karym6
DW Regular
Did they feel empowered? Did they feel great? No. As they huddled together in their underwear in a filthy, disused Victorian swimming baths, the lucky finalists in Gok Wan's Miss Naked Beauty competition felt anything but.
'Degraded, confused and very, very tearful,' is how Denise Ching describes her emotions as she staggered from the pool, where moments earlier Gok - self-styled champion of real women - had set a fire hose on her and 23 fellow 'contestants' in a bid, he claimed, to reveal their natural beauty.
For Sonia Potoczny, 30, the stunt not only left her shocked and embarrassed, but sickened by its brutality.
Beauty competition
'I was genuinely scared,' she says. 'And afterwards, disgusted.'
Having already endured the humiliation of a bikini parade on Blackpool Pier, for some of the women who arrived for filming that day - dressed to the nines in eveningwear and full make-up, as per Gok's instructions - doubts over taking part in the show had already started to set in.
Terrible time: Denise Ching took part in Gok Wan's Miss Naked Beauty show
The production team had resolutely refused to reveal the exact premise of his exciting new series, saying only that the experience was guaranteed to be an uplifting one. 'When we turned up at the swimming pool, we still had no idea we were in a tacky reality show,' says Denise, a 43-year-old receptionist from London. 'I thought we were there for a worthwhile documentary about the beauty industry.'
Instead, Gok and his co-presenter, Myleene Klass, marched them into the 'Love Pool' (as he patronisingly called it) and gleefully announced the details of their first 'test'.
They had just 15 seconds to decide whether to leave the pool - abandoning their shot at a yet-toberevealed dream prize - or to tear off their expensive, drycleanonly eveningwear and prepare for an ice-cold soaking.
'I couldn't make that decision in 15 seconds,' says 20-year-old fashion student Emily Rainbows, from Manchester.
'I didn't want to take my clothes off. The knickers I was wearing were see-through and I didn't want to be seen on TV like that. But everyone around me seemed OK with it and I think we all still believed there was a good reason for taking part.'
After all, Gok is well-known for persuading the nation's women out of their clothes. It is his tried-andtested method for restoring their battered confidence.
As the presenter of How To Look Good Naked, Gok has cajoled so many hefty housewives into the nude, and introduced them to their inner goddess in the process, it's little wonder these women trusted that this leap of faith would be rewarded.
'But after he sprayed us with water, I felt horribly vulnerable,' says Emily. 'I thought: "I'm standing here in my knickers, with a load of people I don't know, surrounded by a film crew. What have I got myself into?" I hadn't got a clue.
'Ever since, I've been worried about how it must look. My face, smeared with make-up, is on the trailer for the show. My parents say they're proud of me no matter what, but I can't help feeling I've let them down.'
Enlarge Sonia Potoczny, at home after appearing on the show, says she felt pressured into stripping off. But Gok insists the show was a 'real laugh'
Sonia, too, a business development manager for a chocolate manufacturer from Hertfordshire, says she felt pressured into stripping: 'I stood there frozen for a second, trying to take it in. I didn't want them to ruin my dress. I wasn't wearing a bra and I didn't want to be seen topless on TV.
'I'm quite a shy person and I knew my fiancé, James, would be upset to see me almost naked on TV.
'But the production crew made it seem like such an achievement to be there. So carefully I took my dress off, covered my breasts with my hands, and just hoped the cameras weren't on me.
'The way the programme was edited, it looked like we were crying with relief or joy, but in most cases they were tears of regret.'
Needless to say, their version of events differs markedly from Gok's who, when quizzed this week on the merits of this cruel trick, insisted: 'It was a real laugh. Everyone found it very empowering.'
His intention had been to 'strip them of their armour' of make-up, hairspray and glamorous clothes, as a first step to accepting themselves as nature intended.
The scene at the Victorian baths was just one of the many crude set pieces that make up Miss Naked Beauty (Tuesday nights, Channel 4), Gok's search for 'a woman who truly embraces her natural beauty, her natural state and will go out there and empower every single woman'.
Denise, Sonia and Emily, who appeared in the first episode, which aired last week, believe they had a lucky escape when they were rejected by Gok's panel of judges.
'How can he possibly expect to find natural beauty in a show that is fake, fake, fake from start to finish?' says Emily, who claims that when she was sobbing from shock at the swimming baths, Gok dashed to her side, not to comfort her, but to ask her to 'wait for the cameras'.
Enlarge The contestants of the show walk along a pier in their bikinis
'I thought the whole point was that we were real women, with real emotions. I thought Gok understood that. I'm disappointed he didn't step in at any point to say: "Maybe we've gone too far." '
They had all responded to an advert appealing for women of all shapes and sizes to take part in a beauty pageant with a difference.
SONIA, who had been ill for months with hepatitis A, hoped the programme would give her a confidence boost. 'When I saw Gok's name attached to the programme I thought it could be the perfect pick-me-up.'
