Phillip Schofield: Cast Away review, Channel 5
3/5
Before he’d even embarked upon his 10-day stint alone on a deserted island for this three-part series, Phillip Schofield was interviewed at the start of the show and said firmly: ‘I’m not doing this as a “poor me”… I don’t think I have a right to do a “poor me”'.
But by the time he started detailing his major beef with people he now calls ‘the three sh*ts’ in the television world, who he clearly believes were central to his ‘cancellation’, or else did not sufficiently support him, it became clear Schofield would not pass up this opportunity to settle a few scores.
At times the programme felt less of a survival challenge, and more of a personal opportunity to unburden himself. ‘When you throw someone under a bus’, he explained in the middle of an angry fireside tirade, ‘you’ve got to have a really bloody good reason to do it’.
Of course his whole concept of being thrown under a bus is classic ‘poor me’ behaviour. ‘I’m not bleating’, he added, eyes burning with resentment, ‘I’m just getting it off my chest’. Well if you can’t get something off your chest when you’re alone, hungry and exhausted, and filming a series for Channel 5, then when can you?
The whole exercise did make for intriguing viewing, though, as Schofield went further down the rabbit hole of his darkest thoughts, while trying to find something, anything to eat. Things got genuinely bleak when his fishing rod broke and he ended up not eating for 24 hours.
Overall, though, the show did what its subject wanted it to: showing himself to be a complicated man in a nightmarish situation at least partly of his own making, juggling shame and anger and so much more. Although in the end I doubt it will change many people’s opinion of him one way or another.
Cast Away is currently available to watch on Channel 5