I was banned from an apprenticeship because of my shame over alcohol – now I’m making £1million a year

A former Apprentice contestant who was banned from the show for drinking too much is now “living his dream” after recently hitting £1million in sales.

Reece Donnelly, 26, the founder of theatre School of Scotland and Theater College of Scotland, landed his first professional acting role at the age of seven and later worked on programs such as Waterloo Road.

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However The Scottish entrepreneur has been banned from the Boardroom show after being so drunk that it was considered unsafe for him to attend.

A source told us, “Nothing like this has ever happened to the apprentice.”

“It’s the first time someone has been shown the door in competition by someone other than Lord Sugar.”

And months after the mid-air drama reality The flop refuses to acknowledge the incident and says he left the bat at the line he left for Health Reasons.

Growing up in a working-class area of ​​Glasgow, Reece never thought he would be successful Business Owners early 20s with a turnover of £1million students work on projects like Grandpa’s Great Escape, The responderMatilda, Harry Styles’ Music Video Adore You and other starring roles for the BBCCBBC and Netflix.

Earlier this year, when an opportunity arose for Reece to join The Apprentice to showcase his company and “fly the flag of Scotland,” he jumped at it.

Despite being banned from The Apprentice, he has continued to focus on his passion for the performing arts, where he teaches and inspires them next Generation he started a podcast and said he’s living (his) dream.

He has plans to open the company as a franchise with headquarters in the North, South and Ireland and as a personal goal he would do so Love to commission his own BBC or CBBC show encourage Children “go out and get it”.

“Life is a movie and you are the lead – that’s the only way I can describe my journey,” he said.

“I’m living my dream… but I’m all about the motivation and I firmly believe someone up there just sent me a gold nugget to open this school.

“I’m the most grateful person in the world. I’m obsessed with school, and I’m obsessed with it because it gave me a life I never thought I would ever have.”

Reece had humble beginnings in Glasgow but said he would never let his working-class background hold him back.

He was observed as a “cheeky, self-confident young person”. Primary school and landed his first acting role at the age of seven in CBeebies’ Carrie and David’s Popshop! before later joining the cast of Waterloo Road, where he worked professionally for two years.

After earning a BA (Hons) in Acting from the university Hailing from Sunderland, he combined his passion for acting, teaching and business and founded the Theater School of Scotland in 2017 – and ‘the beast was born’.

From then on, he said, “he just grew arms and legs” — but his success didn’t come without hard work.

“I really believe that my motivation comes from wanting to improve my skills Future life and that of my family Future Live and make performing arts accessible to everyone,” explained Reece.

“I’ve worked hard to get what I have, but I thought, ‘Here’s an opportunity and I can either take it or scale it down.'”

After seeing the school “grow and grow and grow” and set up a scholarship scheme, he decided to invest £250,000 in the construction of a brand new main building in central Glasgow, which he, along with two other centres, is “completely obsessed with”. , which are now open Edinburgh and Greenock.

He also founded the Theater College of Scotland which was recognized by the Scottish Qualifications Authority By the time he was 24, he was the youngest college owner in the area United Kingdom.

Reece now has around 700 students across the school and college and most recently generated sales of £1million. Reece has witnessed high school students land dream roles in a number of areas TV shows and moviesand he plans to franchise the company and open a headquarters in England. Wales and Ireland in the future.

“In the beginning I had a lot of imposter syndrome and thought, ‘Is this all going to end?’ Am I the right person for this? Work?’,” he said.

“But I think the mental strength comes from really understanding that you worked hard to be here, that you should be here and that you were in the right place at the right time.”

Reece was asked to be a contestant on BBC show The Apprentice earlier this year and he said he jumped at the opportunity immediately as it “caused his worlds as an actor and a business owner to collide”.

“I didn’t have to learn any lines, I just showed up, chatted, enjoyed my life, took a deep dive with the assignments, and I’ll never forget it.” (Baroness Brady) said, “You’re fine.” he said.

“Because of my background, I felt like I should never have ended up on TV, so as a little guy from Glasgow I just took it easy and just enjoyed it.”

“But it was a very strategic business decision as I thought, let’s go ahead and show the rest of the UK my business, in front of millions of viewers every Thursday night, and if Lord Sugar wants to give me a quarter of a million pounds, he can me.” give a quarter of a million pounds.”

Though it was “brutal” and he and the other contestants had to look like “a bunch of jerks” at times for entertainment reasons, he said he was extremely grateful for the opportunity and enjoyed his time on the show — until he had to leave and saw how the “melodrama” unfolded afterwards.

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