LADY SPEAKING FRENCH
This program me contains strong language
That sounded quite good.
Yeah, some good stuff, actually.
Was that an audio book? No, it wasn't.
It's just a bit of music, but it was just too, maybe too relaxing.
It's put me in a nirvana-like state.
Just be on the ball, right? Yeah.
How you feeling this morning?
Rudely looked in your bag.
You brought some of the good stuff.
We're going to dip into that.
What actually is that?
That is blackcurrant juice. Yeah.
But, like, kind of like alcohol Ribena?
No. Taste it. Have a swig.
Are you serious? Yeah, get it down you, Louis.
That's not... That's... That's got something...
That's...erm...
That's got some kind of alcohol content.
No of fence. What is it?
None taken. It's rum.
That's rum?
Come on, then.
In a quiet corner of northern France,
I was with the rock star Pete Doherty.
What a mess, huh?
What a dump!
That's the line, isn't it?
A one-time hell-raiser with an extensive list of hits
and criminal convictions,
Pete had invited me for a dip into his new, more sedentary life.
Oh, that's quite comfy.
Tres comfortable. Oui, c'est Mage.
Are you fluent?
I probably should be more fluent than I am.
Shall we do it in French or English?
Let's try it in English.
Could be a short interview in French.
Yeah. Ca va?
Tres bien. Ooh la la.
Yeah, come on. Fuck it. we'll do it in French.
In Normandy is a seaside town of not many more than 1,000 souls.
For the last three years, since moving from Margate,
one of them has been Pete.
Do you come down here of a day? Yeah.
Sometimes I come down with a paper and sit. Yeah.
Do you ever perform in the bars?
I play here a lot, yeah. Do you?
I get a free meal and that, yeah. Seriously?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Though he still travels for occasional gigs
and live appearances, most of the time he lives here,
trying to stay out of trouble, maintaining his longest stretch
of semi-sobriety since he first came to fame 20 years ago.
It feels like we're on holiday.
Just you and me. Look at that.
Yeah, it's bonkers, isn't it? That's proper old.
That's lovely.
They don't make them like that any more.
I owe him money, though. Don't want to go in there.
No, you don't! For what? Yeah, I do.
Just for a meal. I said I'd pop back and pay.
I didn't. You'll get a reputation.
We're very excited to welcome a marvellous new band to the show,
The Libertines.
Pete is the poster boy for rock and roll excess.
Coming to fame with the group The Libertines,
where in partnership with Carl Barat in the early 2000s,
his literate indie rock revived the UK music scene.
The winners are The Libertines!
Kicked out of the group, he formed Babyshambles.
# Fuck forever
# If you don't mind... #
But more than his records,
Pete has been known for his run-ins with the law...
Are you worried about today?
I'm bricking it a little bit.
...a high-profile relationship with Kate Moss...
Pete, Pete, how are you feeling tonight?
...and his long, damaging love affair with heroin.
# Fuck forever
# If you don't mind... #
I was curious to get to know the recently tamed rock beast
and to reflect on his past and his future.
Tell me where we are.
We are in my atelier, a fancy French word for studio, yeah,
which is becoming more of a makeshift storage space
for all my bits. Al the artefacts of the shipwreck of my life.
Yeah.
That caught my eye.
Oh, my God, I know. And mine.
I saw that, I didn't... What's that all about?
I don't know. It's just an old suitcase, had loads of stuff in,
hadn't opened it for ages, and then, bang, when I opened it,
"Do not touch."
It is quite a strange thing to have on your suitcase.
Especially inside the suitcase.
By the time you've got it open, it's too late. Mmm.
This is fun.
The young Pete Doherty.
At the National Portrait Gallery.
You know, you're starting to make me look like I've just got, like,
this locker room full of Kate Moss memories or something.
That's complete chance.
I saw her actually on a Diet Coke advert the other day.
"Coca Cola."
