Rob Kemps thinks his collapsed popularity is something temporary. Such a dip is part of having a very long career in showbiz, he says. “It’s a bit of a headwind.”
For a while, Rob Kemps was the celebrated man who went from left to right on stage but meanwhile shone in NPO titles such as De Slimste Mens and Chansons, but how the tide has turned… Rob suddenly started making bad TV at SBS and had a talk show in which he was asked questions by someone else. And then? He abandoned his young family.
Worried about Rob
That drama in his private life is enough, but the way in which he displays his new love happiness really upsets a lot of people. “Everything is more fun with you!”, he continuously writes with all kinds of holiday photos with his background dancer. “Everything is better now!” And then his ex just sits at home raising their children…
That affair seems to be costing Rob an incredible amount of money, because his popularity has collapsed to such an extent that an extension of his TV contract is unlikely. Wilfred Genee is concerned: “I’m a little worried about you, because your career went up like a comet and suddenly you seem to be going down like a comet again.”
Something temporary?
Rob then pretends that his collapsed popularity is something temporary. He answers in BNRs The Friday Move: “Well, look, of course it is true… If you rise very quickly, everyone likes you. Yes, then it becomes a bit quieter and then you get some headwind. I think that’s just part of it.”
All people with a long TV career have to deal with this, Rob believes. “So in that respect I wouldn’t necessarily worry about that. I think if you have a career that hopefully lasts a little longer, then you always have some peaks and valleys.”
Bad broadcast
The negativity surrounding Rob actually started over a year ago, well before that thing with that background dancer. Then it was leaked that Rob was furiously calling all kinds of editors, including those of RTL Boulevard, but also those of Today Inside. René van der Gijp in particular was pissed off about that.
Gijp wanted to broadcast a fragment of Chansons in VI, but Rob personally stopped that. “You had been very angry, first at René and then at me,” Wilfred now looks back in The Friday Move.
Framing
That’s all untrue, says Rob. “I have never been angry with you and certainly not with Gijp. But that’s the beauty of your program. That’s why I still watch it. It’s a bit like this: if you say something, it’s like that, right? You throw something up, then it becomes a riot and then you say to me: ‘Yes, what is it actually about?’”
Finally, Rob sat at the table at VI, but that didn’t go well at all. “No, it was a bad episode. But it wasn’t just me. (…) Johan Derksen thought that I… I spoke for the first twenty minutes and then I was told that I had said nothing.” But, he concludes: “I would very much like to come to your table.”