Here’s why Holly Willoughby and Phillip Schofield’s feud has finally made This Morning into watchable daytime TV
IF This Morning’s production team were trying to gloss over the Phillip Schofield/Holly Willoughby feud yesterday, they hadn’t chosen the best holiday destination offer.
Split, in Croatia — which presumably just got the nod over Dead Horse, in Alaska.
It seems to hint at the immediate future for ITV’s “golden couple.”
In the meantime, they must fix grins and get on with things, in relatively frosty fashion.
No bad thing in my book.
Some people think it’s the essence of their on-screen “chemistry” but I’ve always found Holly and Phil’s private jokes and giggling fits to be the most insufferable intrusion into the beaches and bowel cancer world of daytime television.
I also think TV partnerships work best if there is a bit of edge, like Eamonn and Ruth, or a barely concealed loathing, as Susanna Reid seemed to have with Piers Morgan, which turned Good Morning Britain into television gold.
If you’d never seen Phil and Holly before, you’d probably have been none the wiser about the feud.
Both are, after all, accomplished and professional TV performers.
But if you did know the background, it’s fairly clear the dynamic has subtly changed.
He was hardly helped by the day’s schedule which didn’t seem to be able to stop stirring the pot.
First up? A discussion with Gyles Brandreth and Camilla Tominey on working from home that seemed to spark something within Holly.
“When you’re at the beginning of your career, with that sort of mentoring thing, watching someone who’s been in the business a long time…” she said, before her voice tailed off as she realised exactly where that train of thought was heading.
The absolute killer for me, though, was an item about online scams which lure you in with teasing questions like: “Which This Morning presenter are you?”
A question Schofield couldn’t resist.
“If I saw that I might enter and find out which one I was.”
Phil, from what I’ve heard, you’re about to become the ‘former’ type.