EVERY SPOKEN WORD
150 min read · 30,036 words- 0:00 – 15:00
(wind blowing) So, the reason…
- CWChris Williamson
(wind blowing) So, the reason that I wanted to do this podcast is twofold. 60% of the reason why I wanted to do it was because I was on Love Island on season one, and the filming and editing process is interesting, and I know that it's a very popular TV program. I think that fans of the show would like to find out some of the stuff that goes on during the process. 40% of the reason-
- G1Guest 1
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
... (laughs) is due to a pure time management perspective that I get asked the same questions over and over, and now all that I need to do is link them to this single podcast.
- G1Guest 1
So even 10 minutes ago, you got a text saying, "What was Love Island like?"
- CWChris Williamson
"Hi, mate. What was it like on Love Island?"
- G1Guest 1
So-
- CWChris Williamson
Like, and I can say-
- G1Guest 1
... if, if that's representative- (laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
Now all that I need to do is create a shortcut on Alfred or on, uh, text correction on my phone.
- G1Guest 1
Life hacks one.
- CWChris Williamson
Life hacks one. That camera.
- G1Guest 1
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
Um.
- G1Guest 1
Why that, why not that one?
- CWChris Williamson
'Cause that one's not looking at me, mate.
- G1Guest 1
Oh, I see.
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- G1Guest 1
Very clever. (laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
If you are, if you are listening through iTunes, we are in a room surrounded by technology.
- G1Guest 1
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
But it's been offset by the fact that I've got some lovely candles over on the far side, so.
- G1Guest 1
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
Just in case the technology was too much. Yeah, exactly. So did either of you watch Love Island when it went on? I'm talking for people who don't know what I'm on about, Love Island is a reality TV program in the UK. Um, it is a little bit like a cross between Take Me Out and Big Brother, I think is probably pretty fair to say. It's not as sort of cheesy or raunchy as Ex On The Beach, which is an MTV show, or as Geordie Shore. It's not kind of as extreme as that. It's kind of-
- G1Guest 1
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... fl- it's quite fluffy in a way, I guess. Um, and yeah, I was on the, I was the first person through the door on season one, and I was there for three weeks, three and a bit weeks, I was there. And yeah, it was, um, it was three, no, two and a half years ago now, but it has just been released on Netflix.
- G1Guest 1
Netflix. So you've had another surge of interest?
- CWChris Williamson
(clears throat) Well, I mean, the, the people are grilling me about stuff that I did two and a half years ago when I can't remember what I did this morning.
- G1Guest 1
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
So. (laughs)
- G1Guest 1
So I guess the first thing is, have you re-watched it or re-watched any part of it to refresh your memory? Or when people remind you-
- 15:00 – 30:00
Right. …
- CWChris Williamson
so that you are beginning to get conditioned, you get a bit of a tan, you start to chill out, you start to think about the, what's sort of coming up. So they've got control over you, um, so that you can go and do media obligations when you need to. You've got an interview with Reveal Magazine later on, and then we're gonna do some press shots, and then we're gonna do whatever. The other thing is, so that they can start to reveal stuff about the cast members to, o- online and to the public back in the UK, without any fear of you seeing it. (laughs)
- G3Guest 3
Right.
- CWChris Williamson
So if I was to go into a corner shop, I wouldn't be allowed to go in without my chaperone.
- G3Guest 3
What, and he makes sure he does, he's, he's like going round-
- CWChris Williamson
If I, if I, it's to make sure-
- G3Guest 3
... going like that so he doesn't-
- G2Guest 2
"Let's just have a look at your phone."
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs) Exactly.
- G2Guest 2
Just quickly (imitates camera shutters clicking)
- CWChris Williamson
That was Love Island, 2015.
- G3Guest 3
Wow.
- CWChris Williamson
Um-
- G2Guest 2
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
... and we had slots in the gym. So I was in at 8:00 AM, which was fine for me 'cause I train in the morning.
- G3Guest 3
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
But yeah, we have slots at like 8:00 AM u- until 9:00 and then a half an hour window where the next person would go through. And I didn't know this at the time-
- G2Guest 2
They've got you fully on lockdown then. That's incredible.
- G3Guest 3
Can't watch TV?
- CWChris Williamson
It's... No, no, no TV. I took like a hard drive out with me and was able... That was the first time, I've said this before, it's the first time that I finished a book because I had no distractions. And-
- G3Guest 3
What, what did you do?
- CWChris Williamson
So sunbathed a lot, trained a lot. I was in a deficit, so I hated my life a lot. (laughs) Um, which was, which was just thought about food. No, it was good. It was honestly, that week was probably one of the most liberating I've had. If you think about it, you don't have to think about anything.
- G3Guest 3
You don't have to be anywhere else other than exactly where you are. There's nothing else to do.
- CWChris Williamson
You can be as present as possible with no sense of guilt-
- G3Guest 3
Mm-hmm.
- G2Guest 2
But as long as you can let go of the fact that-
- CWChris Williamson
... that you're lost doing something else.