That's what she'd say in the morning to her assistant, like, "Coca Cola."
And then I learned Donald Trump does the same thing.
It put me off a bit. Drinking Coke?
Well, ordering it from her assistant all the time. Really?
"Coca Cola."
Pete's studio was a testament to the years he spent writing,
making music, creating art.
When the time came to talk, however,
we've started unavoidably on the subject of drugs.
OK, ready? Here we go.
So I was, um...
I've been watching videos online, old and new, Libertines
and Babyshambles.
And under one of them, one of the comments was,
"Pete Doherty, a talented and brilliant young drug addict
"whose life was tragically derailed by writing and performing music."
Oh, I see. Yeah, that's great. Yeah.
Yeah, was that just some random comment?
It was the most liked. Yeah.
we'll have to try and get in touch with them.
Get them working with PR.
But do you think there's anything in... Not...
Obviously, that's a joke, right?
But the idea that, that the two are sort of intertwined and part of
what drugs gave you was a sense of raising the stakes on everything.
It gave it a life or death intensity,
the sort of sense that you're dancing on the rim of a volcano?
I think so, yeah.
I think I definitely fancied myself as this, this rim dancer.
We wanted to die for something.
We felt like... Did you? Yeah.
Do you mean literally? Yeah, I think so.
For? For something worth dying for, basically.
And in your case, it was?
This crackpot vision of England that I had.
Do you know what I mean? Yeah, just being able to enjoy, appreciate,
be moved by, be consumed by poetry.
The poetry and history of England.
When you won your NME Band of the Year award in 2004,
you did Siegfried Sassoon's Suicide in the Trenches. Yeah.
Shall I get that on YouTube?
Yeah, no, I don't want to see that.
I don't want to see that. The...
Why don't you want to see that?
I don't know. Just, I don't like to see myself on screen.
Go on. Ready?
'Listen, though, just give us two seconds, right? Calm.'
Yeah, no.
Yeah, I do look like I'm about to drop dead any second, though.
Look at the state of me.
He slept soundly through the lonesome dark...
And whistled early with the lark.
'You smug-faced crowds with kindling eye
'who cheer as soldier boys march by,
'Sneak home and pray'
you'll never know
The hell where youth and laughter go.
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
Carl looks like he's, he looks like he's a bit embarrassed.
Had you prepped it or not?
I don't think so, no.
But he had... one of the first things...
He happened to know it by heart as well.
It's quite striking. Well, he'd set that to music.
# I knew a simple soldier boy... #
Hank Williams skiffly guitar riff
with Siegfried Sassoon poetry over it, yeah.
What's not to like? Know what I mean? Like...
How important to your musical journey was meeting Carl?
I had this big... I had this big dream
that I was going to get to London
and just get a band together,
and I was going to find a guitarist
that was going to put this magical music to all my amazing lyrics.
And then I met Carl and he was like,
"No, no, no. If we're going to do this, I'm singing too.
"You're going to have to learn to play the guitar properly.”
But meeting Carl and, like, getting Carl to,
trying to get some momentum behind our songwriting,
which I was inspired by from the start,
was probably the most transformative thing in my life, really.
HE EXHALES
Free with the Observer, imagine that.
Free with the Observer. They were giving them away!
Narcissist. That was a good song, that.
Can't Stand Me Now. Yeah.
How does that one go?
# It was an ending fitting for the start
# How you twisted and tore our love apart
# Your light fingers through the dark
# Shattered the lamp into darkness
# You've caused us... #
That's Carl's line and then I say,
# No, mate, you've got it the wrong way round
# You shut me out, you tried to blame it on the brown
# Cornered the boy, kicks out at the world
# The world kicks back a lot fucking harder now
# You can't stand me, no, you can't stand me now... #
It's a love song of sorts...
Yeah, it is, yeah.
...about friendship gone wrong. Yeah.
Was your relationship on the rocks at the time?
