When Coleen Rooney signed up for I’m A Celebrity, executives at ITV could scarcely believe their luck.
The nation’s most talked about WAG since Victoria Beckham was prepared to leave her palatial £20 million mansion for a camp bed in the Australian Outback, and swap haute cuisine for a diet of rice and beans.
It was one of the greatest coups in the show’s 21-year history. Not least because, unlike a number of the other stars, she didn’t need the appearance fee. A busy mum to four boys, her main focus has been to keep husband Wayne in check and raise her sons.
I’m A Celeb’s viewers lapped up her tales of life Chez Rooney, including the unlikely revelations of her meeting with Donald Trump and Wayne’s penchant for writing her romantic poems. Together with her determined performance in Bushtucker trials, it earned her second place in the final.
Now, as she returns to the UK, the Mail can reveal the secret reason why Coleen went to the jungle: a new reality television show likely to net her and her husband an eye-watering £5 million.
While Coleen, 38, has been facing challenges involving snakes, cockroaches and rats, her agent has been working just as hard. Paul Stretford, who also represents her husband, has orchestrated a bidding war between the world’s biggest streaming giants.
Bosses at rival Disney and Amazon are competing for a warts ‘n’ all fly-on-the-wall show that will follow the Rooneys inside their Cheshire super-mansion.
I can reveal that Netflix opted not to bid, since they had already commissioned David Beckham’s hit four-part docuseries Beckham – which racked up well over 200 million hours of viewing time globally – as well as a series focusing on his wife Victoria, to air next year.
It is Disney who are close to paying the multi-million pound fee, though competition has been fierce.
‘It was all set to be Disney’s and then Amazon appeared in the frame,’ says an industry source. ‘That has sent the fee up. It looks now like the show will go to Disney, but there’s still time.
‘Coleen’s time on I’m A Celeb has made her the nation’s sweetheart, even if she didn’t win. The British public can’t get enough of her. Her profile is bigger than ever and the fee for her family’s reality show will reflect that.’
I’m told that 39-year-old Wayne – currently manager of Championship side Plymouth Argyle – and Coleen are both enthusiastic about the prospect of opening up their home to the cameras, despite it being somewhat of a madhouse by many accounts.
The couple’s four sons, Kai 14, Klay 11, Kit eight, and Cass, six would appear on the show. Indeed, the youngest two appeared before seven million I’m A Celeb viewers on Friday night when visiting their mum in camp, before charming the nation in Sunday night’s tearful reunion with her. Meanwhile, the eldest two have regularly supported Mum on her (and Wayne’s) Instagram accounts.
And then there are Coleen’s beloved parents Colette and Tony. Only Colette appeared on I’m A Celeb alongside her grandsons, but Tony was there to meet his daughter at the bridge when she left the show.
Coleen greets her mum and two youngest sons Kit and Cass as they visited her in the jungle
Opening the doors to their £20million mansion? Coleen and Wayne could be the new Osbournes
An ‘At Home with the Rooneys’-style reality series would be quite the move for Coleen, who despite being half of one of football’s most famous couples, took a decision 15 years ago to step out of the limelight to focus on her family. Her time in the jungle has transformed her into not only a star, but a highly relatable one.
‘Coleen is the most underestimated person in showbusiness,’ said a source close to the Rooneys. ‘Despite her fame and wealth, she hasn’t forgotten her Scouse roots. She can get on with just about anyone.’
‘She was very savvy to share a little of her family life with the nation, and has definitely left them wanting more.’
One person who knows this is Stretford, the veteran football agent who masterminded Wayne’s 2004 blockbuster move from Everton to Manchester United in a deal worth £27 million.
Stretford also negotiated Coleen’s jungle contract, reported to be £1.5 million, and is described by those who know him as a ‘terrifying genius.’
He later set up Cheshire-based Triple S Communications, which also represents former England manager Gareth Southgate and defender Harry Maguire.
It’s clear the PR firm was behind the clever social media campaign while Coleen was on I’m A Celebrity, during which Wayne lobbied fans to nominate Coleen for the frequently repellent Bushtucker Trial challenges that do so much to boost contestants’ popularity.
‘Of course, the goal was to raise Coleen’s reputation and there was massive hope she would win the show,’ said an insider. ‘Social media was hugely important and there was a lot more going on behind the scenes than perhaps Coleen’s followers thought.’
Coleen’s fortitude during the revolting Bushtucker trials gained her lots of fans
‘It is all now becoming clear that at the end of this is a big television deal.’
Despite their relative reticence compared to footballing couples such as the Beckhams and the Vardys, both Wayne, who has been manager of Plymouth Argyle since May, and Coleen have made documentaries about their lives.
In 2022, the former England striker teamed up with Amazon to make Rooney, a feature-length programme about his life in sport. Coleen’s three-part series about her notorious court battle with Rebekah Vardy, called Coleen Rooney: The Real Wagatha Story, aired on Disney last year.
Both shows were deemed huge successes for their respective streaming companies. And Coleen has TV experience under her belt: she hosted her own reality show, Coleen’s Real Women, on ITV2 in 2008, but gave up her TV career to be a stay-at-home mum after she gave birth to Kai in 2010.
Other than a campaign with McDonald’s to find the UK’s most committed ‘football mum’ back in 2017, Coleen kept a low profile – until of course the Wagatha Christie case. In October 2019, she found herself making headlines after taking to social media to share her suspicions that Rebekah Vardy had been leaking stories about her to The Sun newspaper.
A very public battle followed which ended in the High Court in 2022, with Coleen claiming victory after her rival unsuccessfully sued her for libel. Vardy, not one to let things lie, has documented her rival’s time in the jungle in an uncharitable column in the Sun newspaper.
But Coleen has had the last laugh. The Rooneys are now set to join an illustrious list of families who invited cameras into their homes, following the Osbournes, the Kardashians and most recently, the Rees-Moggs.
Keeping Up With The Kardashians catapulted Kim and her four sisters to global fame when it launched on America’s E! channel in 2007. By the time the show ended in 2021, it was estimated to have made them £2 billion.
While the Rooneys might not harbour such lofty financial ambitions, they can be sure of entertaining fans by sharing their personal lives – on their own terms.
‘There has been so much said and written about the Rooneys since Wayne and Coleen were teenage sweethearts at school,’ said a friend of the pair. ‘Now it’s time for them to share their own story and it will be compulsive viewing.’