- G2Guest 2
... like, this is a weird situation. I've got a chaperone and-
- G3Guest 3
(laughs)
- G2Guest 2
... so on. But once, I guess, (laughing) once, once the novelty of that's gone, it's like I can just sort of be...
- CWChris Williamson
I was thinking, I f- personally, I found it incredibly liberating.
- 30:00 – 45:00
They weren't that contrived.…
- G2Guest 2
later or something, a bit, so it gets a bit messy-
- CWChris Williamson
They weren't that contrived. The... another, another one of the things... So this is one of my fears, right, before I went on. Remember that Jade Goody incident where... with Shilpa Shetty where she was like, "She should go home," and there were burning effigies of pigs that looked like, um, Jade Goody in the street? It was on Big Brother.
- G4Guest 4
Ve- vaguely.
- CWChris Williamson
And Shilpa Shetty was this like big Bollywood star. And...... my, I had in the back of my head-
- G5Guest 5
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
... (laughs) just don't, don't do something that's that newsworthy.
- G5Guest 5
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
And obviously, you're like, I've never said anything like that in my life, but fuck knows what could happen.
- G5Guest 5
Keep it under the surface.
- CWChris Williamson
And then with the editing as well, um, because you never get to see-
- G5Guest 5
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... what the final edit looks like.
- G5Guest 5
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
And when we were the first season, like going on now, you understand. You know how it's going to be cut, what the sort of flow is going to be, what kind of end result they're looking for. It's quite fluffy, right? It's quite nice. They're not trying to make anyone look like a tit.
- G5Guest 5
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
Whereas before you go in, you don't know if it's some character assassination waiting in the wings.
- G5Guest 5
(clears throat)
- CWChris Williamson
And I was pretty, pretty terrified.
- G2Guest 2
And, and as you said, it's like selective editing is such a... So the, what I'm interested in now is you said, um, "I was looking forward to there being a bit more alcohol and a bit more freedom to..." So clearly from that perspective, you weren't afraid to, to let loose a little bit with your inhibitions and say whatever. Whereas on the o- the other side, like, not that you are at risk of, like, saying something-
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm.
- G2Guest 2
... racist or whatever, but um, do you, do you think it's because you're self-employed that you didn't, didn't have a sense of, um, "Oh, I better not say something that might have a repercussion or recourse later on?"
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah. That was-
- G2Guest 2
Um-
- CWChris Williamson
... that was definitely a big deal. Um, of the guys on my season, I think if you discount me as company director from being self-employed, i.e. not on temporary work, site work-
- G2Guest 2
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... I think there's only two other people who didn't either work for their family or were self-employed as-
- G2Guest 2
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... model, laborer, something similar. And were two people who were-
- G5Guest 5
What, it just doesn't matter?
- CWChris Williamson
... who were employed, yes, outside of that paradigm.
- 45:00 – 1:00:00
Yeah. …
- CWChris Williamson
they're like fucking ten a penny. And they're just like (imitates gun firing) .
- G2Guest 2
Yeah.
- G5Guest 5
Right.
- CWChris Williamson
Scatter-gunning them all over the place.
- G2Guest 2
So they could ruin you if they wanted to?
- CWChris Williamson
They could do, but I guess those guys were so ballsy-
- G2Guest 2
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... that they were able to push, they were able to discount or any fear of that coming up. Which led to them actually being ab- their content was so much more energetic and so much more engaging.
- G2Guest 2
Do you think it was consciously discounting it or they would, just, just didn't care?
- CWChris Williamson
Fuck it.
- G2Guest 2
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
I think, I genuinely just think that most of the guys that were doing that just didn't give a shit.
- G2Guest 2
I don't think it's, like, a, a consideration. I think it's just (imitates gun firing) .
- G5Guest 5
Safe. Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
Well, that's them, but that's, again, that's why they're good cast members.
- G2Guest 2
Yeah, definitely.
- CWChris Williamson
They're good cast members because they don't have that filter. Whereas for me, I was very mindful of the oddness of the experience a lot of the time.
- G2Guest 2
So we, we have this experience quite, quite a bit, and I imagine you will be now increasingly with the podcasts, where you'll have said something in an article that you wrote in 2011 and forgotten about it. And then you'll get a message from someone about, like, a line in it that was-
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm.
- G2Guest 2
... something that you did, and you're like, "Oh my God, I've got to be careful about what I put in the public domain because it might be a recommendation."
- CWChris Williamson
It's out there forever. Yeah.
- G2Guest 2
Yeah. And it's, I mean, it's, it's, it's never something cringey, but it's, it's, like, something, a recommendation that you made that you maybe no longer agree with.
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah.
- G2Guest 2
But someone's like, "Oh hey, uh, three minutes 42 on your video," and, and you're like, "Fuck." Yeah. So.
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah, well I mean, I've never, I've never had that before. And the podcast has been incredibly liberating for me to actually finally speak the truth forward about stuff that I'm interested in after so long of kind of doing this. And, you know, I, I, it, it must sound or it might sound like I'm, I didn't enjoy the, the, um, process of going on Love Island. I really did, but I didn't enjoy it for the reasons of, like, being lad, being in there, the little bit of adoration and social equity that you get coming out. I enjoyed the experience for the experience.
