The Not So “Secret Diary Of A Call Girl”
I’ve seen the first two episodes of Showtime’s “Secret Diary Of A Call Girl,” starring Billie Piper and for something that was touted as a sexy romp in the call girl trade, it doesn’t deliver. Piper plays “Belle” an expensive escort who loves sex, money and the power of having her customers at her mercy. “Escort, hooker, prostitute, whore. I don’t care what you call me,” she says. “That’s just semantics.”
Though it’s supposed to be a comedy, it didn’t make me laugh. Though it’s supposed to be an exclusive look into the “glamorous” life of the sex trade, it didn’t feel very exclusive, or for that matter very exciting. Sure, Belle gives us tips of the trade like she uses men’s deodorant because, “a professional never lets her client leave smelling of woman.”
Why does she do it? “I love sex and I love money. And what I really like is being my own boss. Or pretty much my own boss.” Her boss is an “agent” who vets all her clients and takes a cut for the privilege.
Belle’s normal life is as Hannah, a supposed legal secretary, with a clueless boyfriend and family. And Belle is very careful to keep pure, sweet Hannah from her impure alter ego.
The show is only half an hour and it’s shot in a kind of washed out haze. Belle’s oh, so knowing asides to the camera are too smug for words and they only make me want to see her slapped down a peg. Or Two. Or three.
Maybe by the end of the series run, the clueless boyfriend and family might catch on to Belle’s act and things may then really heat up.