I am Andrew Tate: Channel 4 documentary reveals rise of notorious influencer from humble beginnings on rough Luton estate to ‘toxic’ social media stardom

His name is known all around the world for his controversial misogynistic rants and toxic male ego. 

But despite becoming, he claims, the ‘most Googled man on the planet’, not much is really known about the private life of self styled ‘Top G’ Andrew Tate.

Well now a Channel 4 documentary, called I am Andrew Tate, has sought to address just that as it looks to draw back the curtain on the 36-year-old ex-kickboxer and porn entrepreneur.

Airing this Sunday at 9pm, the hour-long special will delve into Tate’s humble beginnings on a rough Luton estate to his meteoric rise to stardom and his apparent downfall following his arrest in 2022. 

Film producers were given ‘full access’ into Tate’s home and they promise to provide extensive footage and interviews with figures from his personal life to unravel the mystery behind the man dubbed the ‘king of toxic masculinity’. 

Dan Reed, who also worked on the 2019 Michael Jackson documentary Leaving Neverland, is an executive producer on the film, which is also being directed by Maggie Gaudin. 

Reed said ahead of the documentary’s anticipated release: ‘How Andrew Tate became the most viral influencer on the planet, and what forces and experiences shaped Tate the man (as opposed to the controversy-seeking media icon) is what we’re trying to find out. 

‘This sits at the sweet spot between a tabloid subject and an in-depth, highly-wrought documentary where Amos Pictures is at its strongest in its partnership with Channel 4 – think The Paedophile Hunter (2014) and Leaving Neverland (2019). 

‘Tate has given us full access and we’re looking forward to carrying on filming if he gets out of jail in the coming weeks.’

Anna Miralis, Commissioning Editor added: ‘There are so many questions that surround Andrew Tate, not least how he amassed infamy and fortune in a relatively short period of time, and why it is his anti-feminist agenda resonates so powerfully with his followers. 

‘With incredible access, Dan Reed and Maggie Gaudin are poised to unpick this fascinating and fast-evolving story.’

Tate was born in Chicago but grew up on the infamous Marsh farm estate in Luton with younger brother Tristan and sister Janine after his mother Eileen moved there when he was just 11. 

Eileen divorced their father Emory Tate Jnr in 1997 and still lives in Luton in a 1970’s end of terrace house. 

Tate – whose full name, after his father, is Emory Andrew Tate III – was soon showing the money-making tendencies that have recently seen him come to mainstream attention.

One relative said: ‘I remember when he was 14 he was earning money working at his uncle’s fish business and he had bought himself his first mobile phone. It wasn’t much but he loved it.

‘Then one day these three guys from the Marsh Farm estate jumped him for it. These were not lads to be messed with but Andrew took care of all three of them quite easily.

‘At that stage he hadn’t done any kickboxing, he just had a punchbag set up in the back garden.

‘He was always very sure of himself. He didn’t ever want to be in a gang. He’s an individual and certainly not someone to start a fight, he’d stop fights not start them.’

After leaving school he went into sales where he earned commission on windows and solar panels, bought himself a motorbike and began training as a kickboxer at Luton’s Storm Gym.

He excelled and went on to become a world champion in the sport but it is his post kick-boxing role as an influencer on social media that has proved highly controversial. 

Tate first entered the limelight when he appeared on Big Brother in 2016, but was removed from the programme after a video surfaced online which appeared to show him attacking a woman with a belt – a clip he claimed had been edited.

Since then, he has gained further notoriety for a string of comments about women, including suggesting that they ‘bear some responsibility’ if they are assaulted – an incident which led to him being banned from X, formerly Twitter.

In one video, Tate advised men accused of cheating by their girlfriends to ‘bang out the machete, boom in her face and grip her by the neck. Shut up b***h.’ 

Tate has also garnered a dubious reputation over his various business activities. He operated a website called ‘Hustler’s University’ in which members pay a monthly fee in order to receive instructions on dropshipping and cryptocurrency.

Tate’s followers earned commission for signing up new members, leading critics to label it a ‘pyramid scheme’. 

Together with his brother Tristan, 35, he allegedly set up a webcam business in Romania in which young models told sob stories to unsuspecting male viewers.

Despite telling the Sunday Mirror that the site was ‘a total scam’, Tate claims to have made millions from it. 

