Victoria Beckham - Netflix

[monicagellerbing]

Anyone seen this? I’ve always liked VB and did enjoy this insight into her fashion business but I did find when she was talking about how she nearly lost the business I lost some sympathy. I have no doubt it was stressful but having a millionaire husband to bail you out isn’t the same as what other people deal with when they lose a business and I thought it was a bit tone deaf of her to be sat crying about it when there’s a COL crisis!

Harper is turning out to be a lovely young lady and seemed to have a nice relationship with both V and D.

“DB had decided to stay married”, so basically he’s in charge here and everyone has to put up and shut up to allow a squeaky voiced gimp to continue to rake in the moolah from all his advertising revenue.

The story was already out, Loos was being portrayed as a fantasist and liar so she took some ownership of the situation.

The Beckhams then did a desperate photoshoot on a ski mobile, VB clinging on to her minging husband both physically and metaphorically with a rictus grin on her face.

No one came out of it well, stop with your misogynistic shite, blaming Loos for his awful behaviour.

Nah. It’s all on DB. He’s the cheater.

RL was slandered. Damn right she’s going to protect her name.

stop with your misogynistic shite

Oh give over with your daft accusations of misogyny 😂

Great debating skills you’ve got there!

In case you’re not bright enough, that’s what’s known as “irony”.

Why do you think it’s reasonable to support and protect a sleazy creep like DB at the expense of everyone he harms?

Maybe deploy those great debating skills of yours to explain?

The main thing I remember is that her mum was drinking gin with Coke Zero. What the fuck is up with that?!

This is classic in narcissistic family set ups.

The feted ‘golden child’, the scapegoat and the ignored. The parents live through the ‘golden child’ - it’s a poisoned crown to wear tho - the expectations are heavy from the parents for this child to ‘deliver’.

I wonder if each of their DCs have been through the ‘golden child’ audition at some point before being kicked to the kerb and ignored? Maybe that’s BB gripe? I suspect it was harder for the boys as there may have been explicit expectations of elite sportsmanship - but DB is forgetting that it was the brutal (abusive?) regime of his own father than grew his skills. DB himself did not dedicate a fraction of his time to do this for his own DCs as he was seemingly always preoccupied and busy taking care of his own egotistical needs.

I remember seeing Harper write something about her hopes and dreams. It was a few years ago so she would have only been about 11 and her response was ‘to build a global brand’ - I thought at the time how sad that her childhood was so derelict, lacking and uninspiring.

I also thought on the doc that when Harper was doing the little dance with her Mum that there was no warmth or fun in it. VB was dressed in some ridiculous outfit (her usual very dated, too long, white bootcut over very high heels) so could barely participate and then all VB wanted to do was check her own profile from the clip. Vacuous, vane and not present for her daughter.

I think there is a lot of pressure personally on Harper as the last roll of the dice for a ‘successful’ off-spring.

I always find it a bit weird that nobody says how VB clothes are basically anorexic clothes designed by an anorexic. The loooong trousers, the oversized jackets. They’re not 1970s geography teacher clothes as such, but Karen Carpenter outfits. Bone busters. None of the models In the doc were a normal weight and even VB in the dance scene with her daughter looks emaciated and quite frankly, ridiculous. Poor Harper! What kind of food message is that? No wonder David’s making jams & keeping chickens, he is doing the eating therapy by himself while she sits on the sidelines, taking the piss out of him. I can’t imagine it’s much fun living with all those zero calorie gin & cokes and minus number chocolate years. And I don’t think it’s very healthy that our Princess of Wales is promoting this stuff - especially given that her late MiL was plagued by bulimia. But everyone plays into it, one big show of skeleton chic, girlchild women pretending nothing’s wrong, gaining self esteem by reducing their waist sizes. Shocking, really.

In case you’re not bright enough, that’s what’s known as “irony”

Gosh thank you so much for enlightening me. How awesome you are. That's sarcasm btw.

This is getting really tiresome and derailing a thread with an argument I'm not even that interested it. So I'll let you carry on fighting your valiant cause 😊

In other words you give up because you haven’t got a cogent argument. Cheerie bye now!

