X Factoris more a cultural phenomenon than a television programme, and is a worry for many, writes ANN MARIE HOURIHANE
AS PART of the increasingly endangered minority which watches neither the X Factornor Mad Menone can only stand back and wonder at their merciless march to world domination. Take Cheryl Cole, for example, that Fashion Furby who melts the hearts of several nations every weekend. (How long is the X Factoractually on the television at weekends, by the way? And is it true that there are plans to cancel pesky news bulletins and intrusive weather forecasts in order to accommodate X Factor'sdemands on our air-time?) Anyway, take Cheryl Cole, starve and tattoo her, bang her into a haircare advertisement, marry her to a talented footballer with fewer social skills than a rabbit, pretend that she has malaria, manufacture a couple of feuds she is supposed to be a party to, by all means do all of these things – but please, make her eat something now.
Because Cheryl Cole is not just a source of fascination for the daddies who watch the X Factor, she is an international heroine, the forces’ sweetheart – in other words, a new type of female ideal, revered by both sexes but particularly by her own.
Cheryl Cole has built herself for the camera, knowing that the camera hates fat. On the face of it this was an intelligent decision on the part of an ambitious girl singer. It would be interesting to see a chart that juxtaposed Cheryl’s soaring earnings alongside her plummeting weight. Commercially, her cadaverous appearance and all the hard work that goes into it must make sense. The problem is that, amazing though it is to those of us who manage to survive outside X Factor’s magnetic field, Cheryl Cole is a role model. If only this meant that susceptible adolescents were affecting Newcastle accents in imitation of her. Instead it means that young girls in a couple of jurisdictions are starving themselves to look like Cheryl, with her 10-year-old’s pelvis and 30-year-old’s head. Little girls are living on nothing but water to emulate Cheryl’s glove puppet beauty. This does not happen when you watch the television programme New Tricks.
Television role models can sneak up on you unawares. Homer Simpson says much about the modesty and good humour of dads. I sometimes wonder if I am watching New Tricks because its heroine, Susan Pullman, played by Amanda Redman, is a nice, chunky, middle-aged woman.
Of course she is much more beautiful than her audience – she is a television actress, after all – but at least Amanda Redman/Susan Pullman looks like she eats the occasional pizza, and Susan’s penchant for white wine is unstated but obvious. (She narrowly avoided sleeping with a wine dealer in the last series. It was close.) The point is that SusanPullman/ Amanda Redman is an undemanding role model. She does not make the viewer feel as if she should eschew carbohydrates, or indeed food per se, as soon as the closing credits roll.
New Tricksitself is deeply unfashionable though not, we like to think, unpopular. X Factoris beyond popular, it is the crack cocaine of TV. New Tricks, predictable as an ardfheis speech, is a comfort to some. X Factor, more a cultural phenomenon than a television programme, is a worry to many.
The attention and approval lavished on Cheryl Cole as her reward for being a size six is virtually an advertisement for becoming an anorexic: “Because,” as Cheryl says in her honeyed Geordie tones, “You’re worth it.” Meanwhile, back in the beige and adult landscape of the box-set, the female body everyone is talking about belongs to Christine Hendricks, who plays Joan in Mad Men.
Joan has very large breasts, and a very small head and the most surprising thing about her seems to be that she has been allowed on television at all.
The fashion world, which is so very fond of Cheryl’s flatness, has been pushed by popular demand to accommodate Christine Hendricks’ dimensions, although contemporary dresses do not suit her. Despite a decade of blanket breast implantation looking elegant rather than whorish whilst in possession of large breasts is still considered an achievement.
So Christine Hendricks and her unapologetic curves have been greeted with relief as well as surprise. Even though she has a tiny waist, which is held in during working hours by vicious corsetry, no one could describe Christine Hendricks as slim.
For this reason she is treated as if she was a role model for the overweight female, although in fact she is no such thing.
As Lisa Armstrong in the London Timescommented last week, it is only a matter of time before Christine Hendricks, now acclaimed as a heroic pioneer of real females' representation on screen, is photographed looking less than perfect and accused of letting herself go. It is also only a matter of time before she succumbs to industry pressure and goes on a diet, as another famously curvy girl, Sophie Dahl, did before her.
As a gravity-defying role model Christine Hendricks may well topple in the very near future.
But Cheryl Cole would survive a nuclear holocaust, nibbling crispbread in the rubble. If only it were the other way round.