I’ve considered applying for Channel 4’s Come Dine With Me in the past. Who doesn’t want to hear narrator Dave Lamb’s take on their cooking? I’ve never had the guts to do so, but I’ve known three people who’ve taken part. One was a former work colleague, one an award-winning Belfast drag queen friend and one is a cartoonist who just so happens to have worked for a certain funny little publication called OiNK!
In 2013, Psycho Gran’s creator David Leach starred in one of the primetime editions of the series, the ones which show all four nights of the competition over the course of one hour rather than spread out over a week. I’d never seen his episode (I’d have remembered seeing the large framed picture of Psycho if I had) and I’ve always wondered what it’s like to take part in the show, so it felt like the perfect idea for a blog post.
David is the first host and any OiNK fan will be in awe of his home, with the dining room’s wall-to-wall comics and movies, Psycho Gran on the wall in the living room and, if you look closely, one of my favourite strips greeting visitors by the front door. Two of his guests, Joh and “funtime vicar” Levi poke fun to begin with and surprisingly it’s Noelle, who seemed a bit stuck-up in her intro, who comes to David’s defence while he’s off cooking. These were first impressions only and by the end of his night there’s a definite feeling of respect for his work and a love of his sense of humour.
As for his cooking, sporting a fetching apron David served up three pun-labelled courses, beginning with quail eggs (ooh, fancy) on mushrooms and toast with ham and hollandaise, followed by a hearty lamb dish I’d pay anyone to cook for me, and a coconut pie for pudding that I’m definitely going to have to try for myself. Unfortunately, contrary to the narration, the recipes are no longer on the Channel 4 website “to add to your own online scrapbook”. (So I’ve pestered David for his recipes.)
He’s certainly got knife skills, I’ll give him that! While in the kitchen, his gloriously Leach-like puns are sometimes met with corny music and some funny Dave Lamb narration, as we’d all expect. The music choices elsewhere are often genius. David tells Levi he doesn’t believe in organised religion, only for Levi to then admit he’s a vicar. So cue Papa Don’t Preach for David entering Levi’s home a couple of nights later.
It’s on this particular night that I burst out laughing a few times. Watch out for David’s deadpan reaction to Levi’s Jesus painting, for example. He told me one of his own favourite moments also came from that night, when he heard the sound man in the next room laughing at his comment after Levi plays a song on the piano. I won’t ruin the moment for you. Or how about when David apologises for offending Levi, only to immediately take it back when Levi says he wasn’t.
There’s a bit of tension between the two but over the course of the week they embrace their differences and produce some genuinely funny moments together. You could say there’s a bit of a story arc between the pair that ultimately leads to a conclusion in the competition that couldn’t have been better planned if it had been scripted. Speaking of “scripted”, I asked David about the production itself. How real is this little slice of reality telly?
“The first time you meet the others is when they knock or ring on the door”, David told me. These bits sometimes look staged so I was surprised! “But their entrance is filmed three times.” Ah! “The show is very stop/start,” he continued. I suppose with limited space in people’s homes it’s not like they can have multiple cameras catching everything organically. “They’re stopping to recored reaction shots. The show is very carefully editorialised and controlled. I was surprised how long the days were, when you were hosting they were setting up at 8am, they didn’t leave my house until 1am and you’re doing it all again the next day.”
Sounds exhausting! So is any of it actually scripted? Are the conversations, which can sometimes lead to confrontations in other episodes, prompted with specific conversation starters by the crew?
“Not that I remember, although I don’t need them. There were topics we were told not to talk about, for example Noelle’s house was infested with mice, which we watched run along the work surfaces and floor but we weren’t allowed to talk about it because they weren’t filmed. The director knew all our secrets and was steering the conversations. The conversations are stopped during the meals to get reaction shots of the five guests. It kills conversation. Also we were shepherded by an assistant and if we started having interesting conversations we were told to stop and save it.”
Overall it seems contestants do talk about what they would’ve discussed without the crew there, it’s just all done in a very (unfortunately necessary) unnatural way.
“Levi was told he had to tell us his secret (him being a vicar) and Joh had to reveal her ‘glasses secret’ (that she wears a fake pair to look smart – Phil). I was encouraged to do my party trick of fake vomiting (far too convincing, that! – Phil) and the show tried really hard to get me to dress up as a superhero, but I refused. I told them after I would have dressed as Godzilla. They know lots about us, so they steer conversations but it’s all us.”
Obviously it’s pure luck who we’d end up sharing the screen (and our dinners and homes) with if we applied, and in this case David seems to have lucked out and been given an enjoyable bunch to spend four very long days with. David’s own genuine character comes across and I get the impression from him that the same is true of the others.
“Of the three of them, I liked Joh and Noelle the most and for a while we’d go out for meals,” David says. Joh is endearingly ditzy and her mixing up the jobs of vicar and fishmonger is a classic moment. I also love how honest she is about cheating with shop-bought ingredients on a cookery show. Then there’s Dave Lamb’s comment, “that’s some party trick”, when Noelle claims the eggs she’s cooking “are my friend’s mother’s”!
Speaking of Mr Lamb. How was it being the subject of his famously cutting commentary?
“I knew going in that because of my personality if I wasn’t 100% honest I would be branded as the villain. I also knew of the four of us I was the most interesting (I’m not being big headed), so I approached it totally honest, no game play. Dave Lamb clearly took the piss out of me and also claimed my foaming hollandaise sauce had split but it hadn’t, and Levi claimed he was missing an egg, he wasn’t. So I don’t really mind about Lamb. I was the joker, I played jokes, I battled with Levi and I didn’t back down, so I was fair game.”
I won’t spoil the show if you haven’t seen it by giving away what position David finishes in, but I’m curious about what he thinks of the overall experience. With all of the things that come with the production of a TV show (and in your own home to boot), what did he make of starring in Come Dine With Me?
“For me, it gave both halves of my brain a chance to work together in unison; the creative side and the performing side. I could see my creative side writing gags for me and at one point I started laughing early because I read a joke I lined up too soon. Actually I loved… bloody loved it all”, he concludes.
Between the original series, the primetime version, the couples, the professionals, the celebrities and the Christmas specials there are nearly 2,000 episodes of Come Dine With Me available to watch on Channel 4, and it doesn’t help that they’re not split up into seasons. Just as well I’ve got a link for this episode then, isn’t it?
Eat beforehand though, or you’ll be starving by the end.
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