SITTING on the sofa of his Essex home alongside his best friend James ‘Arg’ Argent and sister Jess, Mark Wright watches a clip of his on-off girlfriend Lauren Goodger getting a spray tan, dressed only in underwear.
‘She looks f****** 19 stone, the div,’ he says as both Jess and Arg tried to keep straight faces.
This sickening comment was screened on the ITV reality show The Only Way is Essex in its first series back in 2010.
It was part of the ugly narrative that Mark set up – and the show happily broadcast – that Lauren, his childhood sweetheart, was not as slim as some of her co-stars including Amy Childs. Lauren says she was a size 10 to 12 at the time and has since revealed that she had to have therapy to deal with the comments.
At the time though, it was compulsive viewing. Millions watched and giggled along as Mark and Lauren played out their tumultuous romance for the cameras.
But 15 years on, things are very different.
As Mark, now 37, enjoys life as a first-time father after wife Michelle Keegan gave birth to daughter Palma last month, sources close to Lauren ask how he and ITV ever got away with making such vile comments about her.
One friend tells me: ‘It is unbelievable that that was allowed to ever be screened. You have to remember the impact these kind of things can have on someone.
Lauren says she was a size 10 to 12 at the time and has since revealed that she had to have therapy to deal with Mark’s comments about her weight
‘Some of the things Mark said to Lauren were absolutely vile, they were awful and cruel. Lauren was nowhere near 19 stone. It all feels so misogynistic. Mark was the popular lad who had girls throwing themselves at him
‘But then you have Mark’s sister Jess sitting there too.’
But that jibe was just one of many cruel jokes Mark made at Lauren’s expense that were aired on prime-time television.
At one point, while he and Lauren were on a break, Arg asked Mark if he’d get back together with her. Mark replied: ‘You know what my ideal thing would be, don’t you? I would just like to freeze her and unfreeze her again in ten years, but unfortunately I can’t do that. Talk of the devil, Lauren’s calling now.’
In another scene at Mark and Lauren’s engagement party in 2012, co-star Lucy Mecklenburgh admitted to Lauren that she had spent the night with Mark.
Instead of apologising to Lauren, Mark shouted at Lucy for confessing.
‘You watch those scenes and Lauren was an emotional punch bag. If it wasn’t about her weight, it was Mark humiliating her.
‘ITV would say some of it was scripted but it was all based upon what was going on in real life – and so often it was cruel.’
Mark Wright with Lauren Goodger at their engagement party in May 2012. Mark called off the couple’s marriage plans five months later
Mark and Lauren had met as teenagers and Lauren was close to Mark’s family – including Jess.
When TOWIE launched, they became instant stars. Their relationship was central to the show for the first two series before Mark left to pursue his own career.
Mark’s playboy antics – which led to tears and fights – were ratings gold dust and helped the show earn a controversial Bafta in 2011.
Mark and Lauren even got engaged on the show – only for Mark to call off their decade-long relationship entirely five months later.
Now mother to daughter Larose, three, Lauren says: ‘I made myself a doormat and he wiped his feet on me every single day.’
Wright with wife Michelle Keegan, who gave birth to their daughter Palma last month
This unpleasant chapter in Mark’s life is surely one he’d rather forget as he promotes himself as a wholesome dad and husband to former Coronation Street actress, Michelle.
Indeed, when Lauren appeared on Celebrity Big Brother back in 2014 – two years after their split – at the same time that Mark, 38, starred on Strictly Come Dancing, he was said to be concerned about what she might divulge about their relationship.
He was so worried that he sent a letter to producers Endemol to remind them of a contract that Lauren had signed four years earlier promising not to speak about him. Lauren reportedly signed the agreement in 2010 while the couple – who were together at the time – were on holiday.
That episode, say those familiar with the two reality stars, illustrates the lengths Mark was willing to go to in order to protect his image as he embarked on a solo career.
‘Mark had been desperate to get himself a career in showbiz,’ said one source close to him. ‘He was absolutely thrilled when his agents managed to pull it off but then it became clear that Lauren was also going to be on the telly at the same time – on Big Brother.
‘It’s the show where people are paid to say sensational things. It was bad luck for him that while he was trying to elevate himself to the next level of his career, Lauren was also on the airwaves.
‘While Lauren might have been fairly tame in what she has said about Mark, what he said to her on TOWIE is all over YouTube, something Mark will surely hate.’
Friends of Lauren, 38, point out that it isn’t just Mark at fault, but also ITV. Indeed, they have come under much criticism for how their reality television stars are treated – and how it affects their mental health. The channel was forced to increase their duty-of-care protocols following the deaths of Love Island stars Sophie Gradon, who was aged 32 and Michael Thalassitis, aged 26, who took their own lives after appearing on the dating programme in 2018 and 2019.
Then a year later Caroline Flack, its host, tragically died by suicide after she was ousted from the show after being charged with attacking her boyfriend Lewis Burton.
‘Lauren has struggled with being famous,’ said one former pal. ‘She deserved better from ITV – and Mark.’
