Impossibly, in the 19 years since Madeleine McCann disappeared from her hotel room in Praia da Luz, no TV drama about the case has yet been made.
You might imagine, especially after a decade in the toxic grip of true crime, the unsolved mystery of a missing three-year-old would have been catnip to mercenary TV producers. Especially this missing three-year-old, who, since the day she was taken has been the subject of dangerous obsession for a cult of unhinged, intellectually challenged conspiracy theorists ready to scrutinise every footnote about the case.
Yet, most broadcasters have sensibly elected not to touch it, swerving altogether the inevitable accusations of sensationalism, insensitivity, crass speculation and indulging the morbid, fanatical interest in this child and the parents, Kate and Gerry, who survived her.
Into the breach steps Channel 5, promising to take us into Kate McCann’s interrogation three months into the investigation, as she was named official suspect, “arguida”. Under Suspicion: Kate McCann is a feature-length drama that imagines the McCanns’ darkest days, and consists mostly of long, tedious, dimly lit interviews between the exasperated, exhausted mother and uncompromising translators and police.
It plays out like a weak imitation of Line of Duty, only the bent coppers are Portuguese and there is no twist because – guess what? We still don’t know what happened. There is nothing wrong with the acting, with Laura Bayston pulling off a convincing likeness and Liverpool accent, and it mercifully avoids extremes of poor taste by focusing on this very specific juncture in the case rather than rehashing the whole thing. But what light this is supposed to shed about the story, or what insight it gives us into this mother’s unique emotional turmoil – the things that might give it artistic purpose and deliver it from melodrama – remains unclear.
You don’t have to be one of those obsessed with the case of Madeleine McCann – I’ll get to them in a moment – for the word “arguida” to take you right back to 2007. It marked a critical and shocking turning point and the world was gripped. I remember all too well the sensation when Portuguese authorities turned on Kate herself and lent credence to the idea she might have harmed her child.
That word, seldom heard here before or since, brings back visions of tabloid newspapers and breaking news bulletins. It was when the media, including some British outlets, shifted from portraying the McCanns as grieving parents and started regarding them with caution and doubt. It was when an ever more vocal minority felt legitimised in their conviction that this couple, suffering every parent’s worst fear, deserved suspicion rather than empathy, humility and peace. Because they must have done it.
No matter Channel 5’s defences, or the truth that art helps us understand life, it is for them that this drama has been made. For the nasty little corner of the internet that proved your child can be kidnapped in the most high-profile unsolved mystery in British history and life can still get worse, because people will say you did it or that you deserved it because you left them unsupervised.
The McCann family’s treatment by the tabloids was nothing compared to the mobilised trolls on Twitter and on Reddit, in the comments section of every news report, and the stalkers who send letters to their home and show up to harass them in their village asking for confessions and DNA samples.
At the time, when the McCanns used every possible resource to maximise publicity and find Madeleine, they could never have known how badly it would come back to bite them, and how the obsession with their child would be inherited by future generations of people – some of whom weren’t even born when she went missing. The same people who have normalised true crime so deeply that they can no longer recognise boundaries or reality and who treat amateur sleuthing as a sport.
A Madeleine McCann deep-dive on the internet will lead you to very ugly places and to people who have lost their last shreds of humanity, channelling most of their venom towards Kate McCann herself. In their fantasy, she must be a villain. Because she was too articulate. Because she was too composed. Because she hadn’t displayed the requisite emotion to the cameras. Because she still went for runs, still brushed her hair and put on make-up. Because she was middle-class and had the means to advocate for her child when “poor children go missing every day and they don’t get this much attention”. Because she won’t go away and go silent. Because she did go back to normal life. Because she let it happen, and a good mother never would.
I am not so righteous that I will pretend I’m not intrigued by the case of Madeleine McCann. Of course it fascinates me, of course I understand why it is enticing. I wonder if we will ever know what happened. But you can be interested in a mystery without losing your compassion.
Which brings me back to Channel 5. Its drama does not ask questions about the culture in which this happened, or the impact of the case, or why we are still fixated on it – or even many questions about the McCanns at all. It just rakes it all up to give people who already hate the McCanns a little bit more to pore over. At least reality TV admits it’s made for the lowest common denominator.
Fuel the salacious trolls all you want, but don’t pretend this is anything more than an invitation to judge Kate McCann all over again. We don’t need TV drama about the McCann family, we need to leave them well alone.
Hence then, the article about channel 5 s madeleine mccann drama is nothing more than fuel for rabid trolls was published today ( ) and is available on inews ( Middle East ) The editorial team at PressBee has edited and verified it, and it may have been modified, fully republished, or quoted. You can read and follow the updates of this news or article from its original source.
Read More Details
Finally We wish PressBee provided you with enough information of ( Channel 5’s Madeleine McCann drama is nothing more than fuel for rabid trolls )
Also on site :