Who will be the next… Dyke-oon?

If OTT ever created a show, it would be this one. Well, this one in principle. 

Get Me The Producer starts on Channel 4, Monday 15 October. It features Greg Dyke (Grey Dyke!) overseeing an Apprentice-style challenge in which 12 people new to TV perform a series of TV production-related tasks, all hoping they’ll be the one awarded a year-long contract with a leading indie (presumably Princess, who make this).

“Television?” snaps Greg. “It’s all about ideas. Simple as that!”. And then off we go. The iconography is all present and correct – opposing teams, white boards, water coolers, mentors. And fantastic non-sequitars …

“Let’s have a little fun being creative”. “I hate losing … I’m not allowed to play squash any more, put it that way. I can be quite – you know – violent”. “Only hold the potato once … chuck a banana in!”. Plus, my favourite: “How interesting is seeing a chicken really going to be? For five minutes? On British television?”

Alas, in practise, it’s a bit more Tycoon than Apprentice. Greg’s holed up in Brick Lane, seemingly living in a flat above a library, where he’s continually shuttling executive chairs around the office, and chewing on his spectacles. Described as an “education” commission by C4, it actually feels a bit like that – as though the reality show element is merely a fashionable fiction to get across messages about working in industry. But for all that, it’s still enough to hook me. 

“If you Google my name,” says team leader Karen Seeberg, “you’ll find out I was a James Bond girl. But I really don’t want that held against me”. In fact, if you follow her advice, the first thing you’ll find is her vanity site -www.karenseeberg.com - and a spot of cracker barrel philosophy: “Life is like a wild tiger. You can either lie down and let it lay its paw on your head … or sit on its back and ride it”. Hear her roar!