Friday, July 07, 2006

Extract from Radio Times article on Big Brother

See HERE for more

It's day 50: we're around halfway through Big Brother 7. I'm still watching the show every single day, but at the moment it makes me feel rather low. This series feels much darker than previous ones. It's a bit less Love Island and a lot more Stanford Prison Experiment; although alarmingly, unlike that infamous 70s exploration into disorientation and paranoia, there doesn't seem to be anyone around to pull the plug.

I had a feeling of disquiet about BB7 from day 1 when Big Brother confiscated the housemates' suitcases, made Shahbaz and Lisa leaders, then broadcast their first diary-room visits to the entire house. Paranoia and bullying took grip almost immediately. After six days, Dawn had deteriorated from a proud, intelligent woman to a subdued, hollow-eyed shell.

Deprived of fresh clothes and deodorant and castigated by the others for BO, Dawn asked to leave many times. Eventually she was chucked out and nationally branded as "a cheat". Last thing I heard, she was on hunger strike, but by this point I was too caught up in Shahbazgate and the Lord-of-the-Flies hounding of Sam.

But what right do I have to moan? I still watch every day. I watched every day last week when visibly unhinged Lea sat in the diary room sobbing her heart out and muttering stuff like, "I can't see the point, there's no point…no-one is my friend, I have no friends."

However, the live eviction on Wednesday night crossed a new line for me. Love or hate Ash, I don't believe she was in any fit mental state to go back into the house from the diary room at 10pm. "I don't want to go in there," she said quite plainly through hysterical sobbing.

Unfortunately, this didn't fit in with the live TV schedule and Davina's links so Ash was ordered in. I think Davina's face said it all when the camera panned back to her to tie up the show: guilty discomfort.

She's quite a hard little piece is Ash, so within about three hours of being back in the dragon's den she was sort of OK-ish. We all saw her smile when the soft-voiced, nice-sounding producer cracked a joke. But, in my book, the whole thing was a mistake.

I'd like to see some laughter and friendship in the house now. Not this odious bullfrog masquerading as a woman, Jayne Kitt, who stirs things up at every opportunity. Jayne is infuriatingly vile. Gobby, belligerent and divisive.

She's one of those people who just mouths off all day long, spouting utter rubbish and making weak, bawdy jokes, which you're compelled through politeness to fake-laugh at. People like Jayne are the reason you should never ever book a last-minute dirt-cheap holiday to the Dominican Republic thinking: "Hey, how bad can it be?!"

Rest assured, someone equi-hideous to Jayne will be in your all-inclusive complex, getting her hair braided, telling loud, pointless stories about Bluewater and wetting herself during limbo night.

I'm sorry, Jayne, you're probably quite nice, you just remind me of a woman I once worked with so that's you judged, by me, who's so bloody perfect. That's what Big Brother does to us. It's like Grace Adams-Short who had the vast misfortune to remind me exactly of a girl called Alice who I went to Carlisle 22nd pack Brownies with in 1980 who was made sixer in Gnomes when I wanted the job. It still stings.

Jennie is still being lovely, but lovely like the very junior girls that work in my hairdressers are lovely. They twitter on for half an hour while washing my head, then when I come to pay I can't even tell which one to tip as they all look, sound and dress exactly the same to an old crone like me. Plus, I talked to all of them about how excited they were about going to Faliraki. (That's me going to end up with an eyebrow like Glyn next time I go.)

Michael is probably too clever to be in there. He's trying to second-guess what we all think; thus, Susie: "The posh lady is…erm, nice, yes, nice!" There's a bit of predictable antler bashing between him and Richard going on. "People think we should be friends cos we're both gay!" he huffs. It seems like how people perceive him is a huge sticking point. Ironically, the only person who has any issue with Michael being gay is Michael.

I hope Lea goes home tonight, mostly for the sake of her own mental health and secondly as she's a drag to watch. Lea Walker is a massively self-absorbed and destructive woman. Throughout all of her moans about how giving and caring she is towards other people, I've never quite been able to shake an image from the end of Lea Walker: Porn Uncovered on Men & Motors, the documentary about her fledgling porn career.

Just before the titles roll, Lea is mopping herself up after a hard day's filming. "So, Lea," says the documentary-maker, "That was your first porn film? What are you going to tell your friends and family?" "Eh?" says Lea, as if this is the first time she's ever thought about the repercussions on her son. "Well…I'll just tell 'em I made a porn film I suppose," she shrugs, "Or I'll just say I was out shopping."

It's logic like this that makes me impatient with Lea. Because, it wouldn't take a genius to work out the little lad would probably prefer to hear mum's gone to Iceland.

Has it all gone too far? Or, maybe, do I need to get some fresh air?

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posted by Freddy @ Friday, July 07, 2006 Comments: 0

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