What it's like being part of the paparazzi

STAN GRANT, PRESENTER: Our next story changes the pace somewhat.

We're about to move at the slightly frenetic pace of the local paparazzi: those with the long lenses who chase those exclusive celebrity photos.

They are a competitive and often unscrupulous bunch, as you will see.

Reporter Andy Park has been tagging along to see if they draw a line with their own private lives.

ANDY PARK, REPORTER: It's 5:00am and paparazzi photographer Jonathan Marshall is scrambling to the airport to capture arguably Australia's most famous actress.

(To Jonathan Marshall) Considering all the jobs you go out to, how many of them would be pre-arranged by the celebrity or the manager themselves? What percentage?

JONATHAN MARSHALL, PAPARAZZO: There could be a period there for which 80 per cent is.

(To unidentified celebrity) Did you have an altercation with a stripper the other day?

UNIDENTIFIED CELEBRITY: No comment, buddy.

JONATHAN MARSHALL: Welcome to Sydney, mate.

(Footage of Ed Sheeran emerging from customs at airport)

ED SHEERAN, SINGER: How you doing?

UNIDENTIFIED CELEBRITY: Your behaviour is unwelcomed, uninvited and I would like it to stop.

JONATHAN MARSHALL: Celebrities need us. We need them. It's a love-hate relationship. And it's been around forever and it's going to continue forever.

ANDY PARK: Jonathan Marshall has been repeatedly accused of overstepping the bounds of privacy.

JONATHAN MARSHALL: Maybe you should be the one at the strip club.

UNIDENTIFIED CELEBRITY: I beg your pardon?

(Excerpt from Media Watch, ABC TV, 18 March 2013)

JONATHAN HOLMES, PRESENTER (2013): One thing we know: Jonathan Marshall turned up uninvited at the Barkers' home in New Zealand in February and secretly videoed them.

(Excerpt ends)

JONATHAN MARSHALL: Are celebrities complicit? Well, the greatest level of assistance is usually from your reality television C-graders whose star is fading before it's even really shone.

Good evening, guys.

ANDY PARK: So it's kind of a mistake to think that the game or the competition is between you guys and the celebrities: it's more of a competition between paparazzi?

JONATHAN MARSHALL: Yeah and it's a healthy rivalry.

That said, you've got an earpiece in this morning. So who are you talking to?

So that's Liam. He's my colleague.

ANDY PARK: Liam Mendes, Jonathan's 22-year-old wing man, has had his own share of run-ins with celebrities - and the law.

(Excerpt from A Current Affair, Channel Nine, May 2016)

TRACY GRIMSHAW, PRESENTER (2016): Well, now judgement day for Michelle Bridges after an ugly confrontation with a photographer in her local supermarket.

REPORTER (2016): Liam, what was your reaction to today's court decision?

LIAM MENDES, PAPARAZZO (2016): I was very happy.

(Excerpt ends)

LIAM MENDES: Yeah, we work a lot of the time together: pretty much most of the time. You know, two people work better than one.

(Footage of Jonathan Marshall at Sydney Airport)

JONATHAN MARSHALL: This is like a second home.

Like, I'm yet to see Nicole Kidman walk out here like a normal citizen. So yeah, you'd be very surprised if you weren't seeing cars at one of the back entrances.

I mean, one of the other scenarios is that if there's no car, then she is not actually even coming. Sometimes information can be wrong.

(A man emerges from the customs area. Liam Mendes walks to him and shakes his hand)

LIAM MENDES: Good morning, Evan. How are you?

'EVAN': Guys, if I could just ask a favour.

If you guys stand here, you'll get the shot.

LIAM MENDES: No worries.

'EVAN': Done.

(He walks off)

JONATHAN MARSHALL: So that's Kidman's long-time security guard.

LIAM MENDES: But if Nicole doesn't want to be shot at this hour of the morning, he'll make sure to get into our shot.

JONATHAN MARSHALL: The beauty about this is: we've found where the talent is going to come. We are the only photographers here. This is a good Friday morning.

ANDY PARK: Exclusive?

JONATHAN MARSHALL: Exclusive.

(Footage of Jonathan Marshall parked by the side of a rural road)

ANDY PARK: Today's wedding of Peter Stefanovic and Sylvia Jeffreys south of Sydney is a tabloid field day.