I agree with this. Not condoning cheating at all, but he was the one who had everything to lose. And if you’ve got a roving eye, if it wasn’t her it would have been the next lady who he targeted. Of course it would have been better if she turned him down, but he shouldn’t have gone for her in the first place. I don’t blame RL for defending herself. The point is how Victoria reacted. She didn’t have the confidence to kick him into touch. And this is possibly because, as I said a couple of pages ago, she’s broken. All she has is the illusion of Brand Beckham.

RL went with a married man so little sympathy but it boils my piss that David came out of that smelling of roses. He’s still not been held to account, not properly, they skirted over it in his documentary.

RL would’ve been unemployable for a while after that came out so no wonder she capitalised on it. Victoria’s displays in the aftermath were embarrassing. I get she had a family to think about but Brand Beckham was more important than her self respect.

I think that’s the tragic thread running throughout. VB desperately and relentlessly trying to put the genie back in the bottle with her futile attempts to control / create the narrative of the perfect marriage and family - when everyone can see it for what it is - and no one would judge her for DBs transgressions - many women walk in those shoes.

She must be exhausted with it all - especially when those closest to her - her first born and her DIL, are now not just not playing ball, but are actively (although currently silently) hostile.

The public vow renewal where they were all excluded would have been excruciatingly painful and deeply wounding. I don’t know how she’s coping with that. No doubt there will be a baby along sometime soon that will be weaponised via SM to taunt her further. I really feel for her.

I’m watching the first one - liked her more than I thought I would but a couple of things struck me. It’s often watching the people around someone gives you more a clue about them and none of the staff in her fashion brand seemed particularly warm to her or happy around her. Not a smile among them. The second thing was the dance with Harper. It was strikingly joyless. If it was me and my daughter we would have been giggling. And when she looked at it back she said you’ve got me from a good angle

I agree with this, she is very much a functioning anorexic and it’s really sad that she chooses the ED over her self and her family. All that money she could have spent on therapy and recovery and instead she spends it on clothes for other anorexics 🤷‍♀️

Living with someone with an ED is joyless (‘I’ve not eaten a chocolate since the 90s’) and ED effects absolutely every aspect of normal life.

I really feel sorry for her kids and I could see David overcompensating especially with Harper.

Totally agree she appears to be a functioning anorexic. The fashion world is probably the worst place for her really.

My Dd coming is out the other side of this and I actually found myself not wanting Dd to watch this documentary as it’s normalising being that anorexic size. So thanks for that Victoria 🙄

It was really dull. David gives off vibes that he can’t really be annoyed with her. That comment that he could think of lots of flaws… he and Harper seem to make a good Team but lots of side glances etc suggest all not great. VB saying she hasn’t had chocolate since the 90s… 🙄 and all that guff about not being able to smile on the red carpet didn’t indicate much happiness behind the scenes and much insecurity/vanity. Didn’t find VB especially funny or warm or deep. No harm to her but not someone I’d want to be like or be friends with.

Reminds me of the vibe in one of dds friends houses - mum has lots of strong ideas and rules (no sugar etc) dad and only daughter subvert the rules behind her back and have a warmer deeper relationship just the two of them, it’s quite sad really not a dynamic I wound want.

I watched it out of curiosity. DH and I are a similar age and got together at the same time as them, we got engaged around the same time as them. DH even had the Beckham curtains hairstyle. 😁

It was ultimately disappointing because it didn't go very deep. We didn't get to know anything that we haven't already read about. For a documentary to work it has to show you the other side of someone, or interesting things about them that you had no idea about. There were no revelations, no hidden talents, no heart to hearts, no baring of the soul, no hidden depths, other side of the coin. It was just all a bit.....shallow, really. A facade. Much like the whole fashion business seems to be, so I guess the fashion thing is a good metaphor for their life. All about outward appearances, It was painfuly obvious how conscious she was of having her hair sitting just right when the camera was on her, or if she looked perfect on the tiktok video her daughter was filming. I just watched thinking "God, how exhausting must it be to live your live so aware of how you look all the time".

Regarding a couple of points that people have made:

The whole Madrid/affair thing. What a difficult part of their lives that must have been. She'd just had a massive change in her very public and successful career, she had very young children with all the hormones, the tiredness and pressure that they bring, feeling like she had to focus on t them while feeling directionless in her career.