Yeah, I think we wrote it and recorded it really,
really quickly, just as it was falling apart.
20047 Yeah.
You OK? Yeah.
In the background to Pete's rehabilitation
is his relationship with his wife of two years
and partner of more than ten, Katia de Vidas,
a musician and film-maker.
DOG BARKS LOUDLY Oh, jeez.
He's called the dogs on us.
Hello? What about the weather?
Flipping heck!
Two months ago, the two of them were joined by a baby girl.
As the family get settled, they've been staying in a large,
rambling house belonging to Katia's parents.
How do you do? I'm Louis.
I'm Katia. Nice to meet you.
Thank you for having us. Welcome.
And this must be...
This is Billie-May. Billie-May.
So cute. Wow! She's brand-new.
She's a month and a half.
She looks like you, Pete.
Do you think so? The poor thing.
Le pauvre enfant!
Is she a good sleeper? She's a good sleeper.
It's the days that are difficult.
How are you finding it, Pete? Er...
Yeah, no, I'm all right.
Yeah, I mean, Katia is doing wonders, you know?
So, we're all right, ain't we? Yeah.
Yeah. I mean, it's all so new, you know? Mmm.
This is your third tour of duty, though, isn't it,
with a little 'un? well, yeah,
technically, I do have two other children,
but I wasn't really part of their... Their upbringing?
...their daily, their daily upbringing, no.
Be a bit different this time around? Hope so, for her sake.
Yeah, different times.
Oh, thank you! Say hello to uncle Louis.
Here we go.
Got to support their heads, don't you?
Because they're very... they're very precious.
They're very precious.
What is it? Are you OK?
Are you OK? What is it?
How about this?
Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh.
Oh, oh, oh, oh.
Oh, oh...
How long have you been together?
Ten, 12 years.
And may I ask how you met?
I'd been hired to film a Babyshamble gig.
Then we had a great friendship for years before we got together.
And then we got together.
When you fell in love with Pete, what did you fall in love with?
I guess a life a bit less ordinary.
And he was hilarious and charming and intelligent. All right!
KATIA LAUGHS Aww,
You know, Katia, you would have known Pete
when he was active in his addiction.
That must have been difficult at times.
Well, it's a roller-coaster, active addiction.
But as bad as it sounds, he was manageable for a while.
He was all right.
Are you having to hide it, or are you doing it openly?
That was the thing. Yeah, I'd never hide it.
Katia was never, ever interested in drugs herself.
And so around Katia, I probably used to be,
not under manners,
but there wasn't that frantic need to score
like when you hang around with other addicts.
Was there ever a time when it felt like, it's either me or the drugs?
Yeah. The last two years of active addiction.
We were back in England and, you know, that was too much for me.
Yeah, well, that's why I'm clean, really, now.
That was in Margate, was it? Yeah.
I wouldn't have stopped, I don't think,
if Katia hadn't given me the ultimatum.
You know, especially because she wanted a child.
She's like, you can't just have a child while you're like this.
In Margate, you were like a magnet to jerks.
They came to get money, drugs.
They were like old school Margate boys
and had been using for many years
and trying to do creative things but not really getting anywhere.
And then all of a sudden, it was sort of dum, dum, dum.
There were just those six months where everyone died. Like...
And you were going to be next.
That's why we like,
"Allez, let's go, let's leave, let's stop this.”
And then I ended up really close to going to jail in France.
And so I was put on probation and we used this address.
So that was December 2019.
And then the pandemic happened.
It was like, fuck, all these forces are conspiring
against my drug use.
And that was like a big... some sort of message from God.
So I kind of just went, phew, and just sat, sat here, really.
So I got off the gear, yeah, about that time.
PETE SINGS IN FRENCH
# Le chanson du... #
Do you remember that, The London Paper? Dimly.
"Doherty banned from London."
I think you quite liked that, didn't you? Absolutely.
