The Herald - The Herald Magazine
TV review Undercover dieters keep the weight loss under wraps
SECRET Body (BBC Scotland, Tuesday) is only on its second episode but is already becoming a word of mouth hit, largely due, I reckon, to its catchphrase (of which more later).
Yes, it is another weight loss show built around the age old notion of moving more and eating less.
The difference here is that those who take part – this week it was student Jack and cafe manager Lisa – hide their changing physique behind a body suit tailored to their original shape.
You are probably thinking what I was thinking: that the suit is just a gimmick, and any success surely owes more to boring old healthier eating and exercise. Being followed by cameras is always a good motivator, too.
Oh ye of little faith. The suits worked for a variety of reasons, including bringing home how much weight Jack and Lisa had been carrying around. Taking the thing off also gave them an immediate “before and after” comparison that kept their spirits up.
As the hour drew to a close friends and family were invited to what they were told would be the start of a weight loss drive, only for Jack and Lisa to ‘fess up and say the soon to be immortal words, “Who wants to see my secret body?”
Cue applause, congratulations, big smiles and some tears. Very unScottish, but it was lovely to see.
Sue Perkins has been on two camper van trips, one spent crying in the Highlands, the other crying in Cornwall.
Yet when we caught up with her in Sue Perkins’ Big American Road Trip (Channel 4, Sunday) she could not have been happier. Maybe it was because she was zipping along the Pacific Coast Highway in California. It’s probably against the law to cry in California.
Perkins, we’ll call her Perky because she is (even when you would really rather she dialled it down a notch), was living in a van. Hardly new. As long as there have been vehicles, there have been people living in them, but now there has been an Oscar-winning movie, Nomadland, and a hashtag, #vanlife,
so a documentary had to follow. Yup, the law again.
In the first of a two part series Perky met a couple called Blix and Bess and their dogs, a young woman travelling solo, and an hold hand at the game. She zeroed in on what most people would want to know about: the toilet. There is much more to come on this next week when she is in Colorado. For now, she found out where to go (the bears were right) and how to go (dig a hole, never!).
She also asked about safety, but no-one had a bad story to tell. It was that kind of documentary, content to skim the surface. If there were other stories here, about loneliness, or past sadness, they were touched upon in the lightest of ways.
There were a few interviewees in Stacey Dooley: Stalkers (BBC1, Wednesday) who must have wished they could drive far away from what life had dealt them.
One in five women and one in ten men will be stalked in their lifetime, most commonly by an ex-partner. What nasty, soul-sapping behaviour it is.
It was all here: the constant text messaging and calls, being followed in the street and, in one case, applying for a job where the victim worked. Dooley spent time with a support service and a specialist
police unit, went on a raid and spoke to a stalker. Among documentary makers, Dooley is a hugger. If she’s talking to someone who is upset her instinct is to physically comfort them. Not a technique many filmmakers could employ without it seeming awkward or forced, but Dooley is a natural, one of life’s emphathisers.
Whenever someone takes a pop at Netflix for being more about quantity than quality, the streaming service will point to Ozark (Netflix), the fourth and final series of which began yesterday. The tale of a middle class family from Chicago who plunge down the rabbit hole of laundering money for a Mexican drugs cartel, it can be seen as death of the American dream stuff.
Mostly, it’s just terrific drama. But yes, if you are looking for it, there is plenty said about the state the US is in.
The story picked up with mom, pop (Laura Linney, Jason Bateman) and the kids, driving along, talking about
the FBI interview they are due to have tomorrow. As one does. “The beginning of the end” the episode was titled.
Any notion that the Byrdes are going to go quietly into whatever night lies ahead was quickly put to bed in a cracker of an opening episode.
I wanted to rush ahead, but this drama should be rationed and savoured, unlike the Christmas panettone that may or may not have been devoured while watching Secret Body earlier. Wonder if they’re recruiting for the next series?