Her husband was in a different country for a time, with a big career change of his own to manage, he wasn't sure of his place within the team yet, he had an ego that needed massaging, women throwing themselves at him just when he was at the age where most men fancy themselves as god's gift to women anyway, even if they dont possess the talent, fame, wealth or looks that he had. Just a horribly pressured situation for any marriage to have to cope with. All the ingredients for an affair were there.

I have no doubt that something went on during that time and it's easy to understand how and why that could happen to anyone in any vaguely similar situation. They hinted at it strongly during his documentary. But why oh why should they go over it again? It was a dark period in their marriage, they wanted to patch it up and stay together and move on from it. It was a long time ago. I don't think they owe anyone an explanation, least of all millions of people who don't know them, and especially not in a way that would embarrass or upset their children. In their position I would have done exactly as they've done - heavily hinted, talked about the pressures at the time, wanting to move forward as a family etc, let people draw their own conclusions.

Regarding their personalities portrayed in the show, I agree that Victoria seems insecure, and desperate to be accepted and thought highly of. David at least seemed to feel a sense of acceptance that he'd achieved some great things in his career and was now happy to reflect on that and feel like he could enjoy some of the results of his success, whereas for Victoria, it just seems like she's still trying to prove something. He DID seem frustrated with her at times, but I think it's because he can't understand her need to still feel accepte by people, and be so driven and wants her to just relax a bit and enjoy the lighter side of life with him without this feeling of needing to achieve something all the time.

Her upbringing was mentioned in the documentary and some comments her dad said made me wonder if her inability to be satisfied with what she's done so far has come from him. It's like she feels the pressure of measuring up to his yardstick of hard work and is still trying to prove something to him. Didn't he remortgage the house to fund her through theatre school or something? That's a lot of pressure on someone at a young age.

Ultimately, it was all a bit one-dimensional. Didn't show anything of their real life. We didn't even know what their daily routine was. incidentally, she is portrayed in the media as being a hard worker but it's not like she's putting 9 hours of solid graft in 5 days a week like most of us, I bet, and then coming home and doing a load of domestic chores on top. In the garden in the Cotswolds, Victoria tells David "I like what you've done with this". I wondered exactly what it was that he'd done. Was he into garden or landscape design, was he into growing plants from seed, was he shifting wheelbarrows full of soil about, mowing the lawn, weeding? Or did he just tell the gardeners what he wanted doing? Kind of like how I imagine Victoria is with the designers that are ACTUALLY making the clothes in her fashion line.

Oh, AND did you see the tension when that poor woman at the fashion show gave a bag to a model to walk with by mistake (the plan was for the model not to carry one). I couldn't help but notice Victoria's millisecond-long look of irritation at the woman, even though the woman apologised, obviously felt bad about it, and anyway, IT WAS JUST A FUCKING BAG.

Maybe I'm just not the intended audience. I am never going to be the sort of person who is going understand why someone would have a nervous breakdown over whether someone walks down a catwalk with a bag or not.

This was one of my favourite things on TV this year I love her self depreciation, such a British sense of humour and genuinely showed the tough side of what Is often perceived as a "frivolous" industry

Excellent posts @CurlyhairedAssassin

Not really working class when her dad was driving her to school in a Rolls Royce.

She wouldn't have got anywhere with her business if it wasn't for her rich husband, he ploughed millions into her business and lost millions.

This - he is so push away - trying to think of the right way to put it. I saw a video on Instagram of them dancing - VB was all over him and he really really didn’t care you could tell. Either he’s not one for PDAs or he was just not that into her.

I thought that the documentary showed her as spectacularly tone deaf, expecting sympathy for her “struggle” to be taken seriously as a designer whilst bypassing training, leaning on a $36 million bailout from her husband, and portraying the possible collapse of her label as some kind of existential threat. It wasn’t resilience or authenticity but insecurity dressed up as struggle.
She ignores the reality of her privilege and sounds self-indulgent, no wonder other designers can't take her seriously. Some sections were just obscene really. Oh and I agree with pp, the whole documentary was also unbelievably boring.