Vanessa Feltz has spoken out about the media’s fixation on her weight, saying she has been “vilified” and “violently criticised”.
The TalkTV host commented on the tabloid press’ ongoing speculation with her size and, more recently, “miraculous losses”, saying she has put up with a “real level of vituperative bile”.
The 60-year-old said she that she has had to deal with “racism, misogyny, fattism” during her career, with the Sunday Times accused of antisemitism in 2017 after it suggested her BBC salary was only high because she was Jewish.
“People don’t like what they consider to be a mouthy woman, but what they really mean is a woman with an opinion or a view,” she told The Guardian. “They think women should just shut up.”
She added that the media scrutiny and criticism is still hard to live with.
“It’s absolutely horrible,” she said. “And the idea that you develop some rhinoceros hide and you don’t feel what any other person would feel … of course I haven’t got some superpower that means when someone says something horrible to me I’m not upset.”
She said she is unsure why the tabloid press are so obsessed with her.
“I really don’t know,” she said. “But I do know that some people are on television every single day for years and they are not tabloid characters. And some people are tabloid fodder – and I’ve always been that person from day one.”
The news follows a 2021 claim made by Feltz that Anne Robinson made a racist remark during the filming of a celebrity Weakest Link special in 2006.
Feltz recalled her appearance on the quiz show, alleging that Robinson made the offensive joke about her partner, Anglo-Nigerian singer Ben Ofoedu.
According to Feltz, Robinson supposedly said: “Vanessa Feltz, looking the way you do, how do you think you land all these big Black boyfriends?’
“I said, ‘I don’t think you will use that in the show as it’s racist and also completely inaccurate and in every way unsuitable’,” said Feltz. “And they didn’t use it. I thought it was very ill-judged and they must have agreed as it wasn’t aired.”
Robinson insisted that this wasn’t quite correct, however.
“What I actually said to her was: ‘How can someone like you attract gorgeous Black boyfriends?,” she toldThe Sun.
“First of all, she’d talked endlessly about doing just that, secondly it’d taken her 16 years to discover she was upset about it, and maybe if I had a radio show to promote I might have done the same.
“I’m not complaining about it, but it wasn’t quite what I said. I think she came twice on The Weakest Link and we certainly heard nothing for 16 years.”