- G2Guest 2
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
I was transfixed by the production process. I wanted to know how all of the rushes worked and why there were all of these different cameras and stuff like that. And that, to me, was really, really interesting. That made me a sh- (laughs) That was like really-
- G2Guest 2
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
Didn't make me the best Islander because I was, I, I was far too detached from the actual narrative and of what was going on inside of it.
- G2Guest 2
Mm-hmm.
- 1:00:00 – 1:09:24
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. …
- CWChris Williamson
fatal dose of what that particular network of people are truly like. Uh, when I see party boys and party girls in the front door of a club, I'm able to box them up in a category that doesn't have as much of an effect on me. And they could've played the role with me for 20 seconds as well, right?
- G3Guest 3
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
But they weren't-
- G3Guest 3
You don't, you don't see them 24 hours so you don't know-
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah.
- G3Guest 3
Right.
- CWChris Williamson
But when you live, when you live with them for three and a half weeks, like, you're like, "Right, okay. You are really different to me."
- G3Guest 3
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
And it's fucking apparent. And that ... So if, if I was to go in again, what I, what I would do differently is I'd be, I would be myself. I don't regret the way that I acted on that because it's allowed me to do stuff like this podcast that I love. Um, the ... All of the pursuits I've got on at the moment for-... mindfulness training and, um, speaking the truth, which I think is a real big deal. 'Cause I'd lied through my teeth to get myself on there, to play a role of someone that I wasn't particularly, but someone that I knew I could play the role of.
- G1Guest 1
Mm-hmm.
- G2Guest 2
Would being yourself get you kicked out earlier or later do you think?
- CWChris Williamson
Later, 100%.
- G2Guest 2
Okay.
- CWChris Williamson
I could go on. I'm pretty certain that I could go on as the person that I am now even in that season. And providing that I didn't get stitched with the edit, I think I would, I would have a, a pretty good chance of, of staying on until the end. And one of the reasons is, and this is for anyone who's considering to go on reality TV, there's the, the lack of authenticity shows through really, really starkly because you run out of things that you can think to say and situations-
- G1Guest 1
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... that you can think to create. Whereas that's not how we operate. Our personalities aren't consciously manifested on a s- m- second-by-second basis. They appear as a byproduct of you existing and having an ego.
- G2Guest 2
Mm-hmm.
- G1Guest 1
And you don't have to sit and create like, "Well, what might be interesting to say in 10 minutes?"
- CWChris Williamson
What would, what would Love Island Chris say now?
- G1Guest 1
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
Like, that's not the way it would work.
- G2Guest 2
Must've been tiring to do that.
- CWChris Williamson
It was. It wa- it was, it was fatiguing. But again, for that, like, I'm, I'm incredibly grateful. Like, the opportunity was unreal. And as you say, like, it's really rare. Like, I'm never... I'm n- gonna be very unlikely that something similar's gonna happen again, and I really enjoyed it. But, like, the experience for me, like, when someone says, "Oh, what was the best thing about being on Love Island?" and it's like, "You come out with followers," or, "You have a blue tick on Twitter." "I had a little shaggle of birds." And, and, and I'm, and I'm sat there like, "Oh, well..." Um, when I came out, like top three things probably that happened from Love Island, in no particular order, one of them is that when I came out on the south coast of Mallorca, it's a really, really good spot for stargazing. I'm not really too sure why. And I came out, and it was the night I'd left, and it was kind of, like, emotional and stuff. If anyone's seen the episode where I leave, and I'm, like, a little bit upset because I'm leaving the guys who I've got this bond with and no matter how, um, invested or not I was in the experience, it was an intense experience. And there was a flooding of emotion when I left, and, uh, there was a lot of bromance, like, in there, and I'd b- I had this connection with Max and stuff who was the guy who went on to win. And saying goodbye to him was pretty tough and a few other bits. And I had this sort of bit of a whirlwind 'cause no one had been prepared when, when I left. No- we didn't know it was an eviction that night. So it was kind of just, "Fuck, I've got to go pack my bags and, oh, fuck, right, okay, see you later on, guys." And then I was gone. And I finished and went back to the couple's hotel like I said. Get up up in this beautiful five star kind of that Sandals resort thing where they're all, like, individual little huts. Anyway, I'd finished. I'd finally been given a big beer as opposed to, like, a 330 ml one.
- G2Guest 2
(laughs) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
And I had this big beer and I was, like, sat outside, and there's just crickets going on. It's like finally, like, midnight, completely clear, warm-
- G2Guest 2
Not mic'd up anymore.
- CWChris Williamson
Not mic'd up.
- G2Guest 2
Oh.
- CWChris Williamson
On my own. Able to be with my thoughts, and you haven't got your phone back yet because they've still got 24 hours until what's just happened airs. So you've one day of loo still to go.
- G2Guest 2
Mm-hmm.
Episode duration: 1:16:54
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