Danielle Marr - Sunday Independent Life

Sunday Independent

18 NOVEMBER 2012

LIFE

DR BOTOX WILL SEE YOU NOW DANIELLE MEAGHER ON SINGLE MOTHERHOOD AND WHY IRISH MEN DRINK TOO MUCH

SKIN DOCTOR

DRBOTOXAND THEHOUSEWIVES

Between court cases and high-profile feuding with her ‘Dublin Housewives’ co-stars, Danielle Meagher — dentist, TV star, single mum and anti-ageing guru — is rarely out of the papers these days. Barry Egan meets the woman behind the face and finds her every bit as feisty as her famous great-grand-uncle Michael Collins. Photography by Agata Stoinska.

Styling by Liadan Hynes

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ere are a few things I know next to nothing about: what women want, money, GAA, black holes, chess, feng shui, cooking, Mumford & Sons, business, John Updike, hair products, Downton Abbey, and, last but not least, reality TV. I am, therefore, possibly not the best critic to determine the authenticity or otherwise of TV3’s popular Dublin Housewives. Last week, meeting Ms Danielle Meagher, one of the stars of the show, it wasn’t long before the thorny topic of authenticity reared its yellow-y over-fake-tanned head, however.

Danielle had said that she thinks Virginia Macari, her co-star on Dublin Housewives, was “fake”. This comment, caustic in its cattiness, will not unduly surprise many of you. Anyone who watched the first series will point out that Danielle and Virginia clearly did not get on like a row of Foxrock houses on fire.

I am not here to defend Virginia Macari, but I know her well — she is one cool lady and mother — and I have no hesitation in saying that I think Danielle is not only wrong about her but she is being ridiculous.

Danielle raises forensically plucked eyebrows. “She could air-kiss for Ireland and Italy,” she says, unfairly, of Virginia.

“There’s no substance to her,” she says rather ridiculously. “What does she actually do except for attend the opening of every envelope?” Danielle asks, getting worse. “I know currently she is back designing and I’m sure her lingerie will be a huge success — and, no doubt, any store that stocks her range will be complaining they are running low on stock and saying, no doubt, ‘Virginia’s knickers are flying out the door.’”

I ask Danielle if she thinks co-stars Jo Jordan and Lisa Murphy are fake, too. “Jo is as real life and raw as you get. She is funny and a total grafter. Lisa is sweet,” Danielle says. “There is no bad in her. Maybe the accent is a bit ridiculous.” Roz Flanagan doesn’t seem to have bothered her either.

And what makes you so un-fake, Danielle?

“I’m not fake,” she says. “You will always

know exactly where you stand with me. I’m very black and white. Can I take this opportunity to say that I have no interest in attending the opening of anything in this town? It’s always the same idiots air-kissing each other. And, let’s be honest, these people are going nowhere fast in life. All they want to do is booze, Wednesday to Sunday. I’d rather be with good friends and family having a good dinner somewhere nice.”

I point out that the last time I saw her was after the Lady Gaga concert, at 2am in 37 Dawson Street with an unnamed man.

She gets a bit miffed. “It was only my second time out this year,” she says defensively, “and we walked through and out the back of 37 and into a taxi and it was 1.30am. Obviously, I can do what I want on a Saturday night, but I have zero interest in being in a pub packed full of drunks.

“By the way,” she adds. “I didn’t like your suggestion that you always see me out. You never see me out because I don’t go out. I wouldn’t have any interest in the Dublin social scene and, more importantly, I wouldn’t want to be associated with it.”

How do you think you came across on Dublin Housewives? “I don’t know. Just honest and true to myself. Am I bothered, like? Like it or lump it, that’s me. I was just very honest and true and I wasn’t fake like some of the others. They were all fake to a point, whereas I am very real.

“Virginia is the main one I’m talking about,” Danielle continues. “She is funny. It’s like if you are in a room and there’s a bluebottle in the room and it’s bashing against the window. It’s really annoying when you’re in the room, but the rest of the time you don’t think about it.

