The TV Producer

We were interviewing for a researcher and in walked this small, impossibly pretty brunette who wearing a very low cut top that gave us constant glimpses of what seemed like perfect breasts. She was however totally useless for the role and thick as pigshit but still go the job as I really wanted to have sex with her.

This happened about a month after she joined. I then promoted her to assistant producer and the sex got even more intense. The fact that it had to stay a secret (inter-office relationships were banned by the company’s owner) made it more intoxicating.

Far from being a secret, she’d blurted it out to a few colleagues when pissed one night. As such the owners found out and I was given the old Spanish archer. We carried on seeing each other after that but it wasn’t the same and just fizzled out.

A presenter friend went to a casting the other day held by a female executive producer from a new production company. The gig was to present some crappy, cheap little show for Living TV that also involved a no-mark reality star.

On their own in her office at 7pm (that was the only time she could do) and after about 10 minutes of witty banter, she then fixed him a steely stare and asked “Do you have a big cock?”

Slightly thrown by the change of tack, my presenter friend embarrassingly shrugged and said “I suppose so, never really thought about it.”

“Well get it out, now!” she demanded. Now my friend is not known for being shy when it comes to using his good looks to get jobs but he’s in love at the moment, so this was a no no. It also didn’t help that she was “as big as a whale with a face like a bulldog chewing a wasp”

After explaining his position, she flipped, threw him out and uttered the immortal words “you’ve made a big mistake. You’re a talentless fuckwit and you’ll never work for me” As you can imagine, my mate was gutted.

We’ve all done it.

Things to irritate on GMTV (Get Moving Thickos)

-Scripts written for the criminally stupid – viewers and presenters.

-Roving reporters in some awful town reporting on things like dangerous river levels.

-The (to quote Ian Hyland) ‘surprisingly married’ Ben Shephard.

-Penny Smith’s Dallas outfits and crap ‘funnies’ at the end of her turn.

-Andrew ‘I’m the housewives favourite’ Castle whom I know to be a little more than in love with himself.

-Lorraine, so sweet she gives you that bile in the throat feeling. It’s actually quite a skill to interview guests that were on earlier in the morning and manage to fake interest. You still want to punch her though.

-The cheap set and graphics from the early seventies.

Overall - Anchorman meets Noddy

All TV, by its very nature, is manipulated in some way or faked by producers. We have to do this otherwise people wouldn’t watch. If we just filmed everything, put it all together and then transmitted it, everyone would want to hang themselves whilst having their teeth drilled.

I have lost count of the times I’ve persuaded people to say or do stuff on camera that they wouldn’t normally have done in a million years. This includes the man who had a fetish for car exhausts and although never actually carrying out his desire to have sex with them (whilst still attached of course), I got him to actually do so on camera. It was tastefully done though, there was no nudity involved and the exhaust went on to make a full recovery.  

I have filmed a guy addicted to (or so he claimed) masturbation who embarked on therapy sessions that involved walking through a market and stopping in alleys to knock one out. I had asked to the therapist to make some treatment up that we could film and this seemed like a good one.

Then there was the girl who was selling her virginity to the highest bidder. I managed to get her to include the need for asphyxiation in her ad even though she had never done it nor in fact wanted to. We then filmed some of the respondents showing exactly how they would do the deed.

All reality stars are there to be exploited and manipulated for the entertainment of viewers. http://thetvproducer.com/archives/97 They will be for as long as reality formats exist and people want to watch them.

Reality tv ‘stars’

Nearly every reality tv ‘star’ I have had the misfortune of working with or met has been the vainest, most self-obsessed pain in the arse imaginable. I’m not talking about the reality talent shows where many participants actually do have talent for example the likes of Leona Lewis, Will Young or that opera singer who grew his teeth in Coca Cola. No, I mean those fame obsessed no-marks who’ll do almost anything to get on the box or in the papers. In pursuit of this nirvana, they live in houses or on farms, carry out laughable tasks, pretend to be ‘motivated’ to reach some pointless goal, humiliate and degrade themselves in any attempt to steal the limelight from their fellow saddos.

Of course, as programme makers, the joy is that there is no end to the queue of people wanting this. No matter what the format, we will always find ways to exploit some fat special needs girl with a penchant for flashing her tits in order to get good ratings. If you ever hear a channel apologising for bullying or a physical confrontation that happened on a reality programme, don’t believe a word of it. In some programmes I made, we actively courted those reactions all to get more viewers. When one got out of hand, the channel publicly slapped our wrists but privately couldn’t have been happier. It doesn’t really what people are saying as long as they are saying it about the programme and thus watching it.

They are all unconscionable idiots before they get their taste of fame but a brief flirtation with celeb status turns them into complete and utter shits. They get agents, drop names, use coke heavily, make demands to make Mariah Carey wince and complain about press intrusion even though that’s the thing they crave above all else. Because they have no discernable talent however, they soon disappear off the radar, stop getting papped and end back in their local town trying to live off their notoriety.

