Phillip Schofield looked “diminished and stooped” with a “vulnerable look” as he broke his silence after confessing to an affair with a much younger colleague, a body language expert claimed last night.
The former This Morning star sat down yesterday to speak for the first time since leaving the ITV programme, saying he will die ‘sorry’ for the ‘sadness’ he has caused his young male lover.
Body language expert Judi James told MailOnline that while Schofield was questioned about his affair, which he previously called “ill-advised, but not illegal,” he sucked and massaged his blue vape “like a stress ball.”
The former host had “his shoulders drooping down” with “deep furrows on the sides of his mouth that suggested misery,” as he categorically denied not grooming his former lover.
When Schofield recounted his pathetic text to his co-host Holly Willoughby to tell him how “deeply, deeply sorry” he was for lying to her about his secret relationship, Ms James told MailOnline that he had a “classic facial full of sorrow’.
Looking ‘diminished and hunched’ with a ‘vulnerable look’ last night, Phillip Schofield broke his silence to admit he’s been a ‘broken’ man since confessing his affair
Body language expert Judi James told MailOnline that while Schofield was questioned about his affair, he was sucking and massaging his blue vape ‘like a stress ball’
“His eyes widen before his mouth clenches, drawn down empathetically at the corners,” she said.
The star admitted that “no one has done anything wrong except me” in an interview with The Sun, where he gave some “visual cues to signal fear.”
In a separate grille by the BBC’s Amol Rajan, he was questioned over a photo showing him attending the young man’s drama school when he was a pupil and just 15 years old.
Schofield helped the young man get a job at ITV, which he started when he was 18.
He said, “It was a totally innocent photo, a totally innocent Twitter following, of which I follow 11,400 people, and then it was a totally innocent back and forth time about a job, about careers.
‘What is wrong with that? What’s wrong with talking to someone regardless of age?
“Does that mean if you follow someone on Twitter, you absolutely don’t talk to anyone else or give advice?”
Studying Schofield’s movements as he was sternly questioned as to whether he was grooming the young man, Mrs James said: “As the list of charges is read, his head tilts, alert to the words, which would normally indicate surprise or disagreement with what is being done. said. His blink rate increases to suggest tension.”
As Schofield states that he categorically failed to groom the young man, he “visually protests his innocence by throwing his hands out and up, shaking his head, and holding his vape in one hand.”
In a separate grille by the BBC’s Amol Rajan, he was questioned over a photo showing him attending the young man’s drama school when he was a pupil and just 15 years old.
As he declares that he categorically failed to care for the young man, he “visually protests his innocence by throwing his hands out and up, shaking his head and holding his vape in one hand”
But admitting it was ‘unwise for it to happen’, Ms James said ‘there’s a deep nod of acceptance and eye contact with the interviewer here’.
When he reinforces the point that “it was consensual,” he uses “eye contact and a precision gesture to get his point across,” the body language expert said.
Schofield cut a mournful figure in interviews last night apologizing to the young man he dated, his wife who lied to and his co-star Holly Willoughby, whom he failed to tell about the relationship.
The two bombshell interviews were released just hours after ITV’s boss Dame Carolyn McCall was summoned to appear before MPs to answer questions about the broadcaster’s approach to protection and complaints handling.
Schofield’s admission to the secret relationship plunged the broadcaster into a crisis, with sponsors pulling out of multi-million pound deals and former employees behind the scenes of This Morning making claims of ‘toxicity’.
The Committee on Culture, Media and Sport has written to Dame Carolyn today asking her to attend Parliament on Wednesday 14 June at 10am.
The instruction comes after the station was forced to a humiliating climb downhill yesterday, where it announced it would engage a lawyer to “carry out an external assessment to establish the facts” surrounding the ongoing chaos that has engulfed ITV since it was released. scandal erupted.