Ladette to Lady - Episode 1
28 September 2006
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All over Britain, ladettes are running wild. For an entire generation of young women binge-drinking, fighting and rampant promiscuity are now a way of life. But we’ve devised a radical solution to this problem. Half a century ago Eggleston Hall was one of Britain’s leading finishing schools. Young ladies used to go there for an all round polish in the social and domestic arts – before making their debut in society. Now the school has re-opened to see if today’s out-of-control young women can benefit from this old fashioned curriculum. An indomitable collection of staff, headed up by floristry tutor Gill Harbord, cookery teacher Rosemary Shrager and etiquette coach Liz Brewer, have got just five weeks to transform eight of Britain’s most shameless ladettes into perfect ladies fit to be presented at a Society Ball.The eight ladettes submitting themselves for transformation are:19-year-old Essex girl FRANCES ROWE, famous for flashing her newly enhanced breasts; LOUISE PORTER, a stunning scouser who’s been sacked from every job she’s ever had and “can’t count the number of fights she’s had with strangers on the streets”; binge drinker VICTORIA JENKINS from Pontefract who drinks every night except Monday and then only has a break because the pub is shut; EMMA PHILLIPS-MARTIN, 22 from Essex, who’s notoriously vulgar; barmaid REBECCA SQUIRE whose sexual appetite has earned her a reputation in her home town of Fleetwood; Chelsea fan LAURA HEARSUM who is extremely proud of her very intimate body piercings; ANGELA MOTT from Essex, page three girl for the Daily Sport, and finally, baby of the group 18-year-old CLARA MAYER, a self confessed tom boy from Kent.Headmistress Jill Harboard feels this year’s girls are the worst yet.“Their sexual behaviour is utterly ghastly,” she says, and etiquette coach Liz Brewer is determined to make them see the error of their promiscuous ways during their stay at Egglestone Hall.“I think if they can understand how they’re cheapening themselves, how they really are slags as far as their sexual behaviour is concerned, if they understand that then they can move forward.”But before they’ve even had chance to unpack, the finishing school’s disciplined regime kicks in and the girls swap their high fashion outfits for a green tweed twin set and pearls. All trace of their former lives must be removed – including piercings. Laura Hearsum has come to Egglestone Hall to learn refinement, but will she confess to Jill Harboard that she has piercings of an intimate nature?The ladettes have just four days to prepare for their first big test: a shooting party at Burton Agnes, one of Yorkshire’s finest country estates, at which they will be expected to show of what they’ve learnt at Finishing School so far – in particular how to behave around gentlemen.Liz Brewer stresses the importance of ‘the chase’ and that the girls should learn not to appear too easy a target for the gentlemen.
“Don’t give them a free sample,” she says. Her comments hit a nerve with 21-year-old Rebecca who openly admits she loves having sex.
“It’s all common sense and everything she said don’t do I do, and I just feel really cheap and I just feel like a bit of a slapper. And I’ve always said I don’t care what people think of me and I didn’t think I did, but now I’m more bothered about what I think of myself now. Before it was just all a laugh being here, but now, now I am going to be a lady and I’m going to prove it.”
At the weekend’s shooting party they will be tested on everything they’ve learnt so far, and their every move watched with interest. Rosemary underlines that the value of the school is to teach them good manners and behaviour, as well as skills that they’ve never learnt before – skills that are lost in modern day life, such a sewing, how to cook meals from scratch and flower arranging.
“I know it’s old fashioned maybe, but old fashioned can be good,” says Rosemary.
The girls are chaperoned to the party by etiquette teacher Liz Brewer where they meet a selection of eligible bachelors, the cream of the public school system. To begin with the ladettes make a favourable impression; but the influence of alcohol and some gentlemen who are out to make mischief leads to a series of appalling faux pas at the dinner table. Sunday Sport model Angela Mott gaily discusses her breast implants; Chelsea Fan Laura Hearsum confides in the gentlemen about her body piercings; and scouser Louise Porter burps ostentatiously and sings at the table.
After a pheasant shoot the following morning, the ladettes return to Eggleston Hall for the ordeal of the weekly assessments. One by one the girls must face the staff and account for their performance at the shooting party and in class. Then the first ladette will be ‘invited to leave’ Eggleston Hall and a taxi is already waiting to take her away. The ladettes get the roasting of a lifetime and one by one their hard façade is stripped away leaving many in tears, and none wanting to be the first to leave.
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