Fireworks and floaters form beneath two eyelids, pressed against eyeballs, rumbling convulsive noises as sight tables into focus –
a tomato.
The back of the sun, the behind, the backstage, the seasoned celeriac base supporting the meaty star of the bolognese,
Cherry tomatoes clustered on green stalks like grapes twinkle - jewels amongst the bubbling soupy pasta sauce.
It’s hot - sweltering - enough to burn your tongue and scorch your palette raw.
And duly scorched, Who Wants To Be A Millionaire is yapping at me, while I eat my TV dinner.
The live audience isn’t half gobby –
Gob, a), splutter, b), gob, a), gargle, d)
And second-helpings later, through the static of canned applause and coughing cuts, like butter, the pressurised, arpeggiated, Catherine-wheel-like firework-bass of a winner’s million pound answer
An eruption of noise – he’s won! I’ve never even seen a win on tv before!!!
But on page one of the Sun on weekly shop later reads:
Sheme – Google, cough – text, cough – cough, softly –
‘WinnerS?!’, scoff the tabloids.
The trial was hotter and more voyeuristic than the game itself,
There’s something inexplicably sexy about getting caught, paraded past vast swathes of onlookers gossiping, gasping, desperate for a glimpse, rubbernecking like drivers past a car crash.
‘The hairs of the court audience stood up as they kissed.’
From the gallery in court the trail was like watching live sport.
Every witness statement, reel of evidence, and prosecution electric,
Every statement from the three defendants tantalisingly erotic – we watched, ensconced, jealous of the jury, crowned with beads of sweat and racked with this curious, perverse longing.
Their bail toll was announced: one million pounds, to buy out these now minor celebrities.
Every voyeur in the country was a part of their romance - the ones who couldn’t make the trial in person watched with their jaws on the trays atop their laps; TV dinners all round for the six months it lasted.
And oh how each one wished they were a millionaire.
A response to the film from skeleton hands:
A film about who wants to be a millionaire and what it's like to be seen, I hope you're all
well entertained.