I KNOW first-hand how unscrupulous newspapers can distort reality to stir up controversy. Those of us who tuned in last Thursday to Trouble Abroad, ITV1’s look at the struggles of expatriot life, discovered that television cameras can twist facts even more glaringly. In fact, a canny director can do just about anything to distort reality. Even make a spacious tree-lined development of upmarket villas look like Beirut after a civil war. Well, perhaps not quite that grotty – but certainly scally-in-the-alley territory.According to series director Deborah Lovett, the intention was to focus on bubbly Essex girl Claire Tyson’s struggle to make a success of running a Costa Blanca bar in a bleak economic climate.Unfortunately filming at Rayz Bar in El Raso, Guardamar, ended some weeks before the most dramatic event of last summer, Ms Tyson’s sudden return to the UK. Until then, she had been a popular figure in the El Raso community – but it rankled with some when she left without saying goodbye to her staff, who tell me she’s never been in touch to this day.Claire insists the emotion of saying farewell to her friends would have distressed her too much. Make your own judgement on that one – I prefer to remember the effervescent personality whose infectious laugh was always, you might say, a Rayz of Sunshine.
Unfortunately, those Rayz clouded over when one of Claire’s waitresses announced on camera that El Raso was like ‘a council estate in the sun’. Cameras panned across empty streets, focused on a lone torn canopy – and in a few seconds of primetime TV probably lost the Spanish property market half its annual sales. to Brits. Millions of ITV1 viewers were told by Claire that the once-buzzing El Raso urbanisation had been abandoned en masse by the geriatric British community.We residents know that wasn’t true - and it is even less so today. Estate agents Property Choice, whose office is next door to Rayz Bar, say El Raso is so popular with buyers of all nationalities that there’s virtually nothing left for sale on the urbanisation. The social scene is also thriving, with two new bar/restaurants having opened since Claire left. OK, things were less salubrious when the cameras were making Trouble Abroad a year ago. But when researchers started touting for potential participants in the two-part documentary, there was no mention of the series title. Indeed, the emphasis was on this being a POSITIVE look at expat life.I know little about the company that made the series for ITV, apart from the fact they are either short of money or unbelievably mean. A year ago, I helped them to find a suitable local subject for the series and was happy to give them editorial space in the weekly newspaper I edit. Yet they claimed they couldn’t afford even 15 euros for an advert (advertising being this newspaper’s only meaningful source of income).. I also understand Claire was not paid for the nine exhausting days the cameras followed her around, intruding into every aspect of her life. With so many people all too eager for those fabled 15 minutes of fame, I’m not surprised the programme makers kept their hands in their pockets.But you can bet ITV were left counting the Costa their bill – bigtime.Published in The Courier (www.thecourier.es) January 18, 2013
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| CLAIRE TYSON |