Yeah, well proud of it.
What was going through your head, do you think, at that time?
“I've got to change my life"? "This is fun"?
“I need to get some drugs quick because I'm jonesing"?
All of the above?
No, I think I would probably have been prepared.
If I was going into court, I probably would've had
a little something bold. What? Had a wee nip on the way in?
Well, no, I would have had something stuffed up my arse,
in readiness for if they sent me down.
Seriously? Yeah.
Wrapped in a condom or something?
Wrapped in a bit of clingfilm and then a little bit of...
Vaseline? Butter. New Zealand butter.
This was before I tasted Normandy butter,
which is definitely the creamiest.
Yeah, it was, I suppose seems a little bit grotty and...
But you're just...
What, putting drugs up your bum? What's grotty about that?
And then taking it out and then... Yeah!
But at the time it's...
It's just your main focus and concern.
Nothing else really matters because you could be doing that,
you know, you could be doing that in a cell or, you know,
you could be doing it in a suite at the Ritz.
It didn't really matter to me.
What about this bit?
"He then sped away in a car, blowing kisses
"and flicking V-signs at fans and press."
That's hard to do at the same time as well!
There was more than ten years after this
in which the ups and downs continued.
It makes you think, I must have,
must have thought it was all worth it, to go through that.
Worth it, or you were in the grips of something you couldn't control?
Pete's chronic drug use has, over the years, led inevitably
to chaos, not least his more than 15 criminal convictions
and several stints in jail.
The singer Pete Doherty has been arrested again just hours
after appearing in court on drugs charges.
He's being held on suspicion of possessing Class A drugs
with intent to supply.
Through the 2000s, Pete was the most visible member
of a circle of heroin-using bohemians
who seemed to attract trouble.
In 2006, at a party thrown by one of Pete's friends,
the young actor Mark Blanco lost his life
in circumstances that are still disputed.
I wondered about Pete's attitude to the mayhem
and tragedy that had followed him.
Hang on.
One of the allegations over the years
made by people in your orbit, or formerly in your orbit,
is that you've enabled other people, that you've brought people down.
Do you think you've ever been guilty of glamorising heroin use?
Whether it was intentional or not is a different subject matter,
but probably, yeah.
Because at the time everything was so vivid
and really, it was magical to me.
It's just, I was so enamoured by it all, you know?
But what has hurt is when...
I think it was my mum actually showed me an article.
Don't know why she showed me it. Frigging... it destroyed me,
about a mother whose son had died from drugs,
and she insisted that the only reason he'd done drugs
was because I'd, you know...
So was it someone you knew? No.
But that hurt and made me, made me think.
I mean, I probably, if I thought about it fully,
I'd refuse to accept that responsibility.
But it did touch a nerve.
So we should talk about Mark Blanco, who was a young man,
a young actor, amateur actor, who died in circumstances
that are still disputed, from head injuries sustained
after either falling off or being thrown off
a first-floor balcony in East London.
It was at a party you were at, at the house of,
was it Paul Roundhill? Mmm.
Mark Blanco's mum, Sheila, had led a campaign ever since
trying to establish what exactly happened. Yeah.
You can't, you couldn't blame her for that either. No.
Her son fell to his death, and some people, I think,
genuinely believe was thrown to his death.
And then I'm on camera running away.
Past his dying body. Yeah.
I never met Sheila Blanco, you know, but...
I can understand, like, you know what I mean, her anger, and...
I think her anger at me is... well, it is misplaced,
although it's also shady and, like...
...fucked up.
He'd been happy for me to know about this play he was doing called
Accidental Death of an Anarchist,
about a guy who falls to his death
from a balcony. From police custody, yeah.
And so I was really... I was quite excited.
But then when I met him, there was a bit of a friction between us.
On the night in question?
On the night in question, it's, that's all...
That's just all there lurking in the past, really.
Yeah.
No-one knows really what happened, because no-one saw it.
