Trinny and Susannah (From Boom To Bust) interview

Trinny and Susannah discuss their new Channel 4 mockumentary From Boom To Bust, which debuted online. The docu-drama follows the few highs, and many lows, as the duo endeavour to get another big break...


Can you tell us where did the idea came from?

Susannah: "It was an idea that Babydaddy from the Scissor Sisters came up with. We were just chatting, and we’d been having a really shit time in the press. I was very upset about it and he said ‘well look you’re still being written about and we ought to start celebrating what people are criticising you for in a humorous way’… And then it became a mad mockumentary!"

And did you have any reservations about sending yourself up like this?

Susannah: "None whatsoever; absolutely none! We take what we do very seriously when we’re dressing women. But when it comes to ourselves, we really do not take ourselves seriously at all."

The show deals with you in a career slump. Have you guys experienced lows like that in reality?

Susannah: "Yeah we have, absolutely, and that’s where the idea for the show came out of a newspaper feature saying ‘Is this the end of Trinny and Susannah?’ We’ve never completely been unemployed but we’ve definitely had a tough time. And we were out in the TV wilderness for quite a while. We were doing quite a lot of work abroad, and we just thought sod it, we’ll carry on working abroad. And then we came up with this idea."

Did you realise you both had a facility for acting? Had either of you acted before?

Trinny: "No. And I wouldn’t say we were acting, I mean we are playing ourselves, or parodies of ourselves. So we were very fortunate to be working with some very talented comedic actors who were also writers in their own right. And so they were able to ad lib though we did have a script. And we could bounce off them and react to what they were saying and doing."

You talk about the improvisation. How did that work? Because some of the scenes, like the focus groups, weren’t actors at all were they?

Trinny: "No, they were real – they were completely real. It was truly awful. We had two focus groups, the first one was where Toby, our hopeless idiot agent asked them ‘what’s the first thing that comes to mind when you think of fashion?’ And they were answering with ‘Victoria Beckham’, ‘Marc Jacobs’ and ‘Gok Wan’.

"Eventually he had to say, ‘and what do you think of Trinny and Susannah?’ because the other half hadn’t even mentioned our names. I was certainly upset! We weren’t in the room, so what they were saying was what they felt. And when we came in we were able to turn them around, but that was pretty excruciating."

Were you tempted to not go in the room at all?

Susannah: "No, because it was part of the show. Although it is kind of weird, when you’re working with people who think you’re doing something real when its not."

And what was the story with your encounter with the Duke of Wessex? Did you just bump into him [at the races]?

Susannah: "Again we had no idea he was going to be there. Trinny and I knew a lot of people there as it turned out, and we had to carry through the charade of Toby being our ‘real’ agent, and these people saying ‘what are you doing with that guy?’ It’s so embarrassing… We had to carry it through with people we knew very well."

Trinny: "We had to judge this race, and that was broadcast live on Channel 4 during the racing coverage and Toby was pushing jockeys out the way, and we were just cringing. And then we had a letter form Ascot saying, just to let you know, Trinny and Susannah are welcome to race courses around England, but if they were to bring their agent with them again he would be banned!"

So the presentation scene was live on Channel 4?

Susannah: "Yeah. You see him pushing everyone. And he’s got this little video camera that was going out live on 4."

You must have found that excruciating...

Trinny: "Susannah absolutely loved it. I must say I was absolutely dying of embarrassment more than her."

So why did the show end up on the web and did you ever think it would ever end up on TV?

Trinny: "The show was made specifically for online. And it was a model that really interested us, because it was going to give us the freedom to be far more creative, to be more in control, and to push the boundaries and to push ourselves in a genre that we were creating.

"So that’s how we set out, and we will be doing another show online. And it’s a huge bonus that Channel 4 has taken it up; for us it’s the only channel that this show could fit on. And we feel very proud that that’s happened because it’s the first time an online TV show has featured established personalities."

When you set out to make it, was the idea behind this to get back on TV or was it a bit of fun?

Trinny: "A bit of both in a way. But we just knew in England we needed a new shift, we have had 10 years of being on TV in a certain way. We wanted a challenge – something new that we would really enjoy filming."

And finally Trinny; is bottom slapping a real treatment?

Trinny: "I think it is."

But you don’t go in for it in you real life?

Trinny: "Definitely not!"


Trinny & Susannah: From Boom To Bust airs at 9pm on Thursday 30th September 2010 on Channel 4.