[LenochkaO]

Thank you, reality TV

Jenny White hails the cool new lesbian stars who are changing the face of showbiz

Friday November 7, 2003
The Guardian

On November 17 Fame Academy winner, singer-songwriter Alex Parks will release her debut single Maybe That's What it Takes. Her self-penned ballad is hotly tipped to make the Top 10.
But Parks's TV victory and her Ј1m recording contract prize can be seen as much more than a mere personal success for the lesbian teenager. Her triumph also marks another stage in the rebranding of gay women in the public mindset, the culmination of a year of unprecedented lesbian visibility in British showbiz.

Importantly, the 19-year-old Parks has given young gay women their first pop idol to swoon over. Interviewed immediately after her Fame Academy win, Parks highlighted the fact that she had no role models to relate to when she was growing up and that she hoped her win would help to inspire other young lesbians.

While gay male showbiz household names trip off the tongue, there is still barely a handful of out lesbian celebrities. It is about time that some cool Sapphic stars shook up Middle England's perceptions of lesbians.

Those decades-old, tabloid images of gay women endure. Lesbians are still either viewed with suspicion - man-hating militants sporting dungarees and crew cuts - or as objects of amusement and titillation; the male fantasy of two femme stunners indulging in hot lesbo action waiting for a bloke to jump in and finish the job off properly.

Although Pam St Clement and Sandy Toksvig have been out and proud for years, these middle-aged, middle-class women will never set Celebdaq on fire. This past year can be seen as a watershed in lesbian visibility aided by the reality TV phenomenon that can transform unknowns into "celeb personalities" overnight.

Until last summer's appearance on I'm a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here, Rhona Cameron was little known outside the stand-up comedy circuit; her lesbian-themed sitcom Rhona, which aired in 2000, was poorly received. But her jungle stint catapulted her to household-name status within a matter of weeks. She gained tabloid and celeb magazine coverage and a primetime ITV gameshow, Russian Roulette. And now she has written her first book, an autobiographical novel, Nineteen Seventy-Nine: A Big Year in a Small Town, published last month, in which she recounts the teenage angst surrounding her first forays into lesbianism.

With her new-found fame, Cameron also managed to out her former girlfriend Sue Perkins, one half of television comic duo Mel & Sue. Perkins, apparently persuaded by Cameron, then appeared on Celebrity Big Brother in November last year.

In February, lesbian stereotypes faced their biggest ever challenge. Former Page 3 pin-up Sam Fox came out of the closet and introduced the nation to her female partner in the Channel 4 documentary Our Sam. There was more footage of the couple together throughout March when Fox was one of three celebrities competing to run the most popular bar in ITV's The Club.

Parks's appearance on Fame Academy took this increased lesbian visibility to new ground. The reality TV show format allowed people to gain a rounded picture of her: meet her family; see her form friendships with other contestants; share her pre-show nerves and passionate performances. They were able to see that her sexuality is only part of who she is.

After her win, she expressed relief that her sexuality had not overshadowed her stay: "That's just me. I didn't come in here trying to hide it or shout about it. It doesn't really make a difference."

Throughout the series Parks was praised by the Academy judges and press alike for being '"individual", "original", and "different". She is one of the first primetime TV personalities that baby dykes can empathise with: the funky boyish looks; and coming out worries, such as "What would the grandparents think?" But above all the realisation that your sexuality is no barrier to following your dreams.

· Alex Parks is interviewed in Guardian Weekend tomorrow.