I certainly didn't see it.
He was being... I think it's widely acknowledged,
he was being a bit drunk and maybe in your face.
I couldn't connect with him at all. Something weird was going on.
Like, that girl I was with at the time, I can't remember her name,
but it was her 18th birthday, I think, as well.
And she was barefoot.
And there was something fucked up happening, the place we were at.
Some party had got well out of control.
So we went to Paul's,
and it turned out not to be a place of refuge, because Mark was there
and he was drunk and there was a scene and he was...
I'm giving you, I'm giving you all this background information.
I don't know why. Probably shouldn't really be talking about it,
but I'm trying to set up for you...
I think it's helpful to understand what happened.
Well, I was mentioning that girl only because that's why we ran,
basically, because this poor girl was in the midst of all this.
Aside from the fact that I had drugs on me
and I was being arrested left, right and centre then.
You know, there was murder enquiries about this.
I just remember feeling so much fucking relief
when I told the police what I knew
and they believed me.
I have never expressed myself well on this
because I'll never feel that...
you can't comment on someone else's grief like that,
you know what I mean? You can't.
And so everything I say about it...
...I just feel like I just tie myself in knots about it, because...
because of how I really remember it
is that he was being an arsehole that night. He was out of his nut.
The other key detail in the case is that someone then went and said
that they pushed him off the balcony, and that was
an associate of yours called Johnny Headlock,
who on the night did have an altercation,
that's established, with Mark Blanco... Yes.
There was an altercation with Mark Blanco.
We all had an altercation with Mark Blanco.
There was pushing and shoving.
And so it's this childish playground thing going on.
And then the next thing is, like, he's on the floor
and his skull's cracked open.
And then...
No, I probably didn't take it seriously enough at that moment.
Maybe I should have just stood my ground,
take a deep breath,
you know, and had the fucking balls just to like, you know,
flush everything down the toilet and be there when the police came.
But I didn't want to see the police. I didn't want to.
It was a fucking inconvenience to me.
And that's an awful thing to say, you know what I mean?
Because he's lying there dead on the street
and I was more concerned about getting nicked for possession.
And this...
This poor girl is like, what the...
And I saw her again in Paris a couple of years later,
and I was in a bar in Paris, and she was there with her then boyfriend.
And then the barman had been a friend.
I keep bumping into friends of Mark Blanco's all over the world.
And this guy refused to serve me.
He said, "I know you, Doherty."
And this girl was there.
And she was you like, "He didn't kill anyone."”
So that was enough for me for a long time,
to know I didn't kill him.
But actually, that's not really what it's about, is it?
Shall we take a break?
Yeah, OK, yeah. Yeah.
You can gather yourself. Yeah, thanks. Take five.
The questions around Mark Blanco's death remain unresolved.
The man known as Johnny Headlock retracted his confession,
claiming he was out of his mind on cocaine when he made it.
Police say the case is still open.
Back in England,
and Pete had been given a weekend pass from his French exile
to join The Libertines for a gig at a festival
called Secret Garden Party.
I was joining them, hoping it might be a chance to meet the rest
of the band, and in particular,
Pete's friend and creative partner, Carl.
Their fractious relationship and its many ups and downs
is part of Libertines lore.
They were staying at a hotel a short drive from the festival.
Room service. Hello, Louis.
How you doing? You all right?
Look at you. That looks comfortable.
Come in. Can I?
This feels a bit... it's a bit Hugh Hefner, isn't it?
Ooh!
You looking forward to the show? I suppose so, yeah.
And I know, as we get closer to the show,
things get a little bit twitchy. A bit twitchy?
I'm not worried about the people, it's not nerves about that
or the show. It's more...
being onstage with The Libertines itself for me
is more challenging than the crowd, you know.
It's more thinking about Carl and what sort of mood's he in.
Yeah, although I wonder what he's like onstage before his...