“I’d imagine that they don’t like me very much,” she says of her co-stars.

It has been a difficult couple of months for the obviously bright and self-proclaimed Dr Botox. On October 25, she was directed by Judge Matthew Deery in Dublin Circuit Court to pay one of her Botox patients €7,500 damages for a breach of confidence.

I ask her, jokingly, if she has ever spent €7,500 on clothes for herself. “I shop in Penneys and Dunnes,” she smarts. “And €7,500 is a lot of money for a small business.”

12 | LIFE | Sunday Independent | 18 November 2012

A few days after the Circuit Court judgement, it emerged in the media that Danielle was suing Cosmedico Clinic in Dublin for alleged medical negligence. The clinic vehemently disputes her claims, saying that it is not directly responsible for the work and that the surgeon involved has his own indemnity and is an independent contractor.

Cosmedico says it will defend the case and that it has full confidence in the surgeon involved. “I had a botched liposuction on my thighs in January 2011,” Danielle claims, “and I haven’t had the confidence to wear short skirts ever since.”

Then one night last month, at midnight on St Stephen’s Green, she was knocked down and badly injured. “I woke up in a pool of my own blood. I had over 27 stitches in my face. It was hell,” she says.

“Between being knocked down and court cases, it feels like I’ve been ringside at the circus the past few weeks, but I’m a glass-half-full person and these tests only serve to make us stronger,” Danielle says. “I feel even more focused and driven towards my dreams and aspirations than ever before.

I am unemotional at court cases. It’s stiff upper lip and purely business.”

It would certainly seem so anyway.

Danielle talks about her big new agent in London — Curtis Brown Talent & Literary Agency signed her at the end of the summer — and about how she is signed to the presenters’ department “alongside Clive Anderson, Made In Chelsea’s Ollie Locke, movie star Steve Martin and Strictly Come Dancing star Artem Chigvintsev”

‘Virginia could air-kiss for Ireland and Italy.

What does she actually do except for attend the opening of every envelope?’

Danielle also drops names like most people drop keys on the hall table when they get home. She talks about hanging out after the Olympics at George Michael’s house in London with Noel and Liam Gallagher and the Spice Girls. Dr Dani is not stuck for self-confidence. She says her high-octane performances on Dublin Housewives on TV3 — the second series of which is airing in early December — means she is now, to use her own term, “TV gold”.

I ask for some examples of when she was “gold” on TV. “Obviously I have done more serious expert presenting but Dublin Housewives, soon to be rebranded Dublin Wives for season two, was a great vehicle to showcase my personality. I genuinely couldn’t care less what people think of me as I am 110 per cent comfortable in my own skin and in my own life, so I just did and said whatever I felt was honest,” Danielle replies.

“I think in season one the best lines were references to the VIP style awards but I hear MOD,” she says, referring to VIP magazine publisher Michael O’Doherty, “is already planning on making me guest of honour next year.

“Also in season two,” Danielle continues, “I knew I had gotten away with the tongue-and-cheek boldness, so there are some real humdinger one-liners. I thought the rest of the cast were boring and none of them except Jo Jordan had any quick wit. I remember meeting Jo Jordan for the first time, and, by gosh, she is funny. She makes me laugh. Virginia had one one-liner — ‘she has more issues than Vogue’ — which was clearly much practiced and clearly plagiarised. So, yawn, totally boring.”

You have to admit that Danielle Meagher is feisty, witty, cocky, a bit mad, a bit lovely, a bit full of herself. She tries way too hard, but is essentially pretty likeable with it and I put her bitchiness down to basic insecurity about her looks. The middle-aged English couple sitting next to us in the Dylan Hotel must be wondering who is this pint-sized woman with the strong opinions about everything — most of all about herself — waving her well-manicured hands around.

The waiter comes with the wrong order