Tough decisions

Posted by Lara Masters at 08:08 on 21 Jul 2008

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This week’s elimination saw our American model Jenny Johnson getting the boot. Jenny, who had a car accident leaving her with difficulty walking, the shakes and vision problems was “under observation” from early on in the competition because whilst her photographs were beautiful, her behaviour was causing concern both in the models’ apartment and on photo shoots.

The girls and crew had brought to the judges’ attention that she wasn’t eating enough which of course rang alarm bells, especially with Marie O’Riordan, editor of Marie Claire, who was not happy to promote a model who might have a tendency towards an eating disorder. Also, by her own admission, Jenny said that she found it hard to make female friends and she “surrounded (herself) with penis.” I was surprised she didn’t have more girlfriends because she is, to use her own self-description “delightful”, fun to be around and really bright but when the judges went out for drinks with the girls, Jenny was quite alarmingly focused on any male in the vicinity. For someone without 20/20 vision she had an uncanny sense of knowing exactly where any vaguely attractive male was situated and at one point asked if we thought it was “okay” for her to flirt with a guy sitting at the bar with his girlfriend or should she wait until his girlfriend went to the loo?!

A few days earlier, Jenny’s “exuberance” (or vociferous use of colourful language) had got the girls thrown out of a nightclub so when she then flirted overtly with one of the judges, Mark Summers, who is gay, and he felt virtually sexually harassed, there was no way we could keep Jenny in the competition and expect her to go out and single-handedly pave the way to break down negative preconceptions about disability and change the face of the fashion industry. All the judges struggled with the elimination because we liked Jenny but she wasn't enough of a team player to succeed in the industry as a model. I felt she should still use all that energy and charisma to work in entertainment somewhere, maybe as a stand-up comic as she is hilarious.

Mark and Wayne got into a fight when Mark laboured the point to Jenny that she was too flirtatious and Wayne felt that he was handling the situation insensitively and turning the show into a typical sensational reality programme and Wayne felt very strongly that he did not want to be involved in this type of exploitative television. I felt that the point had to be brought up with Jenny that she needed to rein in the sexual nature of her interactions with men, especially if she was working with them but none of us were prepared for Mark’s heavy-handed outburst particularly when he suddenly turned on Wayne and accused him of being scared to say what he really thinks for fear of upsetting people.

The boys' disagreement was so heated that Mark stormed out, Marie suddenly left “for a meeting” and Wayne was on the verge of leaving the programme altogether but I urged him to stay and help me try to use this show to make a difference to attitudes towards disability and influence a change of practice in the fashion industry. When Mark returned to the set he admitted that he had over-reacted and harmony was restored. Kind of.

How long will the truce last? Tune in on Tuesday 9 p.m., BBC 3 to see who will be the next to go.

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