Philip Schofield interview on BBC News/iplayer now.

[JeandeServiette]

Anyone else watching?

I wasn't supposed to be up this early but what the heck.

Why are people complaining that people are taking too much about this story? When Schofield has just done big interviews with the BBC and The Sun? People are responding to something he's out out there himself!

I’m not complaining about too many stories about him but what I am angry about is Philip’s damage limitation and the feel sorry for Philip narrative. He seems to think he should get sympathy not the men he’s groomed and then when that’s not forthcoming he gives endless interviews whining how badly he’s been treated.

If everything he’s done is acceptable then why has ITV sacked his sad little arse?

I don't understand is why celebrities in "difficult situations" are paying pr people and the pr people are saying "do some high profile interviews and get across your side, tell "your truth" bs because it's gone down really well with other celebrities in strife!"

Assuming Schofield did use pr people for this.

you sound like you work for his PR team.

There has been criticism of Sam Taylor Wood and the 24 year age gap. "Old soul" or not, he was 18 and she was 42. She was in a position of power.
It was reported at the time that his parents were unhappy/estranged when they married.
Older men have the seedy/young enough to be his daughter/must be the £, daddy issues tropes. Older women have the cougar trope.
We are very used to seeing older man-trophy wife. We sometimes see older woman-younger man. Harry Styles was recently with his ten years older director.
Plenty of May-September gay marriages. But they usually have met them for the first time as adults.
It all comes down to what the runner thinks. At 27, he can now look back and decide whether he had agency or not at 20. He knows how things happened and whether he was exploited or not. If he does feel that Phil fucked him over, that goes very much against the "We're mates" narrative currently being pedalled.
Someone upthread said I have lots of time on my hands - I do this week and posted the points from the interview as I cannot fathom how Phil has double-downed on so much. The tone of the extended Sun interview though is different,
he seems a lot less vulnerable and more dogmatic. No idea who has advised him or what he has agreed with whom but falling on his sword whilst making out it is all to protect the runner seems at odds with so much others have said.
That's before you even get onto allusions to problems the runner was having.
I'd be interested in what those who work in media, PR or law think as to how this has all exploded after three years of silence if the runner wanted it to remain unreported.

Was the timing ever explained? What actually triggered PS to admit this affair? All the stories leading up to it were about a rift with HW but he's saying she didn't know. So what was the rift actually about then?

I'm watching it now. (As opposed to reading quotes from it)
Not long in.
Can't help feeling cringey about it and that he might have been better just keeping silent

Some people on here are saying that Schofield was in a position of power at work and are concerned about the big age gap (rather than the fact that the man was 20).

Sadly, this happens all over the place ...

Al Pacino is 83 and his girlfriend is 29. They are expecting a baby. She was a producer on one of his movies.

Robert de Niro is 79 and just had a baby with his partner who is 45. They met on one of his movies.

It feels a bit like the DM wants Holly out too.

This sums it up for me

We are separated but very much together?!
What's that mean?!!

Maybe this runner is feeling more rejection now that Phil is actually saying this relationship skills never have happened and he regrets it happening

Did his marriage go off tracks now after the affair revelation or after him coming out as gay?

I can't get my head around the fact that he came out as gay but it just seemed to be a non-issue he was married.

I thought they remained friends after he came out because they still went places as a family but he’s still been wearing his wedding ring all that time despite a lot of reports he’s been living with a guy. Why not just take the ring off? The whole purpose of the ring is to say you are married and committed to someone, which isn’t what he’s been doing for the last 3/4/5 years

Caroline Flack's mother has essentially said, enough.

"Asked how he was, and after a long pause, the TV presenter told the BBC's Amol Rajan: "I think I understand how Caroline Flack felt."

Christine told the BBC that Schofield "knew Caroline" and when she died, "he was very upset".

"I think he's now realising even more what she went through," Christine said. "But until it happens to you, you feel sad but you don't understand."

Phillip Schofield: ITV hasn't learned from Caroline Flack's death, her mother says - BBC News

I watched the interview again and it’s angered me so much more. He made out he regretted what happened in his dressing room so much (even said he’ll regret it forever) but then went on to say it happened another 4 or 5 times. Literally only sorry he got caught or his conscience would have surely kicked in over all those months! Weird answer about why he was seen out for a meal with MM too, he just told him they’d go out for food so he wasn’t on his own waiting to get picked up? That’s bizarre! Would anyone else go out for food with a young guy in that situation?! A very vague timeline given of when the relationship started too as he said after a few months of MM working there they became mates so it sounds like it started pretty quickly, making the grooming theory much more likely. It’s not like he’d known him years and he was just some random guy from work in the end up.

It’s quite clear when watching it again what someone else has pointed out with him saying ‘god no!’ every time something is most likely true.

Another vague answer on why the story was coming out now too. He just said ‘it got too big’. If you’d done something this bad and hid it for all those years it makes you wonder why he’d go off his own back and make a statement telling the world about it, unless there’s something else he was threatened with 🙄

I don't care about PS. I avoided the interview until the BBC 10 o'clock news opened with it and forced it on me and I'm annoyed. Every bloody news channel across the board had this story yesterday and gave it undue prominence. If he's broken the law then charge him. If he hasn't, then leave him to whimper alone. I'm sick of zlebs giving televised interviews that seek to manipulate our emotions in their favour because they've been found to be unlike their advertised persona. Enough.

Yes, it does. But did that 29 yo meet Pacino at 16? And did he get her a job a a producer at 19 and then did he have encounters with her in his dressing room at 20?

That’s true re the runner. Don’t forget Philip is kindly paying his legal fees and therefore retains control over the runner. I hope, but it won’t happen, that someone else with money sees the runner is being controlled by Philip again and offers to pay his legal fees.

I actually feel more sorry and concerned for the runner now, Philip may be giving false sympathy lines to him, but the runner is far more at risk of suicide than Philip.

For Philip it must be hard. All his adult life he’s been in tv and been used to being lauded and have every whim catered to. With TM gone he has nothing so of course the other day you see him breaking cover in his grey tracksuit and that’s why all these interviews are coming out. He just can’t help himself. He’s encouraged by his pathetic wife and daughters to peddle “they’ve got me because I’m gay” and coincidentally it’s London Pride this weekend so a few gays will support him on that side (apart from Rylan!).

He will never go away quietly.

Also those saying re older relationships with men and women. My dad met an 18 year old at 35 and married her and had children, she was from a traditional British Cypriot family. Years later she said she’d felt the relationship was sort of wrong re power as my dad had been married twice before with 3 kids and a drink problem, but he told her all this. Another friend of the family married a Japanese woman in his 40s when she was mid 20s, had children by him but got lots of comments from people re the age gap and after he died said he wasn’t the easiest man, she got together with him quite young (though not illegal) and maybe wished she hadn’t done.

So yes, age gap marriages can have problems. They can be fine. I personally think if it’s a big gap then yes one person who’s older often does feel and maybe act like the more mature person but if the younger person knows this and takes this on board then yes it can work. It’s only if the older person gets bullying and controlling because of it that things can go wrong.

This . He is a disgrace making out he is the victim . What about his poor wife in all this although I'll never understand why she didn't kick him to the curb . Probably because he's got the money .

I agree - he has no sympathy concern for anyone except himself. The whole thing was a poor attempt at damage limitation.

He's lucky he never tried acting, because he was appalling. "Ham" doesn't begin to describe it. Self-serving dross.