The true purpose of the show (which, bizarrely, is to find a suitable candidate for the specially created role of TV presenter/ magazine columnist/model agent/ ambassador for real women) was revealed only after the hose down.
To stand a chance of winning, the women were told, they would have to live together in a Big Brotherstyle house and submit themselves to weeks of Gok's childish games.
So much for being content in their lives and their skin. The programme works on the grotesque assumption that every participant would drop her life to become a multi-tasking media babe like Myleene.
The judging panel: Kathryn Flett, James Brown, Mica Paris
Denise says: 'I've had a great career and I'm very proud of it. There were business women, doctors and lawyers. It's an insult to assume that they would want to compete for a meaningless job like that.'
Like thousands of women, Denise, Sonia and Emily were invited to a screen test at a London studio, where researchers fussed over them as they were quizzed on their views about real beauty.
From there, successful candidates were sent to Blackpool on the understanding that they were Gok's chosen few. The production made no contribution to their travel or accommodation expenses. Sonia says: 'Gok said a beauty pageant just isn't a beauty pageant without a swimwear section. So everyone started taking their clothes off. There were bums and boobs everywhere.'
As members of the public looked on, the 200 women were ordered to walk up and down Blackpool Pier in heels and swimwear.
Whatever the panel were looking for, they had seen enough to dispense with half of the contestants after a couple of trips up and down the pier. But not, however, before Gok had groped the breasts of one obliging young lady.
Sonia says: 'Gok thinks because he's gay that it's OK. If he was straight, he'd be classed as a pervert.'
The 100 women eliminated from the competition dressed themselves and left the pier with no real idea why they had been rejected.
The 100 who remained were herded into Blackpool's Winter Gardens and asked to remain in their swimwear until they had been before the judging panel.
The panel included singer-turned-stylist Mica Paris and James Brown, former editor of Loaded, the original lads' magazine.
Denise said: 'James Brown laughed in my face when I tried to suggest beauty came from within. What woman in her right mind would go on national television to be humiliated by a man like that?'
Other contestants were criticised for their make-up, fake tans and cosmetic surgery.
When Emily found herself before the judges one last time, 'pleading for my survival, pleading for them to accept me', she, too, realised that she wanted out of Gok's circus.
'I thought Gok stood up for women. But now I know the truth about how these shows are made I feel used. I've been made to look like a mug.'
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1081696/How-Gok-Wans-Miss-Naked-Beauty-contest-did-empower-women-merely-exploit-national-TV.html
'Degraded, confused and very, very tearful,' is how Denise Ching describes her emotions as she staggered from the pool, where moments earlier Gok - self-styled champion of real women - had set a fire hose on her and 23 fellow 'contestants' in a bid, he claimed, to reveal their natural beauty.
For Sonia Potoczny, 30, the stunt not only left her shocked and embarrassed, but sickened by its brutality.
Beauty competition
'I was genuinely scared,' she says. 'And afterwards, disgusted.'
Having already endured the humiliation of a bikini parade on Blackpool Pier, for some of the women who arrived for filming that day - dressed to the nines in eveningwear and full make-up, as per Gok's instructions - doubts over taking part in the show had already started to set in.
Terrible time: Denise Ching took part in Gok Wan's Miss Naked Beauty show
The production team had resolutely refused to reveal the exact premise of his exciting new series, saying only that the experience was guaranteed to be an uplifting one. 'When we turned up at the swimming pool, we still had no idea we were in a tacky reality show,' says Denise, a 43-year-old receptionist from London. 'I thought we were there for a worthwhile documentary about the beauty industry.'
Instead, Gok and his co-presenter, Myleene Klass, marched them into the 'Love Pool' (as he patronisingly called it) and gleefully announced the details of their first 'test'.
They had just 15 seconds to decide whether to leave the pool - abandoning their shot at a yet-toberevealed dream prize - or to tear off their expensive, drycleanonly eveningwear and prepare for an ice-cold soaking.
'I couldn't make that decision in 15 seconds,' says 20-year-old fashion student Emily Rainbows, from Manchester.
'I didn't want to take my clothes off. The knickers I was wearing were see-through and I didn't want to be seen on TV like that. But everyone around me seemed OK with it and I think we all still believed there was a good reason for taking part.'
After all, Gok is well-known for persuading the nation's women out of their clothes. It is his tried-andtested method for restoring their battered confidence.
As the presenter of How To Look Good Naked, Gok has cajoled so many hefty housewives into the nude, and introduced them to their inner goddess in the process, it's little wonder these women trusted that this leap of faith would be rewarded.
'But after he sprayed us with water, I felt horribly vulnerable,' says Emily. 'I thought: "I'm standing here in my knickers, with a load of people I don't know, surrounded by a film crew. What have I got myself into?" I hadn't got a clue.
