As Jeff and Freddie Brazier set off on the latest leg of their journey on Celebrity Race Around The World tonight, it’s only fair to wonder how they will get on. Only a couple of episodes in, the father and son relationship has sometimes made for uneasy viewing.
As they reach Salvador, on the coast of Brazil, to visit the Farol da Barra lighthouse, it’s Mother’s Day – a terrible reminder of Jade Goody’s death on Mother’s Day 2009. Both speak movingly of their loss.
Freddie was only four years old when his reality TV star mother died of cervical cancer, leaving her partner Jeff to care for two little boys — Freddie and his older brother Bobby, who was just five.
Tonight’s episode is one of those heartbreaking TV moments — remembering Goody as the sun sets, they head out for a swim together.
‘That was always going to be a difficult day,’ Jeff said. ‘Freddie felt a bit uncomfortable so we got in the sea and we just swam. The waves were really big and it was really cool. We just played and it was a really important, significant moment for us.’
Jeff and Freddie Brazier on Celebrity Race Across The World. The pair are due to reach Salvador on the coast of Brazil in the latest episode
Freddie’s mum Jade Goody died after a battle with cervical cancer on Mother’s Day in 2009
Freddie, 19, admits he doesn’t remember his larger-than-life mum: ‘A lot of my memories that I have of my mum have come from watching a documentary, YouTube clips, newspapers. They are not my memories.’
He adds that since Goody died, aged just 27, which was ‘really hard’, he has tended to keep his feeling bottled up: ‘I don’t really like showing my emotions. I don’t even speak to my dad much about my mum either. I just avoid it. I don’t want to feel like I’m a burden to them.’
But he added, perceptively perhaps, that in making this epic trip with his father that ‘maybe Mum’s pushing us in the direction of where we need to go’.
There have indeed been hints – more than hints – that there are cracks in the father-and-son relationship.
In the opening episode of Celebrity Race Around The World earlier this month, Jeff was seen walking away after Freddie claimed their family don’t speak openly to each other.
Jeff was also said to be fearful of how the two men would get on before they signed up for the series. In one scene, as they struggled to navigate the first leg through Brazil, both lost their tempers and Jeff stormed off.
Freddie told the cameras: ‘Part of me came on this race to open up with my Dad and already he’s storming off. That’s not good. He might not like what I say, I’m just trying to talk to him really but it’s hard.’
But today the Mail can reveal a family feud between the pair has its roots, not in the usual parental squabbles over getting home late or disagreements over unsuitable girlfriends, but something that runs significantly deeper.
In fact, family friends say fallouts between the two can be so bad that Freddie will flee former reality television star Jeff’s £1million Essex mansion to go and stay with his grandmother, Jade’s mum Jackiey Budden.
It is at her two-bedroom flat in Bermondsey, east London, that he seeks solace.
‘Freddie will often turn up on the doorstep, sometimes very unhappy, and wanting to see his nan,’ a source said. ‘He and Jeff often argue, the rows can be bad, things go really, really pear shaped between them and that’s it, he leaves.
‘Freddie has got so much love to give but he doesn’t feel like he gets it back off of his father.
‘While Jackiey has her issues – and will be the first to admit she isn’t the most perfect or archetypal grandmother – he can share his feelings with her which is something he can’t do at Jeff’s. He has had a terribly sad life but he feels he can’t talk about it.’
Jeff, for his part, talks movingly on Celebrity Race about having to step up to help his sons after Jade’s death: ‘I think when the boys lost their mum I really doubled down on putting all of my time, effort, attention, focus on the children.’
In the opening episode earlier this month, Jeff was seen walking away after Freddie claimed their family don’t speak openly to each other
Jade with her sons and her husband Jack Tweed, who Freddie is said to spend time with often
Though a source close to the family confirms what he says, it has not been enough to cement his relationship with Freddie: ‘Jeff took the boys in when Jade died, he took them away from the limelight and did his best to bring them up amid such difficult circumstances but sadly Freddie just can’t see eye to eye with him.’
There are, I’m told, stand up rows.
The problems began around five years ago when Freddie turned 14. Living in Bobby’s shadow as his younger brother, Freddie is said to have felt lost.
Jeff, who found fame in the early noughties on Channel 4 reality show Shipwrecked, had just married Kate Dwyer, a public relations executive, and despite all parties trying hard, as with many blended families, things were fractious.
As Bobby, 21, began to carve out a career – landing a role on BBC One soap EastEnders in 2022 and dancing up a storm on the last year’s Strictly Come Dancing – Freddie struggled.
So just what has driven the wedge between Jeff and his son?
Friends say the heart of it is Freddie’s relationship with Jackiey and the poor relationship between Jackiey and Jeff.
‘He is furious at the idea that Freddie goes to her house after they have a row, he is cross at the idea of him going to seek solace there.’
But, whether he likes it or not, I’m told Freddie loves nothing more than to put one of Jade’s exercise DVDs on in the bedroom that she grew up in, stand on the bed and follow her workout.
‘Jeff and Jackiey had a fall out some years ago and it really is the salt in the wound,’ said a family member. ‘Freddie has to hide seeing his Nan, so does Bobby, but they will never, ever make up.’
Another issue which is said to particularly rile Jeff, 45, is that Freddie often spends time with actor Jack Tweed, his late mother’s husband. They married just a week before she died.
Following Jade’s death, contact was rare between Freddie, Bobby and Jack, but as Freddie has got older, and therefore able to have his own relationship with him, they have become closer.
The family source said: ‘Freddie loves to go out with Jack and also James Argent [former star of reality show The Only Way Is Essex] whom he knows well. When Jeff got the boys, he wanted to shield them from as much heartache as he could, but in reality what Freddie wants is to remember his mum.
‘Being around Jack is something Freddie enjoys. He knows how happy Jack made his mum and there is something comforting about that.’
And right now, it seems, Freddie is keen to keep reminding himself of his mother. That comes across loud and clear on Celebrity Race Across The World.
The question is whether, ultimately, it will bring Freddie and his father together – or tear them apart.
