Potential Suitors

I was approached by Real Radio the other day to discuss the fashion of our three would-be leaders on the campaign trail – Messrs Brown, Cameron and Clegg. Cameron looked positively presidential when he was in Leeds recently, mucking in and shaking hands with his sleeves rolled up, tie off with top button undone like he'd just returned from a particularly stressful chess match, revealing white shirts with no blazer. We think his team may be studying the Obama camp quite closely.

He's not the only one who's been taking fashion cues from America, of course. Remember Tony Blair? Anyone? He was around a few years back? Do you remember that quickly assembled press conference held outside Number 10 when Leo was born, and he bandied out of the house with the sort of windswept grin and ruffled formality of a man who may have just possibly delivered the baby himself. I can picture Cameron doing the same thing, maybe heroically jumping in front of traffic to save an old lady on a bicycle in the process. Accusations of airbrushing won't help Cameron with regards to his latest campaign posters, although kudos is due on his mini-quiff – which is hardly the sort of post-modern hair do that you'll find Brown striking up in the run up to May 6th. Although slowly creeping further up his forehead (that's called a recession, surely?), the look is both contemporary and adaptable for a busy, 24 hour media roll call. Blair had a similar look, funnily enough.

I maybe sounded a bit too harsh when addressing Our Great Leader, Gordon Brown, who I said "probably shouldn't smile so much." That's unfair; he can't help it that smiling seems to go against every muscle on his face, only for it to quickly disappear as soon as it's arrived. Brown should stick to playing it serious. His wardrobe surely matches: office tailoring at its most monochrome, like a politician from the forties. This works, I guess, as there is a war on. I even saw him on telly wearing a blue tie. Tory colours, of course; does this instigate a break from traditional standard issue colours? Maybe, yes. After all, when did you last see Cleggover brandishing a liberally bright yellow tie and pochette combination? I quite like Nick Clegg, but he's starting to resemble a Geography supply teacher.

Of course, more attention is being paid towards the leader's wives: SB, SamCam and The Other One. I read that a leading national fashion glossy is ringing each party head office every morning to find out what the three women are wearing. I quite like The Other One, who isn't playing ball in the slightest and still going to work as per usual. And just so you know: her name is Miriam Gonzalez Durantez, a Spanish catholic, who bizarrely resembles Cherie Blair. SamCam and SB are undergoing much bigger media campaigns in rather inoffensive high street clothing, but if they really wanted to court some serious press attention, may we suggest a House of Gaga makeover like Beyonce in the video for 'Telephone'? Or is that image just too much to comprehend?


I think that ‘Live from Studio Five’ is fast becoming my favourite early evening TV show. It’s just about the funniest thing that Channel Five have ever broadcast. A light entertainment panel show which eschews the pressing issues of the day in favour of the sort of idle chatter that you’d (quite rightly) walk away from if you overheard it at a bus stop. These stories usually involve a celebrity who said something to someone else that may have been taken badly and forced the aforementioned celebrity to go on a diet/get a divorce/hide in a jungle/write a book about it, or they might tackle a Burning Issue (akin to the BBC’s painfully awful high brow if better represented version 'The One Show') and vox pop members of the public to offer no resounding opinion or shed any light on the debate whatsoever. I’m amazed that the presenters can even read. It’s hosted by Ian Wright, supported by Kate Walsh from 'The Apprentice' to his left, and a guest numb nut in what appears to be a revolving dunce’s chair now that Melinda Messenger has wisely scarpered. (For not getting on with Ian Wright, apparently. She’s from Swindon, you see, and we can spot possible career ending humiliation a mile off).

But it’s the level of over enthusiasm from the presenters which is so compellingly, idiotically brilliant. Take Wright, for example, who appears to just say whatever words happen to pop into his head at any given moment, and, during an item regarding forty-something actress Jennifer Aniston who is still (shock horror!) single, Wright can’t help but yelp out the word “fit” every now and then, before he actually makes a point: “she’s clearly obsessive or something.” His input during a wine taste test has him shouting (actually shouting) words like “woody” and “body” repeatedly, like his batteries might need changing. Kate’s no better, who seems to be excited about absolutely everything, even during an interview with Amanda Byram, who presents the cataclysmic thunder dump 'Total Wipeout' on the BBC in which athletic morons jump from large apparatus into pools of water, repeatedly, over and over and over, but the hyper trio of babbling presenters gush so much that they’d have you believe it was the best piece of theatre since Gielgud. By the way, all of this happened on the same show.

I know that Charlie Brooker has said all of this before but frankly it can’t be said enough. Honestly, just stick it on next time you get home, and if you can survive the first five minutes (this is usually regarded as the breaking point for most of television’s worst programmes, where you feel so physically disgusted that you might actually consider setting fire to the whole lot and locking the door behind you), then I can assure you that you’ll never be caught watching ‘The One Show’ ever again.