Crossing the divide

Take four Protestants and four Catholics, put them on an island in a Big Brother-type setting and what do you get? An eye-opening look into the North's divided society, writes John O'Farrell.

Reality TV is about to grow up. This most despised genre of contemporary broadcasting (by critics) and guaranteed ratings-puller (of viewers) is about to take on the black hole of commercial television: Northern Ireland. Tomorrow night, ITV will broadcast a special edition of the most watched current affairs programme on British TV, Tonight With Trevor McDonald. The idea is fiendishly simple. Take four Catholics and four Protestants from the North, put them in an isolated activities centre on the Isle of Man for a week, and film everything that happens. Two of the participants have been involved on opposing sides of the Holy Cross primary school dispute.

The Big Brother format has spawned spin-offs, most using the situation created when several strangers have to live cheek-by-jowl for our voyeuristic titillation. Will a contestant crack up? Will there be a fight? Will there be live "shagging" on the telly?

The producers from Granada TV, who concocted this exercise, have loftier ambitions. "Too often, people switch off, mentally or literally, when Northern Ireland comes on the box," says the programme's director, Roger Corke. "This is current affairs television about Northern Ireland that people will watch, not just reality TV."

Corke is immensely proud of his programme, insisting that "this is different from any other reality TV". Rather than pandering to an audience's craving for "sex, drugs and rock'n'roll", he believes that "this is not trivial. This is about things that matter . . . this is reality TV that matters."

If Corke sounds like another naïve Englishman who believes he can make an immediate difference when he claims that one week in the Isle of Man has decontaminated eight Northerners from bigotry and sectarianism ("these people really have changed"), bear in mind he is a veteran of two decades of current affairs television and has worked on some notable World in Action programmes on the North.

So what happened during one week in late February on a cold, wet and windswept corner of the Isle of Man? The eight participants, who had responded to an advertisement calling for "contestants for a Northern Ireland Big Brother", arrived at the Venture Centre, a winding country lane near the village of Maughold, on the north-west of the island. Unknown to each other, their first "task" was to try to identify the religion of their fellow contestants. Just by looking, the four Catholics managed a 100 per cent rate of identification. Three of the four Protestants assumed that a Catholic woman from a middle-class background was "one of theirs". This notion was quickly shattered as soon as they heard her name, Ciara O'Neill.

The format of each day was established by psychologist Dr Cynthia McVey, of Glasgow Caledonian University. Dr McVey has a public profile in Scotland akin to that of Dr Anthony Clare, and she worked on the BBC's year-long reality programme, Castaway; she is also a Scottish Presbyterian who married a Catholic and much later converted to Catholicism.

Each morning while filming, the participants were divided into two mixed groups for outdoor activities, which depended on mutual trust and support. These "team-building exercises" included abseiling, raft-building and gorge-walking. The afternoons were spent drying out and warming up, while doing indoor exercises. After dinner was cooked by one Catholic and one Protestant, a round-table discussion would be held on an aspect of life in the North. Each would then individually "discuss" the day with "Big Sister" in the "think tank", a room rigged with two cameras and a two-way speaker linked to the control room.

The spur for the exercise was the finding by sociologists that teenagers in "interface areas" of Belfast had rarely, if ever, held a "meaningful conversation" with a teenager from the other side. That was true of most of the participants.

Three of the four Protestants live in the greater Shankill area of Belfast. Robert (or Rab) Orr is in his 40s and does part-time DJ-ing at the Glasgow Rangers Supporters' Club. Jacqui McMillan lives near the Shankill Estate, an area associated with Johnny Adair's "C Company" of the UDA. She took part in the Holy Cross protests in nearby Ardoyne. Stewart Gibson has markedly more moderate unionist views than the other Protestant participants, despite living close to a peace line, but he seemed reluctant to express his opinions during discussions, letting the others set the pace. Debbie Kidd had quite hard-line views, despite being perceived as more middle-class - she is a teacher living in south Belfast.

The Catholic contestants seemed more diverse. Ciara O'Neill is a graduate and works in Stormont for her father, Eamon O'Neill, the SDLP MLA for South Down. Gerard Duffy was originally from the Falls Road, but had lived in New York for eight years before recently returning to Belfast. Seán O'Kane is from Derry and recently acted in the Bloody Sunday docu-drama. Margaret Fitzsimons lives in Ardoyne, and walked her niece to Holy Cross primary school throughout the protests last autumn.

While not exactly a representative sample of the two major communities in the North, the participants lived up (or down) to the expectations of the programme- makers. "Within minutes of the start of the first discussion, they were at it hammer and tongs," recalls Neil Barnes, the producer who thought up the idea for the programme. The first "debate", on sectarianism and bigotry, was lead by news footage of two incidents in October, 1993: the Shankill bomb and the Greysteel massacre. It emerged Rab and Jacqui were at the scene in the Shankill that Saturday, Rab helping carry out bodies from Frizell's fish shop. The Greysteel pub shooting one week later saw an aunt of Seán's killed by the UDA.

From the first day of filming, it became clear - aside from the side-taking during the evening discussions - that they related to each other as human beings. Gerard and Rab were the only two smokers and bonded over cigarettes in the courtyard of the Venture Centre. Stewart and Seán got on as the youngest (both are in their early 20s). Ciara got on with everybody, but most seemed to dislike Debbie. Jacqui and Margaret, despite Holy Cross, got on famously, talking late into the night about some very intimate personal details.

At the start of the week, Jacqui was asked when was the last time she had a conversation with a Catholic. "Never," she replied. According to Roger Corke, "Rab and Jacqui have gone the furthest journey". Dr McVey concurs. "They are ordinary people, it's their way of life that makes them sectarian. They are actually nice people, who are all great crack."

