Ladette to Lady

The ladettes have just 5 days to prepare for their first big test a ‘Fruits de Mer’ luncheon at one of Scotland’s most magnificent stately homes, Manderston where they will meet the eligible bachelors. They will be expected to show off what they’ve learnt at Finishing School so far, including how to tackle sophisticated food with appropriate table manners. The girls first lessons is Oyster eating and the results are disastrous. Army girl Simone returns her half digested shellfish to the table. “It felt like I was swallowing my own phlegm you know?” In the 1950’s it was essential for a lady to be correctly dressed for every occasion. Mrs Brewer asks the girls to show her what they might wear to the end of week task. Unimpressed she asks them to choose from her hand picked selection of clothes. Most of the girls delight in the options but again it’s Liverpudlian, Charlotte Donoghue who causes trouble and refuses to change out of her revealing dress. It’s not a move designed to impress Mrs Brewer who informs her she looks like an, “absolute slut” and that “she can’t go to lunch showing her breasts”. A fight ensues and Charlotte storms off calling Mrs Brewer “a slut” in return. A crisis meeting is called and Charlotte leaves Eggleston Hall, after just 2 days, having learnt nothing. Having missed a whole day of classes the ladettes are ill prepared for the end of week task but still manage to turn the eye of the eligible bachelors. The next day the ladettes face the ordeal of the weekly assessments. One by one the girls must face the staff and account for their performance at the luncheon and in class. Then the first ladette will be ‘invited to leave’ Eggleston Hall and a car is already waiting to take her away. The ladettes get the roasting of a lifetime and one by one their hard façade is stripped away leaving some in tears, and none wanting to be the first to leave.

At the start of their second week at Finishing School six ladettes are faced with a daunting challenge. On Saturday night a selection of eligible bachelors are coming to Eggleston Hall and the girls must cook them an elaborate 3 course dinner including soufflé pancakes. Under the fearsome tutelage of cookery teacher Rosemary Shrager, the girls have got just five days to master some of the most testing techniques in haut cuisine. But it’s not just the dinner that’s worrying the staff. This term’s ladettes are the worst intake yet, indeed the teachers are unsure they are teachable at all. They hope that a physical transformation might motivate them to act like ladies. Three grooming experts are drafted in and a whole day is spent eradicating the last vestiges of ladette style. The teachers are so impressed with the results that, just like the finishing school girls of the 1950’s, they allow the ladettes a night out at the local pub. Mrs Shrager sends them off with the warning, Her warning is not heeded the girls hit the bar with vengeance. Simone Webber throws up with in ten minutes of arriving and soon after Cockney rebel Holly Clements is straddling and snogging one of the unsuspecting locals. On the girls drunken return to the hall Mrs Shrager is “appalled” to find the girls drunk, disorderly and very disrespectful. The morning after the girls face the wrath of the teachers, but Army girl Simone Webber has reached her limit and lashes out at them, storming out. Mrs Shrager finds her packed, ready to leave and riddled with guilt. She manages to persuade her, for the first time in her life, not to walk away from a difficult situation, “If you threw the towel in now you would be doing yourself a big injustice” . Her punishment fits her initial crime, she and Holly were sick in the minibus on the way home from the pub and now they have to clean it up. On the eve of the dinner party the girls are informed there will be a division of la

