For SQ, who posted a link to the following snippet:

Robbie Williams' Gym Encounter With Eminem

British pop star Robbie Williams became friends with Eminem after a chance meeting in a Los Angeles gym. The Rock DJ singer couldn't believe his eyes when he saw Eminem walk into the exercise room and was amazed when the 8 Mile star was equally interested in him.

Williams recalls, "I saw Eminem at the gym once. It was in LA and I saw a load of bodyguards come in first and thought 'aye, aye, who's this then?' And it was Eminem.

"He walks past and I say to my bodyguard 'hey, look, Eminem's in' and I turned around and he was saying 'look it's Robbie Williams' and we both said 'Wassup?' He sent me his single once Without Me. I suppose when I write one I like, I'll send him one of mine."

[November 29, 2004 - WENN]

They don't talk while they're working out but they eye each other off with guarded approval of their respective routines, Em at the punching bag and Robbie working weights. Afterwards they slap sweaty hands, crack a few jokes, all the while circled by Em's corp of bodyguards and Robbie's retinue. Next time he's in the UK, Robbie says as he's walking out, Em should take some time, check out Robbie's gym. Em agrees without thinking too much about it - "yeah, man, I'll look you up" - and it's only later, remembering or maybe just imagining the gleam in Robbie's eye that he starts feeling maybe he's let himself in for more than he bargained for.

If you're in the industry a while, you start to hear things, and though he's never heard Robbie's old boyband he can imagine just exactly how it must have been, all that faggy dancing and shit. Besides which everyone knows the British are weird: toad in the hole this and catching the tube that; so for all he knows visiting the gym is some kind of secret code and he's just agreed to give the guy a fucking lapdance.

But he doesn't run into Robbie again, and the incident almost completely slips his mind; that is, until the next time he's in London and the call comes through. Robbie, laughing: "didn't think I'd actually remember, did you?" Irritatingly cocky but when he names the time and place Em says ok.

Right up until Robbie walks in Em gets that feeling, that pit-of-the-stomach wanna-throw-up-or-fly feeling he still sometimes get before walking on stage, but turns out that 'visiting the gym' isn't code for anything but 'visiting the gym', and as Robbie shows off with faint pride his latest purchase (according to the sticker, a Bodycraft Fitness Liberator Multi-station, though to Em it looks like another fucking bench press) Em says with a slightly embarrassed 'haha' -

"You know, at first, when you were all 'man, you have to visit my gym', dude, for a moment there I was like-" He breaks off, aware suddenly of Robbie's hand on his shoulder, of Robbie's teeth whiter than sunlight and eyes devilish even as he asks with elaborate innocence, "for a moment there you were what?" And when Robbie is pushing him back against the mirror, pulling at the drawstring of his sweats, mumbling "you were saying?" against the side of his neck, it's all Em can do to mutter, "nothing, nothing, oh."

By Ro, November 2004

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