Do you know what we should do? What room's he in?
Normally he checks if I've got a bigger suite than him or not.
No, he doesn't. He does.
Here we are, this is Gary, our drummer.
Oh, hi, Gary. That's Louis. How you doing?
Nice to meet you, Gary. Good to meet you.
I'll leave you guys to it. Do a good show.
See you in a second. See you in a sec, cool.
Well, well, well, the pig man, what you doing?
I'm good, man. Good, yeah.
This is my new friend, Louis.
This was Pete's idea. He wanted to ambush you.
How you doing? Louis. Nice to meet you, Carl.
Nice to meet you. A pleasure.
There was a famous incident when Pete, and forgive me
if this is painful to bring up, that you broke into Carl's flat.
What had happened?
They were doing these gigs without me.
He did Glastonbury... We did a bunch of gigs without you.
So I'd gone around to speak to Carl and beg him and say,
"Look, I know you're worried about the drugs,
"but please don't carry on without me."
Basically what happened was that it was very difficult for Peter
to arrive at the same time at places
and do the same things that was MO of the band.
I was in my honeymoon period with crack and heroin,
basically, thinking that I could handle everything and do this stuff.
And so I'd gone around to speak to him,
kicked the door in, realised he's not there,
and then, yeah, I've done, like, you know, very, really stupidly,
I've taken some video, things like that.
And then so I was in Japan doing the most painful tour of my life,
just like the guilt tour, thinking I was doing the right thing
for my friend and his addiction,
having my own addiction issues myself. With what? Anything.
Powder, and, well, not anything.
You know, I'd constantly have people telling me,
"Your friend's gone off the rails, you've got to do something.
"You've got to sort it out, you've got to look after him.
"Can't let him do this, you can't let him do that.”
And you know, you've seen the man, he's a rule unto himself.
And I knew that I had to keep the band together.
And I knew we had these commitments and I knew that Pete was
running around with the crew, who weren't my crew, and it wasn't me.
So I felt he was, he was getting away from me.
And so, and going on this tour,
and it felt like, it felt like I was breaking our bond,
our pact and everything that we'd sworn in blood together.
And so, although Peter says he got kicked out the band,
it was never... that was never the case, but of course,
he didn't see it that way.
But, yeah, it was a tough time and I didn't,
I didn't get any pleasure from doing that whatsoever.
Wow, it's still quite real for you, isn't it? Yeah.
Yeah. It was... it was quite heartbreaking, really.
We're both romantics, we both believed in it all so much
and you know when there's just fuck all you can do about something.
It's just...
That's all right, I accept your apology. It's fine.
Oh, what? Do you apologise? Oh, no, no, no.
You're all right, man. I forgave you ages ago. You're all right.
Did you forgive yourself? Come here.
Come! Come on.
Good session, guys. I think we had a breakthrough today.
Same time next week?
After you. Thank you.
No way. Shake your hand.
Because I'm a mate of Louis Theroux?
Wicked! Fancy it later? Are you staying here?
Yeah, I'll be around, yeah.
Teetotal? Or are you still?
Yeah, I'm trying to, like... I've stopped the hard stuff,
you know what I mean? Yeah.
But it's hard, the teetotal thing, especially on a gig day.
But I'll go a week without having a drink.
Are you going to be partying tonight?
Yeah, why not? Why, you offering? What you got?
Absolutely nothing. No, I was joking...
No, I can tell, this one's got the good stuff, man.
What you doing, Louis? Don't back off! What you doing?
All right. Catch you up.
With show time approaching, we made our way to the festival,
linking up with fourth band member John, the bassist.
I wasn't sure what the pre-show routine might entail.
I just know I hadn't expected an ice bath.
The bath was followed by some fortifying shots of tequila
and then it was time to hit the stage.
# Now don't look back into the sun
# Now you know the time is come
# And they said that it would never come for you
# Oh, oh, oh... #
The Libertines were never known for their disciplined live shows,
but what they lacked in tightness was more than made up for
with a sense of unruly authenticity and band chemistry.