They needed a sense of humour to put up with the foul weather that accompanied their outdoor team-building escapades. "Trust me, I'm a Protestant," Rab smirked as he held the rope suspending an abseiling Catholic. When Margaret beat schoolteacher Debbie at the electronic game of The Weakest Link, she trilled: "This one's for Ireland!"

Working together, they concentrated on the job at hand. On the third day, all eight assembled a jigsaw with no plan. When it became clear that the picture they were constructing was a photo of the Queen shaking hands with the Pope, the politics of the image was ignored. They just wanted to complete their task.

I was watching the participants for two days in the control room. Apart from their outdoor activities, at which a team of four camera operatives were present and visible, every move at the Venture Centre was monitored and recorded by 28 miniature cameras, most in the open, with some hidden in a dartboard, a fish tank and a flower-pot. Just feet from the eight going about their business was a full TV gallery with sound desk, 16 monitors and four stenographers transcribing conversations and discussions.

As well as the director and two producers,the technical crew totalled 10, not including a chef to feed cast and crew. There were also two security men at the ready in case the discussions got too hot. Fortunately, they did not, which revealed much about the participants.

The one debate all knew was coming was the one they all dreaded. Monday was sectarianism and peace walls. Tuesday was policing and Orange marches. They knew that Thursday, the last full night, would see "The Way Forward" as the final topic. That left Wednesday for Holy Cross. Stewart was extremely nervous, and tried to explain his fears about speaking out to Dr McVey.

"It's like I'm an ambassador for my family" - back in the Shankill - he said. Rab, Jacqui and Debbie had no difficulty being ambassadors for their communities.

From the start of the two-and-a-half hour discussion (after a steak dinner cooked by Jacqui and Margaret), they saw this as an opportunity to explain their case "to a mainland UK audience", bypassing what Debbie claimed was a "media bias in favour of Catholics". No quarter was given, no positions were shifted, though admissions were made: Rab participated in the protests too, unknown to the producers.

Charges were levelled about cruelty to children, by Catholics at the protesters, and by Protestants at the parents. Equivocation was made about the blast bomb thrown one September morning ("It was threw at the police, not the children"; "How many were injured any way?"). Nasty mind-game tactics were used to undermine opposing arguments. A real atmosphere of loathing, just short of actual menace, pervaded the debate/row. The security men were poised in case things got beyond the mediation abilities of Dr McVey.

Within five minutes of the debate ending, inconclusively, as the eight prepared to individually share their feelings with Big Sister in the think-tank, Seán had them back around the table playing a party game. A celebrity name would be written on a card and stuck to the forehead of a player, who then had to work out who "they" were by asking yes/no questions.

Dr McVey found this "compartmentalising of their lives" fascinating. "They have the ability to have big deep rows over politics and then play party games within minutes. It's a really fast switch."

At least one of the participants shared that view to Big Sister. Ciara said it was "bizarre" how "people can exhibit such bitterness and then play games". Most of the others seemed content that they had "got their point of view across", and dismissed the arguments of the others. "There's an old saying," said Jacqui, "It's a wise man who acts the fool, and I think Séan and Margaret are playing the fool."

It is possible that this episode reveals much about how Northern Ireland has stopped short of the all-out civil war often threatened during its worst periods of crisis, such as Drumcree or the aftermath of mass killings. These people knew when to stop before tempers spilled over. More revealingly, they could easily slip into and out of the imposed roles of speaking for "their com- munity". The sectarian impulses were always there, yet most of the time they related to each other on simple human terms.

In group activities and in ordinary conversation, relations were beyond cordial; they were becoming friends. "They like each other," said a delighted Dr McVey. However, put these eight people (or any mixed group of Northerners) together, and not only will sides be taken along predictable lines, but a strange consensus will develop on both sides of the argument.

Hard-line and moderate beliefs will neuter each other, restraining those with views regarded as "extreme" and bigoted from giving vent to full hatred, while simultaneously inhibiting those on the "same side" who want to understand, or even sympathise, with the opposing team.

On the macro level, it shows how trenchant views act as a controlling mechanism within the two main communities, preventing real reconciliation from happening by altering the terms of the debate, despite rarely getting a majority of electoral support in either power bloc.

There were other noteworthy revelations, particularly about religious beliefs and practices. In a questionnaire filled in at the start of the week, all eight described themselves as "Catholic" or "Protestant" accurately, but only one of the latter four also described themselves as "Christian".

At least half of both groups did not practise their religions and were pro-choice on abortion, and yet Rab said he would not enter a Catholic church, even for a funeral. He does not believe in God, but he believes that "the Pope is the anti-Christ". When confronted with the contradiction, he shrugged and said: "My head's a wee bit twisted." They are normal people, albeit in an abnormal society. "I'm just brought up to hate the Pope as the anti-Christ," admitted Rab.

For an audience in either the Republic or Britain,unaware of the daily tirade of similar views on BBC Radio Ulster's Talkback, some of what is said will appear shocking. Even more strange will be the ability of a small group holding radically divergent opinions to get along, as all eight did for an entire week.

Yet, that is what most people in in the North have done throughout the horrors of the Troubles and the ups and downs of the peace process. It can be plausibly argued that Northern Ireland has had too much reality TV, in the shape of bad news beamed through the tube. This experiment in taking a genre rightly reviled for exploiting the basest aspects of humanity for popular consumption, and using it to shed light on the mundane and frightening realities of daily life in the North, should be compelling, if unsettling, viewing.

The special edition of Tonight With Trevor McDonald is on ITV tomorrow night at 10.45 p.m