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Your support makes all the difference.So Hugh Grant has been arrested by police in Los Angeles and accused of lewd conduct with a prostitute. Of course we don't know if the police account of what he was doing is true, but if it is he won't be the first man to be caught out by the police - and he won't be the last. I should say the Los Angeles police were right to arrest them, but only if they were making a nuisance of themselves in a public place.
If they were out in the open but somewhere quite private - a park, perhaps, then I think the police should just let them be.
But it is wrong to upset people with your behaviour in public, and I would have thought a star like Hugh Grant would have plenty of money for a hotel room. On the other hand, maybe that would have spoilt it for him - sometimes gentlemen find that by the time they are in the room, the moment has passed. Also, he might not have wanted the hotel people to know what he was up to. Privacy is important to celebrities.
But sometimes the thrill is in letting people see what you are doing. Perhaps he is a exhibitionist who gets turned on only when he thinks he might be being spied on. It becomes more and more important to be in the view of other people - a very dangerous pastime. I knew a couple like that who used to give shows in my house. We all used to laugh at them, they were a lovely couple. They loved having sex in public - in parks, on buses, once, I remember, on an aircraft. They were arrested several times and eventually went to Amsterdam, where they performed in sex shows. I'm sure that if this is what Hugh Grant wants, his chosen career offers him plenty of lucrative opportunities for exhibitionism.
I don't know how the police treat prostitutes in Los Angeles. Over here they seem to be getting better - I get the impression they leave the girls alone, though kerb-crawling is a problem.
As for Hugh Grant's girlfriend, Liz Hurley, I'm afraid I feel a little cynical about their relationship. She's done very well out of him for publicity, and I don't know how genuine a relationship it is.If she is truly upset by this, then I don't know how to advise her. The problem is that if this is what men want to do, they are very hard to control. I'd say: don't let him out of your sight, Liz - but that's impossible, you can't keep a man under your eye for 24 hours a day, seven days a week. They will sneak off eventually, and you can't ever trust them, even if they say they are going shopping - I used to have a brothel in Oxford Street which was full of men who'd told their wives and girlfriends they were just out shopping.
Who knows what makes a successful, attractive man act like this? They just can't help themselves, that's my theory.
The writer is a former brothel keeper. The films 'Wish You Were Here' and 'Personal Services' were based on her life.
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