6 March 2002 2301SST - 0800GMT

THE SUN COMMENTS ON VICTORIA'S DOCUMENTARY

Who needs Footballers' Wives when we have the real thing? Posh Spice's Being Victoria Beckham TV documentary showed exactly who the drama was based on.

It was even trailed during an episode of Footballers' Wives earlier, much to the annoyance of Mrs Beckham who resents the comparisons. Fancy cars, sitting around the house in designer suits, boob jobs, tears, kidnap threats, glossy magazine deals. It was all there and this was all real. There were some wonderful moments of hypocrisy and hats off to ITV for showing up the many double standards with some clever editing.

Posh talked about being over-exposed as she hosted her own 80-minute docusoap - with half an hour extra time on ITV2. She let cameras into her homes, allowing film of her son Brooklyn for the warts-and-all programme on Monday night. Her mum Jackie and sister Louise attacked the press as they flicked through newspaper cuttings books with framed front pages featuring Victoria and David adorning the walls of the home. What they failed to mention was that Louise has made a tidy sum over the years from selling stories about her sister to newspapers. And I can prove that.

There was great irony too when Posh spoke of her normal eating habits. Moments later she was filmed splashing out on grapes and a fruit salad for lunch in the supermarket. Steady on with that calorie count, Posh. I raised a glass of chardonnay to her cheek as Victoria talked of how everyone had their price and bleated on about her ex-boyfriend selling his story to the papers. That was just after the bit about Posh and Becks selling their wedding to OK! magazine for a million quid. Jackie is a carbon copy of Chardonnay's mum-in-law, played by Gillian Taylforth, although I can't imagine Roy Keane teaching her a few tricks on the pool table. Later Posh denied having a boob job and claimed: "Honestly, I've just got a really big set of breasts."

Cut to Victoria lying on her back next to a swimming pool with breasts not unlike a pair of St. Paul's Cathedrals against the backdrop of the LA skyline. Next Jordan will be telling us she is as Heaven intended. On that subject, Posh wouldn't be truly posh unless she had a swipe at her large-breasted gutter rival. She remarked on Dwight Yorke's ex: "I think she is vile. Jordan does full frontals on her crutch and t*ts out. It's horrible." Cut again to Posh in scanty swimsuit next to pool, um, sticking her crotch out. Posh has really got the ball rolling with her catty Jordan comments.

Tabloid hacks the length and breadth of Fleet Street are already sitting back and sharpening their pencils in anticipation of handbag Armageddon. But one thing the programme did show was that it's not all rosy on Planet Victoria - Posh does feel ugly. She confessed: "I still have insecurities, even when I'm doing a glamorous photo shoot. Deep down I feel like a spotty teenager." Cut to that LA swimming pool again and that tiny swimsuit. Throughout the show there were close-ups of her family's Hertfordshire home as they moaned about photographers. I'm not denying that David and Victoria are a wonderful couple - great role models for the youth of today. David isn't racist or homophobic. He doesn't take drugs, attack photographers or stagger out of nightclubs at 5am. (I suppose that's one difference to Footballers' Wives.) We should celebrate that as much as one of his free-kick spectaculars. He is the archetypal modern footballer, a world away from the boozy animals of the Seventies and Eighties. And there is no doubt Victoria is a fantastic mother. She takes Brooklyn everywhere she can and makes it clear that he means the world to her.

But why on earth does Victoria do these kind of shows and then moan about intrusion? It's the second one she has done in three years. No surprise she has a solo album that is languishing outside the Top 75 just a few months after release. There were certainly heavy plugs for it throughout but I bet it doesn't bounce back into the Top Ten. Yet still we come back and still we watch this couple's life as if our own lives depended on it. Is it because they have glittering personalities and fascinating conversation? One wouldn't think so on the strength of Monday's programme. For example, in part of the show the couple were entangled on a typically Footballers' Wives cream sofa. Victoria says: "What did we watch last night?" David, sighing: "What Lies Beneath." Victoria: "Scary film. We wanted to go to the toilet but we couldn 't because we was so scared. We was so scared wasn't we." David: "We was." It was at times like this I had to look up my TV listings and check I wasn't watching Alistair McGowan and Ronni Ancona.

There is no doubt there is still a national fascination with the Beckhams' secret life. That's why 8.3 million people tuned in. But WHY are we so fascinated with them? David may be the greatest footballer in this country but Victoria, by her own admission, is at best an average singer with a dying music career. Their home life seems fairly normal and neither of them is particularly outspoken - but still we are glued to the set for every last peek into their private lives. The Beckhams are unwitting actors, if you like, in our own reality TV version of Footballers' Wives. We have all followed their ups and downs with bated breath since they became celebrities as a couple of teenagers.

The public story that is David and Victoria is fascinating and will continue to keep us gripped for years. Long after Footballers' Wives is relegated to the 2am slot on UK Gold we will still be frantically trying to find out what's in Posh and Becks' shopping bags. So ITV should forget about Footballers' Wives 2 and recomission Being Victoria Beckham - for as much as I hate to admit it, I would tune in again.

News courtesy of The Sun
News compiled by Spice Girls Asia News Team