My Secret Wig
Seriously...
BBC
4.1 • 885 Ratings
🗓️ 19 September 2017
⏱️ 31 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Lots of people wear wigs, and go to great lengths to keep them secret - but why? Perhaps it's because the hair on top of our heads means so much to us. It's a crucial part of our identity, the person we see when we look in the mirror, so what happens when it's not there?
It's a question Brian Kernohan has asked himself. Yes, his hair's thinning a bit on top, but it's his secret - until his hairdresser points it out. Brian wouldn't dare suggest a wig - even though he's always wondered if he could try one?
Brian investigates the secret world of wigs with the help of alopecia sufferer Geraldine, who runs a secret wig shop which ensures discretion for all her customers. He explores the stigma attached to wig wearing, and finds out how tastes have changed since the 17thcentury when Louis XIV put wigs at the cutting edge of fashion.
He meets cancer patients who have learnt to "embrace your inner bald", as 16-year-old Sophie puts it, the wig shop owner who surprises customers by wearing her own stock, and meets the opera singer who loves to wear wigs on stage.
But still, Brian is nervous when he is fitted for a wig, and is even more terrified when he has to wear it in public. What if someone realises he's wearing a secret wig - and why does he care so much?
Producer: Freya McClements.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This was an impregnable fortress. The only way you get out was in a wooden box. |
| 0:05.0 | The controversial maximum security prison impossible to escape from. |
| 0:09.0 | And one of the duties of a political prisoner is the escape. |
| 0:12.0 | The IRA inmates who found a way. of a political prisoner is the escape. |
| 0:12.5 | The IRA inmates who found a way. |
| 0:14.5 | I'm Carlo Gableer and I'll be navigating a path |
| 0:19.5 | through the disturbing inside story of the biggest jailbreak in British and Irish history. |
| 0:25.0 | The narrative that they want is that this is a big achievement by them. |
| 0:28.5 | Escape from the Maze, listen first on BBC Sounds. |
| 0:34.0 | This is the BBC. |
| 0:39.0 | Hi, I'm Riana Dylan. |
| 0:41.0 | This is seriously. my secret wig well not mine but we are about to meet people who transform their looks and lives with a hairpiece. |
| 0:54.0 | And for our presenter Brian Kernahan, this is personal. |
| 0:59.0 | He knows his hair is thinning, but he's not quite ready to go the whole hog and don a wig. |
| 1:05.0 | Get over yourself. That's what the people listen to this will say. Get over yourself. Get in there. Do it. |
| 1:11.0 | Our hair can mean so much to us. |
| 1:15.0 | Our crown, a part of our identity. |
| 1:18.0 | There's no mirrors in the room that Sophie's in the oncology and I know now why because as soon as |
| 1:28.4 | Christine the nurse got the clippers out and done bizzes there's a glass viewing panel in the door and Sophie I knew was going to go and |
| 1:38.6 | look in this. But before we meet Sophie, her dad and many more, let's head to the hairdressers. |
| 1:47.0 | I'm sorry to break at the either one that breaks at the one that breaks. |
| 1:52.0 | It's going. it's yeah. That's Ronin Stewart with me. He's a really nice |
... |
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