Engaged on Dragons’ Den was eye-opening – however one off-camera demand crossed the road.
The Dragon’s had some weird requests (Picture: BBC)
I labored on Dragons’ Den again within the early noughties, proper in the beginning of my TV profession, once I was a really junior researcher and nonetheless thought telly was all glamour, pleasure and massive concepts. Spoiler alert: it isn’t. Like most individuals beginning out, I used to be on the backside of the meals chain. I did a little bit of every thing — and by every thing, I imply every thing. If it wanted doing and no person senior wished to the touch it, probabilities have been it landed on my desk.
Some days have been genuinely good. As a researcher, you’d get early entry to the purposes coming in, and infrequently the BBC producers would ask for our opinions on which concepts have been value pushing ahead. That half felt thrilling. You felt such as you have been truly contributing, not simply making tea. And the concepts have been a mixture of artistic ingenuity and simply plain bonkers. There was one man who’d invented a cleaning soap tube you connected below the lid of your outside bin. Each time you closed it, it sprayed disinfectant inside to cease it stinking. One other inventor submitted a board recreation that was actually only a checkerboard of tiny black-and-white squares.
I used to be ordered to select up Deborah Meaden’s dry cleansing (Picture: BCB)
The one rule was you couldn’t land on white — for those who did, you went straight again to the beginning.
Utterly ridiculous, however we performed just a few rounds – and whereas it didn’t make the reduce, it was arms down probably the most infuriating recreation I’ve ever performed.
However I may instantly see why a few of these concepts made it to air. They have been so outlandish, they made nice TV. Watching these pitches come collectively was one of many few occasions the job felt rewarding.
After which got here the moments that made you surprise what on earth you’d signed up for.
We by no means truly met the Dragons themselves – on the time they have been Duncan Bannatyne, Peter Jones, Deborah Meaden, Theo Paphitis, and Richard Farleigh.
They existed in a form of legendary bubble, separated from the remainder of us by senior producers and runners who relayed directions like royal messengers. And typically these directions have been… questionable.
One afternoon I used to be instructed to go and decide up Deborah Meaden’s dry cleansing, as if this have been a wholly regular extension of engaged on a primetime BBC present.
However I additionally left tv for a cause. Behind the cameras, TV may be cut-throat, hierarchical and relentlessly thankless — particularly on the backside.
You’re disposable, replaceable and anticipated to be thankful for each scrap thrown your manner. In the long run, it simply wasn’t for me.
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