ITV
In a nutshell: My husband’s a trillionaire. And what do you do?
The 411: Having your own miserably pisspoor chatshow seems to be a rite of passage once you reach a certain level of celebrity. There can be no other explanation – they never stop coming to throw themselves off the precipice.
“There were unkind rumours that Nigella was spotted giving Saatchi a handjob at her husband’s funeral as the coffin was lowered down”
Perhaps the mistake they make is thinking that because the chatshow is light and breezy any idiot can front one. But of course it’s actually very difficult to do successfully. There’s a reason Parky and Wossy get the big salaries – that elusive blend of froth, insight and common touch doesn’t come around every day.
And now the gods of TV have beckoned domestic goddess and arse legend Nigella Lawson to the clifftop. Nigella has always been well liked. Women like her because her beauty is unthreatening – with hips the size of a bungalow and hands like shovels, she’s no size 8 boyfriend stealer. And her much-publicised losing of loved ones to cancer gives her profundity and vulnerability.
And men like her because she looks like she’ll be a minx in the sack. And while her Times columns set new standards in dreary social commentary and fatuous truisms she was a smart innovative TV cook with oodles of homespun wisdom and an engaging come-fuck-me manner with the camera.
Folk were even kind enough to forego counting the days between John Diamond‘s death and her new relationship with Charles Saatchi. There were unkind rumours that Nigella was spotted giving Saatchi a handjob at her husband’s funeral as the coffin was lowered down – I admit I shouldn’t have started them but I get lonely sometimes.
Anyway, Nigella the chatshow is quite spectacularly bad. She gazes at the camera like a tranquilliser addicted housewife with a glazed grin as if she used to remember who she was long, long ago . Done out in a red cardigan over a mumsy turquoise dress she looks like your insane aunt who’s come to stay for a few days after her latest nervous breakdown.
There was some redhot chat from the panel of Terry Wogan, Maria McErlane and Libby Potter. It felt like three people waiting at a bus stop making conversation to pass the time. Truly grim stuff. Nigella brought up the news story of a 29-year-old who had decided to live in a retirement community and preferred it to everyday society.
With her Stepford Wives smile and dinner plate pupils, she opined that this was fantastic – a younger person choosing living death among the walking cadavers. More grinning. It had the air of a hospital visit when you’ve ran out of things to say and are just waiting for visiting time to end.
Then she cooked Terry Wogan some salmon and he made some innocuous remark about the Michelin inspectors. Completely bizarrely, Nigella perked up with “I would rather slit my throat than be a Michelin inspector!” – uncomfortable laughter all round as Nigella nearly sliced her thumb off in suppressed rage.
Nigella needs to learn that the autocue is her friend and stop talking like she’s got a gherkin stuck up her arse. All spontaneity has been freeze dried out of her – it’s really quite chilling.
Saatchi, the Tory bastard, is plainly drugging her then kicking her nice fat arse out of the door with a badly written TV script then expecting his dinner to be on the table when he comes home from presenting cheques to charities, having dinner with Stephen Fry and the like.
The clearest sign that Nigella is locked in domestic servitude is that there was not one thinly disguised reference to oral sex. Pre-watershed or not, that’s not the girl I married (supposedly, according to the so-called “experts”, the marriage certificate I downloaded off the Internet is not legally binding. No matter, once the restraining order is lifted I’m in there like a shot).
“The clearest sign that Nigella is locked in domestic servitude is that there was not one thinly disguised reference to oral sex.”
Saatchi, you son of a bitch – you don’t get to own a national icon like all those other national treasures you bought. And you don’t get to debase the cultural currency with retarded chatshow horseshit like this.
You give us our Nigella back you bastard!
The best thing about it: Watching the cameramen struggle to find a lens that can actually fit in Nigella’s arse.
The worst thing about it: No one can hear you scream.
The verdict on Nigella: It’s clinical depression in televisual form.
Marks out of 10: 3