Real sight for sore eyes

ACCORDING to a chap on Channel 4 tonight: “There’s never been a successful marriage in the UK.” Hearing such piffle, I was tempted to fire off one of my strongly worded letters of complaint (“I’ll have you know, Mrs W and I are just fine, thanks, matey...”) until it dawned on me I’d misunderstood.

This man, US “dating guru” Paul C Brunson, was referring specifically to marriages concocted on the matchmaking show he’s just joined.

So far, MARRIED AT FIRST SIGHT ( 9.30pm), of which this is series five, has yet to produce a single pairing that’s endured. Not one. How odd.

You could almost believe that the thinking behind it – that a happy, lasting marriage can be created by allowing relationship experts like Paul to pair up two complete strangers and have them not even meet until their wedding day – may be somewhat flawed. If it is, however, it didn’t stop more than 7,000 people signing up for this latest run.

Among them were young singletons Michelle and Owen, plus slightly older singletons Shareen and David.

And those are the two couples on which we’ll be focusing. Not that they’re couples to begin with, of course.

Michelle hasn’t a clue who Owen is. Shareen doesn’t know David from Adam.

But Paul The Guru ( plus “leading UK matchmaker” Gen Gresset – nope, me neither – and clinical psychologist Dr Angela Smith) are soon satisfied as to each pairing’s compatibility. Very soon indeed, in fact. I trust they’ve given a tad more thought to it than the editing suggests, because in airtime terms they’ve pretty much made up their minds within the first 10 minutes.

What’s persuaded them these people are a good match, it seems, is the fact they have things in common. Shareen, for instance, likes camper vans. David, it turns out, has a camper van. Yes, quite.

It’s as though it was written in the stars. But how will each participant’s family react when their loved one reveals what they’re about to do?

With surprise? Naturally. With shock? Probably. With sheer horror? Well, for the show to have a little edge, it does need at least one person to take the news that badly.

In this respect, Michelle’s mum Anne plays a blinder. She doesn’t howl, rant or rave. God no, it’s far worse than that.

What Anne does is sigh. And look desperately disappointed. And quietly tearful.

Meanwhile, the cameras follow Michelle right up to her big day. Will Owen be everything she hopes for? Will Michelle be the woman of Owen’s dreams?

“My heart,” she says, “is literally pumping.”

Well, that’s a relief.