After now watching two episodes of the highly anticipated ‘Made in Chelsea’, I am sure that I am not the only one left disappointed. Reality fly-on-the-wall documentaries have grown from strength to strength over the last few years, attracting huge audiences with their real situations and real people. In the much loved The Only Way Is Essex, there was much dispute over the first series, as I believe some of the ‘characters’ may have been misinterpreted or misrepresented however today the cast are now dominating newspapers and tv chat shows, proving their success to their widespread audiences.
However, I’m sad to say that Made In Chelsea did not quite follow in its lead, unsuccessfully not providing characters that audiences can warm to. Straight away, the audience is introduced to a fairly convincing ‘love triangle’ whereby the man in question (Spencer) is really not worth the battle. Caggie Dunlop and model/dancer Funda are battling it out for his attention, whilst he plays both girls as he appears to be indecisive and wants to have his cake & eat it. Although it provides an interesting storyline for the audience to get their teeth into, we really don’t see much else going on. A very cringe-worthy date with Oliver Locke and Gabriella Ellis was aired, where the very feminine Oliver was quite clearly uninterested in his ‘girlfriends’ attentiveness. It was not only highly odd to watch but also must be embarassing to watch back from both the ‘cast members’ – are they really that desperate for fame, when it is so clear to the audience that they must be faking their relationship.
Although ‘made up chelsea’ contains cringe worthy scenes, a pointless love triangle and characters that think extremely highly of themselves, I believe their time will come and audiences will perhaps find a character to warm to. The cast may learn with time, to be themselves much more without putting on the superficial ‘oh my goodness’ and ‘we’re going to have such a fabby time darhling’ it may be more watchable. This will mean that we can watch it without squirming too much and hopefully (I say hopefully) Caggie Dunlop will find someone she can have to herself – as she is more than capable of doing so.
Only time will tell…
Watch Made In Chelsea – Monday’s at 10pm on E4.
Responses to this article from cast members –