Celebrity Love Island

[faceless]

Even supermodels can be sucked into the flames

Barbara Ellen
Sunday July 23, 2006
The Observer

It seems unjust that when all (three or four) of us have taken the trouble to watch Love Island, we have to live in fear that it could be dropped any second. Admittedly, viewing figures are so poor it has been scheduled round the news, as if an update on the situation in Lebanon could somehow inspire people to stay tuned for Bombhead from Hollyoaks running around in his Early Learning swimming trunks trying to impress Paul Gascoigne's daughter.

Already Love Island has been forced (by the Trade Descriptions Act?) to drop its 'Celebrity' prefix, because its protagonists are so far down the fame alphabet that one of them (the bizarrely plasticised Alicia Douvall) couldn't even say the real one. Moreover, with the inordinate amount of rehab-speak, it's often about as sexy as laundry day at the Priory. However, all this may serve to underline the true appeal of Love Island. It is not about a base desire to watch people having sex; it's about a base desire to watch people fail pathetically to have sex. Rumour has it there is a difference.

Love Island could do more to help itself. It could offer prizes to viewers for guessing how often Pierce Brosnan's son can crowbar a James Bond reference into the conversation (clearly Brosnan Jnr intends to unveil his own magnificent life achievements at a later date). It could embark upon a fight against body fascism with endless footage of Lady Victoria Scurvy, or whatever her name is, proving that too thin looks just as bad as too fat in a bikini. Or it could carry on doing what it's already doing - taking a group of supposedly attractive people and manufacturing situations where one woman is forced into adopting the role of the Wallflower, the Unchosen One, the Left-Out Girl (That No One Fancies), and then, well, that's it really. As all women know, the Left-Out Girl will take it from there. And then some.

Last year, Jayne Middlemiss stole the show with her tear-drenched, almost Shakespearean reaction to being rejected by Lee Sharpe. This year, the universal fear of rejection has been worked into the format by making contestants choose partners and leaving one 'singleton' stranded. Astonishingly (and rather gallingly), the men have dealt with this best. Then again men deal with constant sexual rejection from their early teens onwards, with only a few going on to become fully fledged serial killers. Getting 'knocked back' is clearly part of the male hard drive, so it makes a funny kind of sense that they're better at this kind of thing.

All of which could explain why, so far, Douvall has run off in hysterics, while supermodel Sophie Anderton has been chain-smoking herself into a yogic coma while trying to absorb the shock of being passed over by the likes of Brendan from Strictly Come Dancing. Tellingly, Anderton instantly developed a psycho-crush on tedious Shane ('Look at me tattoos!') from Boyzone. Bewildering though her behaviour was, Anderton was doing what every Left-Out Girl has done since time immemorial - deprived of the warming fires of male approval, she will seek the heat any way she can, even if the flames threaten to consume her.

If we're honest, most women would admit to having been LOGs, reluctant sexual wallflowers, at least for a while. We have all felt the lick of sudden, inexplicable asexuality, the suspicion that we've only been invited to the ongoing dance of human desire to fix the drinks and look after the coats. Indeed, one hears of some women (no names mentioned) enduring such prolonged man-droughts that if you dumped them in Shanghai they couldn't pull a rickshaw. Of course, this is nothing compared to the lifelong LOGs, who have to constantly fight for attention (what is Jayne from Big Brother's constant belching if not a twisted mating call?), but it still stings.

Which is precisely what Love Island seems to be exploiting - the wholly human yet peculiarly feminine inability to be ignored (even more unacceptable if you happen to be a model like Anderton or, in Douvall's case, famous for attracting kings among men, such as, erm, Dean Gaffney). However silly it is, observing Anderton and Douvall's shock at being reduced to LOG status has been strangely affecting - a bit like watching a sadist move a dying plant, with drooping leaves, and wrecked, parched roots, further and further away from the longed-for sun. Love Island has all this: celebrity comeuppance, human angst and the greatest mystery of all - you're not watching.

barbara.ellen@observer.co.uk

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quite a good article I thought -