JONATHAN MARSHALL: It's clear the Stefanovics aren't interested in any photographers being any part of this wedding. But they've got a few surprises coming their way.

(Jonathan takes photographs of an approaching white Mercedes car, which drives past)

JONATHAN MARSHALL: I believe that Karl has actually developed a worrying sense of paranoia. Now, I feel sorry for the guy.

Let's go.

(He jumps into his car and follows the white car)

ANDY PARK: So do you think that you've made him paranoid?

JONATHAN MARSHALL: Probably, I've been part of that process, yeah.

(Footage of Jonathan Marshall in his car)

JONATHAN MARSHALL: So we've got Karl Stefanovic here. Probably because we're heading to, I guess, the pointy end of the wedding, they will be wanting to make sure that there's no paps around.

Look, I don't try and defend what I do, because you are probably going to lose it in a really academic argument. But you ask me: do I feel at all responsible for, maybe, a sense of anxiety and paranoia that he's suffering? I'd be lying if I said that I'm probably not.

He is in a job that at any time he can check out from. He has decided to stay in that job; and in that job, with a marriage break-up, there's going to be interest - in the same way that his own show covers the break-ups of other celebrities; for example, Brad and Angelina.

ANDY PARK: So you're saying, as a paparazzo, that you believe in a right to privacy?

JONATHAN MARSHALL: Yeah, sure. I mean, if you didn't have a right to privacy, what would you have?

(Footage of Tess Woolcock and Jonathan Marshall leaving the Royal Hospital for Women, Randwick. Jonathan is carrying their daughter)

ANDY PARK (voiceover): Jonathan's wife Tessa has just given birth to their first daughter. He has invited us to come and film the homecoming. He's asked his paparazzi colleague to come along, too.

(They arrive home)

JONATHAN MARSHALL: She slept the whole way.

TESS WOOLCOCK: She did!

ANDY PARK: How did you feel being photographed coming out of the hospital?

TESS WOOLCOCK: Oh, I wasn't excited about that and I don't want those photos to go anywhere. (Laughs) I've just given birth to a baby and I felt like a whale!

(To Jonathan) She doesn't look very happy.

JONATHAN MARSHALL: Well, would you be?

(To Andy Park) Well, it's a cut-throat business. We're all trying to provide for ourselves and our families and there's only so many photos to go around. There's only so many dollars to be spent. You know, relations come, relationships go. I'm yet to meet a paparazzo in Australia who still lives in that family unit.

ANDY PARK: Tessa says she gets mixed reactions when she tells people what her husband does for a living.

TESS WOOLCOCK: Why would you want to annoy and interfere with other people's lives?

ANDY PARK: So why does he?

TESS WOOLCOCK: It's his choice. It's his career. He enjoys it. And I would argue he's not really, um, interfering - well, you know, he is interfering to a point.

But you know, these are people that are in the public profile. You know, they're celebrities. They know, going into the industry they're going into, that this comes with the territory.

JONATHAN MARSHALL: This is just about making money. Really, if we're honest.

ANDY PARK: But it's not just about making money, because you expressed this idea that you feel empathy for the person that you are following?

JONATHAN MARSHALL: Oh, but yeah, but - why do you do this job? You don't do this job to have empathy. You do this job to make money.

(Footage at Sydney Airport)

ANDY PARK (to Liam Mendes): Do you worry that, with his new baby, that perhaps he might fade away from the game?

LIAM MENDES: Not at all, no. I don't think it's going to change anything. He's been like this since he was very young. He started off as a pap when he was, like, 16 years old. Here-

JONATHAN MARSHALL: Go, go, go.

ANDY PARK: And on cue, the pair get their pay day. The next 20 seconds earns them $8,000.

(Footage of Nicole Kidman, Keith Urban and their children emerging from customs)

JONATHAN MARSHALL: Good morning, Nicole. How are you, Keith? Welcome back.

(To Andy Park) I make money and I take photos and occasionally I annoy people. There's a juncture there with paparazzi photography that some of your intrusions or some of your activities are unwelcome.

UNIDENTIFIED MAN IN CAR: See you later.

JONATHAN MARSHALL: Thanks, bro.