The BBC says it will be giving its TV current affairs programme Panorama a complete make-over following revelations that reporter Martin Bashir had forged documents to dupe Princess Diana. “Mr Bashir ratcheted up the Princess’ anxiety levels to the maximum by fabricating bank statements to convince her the security services were spying on her," said a BBC spokesman in a suit.
“He did this to get a juicy interview in which Diana spat out streams of invective against the Prince of Wales and the Royal Family, and that gave the BBC our biggest-ever scoop. Now that the truth about Bashir is out, I suppose what we really ought to do is to apologise for his behaviour, promise never to do such a thing again and try to regain the public's trust.
“But we’re going to do something much more fun than that! We’re going to take Panorama, rename it Paranoia, and turn it into a sadistic reality TV show in which we'll be melting the minds of a whole load of other famous people. We’ll lock them for weeks on end in a dark, damp cellar with rats and dripping taps and feed them nothing but hunks of stale bread.
“Every couple of days, an earnest young man in glasses will come in and pass them documents suggesting that MI5, the CIA and Islamic Jihad are all planning to murder them. Then, when they’re on the edge of a comprehensive nervous breakdown, we’ll take them up into a glaringly bright studio, switch on the cameras and just see what insane torrent of demented nonsense they come out with.
“Now, who shall we pick as our first guest? It should be someone who’s already in the depths of despair and convinced everyone’s out to get him. What about Harry Kane?”
First published 15 Dec 2022
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