It’s the third week of term at Eggleston Hall, at the end of which the ladettes will be tested to the limit. They have been invited, by leading society hostess Lady Apsley, to a day of swimming, champagne and fine dinning at one of the countries grandest and most notorious country houses ‘Cliveden’. But before the week even starts a departure throws the school off course. Under the cover of darkness, nightclub bouncer Kelly Simpson has fled. A difficult week followed by a harsh assessment proved too much for her. The week stumbles on and art teacher Susan Wilson opts for shock tactics in the hope of re-engaging the girls. The girls are to paint a male nude. They giggle their way through the class but all sense of purpose and focus has gone. With a grave situation and a vacancy at the school a decision is made to bring back old girl and Liverpudlian Louise Porter in the hope her arrival will reignite competition between the ladettes. Last year Louise was a a foul-mouthed, hard-drinking torrent of trouble, but she showed natural aptitude in class, and Gill Harboard was convinced she could change. The girls are not impressed with the new arrival. But the plan to instill competition in the wayward girls backfires, the old ladettes refuse to compete and instead turn to drink. Mrs Shrager catches them red handed and a show down follows. Nichole looses her temper and reveals that her anger stems from the death of her two brothers over 10 years ago. “I was a very messed up angry little girl” The punishment is harsh – P.E at 7 a.m. in the morning. All the girls have to take part but none of them apply themselves and all treat it as a joke. Mrs Shrager is pushed to breaking point. Tensions are at boiling point and the future of the term on a knife edge. Finally the stand off is broken when 27 year old Simone Webber crosses enemy lines and apologizes for the girls’ behavior. After the week from hell the Ladette’s now must face their most spect

It’s the fourth week of term at Eggleston hall and this week the Ladettes face their first ever public end of week task. They and the eligible bachelors have been invited by Lady Amber Leighton to attend a luncheon at an international polo match. One of them will also be required to present a prize and make a speech. If recent behaviour is anything to go by it could be an unmitigated disaster. After a tense start to the week, a lesson with bohemian art teacher Susan Wilson should be a perfect tonic but today they have to paint portraits of the School Principal. Unbeknown to the girls the one who shows the most potential will be sent on a date with a bachelor of her choice. Simone refuses to apply herself and gives Mrs Harboard a green face. Nicole wins and chooses to dine with the rakish Jonathan Saxby. Being the penultimate week competition between the girls is growing. A simple dressing down from Mrs Shrarger about their messy dorms results in a screaming match between rivals Louise and Nicole. Nicole’s date is a romantic triumph and Jonathan Saxby is genuinely impressed, “She oozed confidence tonight” and Nicole delighted in the glamour of the evening “It’s like being treated like a little princess you always dream of things like this”. The other ladettes who have been allowed down the pub are in a decidedly less sophisticated frame of mind. Binge drinking is the order of the night but 27 year old Simone Webber refuses to join in. “ I have been here 4 weeks now and during that 4 weeks I have realised a lot of things about myself and it’s beginning to frighten me a little bit because I have realised what a prick I have been over the years”. Cockney rebel Holly Clements is far from impressed with the new sober Simone and instead instigates drunken East End style knee’s up with the locals. On the girl’s late return, relations between drunken Holly and abstemious Simone flare up resulting in Mrs Harboard having to step in to stop a

It is now the final week at Eggleston Hall and with just three ladettes left, the competition is stronger than ever. There has been a huge transformation in the girls over the last five weeks and now that it is coming to the end they definitely feeling the pressure. The week will be one long test for the girls; at the end of which they will face the ultimate challenge: to ‘come out’ at their ‘Graduation Ceremony’. The ceremony will be based on the Queen Charlotte Ball started by King George III in the 18th Century, which was still one of the major events of the London calendar for debutantes in the 1950’s. The big difference for our ladettes is only one girl will emerge victorious. Dance is the first lesson of the week. The girls have to practice a waltz for the graduation ceremony and already Holly is throwing tantrums. In elocution the girls are told they will each have to make a 5 minute speech which strikes fear in the heart of Romford Rebel Nicole. On the eve before the graduation ceremony the girls join the teachers for supper and they reflect on what they will take away from the hall. One of the biggest revelation is for binge drinking tiny tearaway Holly who has finally realised that “I can have one or two and still be myself and enjoy myself without falling everywhere and making a plonker of myself I suppose”. The morning of the Graduation Ceremony finally arrives. Just like the debutants of the 1950’s; each girl much execute three elements with meticulous precision: a staircase walk; an audience with members of the aristocracy and a waltz. On top of that they have to perform their nerve-wracking speeches. The girls are pampered and preened all morning to achieve the Queen Charlotte Debutant look but Louise is not impressed with the results and throws a fit. The waltzes are a success and the moving and accomplished speeches leave most of the audience and staff in tears. Finally the teachers retire to decide who is to win the h