former client Nadia a ‘total witch’ on Twitter (now X). That led to much speculation that Nadia and Coleen – still Melanie’s client at that time – were at war.
‘You don’t have to look far to find someone who really cannot stand Melanie,’ says my source. ‘There was a time when they all just took whatever she dished out to them, but the Loose Women started to fall away.
‘Many have turned on Melanie: they say that their lives are so much better for not having her around. Life is easier, more straightforward and there is definitely less aggravation.
‘Woe betide her if she starts revealing secrets: all of the Loose crew have more than enough to respond with. Some of them would actually relish a war with Melanie, it would be very cathartic for them.’
As well as her former Loose Women clients, Melanie is well-known for looking after soap stars including Gillian Taylforth who plays EastEnders character Kathy Beale. I hear that she is not exactly the favourite person at the programme’s press office.
It’s the same for Coronation Street, where Claire Sweeney starred as Tyrone’s mum Cassie Plummer. Melanie has also managed Emmerdale star Claire King and is still believed to have maintained a close friendship with her.
Melanie Blake with Claire Sweeney in 2023, when Melanie represented her
She is the author of four novels: The Thunder Girls, Ruthless Women, Guilty Women and Vengeful Women
The late musician Michael Hutchence, who Melanie claims she was romantically involved with
Melanie, who says she is 49 years old, was also known to be close to editors at the Daily and Sunday Mirror newspapers who would pay eyewatering amounts of money to her for stories and interviews with her clients.
So who is Melanie Blake? Well, for one thing she is the author of four novels: The Thunder Girls, Ruthless Women, Guilty Women and Vengeful Women, all of which, according to her Wikipedia, were ‘inspired by her experiences in both the music and soap industries’.
But her back story is somewhat confusing. One industry insider quipped: ‘Nobody had heard her name until about 2016 – she is very shy about talking about her younger years but you’re not allowed to ask questions.
‘It is, though, a big topic of discussion for her former clients, there is a lot that doesn’t add up.’
In 2020, Melanie also published an autobiography, Confessions Of A Talent Agent, where she claimed she was in a two-year on-off relationship with the late INXS star Michael Hutchence during the 1990s, describing him as ‘a man so devastatingly attractive that he could have made a nun break her chastity vows within minutes’.
Nadia Sawalha and Denise Welch on ITV’s Loose Women. Melanie used to represent both
She claimed that Hutchence offered to pay off her debts – at the time, Melanie was £50,000 underwater and living in a bedsit – but she refused.
It’s fair to say that many of those who know Melanie don’t quite buy the claim that she was in a romance with Hutchence – who is of course no longer around to verify her claims.
It seems he never mentioned her and neither did the tabloid press at the time, which was obsessed with his love life.
Indeed, I’ve had my own dealings with Melanie and have seen just how vicious she can be. Last year I discovered that Claire had dumped Melanie – and she threatened me with lawyers.
She has also blocked me on Instagram which means that I am not one of her 984,000 followers – a figure that seems unfathomable to her former clients.
‘Why would that many people want to follow her?’ asked one, adding: ‘Melanie thinks she’s the celebrity, that’s the problem.’
It would come as little surprise then that ITV sources told me Melanie wanted to become a Loose Woman herself.
I’m told she lobbied the programme’s bosses for quite some time to get a role. However, despite her determination, her services apparently weren’t required.
My insiders on the show say ‘they couldn’t imagine anything worse’ than having her on the programme, which was earlier this year cut down to being aired 30 weeks per year instead of 52 in a cost-saving drive.
‘Oh my goodness, we would literally never have her,’ said my Loose Women insider. ‘No chance, she was bad enough as an agent. We hated dealing with her then – let alone being one of our women.’
And as her clients leave one by one, and with her TV career knocked back, Melanie must be hoping her new book sells a lot of copies – otherwise she may need to find another pop star waving a large chequebook.
