With fake tan in a fetching shade of terracotta, and sporting as much maquillage as a magazine cover girl (he often wears his TV make-up when he is out of the studio), Simon Cowell cut a distinctive figure on Monday night.
On the face of it, the 56-year-old, who was presented with a prestigious Music Industry Trusts award at London’s Grosvenor House Hotel, was being lionised for his successes in the pop world and his charity work.
However, as was obvious from his skittish behaviour at the event, here was a man reeling from an unaccustomed sensation. Failure.
Despite knowing he had to make a speech, by his own admission, Cowell got ‘hammered’ on beer beforehand.
While accepting the award, he made bizarre jokes about his predilection for Botox and Zayn Malik leaving One Direction.
This to the obvious embarrassment of the remaining members of the boyband who were present with Cowell on stage. The sense of crisis was unmistakable.
It was an uncharacteristic loss of control from Cowell, who is generally punctilious about the image he presents to the world.
