Read Russell Brand’s moving tribute to Jade

Posted by heatworld on Friday 27 Mar 2009

Filed under: Jade Goody, Russell Brand

Since her tragic death last weekend, thousands of people have had their say about Jade Goody. But someone we’re surprised to hear piping up is Russell Brand. Showing an often hidden serious side, the comedian has written a long, moving blog entry on his feelings about Jade’s death. “When my Mum first got cancer I must’ve been around the age Jade’s eldest son is now,” he begins. “Too young, in fact, to properly comprehend what was happening, only old enough to sense the tingling presence of fear, the averted looks, the stifled, thin lipped sympathy and muddled, neighbourly compassion. My Mum, Thank God, did not die and whilst her cancer returned several times; each time more frightening for me as my innocence waned to be replaced with dread, she lives still, so I can but imagine the sad confusion of the two bereaved boys.” Russell goes on to say that he knew Jade personally through his involvement with Big Brother (and, as you can see from our picture, she once appeared on his own TV show). “Jade’s defining characteristic was her easy warmth that ingenuously enveloped folk, so perhaps like many people I felt more engaged by her than normal and feel more saddened by her death than I ought,” he says. “She was a right laugh, she joined in with everyone and created a garrulous giddy vibe in bars and cars that elevated the perfunctory time between shows into something which retrospectively seems more special now than it did then. Most of all, though, I was impressed with how she formed an immediate and genuinely sweet bond with my Mother, chuckling and chatting with the effortless intimacy that strong yet tender women frequently conjure and which has umbrellad me from anxiety throughout my life.” If you want to read Russell’s blog entry in full (it’s long!), then click here. We don’t know about you, but we’re impressed and moved by this deeper side of him and, of all the articles we’ve read about Jade over the past few months – and that’s a lot – Russell’s is by far the most interesting, offering a rare insight into both Jade Goody and Russell himself.