But it is his outspoken videos, popular with many young men, for which Tate is chiefly known, with clips of him on Instagram and TikTok having racked up billions of views during the height of his fame.

Tate previously said the ‘attacks’ on him were ‘disguised under the virtue of caring about women.’

He said: ‘None of these people attacking me care about women, none of them donate to women’s charities, none of them donate to charity like I do, none of them help anyone like I do.’

Tate said that he has a ‘unique point of view’ and that he welcomes people to challenge it, and that he has ‘no problem with being disliked’.

However, he said, he ‘does have a problem’ with people taking clips of his videos and reporting them ‘out of context’ and ‘removing the tonality’, and with people ‘accusing him of illegality.’

He claimed he became the ‘most googled man on the planet’ and that he was a ‘victim of his own success’ because it led people to want to find ‘any little clip’ that they could ‘blow up’ to be ‘as controversial as possible’ – because ‘they want the views for themselves’.

YouTube permanently banned Tate for breaching its rules on hate speech. The website said channels associated with Tate had been removed for breaching its terms of service, following similar moves by Facebook, Instagram and TikTok.

MailOnline previously disclosed Tate’s upbringing in the UK and how he split his extended family between those who regard his self-promotion as harmless – and those who think it’s sickening.

In August Tate’s mother, Eileen Tate, still lived in the same end-of-terrace house worth £275,000. Last year she suffered a heart attack in her home and was in hospital on December 21.

A family friend previously said Eileen is ‘proud of Andrew and Tristan’ but likely has her disagreements over their divisive views shared online.

‘Eileen loves her boys. Most probably she doesn’t like what’s going on. What they’ve been accused of is very serious. I don’t think she is happy with what Andrew says, the misogyny.

‘She says he says these things for the response he gets — for the number of hits on the internet. He’s always going on about fast cars and what a man should be, but Eileen didn’t raise him like that. If you say anything to her about it, she’ll say, “That’s my boys.”‘

However, Tate has no relationship with younger sister Janine who is a lawyer in Kentucky, US. He said: ‘I have a sister. My sister and I don’t really talk.’ 

Andrew and Tristan have described her as a ‘feminist’ which is thought to be an admission that she disapproves of his views.

After his fighting career and failed Big Brother bid it might have appeared Tate would disappear into total obscurity but soon his controversial libertarian ideas spouted on social media were attracting admiration from the likes of Donald Trump Jnr, Nigel Farage and fellow Lutonian Tommy Robinson.

As his internet fame grew he left Britain with his brother Tristan to set up in Romania where he continued to build an online audience. He is now said to have bought three casinos in the capital Bucharest.

Tate himself appears keen to move on from his time in Luton. One relative said: ‘He comes to the country quite often but they come in by private jet, buy some cars and go. We don’t see much of him.’

And another uncle admitted it was four years since he saw him: ‘We’ve not seen him for some time. When he does come he is not arrogant or anything like that. We’ll go out for a meal, he’ll buy the drinks, pay the taxis home and treat us all very well.’

The Tate brothers were later arrested on December 29, 2022 along with two women. All are suspected of human trafficking and forming an organised crime group, while one is suspected of rape.

DIICOT, the Romanian anti-organised crime agency, accused them of having recruited women through the ‘loverboy’ method and forcing them to create explicit content on websites like OnlyFans for their financial benefit.

They are alleged to have lured women to their £600,000 villa on the outskirts of Bucharest and several were then reportedly forced to perform in sexually explicit videos which were sold online. 

Investigators have identified seven potential victims in the case.

Romanian officials also seized 29 assets belonging to the brothers, including 15 cars and 10 properties, as well as watches and sums of money, totalling almost $4 million.

They were officially charged on June 20 on charges of rape, human trafficking, and forming an organised crime group to sexually exploit women after spending several months in prison and moving to house arrest on March 31. 

They were freed from this in August but are now forbidden from leaving Romania. 

Tate has insisted he has ‘done nothing wrong’ and has dismissed the allegations against, saying Romanian authorities have ‘no substantial evidence’ against him.

Speaking outside his home in Bucharest, Romania, last August, Tate told reporters he would be ‘absolutely exonerated’ over the charges brought against him and his younger brother. 

Last month a court rejected Andrew’s bid to have his seized assets worth £10 million including 15 luxury cars, watches and properties returned to him after they were seized by police. 

I Am Andrew Tate airs on Channel 4 at 9pm on Sunday January 7.