Current location:Earth Explorer news portal > world
Miriam: Death Of A Reality Star review
Earth Explorer news portal2024-05-21 21:03:06【world】6People have gathered around
IntroductionMiriam: Death Of A Reality Star (Ch4)Rating:Always read the small print. Everybody knows it and nobo
Miriam: Death Of A Reality Star (Ch4)
Always read the small print. Everybody knows it and nobody ever does – when you're young, you can't be bothered, and when you're old, you can't find your reading glasses.
Dating show contestant Toby Green was in an airport bar in 2003 with five lads he'd just met, about to fly to Ibiza for sun and TV fame, when the producers thrust a fat contract under his nose.
'Half was in a language you don't really understand,' he remembered, on Miriam: Death Of A Reality Star. 'Am I gonna say, 'I disagree with that paragraph'? No.'
The repercussions were worse than the six men, all in their 20s, could possibly have guessed. Plied with unlimited drink and tempted with the chance of a £10,000 prize, they spent a fortnight vying for the affections of 21-year-old Mexican beauty Miriam - unaware that she was a transwoman.
Plied with unlimited drink and tempted with the chance of a £10,000 prize, they spent a fortnight vying for the affections of 21-year-old Mexican beauty Miriam (pictured) - unaware that she was a transwoman
Everything about this three-part documentary is grim, including the fate of its central figure: Miriam Rivera, used as bait in this elaborate sexual deception, was found hanged at her home five years ago, after a life of drug abuse
Viewers of the show, There's Something About Miriam, were privy to her secret from the start. Host Tim Vincent, a former Blue Peter presenter, crowed on the voiceover: 'From the waist down, she's a man!'
Everything about this three-part documentary is grim, including the fate of its central figure: Miriam Rivera, used as bait in this elaborate sexual deception, was found hanged at her home five years ago, after a life of drug abuse.
A show that Miriam hoped would launch her as a star treated her as the punchline to an obscene practical joke.
The producers used every imaginable ruse to goad the lads into declarations of lust and infatuation, while making sure they never guessed their date was — in the snide words of Tim Vincent — 'as much Steve as Eve'.
'These boys didn't have the option to consent,' said Dr Gareth Smith, a psychiatrist who was hurriedly flown to Ibiza for the final episode, when the production team belatedly realised that emotions were running high.
Four of the six contestants are absent from this retrospective, though we're not told why. And executive producer Remy Blumenfeld, who masterminded There's Something About Miriam for Sky TV, also did not appear, though on a podcast two years ago he pleaded: 'I don't feel that I was cruel in making it, I feel I was incredibly naive.'
'These boys didn't have the option to consent,' said Dr Gareth Smith (pictured), a psychiatrist who was hurriedly flown to Ibiza for the final episode, when the production team belatedly realised that emotions were running high
A show that Miriam hoped would launch her as a star treated her as the punchline to an obscene practical joke
The boys were naive, for sure. So was Miriam, however streetwise she thought she was. But there was nothing gauche about the production team's intentions. This was sexual humiliation dressed up as an experiment in entertainment.
Though this documentary sets out to condemn, it's constantly distracted by archive clips of the rivals jostling for Miriam's attention and trying to win kisses. It's real failure, though, is pretending not to see the wider context. Most viewers 20 years ago were unaware of the growing trans debate, and phrases such as 'gender fluid' were unknown.
Nobody can be ignorant of the controversies today... though Channel 4 chiefs were apparently too timid to examine them here. All they've done is rake up an old scandal.
Address of this article:http://mauritius.brianlynch.org/content-53d998982.html
Very good!(5137)
Related articles
- Four people killed in a house explosion in southwestern Missouri
- Panthers trade up into first round of NFL draft, select WR Xavier Legette from South Carolina
- Closing prices for crude oil, gold and other commodities
- Japan's Kozuma takes a 1st
- OpenAI pauses ChatGPT voice after Scarlett Johansson comparisons
- Dua Lipa looks smitten with boyfriend Callum Turner as they arrive to dinner in NYC holding hands
- Antiwar protesters' calls for divestment at universities put spotlight on endowments
- Chinese film festival screens 8 Russian movies
- Sophie Morgan suddenly quits ITV show Loose Women as she reveals plans for emigration
- Taraji P. Henson the busty bombshell blows a kiss on red carpet at star
Popular articles
- BBC Countryfile star Adam Henson's wife wrote heartbreaking goodbye letters after cancer diagnosis
- ‘There’s Still Tomorrow’ director Paola Cortellesi talks success, toxic relationships and hope
- Kim Kardashian joins Kamala Harris to discuss criminal justice reform
- South Korean police raid office of incoming head of doctors' group over protracted strikes
Recommended
David Cronenberg's new grief
New reporting requirements for life
Americans react to Walmart axing self
Kylie Jenner is NOT pregnant with Timothee Chalamet's child and the pair are 'still dating'
I visited the most crowded island on Earth
Mark Wahlberg, 52, flaunts his muscles in shirtless video flexing during 4am workout
Burkina Faso Suspends BBC and Voice of America after covering report on mass killings
Hush money trial: Trump's lawyers will grill tabloid publisher David Pecker
Links
- Cheng Lei China: Jailed Australian TV anchor jailed releases rare message
- Russia election: Arrests for vandalism as ballot boxes targeted in Putin vote
- Brick Lane: Chinese political slogans appear on famous London street
- MPs pay not a decision for politicians
- Alarm over 'strange' illness that has killed four and sickened dozens more in Nigeria
- VOX POPULI: Some celebrate while others ponder time and space on leap day
- VOX POPULI: The war in Ukraine enters its 3rd year with no end in sight
- Cheng Lei China: Jailed Australian TV anchor jailed releases rare message
- Pressure grows on Angela Rayner to quit as Labour deputy leader over housing row police probe
- VOX POPULI: Young texters have rendered punctuation marks obsolete