Celebrity Race Across the World‘s Harleymoon has spoken to Yahoo UK about the “nepo baby” label that she and her brother Roman Kemp have faced as they star in the BBC show.
Sitting down with Yahoo UK, singer-songwriter Harleymoon discussed everything from nearly having a different partner on Celebrity Race Across the World to her changed relationship with her brother and helping him with his anxiety.
The siblings may have famous parents — Martin Kemp of Spandau Ballet and Shirlie of Wham! and Pepsi & Shirlie — but they have remained grounded in their approach to life and to the race too.
As the nepo baby label comes up on the race, the 36-year-old told Yahoo U.K.: “Well, I feel like Roman’s already been doing his career for a long time, but I don’t ever feel like we have to step out of a shadow. We’re always a really close family, and we just love each other, and we’ve always been passionate about doing our creative passions, really, but I think we are just being ourselves on the show.
Martin Kemp, Harleymoon Kemp, Shirlie Kemp and Roman Kemp are a close family. (Getty)
“We didn’t have that conversation for TV. We just really genuinely were being ourselves the whole way through it. It’s always been an ongoing conversation since we were kids. People always want to shove nepo baby on you, but there’s nothing I can say.
“Me and Roman, we know that our parents have raised us to be really hardworking. Our parents have come from really humble beginnings. We’re not snobs. They’ve told us to work really hard and be really kind to people, and that’s our truth, so. That’s all we can do.”
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Dylan Llewellyn and his mum Jackie don’t take Celebrity Race Across the World too seriously. (BBC/Studio Lambert)
Shirlie Kemp wouldn’t have lasted a day on Celebrity Race
But Harleymoon almost had a different partner on Celebrity Race Across the World. Her mum, Shirlie, was planning to do the first series, but she dropped out.
Relieved, the singer told Yahoo UK that she thinks her mum would have ruled herself out after the first day of the race.
She said: “My mum would not have lasted until the end of the day. Knowing how stressful that was. It’s so tough. That’s the thing, what I feel like is the adrenaline of being in a race and being dropped in a country where you don’t know where to go.
Shirlie Holliman almost did Celebrity Race Across the World with Harleymoon Kemp. (Getty)
“It’s just so much, and I think you’ve really got to be tough and you’ve really got to be confident, pushing yourself and have the adrenaline and energy to want to keep doing it every day.
“I’m so glad that my mum didn’t do it because she would have hated the stress and she would have been out in a day.”
Inside siblings Harleymoon and Roman’s relationship
Doing the race with her brother brought them closer together. Although they have a close family unit, Harleymoon said they wouldn’t go to the pub together as siblings. In fact, their famous parents worried that they wouldn’t be speaking to each other when they got home from Race.
She said: “It’s hugely given us [me and Roman] a breakthrough, to be honest. Because, like I say, like brothers and sisters don’t always have the same personality. Even though you grew up in the same house, you can be very different people.
Harleymoon and Roman Kemp got to know each other as adults on Celebrity Race Across the World. (BBC/Studio Lambert)
“And as Roman’s very busy working all the time, we didn’t spend that much time together. We saw each other at my mum and dad’s house as a family all the time, but we hadn’t been to dinner or, like I said, been to the pub together, that I can remember.
“So it really could have gone either way. It was just an amazing opportunity to get to know each other again as adults, which is fundamentally what I wanted to do the race for.
“Beyond just it being about hanging out because we come back to our lives and we go back to being busy, I think it’s having that emotional understanding of each other.”
Harleymoon and Roman Kemp helped each other on Celebrity Race Across the World. (BBC/Studio Lambert)
The pressure cooker of the race put the siblings in survival mode.
She added, “When you’re in that environment. That’s so high pressure; it’s boiling hot, you’ve got your backpack, you could easily have wound each other up, but you’re in survival mode, being completely lost.
“You don’t know where you’re going, and you really have to look after each other, and I think it is like serious, serious team bonding. You get to know what’s gonna wind each other up. How can we look after each other? How can we be kind to each other? Doing that for six weeks is unbelievable.”
Helping Roman Kemp’s anxiety
Roman and Harleymoon Kemp threw themselves into Celebrity Race Across the World. (BBC/Studio Lambert)
Roman decided to come off his antidepressants medication for race, and his sister, Harleymoon, stepped up to be a huge support to him.
“You’re in survival mode already, so you need to look out for each other,” she said. “You are all each other has got.”
She added, “I know there’s a camera crew in there, but you really don’t notice them, and you have to keep each other positive to get through that because it was really, really tough. And I mean, even people that don’t travel that much or get worried over anything. That is a big stressful show to do.
“It’s all a combination of heat, backpack, travel, exhaustion. You don’t know where you’re sleeping. You don’t know if you can afford anything like that is enough to give any regular human anxiety. So I think he did really well, and yeah, from my side, I just knew that we had to be a team.
Harleymoon and Roman Kemp got stuck into working on Celebrity Race Across the World. (BBC/Studio Lambert)
“We just really had to stay positive, keep it light, and I knew he was going to worry either way. It’s the truth.”
It goes both ways, as Roman was also able to help his sister in the race. Roman was checking that Harleymoon had her passport every hour, but there were times she admitted to leaving her bag on the side.
She said: “Roman is just so kind, and he was so loving to me, and he was so organised as we get more and more into the show, he really helped me when I was running out of steam. It was just so special to get that time, and you can’t put a price on spending that much time together. I don’t know when else in our lives we would be able to get through that.”
The siblings didn’t let anything faze them, even when they were “bloody starving”.
Safety on Race Across the World
Harleymoon and Roman Kemp supported each other on Celebrity Race Across the World. (BBC/Studio Lambert)
On the second leg, the rules of the race changed as contestants were no longer able to travel at night. It’s the first time this has ever been implemented during a Race Across the World series.
Harleymoon spoke about the rule change and her feelings regarding her safety on the race.
She said: “You are in some countries that have just opened the borders to tourists, so as much as you know, you’re protected with the security team. It’s a very different environment to what we live in the UK, and I think I’m glad they put the night ban on to protect us, to look after us, because you’re traveling from Mexico to Colombia, nighttime is dangerous.
“That’s the bottom line, as you’re traveling through certain towns, you’re quite keen to quickly get out of them, is all I’d say.”
She added, “But I think in terms of the flip side of a race, it was so frustrating because there were points where you just feel so close to the next connection or the next border, and when you find out, ‘Oh no, your connection or the border crossing needs to be done before dark’. And you get there and you know that you’re not going to make it across the border before dark, is heartbreaking because you’re so close.
“We had a few of those moments where we were like: It’s still light! I can still see my hands. We were really, really frustrated, but after seeing some of the towns we went through, I thought, yeah, I’m glad that they’ve kept us safe.”
Celebrity Race Across the World is streaming on BBC iPlayer.