It was oddly heartening to see the rock and roll romance
of the two front men still alive.
We are The Libertines.
Goodnight, campers!
After the show, the merrymaking continued.
When I left, the party was still in full flow.
THEY SING RAUCOUSLY
Back in France, and by now, Pete had by told me the details
of the incident in 2019 which had led to his coming to Etretat.
High on a cocktail of drugs and alcohol in Paris,
he'd attacked a man on a scooter,
been arrested raging at the police,
then urinated on the counter of the police station.
At court, he'd been convicted,
but unexpectedly released on police recognisance.
Lovely, merci.
What were you doing in Paris?
It was the middle of the Libertines tour.
I was a bit all over the place on that Libertines tour.
I think of it now, though, I think I was screaming out to be arrested.
I didn't run or anything, I just sat there.
And he's like, "I'm calling the police.”
I went, "Call the fucking police, I'll knock them out too."
That's not a good look for someone in their 40s.
Absolutely not. It was... Yeah.
It was hard to square the story with the mild-mannered man before me.
Does the French countryside speak to you? Yeah.
What does it say?
Trouve ton chemin. Find your way.
Really? Yeah.
“I will heal you." Yeah.
Do you think we're safe here?
We should be all right sneaking past them cows, it's just sometimes
if they got their young ones, they get overprotective.
Every 14th July, Bastille Day, the cows go crazy with the fireworks
and just charge off the cliffs like...
Does that really happen? Yeah. How many?
I don't know.
Well, they've got the fences up now, but before, you know?
And they're not doing it with joy?
Oh. That's an angle I never looked at, actually.
Cow joy.
Sounds like a Japanese thing, doesn't it?
The cow joy meditation!
# One lone cowboy came riding out one dark and stormy day
# Yippee-ay-ay... #
Shit! Run! They're coming.
Louis, duck and roll!
There you are, you didn't expect that, did you? No.
On the outskirts of town, we arrived at the cottage
Pete and Katia had recently bought and renovated,
which they would soon be moving into full time.
So, come on in.
If it seems strangely clean, it's because we got it spruced up
especially because we knew there'd be people coming, obviously.
Oh, really? Yeah. It's got nice flow, though, hasn't it?
You think? Yeah. It's not really partitioned.
It's all just sort of, it's got a nice feel of...
This is your love nest. Yeah. May |17
Yeah, yeah. You sure? Yeah, of course. Yeah, just...
It's not an invitation to intimacy.
It's a relaxation.
It's quite relaxing, that.
It's big Stinky.
Uh-oh.
Yeah, so me and Katia gonna plot up here, basically.
Yeah, I love my boo-boo.
Who's that? My wife.
Katia.
Katia de Vidas Doherty.
What made you decide to actually get married?
I don't want to, can we stop, can we stop the camera?
Is that all right? Can you stop filming?
You don't have to answer. OK. All right. I won't answer, then.
Because I love her.
But maybe I needed to show her that, to prove that...
To prove, to prove that I loved her.
I didn't know how to prove it,
to make her trust me completely,
to show that I was committed to her and not interested in anybody else.
Do you see what I mean?
I feel like I needed to show her...
.that I loved her
and I was worthy of her trust, you know?
And that she was the one for you.
That your ship had found its port. Yeah, definitely.
Am I right in thinking that you've recorded a new Libertines album?
Yeah, we have.
The songs are as good as anything we've done.
Where did you record it?
So we started recording it in...
Colombia? No! Oh, no.
We did the demos in Jamaica. That's right.
Yeah.
Me and Carl went off to... I think you've been there, that place.
What's it called? Jeff Def Jam, or...
Where's that, in Jamaica? I haven't been there.
Yeah, you told me.
You told me. You OK? Yeah, yeah.