'Ever since, I've been worried about how it must look. My face, smeared with make-up, is on the trailer for the show. My parents say they're proud of me no matter what, but I can't help feeling I've let them down.'
Enlarge Sonia Potoczny, at home after appearing on the show, says she felt pressured into stripping off. But Gok insists the show was a 'real laugh'
Sonia, too, a business development manager for a chocolate manufacturer from Hertfordshire, says she felt pressured into stripping: 'I stood there frozen for a second, trying to take it in. I didn't want them to ruin my dress. I wasn't wearing a bra and I didn't want to be seen topless on TV.
'I'm quite a shy person and I knew my fiancé, James, would be upset to see me almost naked on TV.
'But the production crew made it seem like such an achievement to be there. So carefully I took my dress off, covered my breasts with my hands, and just hoped the cameras weren't on me.
'The way the programme was edited, it looked like we were crying with relief or joy, but in most cases they were tears of regret.'
Needless to say, their version of events differs markedly from Gok's who, when quizzed this week on the merits of this cruel trick, insisted: 'It was a real laugh. Everyone found it very empowering.'
His intention had been to 'strip them of their armour' of make-up, hairspray and glamorous clothes, as a first step to accepting themselves as nature intended.
The scene at the Victorian baths was just one of the many crude set pieces that make up Miss Naked Beauty (Tuesday nights, Channel 4), Gok's search for 'a woman who truly embraces her natural beauty, her natural state and will go out there and empower every single woman'.
Denise, Sonia and Emily, who appeared in the first episode, which aired last week, believe they had a lucky escape when they were rejected by Gok's panel of judges.
'How can he possibly expect to find natural beauty in a show that is fake, fake, fake from start to finish?' says Emily, who claims that when she was sobbing from shock at the swimming baths, Gok dashed to her side, not to comfort her, but to ask her to 'wait for the cameras'.
Enlarge The contestants of the show walk along a pier in their bikinis
'I thought the whole point was that we were real women, with real emotions. I thought Gok understood that. I'm disappointed he didn't step in at any point to say: "Maybe we've gone too far." '
They had all responded to an advert appealing for women of all shapes and sizes to take part in a beauty pageant with a difference.
SONIA, who had been ill for months with hepatitis A, hoped the programme would give her a confidence boost. 'When I saw Gok's name attached to the programme I thought it could be the perfect pick-me-up.'
The true purpose of the show (which, bizarrely, is to find a suitable candidate for the specially created role of TV presenter/ magazine columnist/model agent/ ambassador for real women) was revealed only after the hose down.
To stand a chance of winning, the women were told, they would have to live together in a Big Brotherstyle house and submit themselves to weeks of Gok's childish games.
So much for being content in their lives and their skin. The programme works on the grotesque assumption that every participant would drop her life to become a multi-tasking media babe like Myleene.
The judging panel: Kathryn Flett, James Brown, Mica Paris
Denise says: 'I've had a great career and I'm very proud of it. There were business women, doctors and lawyers. It's an insult to assume that they would want to compete for a meaningless job like that.'
Like thousands of women, Denise, Sonia and Emily were invited to a screen test at a London studio, where researchers fussed over them as they were quizzed on their views about real beauty.
From there, successful candidates were sent to Blackpool on the understanding that they were Gok's chosen few. The production made no contribution to their travel or accommodation expenses. Sonia says: 'Gok said a beauty pageant just isn't a beauty pageant without a swimwear section. So everyone started taking their clothes off. There were bums and boobs everywhere.'
As members of the public looked on, the 200 women were ordered to walk up and down Blackpool Pier in heels and swimwear.
Whatever the panel were looking for, they had seen enough to dispense with half of the contestants after a couple of trips up and down the pier. But not, however, before Gok had groped the breasts of one obliging young lady.
Sonia says: 'Gok thinks because he's gay that it's OK. If he was straight, he'd be classed as a pervert.'
The 100 women eliminated from the competition dressed themselves and left the pier with no real idea why they had been rejected.
The 100 who remained were herded into Blackpool's Winter Gardens and asked to remain in their swimwear until they had been before the judging panel.
The panel included singer-turned-stylist Mica Paris and James Brown, former editor of Loaded, the original lads' magazine.
Denise said: 'James Brown laughed in my face when I tried to suggest beauty came from within. What woman in her right mind would go on national television to be humiliated by a man like that?'
Other contestants were criticised for their make-up, fake tans and cosmetic surgery.
When Emily found herself before the judges one last time, 'pleading for my survival, pleading for them to accept me', she, too, realised that she wanted out of Gok's circus.
'I thought Gok stood up for women. But now I know the truth about how these shows are made I feel used. I've been made to look like a mug.'
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1081696/How-Gok-Wans-Miss-Naked-Beauty-contest-did-empower-women-merely-exploit-national-TV.html
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