Silence of the abs: Men’s Health cover model ‘seen with shirt on’

NEWS HOUR EXCLUSIVE


The magazine-buying public were sent into turmoil yesterday, by this image taken by our correspondent in Torino – it reveals that for the first time, an issue of Men’s Health has been published without a topless man on the cover. Thousands of supposedly heterosexual men are said to be ‘up in arms’ about the absence of the abs. Also apparent by their absence from the cover were the customary phrases:

‘seven days to a six pack’
‘scrawny to brawny in just eight weeks’
‘flat belly foods’
‘lose your gut’
‘six pack abs’
‘great abs easy’
‘fast food, hard muscle’

Most controversially missing was ‘get abs fast’ – for that underserved one per cent of males who are born without an abdomen, and eat into a tube. The cover model of the Italian edition – who has yet to be identified – was even seen sporting a stylish shirt and not looking self-conscious about it, much to the presumed horror of magazine chiefs in Pennsylvania, from where the tome has been honed since 1987. Only the Italians, some were said to grumble. It would never happen in America, surely?

The only previous exception was for Lock Stock actor Jason Statham, who was allowed to protect his modesty with a white T-shirt on account of his moody disposition, and because it was so universally understood he was fit that ‘a little bit of bicep’ was all that was needed.

At least, this was the public story. In an exclusive to News Hour, we can reveal the horror of what happened behind the scenes. Aping his character in ‘The Transporter‘, anonymous sources claim that Statham marched in to the photo shoot ‘smartly dressed and fully armed’, demanding his conditions for shirt wearing were met ‘or else’. Terrified staff were held at gunpoint while pleas for the snarling actor to be allowed an exception were considered. The editors held out for six hours, claiming to the board that this would be ‘the beginning of the end’ and that their journalistic standards could not be lowered. But when Statham began executing hostages, even these cynical scribblers were forced to capitulate.

Sources claim that even the formidable ‘abmaxer’ digital camera filter – used to magically ‘remove’ close-fitting clothes from difficult models – was left on the shelf, such was the fear of Statham’s formidable arsenal of fragmentation grenades, shoulder-mounted rocket launchers and twin Star M249 SAW machine guns. It is an incident that has quietly resonated throughout publishing ever since, one from which we may just now be beginning to feel the waves.