You told me you'd been there.
Why has your voice gone like that?
It's a human, human thighbone.
What's happening? I don't know.
Are you OK? Yeah, yeah. Are you all right, Pete?
Yeah, I'm good.
Just...
Did it go down the wrong way? Are you OK?
I'm good. What's happening?
Nothing, it's all good, it's all good. Look at me. Aargh!
No, no, I'm very relaxed. I'm glad we could get together.
Look at me. Are you all right? Yeah, I'm fine. What just happened?
Did it go down the wrong way? Yeah, it's fine.
It's fine.
How is your health in general?
Erm... you are looking at a very sick man.
Come on. Yeah.
I've battered it, haven't I? I've fucking caned it.
So they came for the heroin
and the crack, and I surrendered to that.
And then it was cocaine and the smoking and the alcohol.
And now it's like cheese and saucisson and the sugar in the tea.
It's all got to go.
I mean, they told me a little while ago as well, if you don't
change your diet and stop drinking, then you're going to have
diabetes and cholesterol problems, you know, death is lurking.
You know what I mean? Come on. What? You can feel it? Yeah.
That's why I carry that stick.
How's the stick going to help?
We'll find out, won't we, when push comes to shove.
I'd love to hear Billie-May talk.
Maybe watch Billie-May grow up and start a family of her own.
No, but that's beyond...
Yeah. That's 25 years. Yeah.
So that's... That's a stretch, isn't it?
If a young person came to you and said,
“I'm thinking of doing heroin"...
What sort of question is that, Louis? Come on.
I thought it was a tee-up.
I thought it was an absolute tee-up.
You could say, like, "Don't do it, son."
Yeah, but what sort of question's that?
It's an absolute gift.
Of course I'm going to say "No, don't do it." Yeah.
My life in using was so chaotic and the consequences of my using
have been so... you put it in and you fuck your body up
and you'll be skint and you'll lose your family
and you'll lose everything you love.
Is it really that good? Is that really, you know...
That's beyond curiosity, isn't it? That's a right mess.
You know, I'm not going to lie, I still get tingles
thinking about it, but I'm not... you know, I'm able to sit down
and talk to you, you know, rather than running off and scoring.
I mean, I still have to take a blocker.
Now it's just a straight injection, buprenorphine.
And it means if I take heroin, it has no effect.
Well, that's handy.
Well, it is for Katia, yeah, you know. And you?
I like to think that I could do without it. You know what I mean?
But they're not, that level of trust has to be earned, doesn't it?
Do you feel like you're being kept on a leash?
A leash of life, I think.
Yeah, the way things are going.
Definitely. A whole new leash of life. Yeah.
But at the moment, I think I'm still reeling a little bit from,
almost like I'm in shock from having got clean still, you know?
HE EXHALES
Yeah. I mean, maybe in ten years,
I'll be able to talk with pride about getting clean.
In recovery, they'd say that everything that you've been through
has brought you here.
And so your being clean now is success.
Yeah.
It's not really made for pleasure seeking!
Get away! You know, you want to come here first thing in the morning,
man, when you're all alone with your dog,
just you against the elements.
Oh, man. We caught it just at the right time as well, huh?
Did we? I'd hate to see it at the wrong time!
Something very scenic about the radioactive waste sign on that buoy!
PETE LAUGHS WHEEZILY
This is going to be tricky.
The last one in the water is a crap interviewer. Hang on.
What a nightmare!
Come on. Come on, Louis! Come on! Jeez!
Come on, Louis! Come on now, you fucker!
In the restorative waters of the English Channel,
I had a moment to reflect on the mysterious qualities
of Pete Doherty.
His undeniable charm, his fragility, his talent,
and his troubling attraction to chaos and derangement.
It was hard to know what the future held,
but with a past so full of misadventure,
it seemed almost a waste to look ahead too much.
It wasn't a nightmare, it was a dream.
What did I say?