There was one exception to the rule, a big brother contestant who was booted out quite early for being a nasty beeatch and public enemy number one. We were going to use her in a pilot for a new gameshow and she actually turned out to be rather nice, quite charming and very easy to get on with. In fact we got on well enough to have a drink-fuelled porn film sex session. Although we didn’t use her in the end, she was a pretty good presenter and was successful for a while and lasted a little longer than most.

I have given gigs to two girls who slept with me.

The first time, I was looking for the talent to present a new daytime programme on one of the main terrestrial channels. The channel’s first choice was well-known, popular and a shoe-in for the job. That was until they got wind that a Sunday tabloid had pictures of her doing Charlie. The channel couldn’t risk it so asked us to find a newcomer with real star potential.

After two days casting, I had a shortlist, one that didn’t include “P”. She was a sloaney blonde ex-model who had been languishing in the obscure and little-watched satellite channels. Her screentest wasn’t going to set the world alight and I’d seen better during the casting. The following week, P rang wanting to meet for a coffee. She flirted outrageously from the start and kept going on about how much she wanted the job. I knew the flirting wasn’t genuine but didn’t care. We went on to a few bars, then dinner and bed. She got the job and I continued seeing her for a while until the filming ended. Realising my usefulness had ran out, she moved on in her pursuit of greater fame. I have seen her recently in ad for a thrush treatment cream.

Peter “I’m free!” Andre says he’s in talks with Latoya for an MJ tribute. More self-publicising tosh that will no doubt evoke a reaction from the other idiot.

One day, even the most dumbass of their fans (aka single-cell organisms) will not trust a word either of them say. I will try my hardest never to write about them again.

They were talking about Jeremy Kyle on ‘You Have Been Watching’ on C4. When I worked on an ITV daytime chatshow, we had the Kyleman on to talk about his ‘life-changing’ journey to Africa with the programme (also on ITV) in which highlighted the plight of poor kids. Before his self-congratulatory back-slapping appearance, he was talking in the green room. He said that the only reason they went out there because it was the end of the series and was a bloody good jolly for everyone. All heart eh.

A researcher who is working for me at the moment, says that it only takes one drink for him to start talking about how horrible his guests are and the stupidity they show in actually coming on the programme - something we’ve all known for quite a while Jezzer.

I’ve been involved in a few of these programmes and have faked it.

          Like many students, my University years were spent getting annihilated, not doing much work and trying to get laid at every opportunity. I somehow managed to scratch a good grade in Law, an astounding feat thanks to a website where I bought all my essays.

After leaving college, I spent a few years temping. Cleaning out the fat from the sewers was a particular highlight. My tools in the turd trade were a white jump suit – yes white – and a long broom handle with a hook on the end. This was used to break up all the congealed fat that had made its way down to the sewers from kitchen sinks. That may not sound too bad but the solidified fat acted like a sieve catching every floater and other unimaginable objects from toilets across London. I threw up violently the first time and only did one more day before I thought it just wasn’t worth it.

Then there were the mind-numbing filing jobs in banks working with fat girls who would go out at lunchtime, drink Gin with slimline tonic and eat baked potatoes with just tuna. To those girls I can now tell you an amazing secret - tonic water doesn’t make you fat! It’s all the chocolate, cakes, crisps, KFCs, burgers and curries you shove down your enormous gob every week that make you fat. Losing weight is actually a very simple science.

The litany of crap jobs continued for a year or so until I met Samantha in a club. She was a plainish brunette with an astounding body and a penchant for the gak. As well as being a complete and utter lunatic, it turned out that her father owned a very successful production company making children’s programmes that sold across the world. Her Dad got a producer to interview me for a runner’s position. Steve, the gayest man I’d ever met (and still is to this day), flounced in and proceeded to tell me what a crisis he was having with one of the presenters who was about to be exposed in The News of The World. Apparently her wholesome image was about to take a battering with pictures of her snorting coke. This was a refreshing change to any other interview I’d ever had and I that’s when I thought that my future lay in TV. Steve actually didn’t care what I was like and wasn’t really conducting an interview, he’d been told by Samantha’s dad to talk to me and knew that it was actually a foregone conclusion. 

So began my first TV job. It didn’t last very long because when I stopped seeing Samantha a few weeks later, it was amazing to find myself not in the job anymore.

The BBC can get it woefully wrong with sport – the British Open being a fine example. The constant droning on about ‘the greatest sporting achievement ever’ when talking about Tom Watson or what seems to be a pathological fear of using graphics or even giving us the leaderboard – there were a few shouts at the screen.

I would like to praise the BBC though for their F1 coverage. The thing they’ve got spot on with F1 is they actually explain what can be very complex rules, technical specifications and strategies. They don’t treat you like a petrol head nerd and I’ve found it compelling.

Jake Humphrey is a very likeable guy who knows his stuff, makes it look easy (which it’s not) and knows that he’s got one of the best jobs in the world. Check out his blog

A far cry from someone like Steve Jones, the smug bastard who thinks we’re the lucky ones to be watching him. He’s supposed to be a complete nightmare to work with.

The only bit that gets on my tits is the ‘EJ / DC’ stuff which wears a bit thin – like EJ’s hair spiked as if he were a teenager binge drinker from Sunderland. A minor groan though.