Have you been in a TV audience?

I've been in the audience for the C4 and ITV versions of The Paul O'Grady Show at The London Studios. Patrick Monahan did warm-up for him when it was on C4 and went on to bigger things. When it moved to ITV, it was in a much grander studio compared to what was used for Channel 4. I still remember waiting in the audience queuing area which was in a wind tunnel. It was brutal during the winter!

My first audience participation was on The Wright Stuff just after Princess Productions took over from Anglia at MTV in Camden. They had a hardcore of regulars who went on a daily basis, largely because they offered tea, coffee and a light breakfast every morning.

The worst experience I had was being in the audience for a Martin Lewis C5 show at Whiteley's, where we had to stand up for the whole show.

Monahan was also the warmup for Golden Balls in 2007, good to hear he's done well since - many comedians started out as TV warmups, I think Stephen K Amos was doing Have I Got News For You around the turn of the millennium.



This was great. Also went in 2005, morbidly enough on the day that Jean Charles de Menzes was killed, meaning the Jubilee line driver announced to us on the way that Stockwell station had been closed due to the shooting of a suspected terrorist, which isn't something you usually hear and I was genuinely amazed they revealed the reason at all, rather than just due to a 'customer incident' or something equally vague not to distress anyone. Meant that when we arrived in the foyer every TV was showing the live News 24 coverage.

They noted that they'd very recently filmed the Two Ronnies Christmas Sketchbook in one of the studios, which seemed astonishingly early at the time (in July) but of course it was done as Ronnie Barker was seriously ill and not expected to live the rest of the year, passing away in October.

I like to think of TV recordings as a day or evening out but one which you should be prepared to have a back up plan in case you don't get in which is why I'd go to Television Centre, Riverside etc which are not far from Westfield. I'd be more reluctant to go to Elstree, Pinewood or Bovingdon which are very far to travel to and not much going on in the area.



I went to the recording of The Paul O'Grady Show when he moved to Channel 4 but it was one of the shows which were recorded as live. Was fun although Paul wasn't exactly complementary about ITV to say the least.

Wish I'd been old enough to see Lily Savage's Blankety Blank being recorded, the unedited videos on YouTube are a real hoot!

You’ve combined two locations there, the first studios used by DOND at the Paintworks and the second studios at the Bottle Yard!

The only time I’ve ever been in an actual studio audience was an episode of Deal or no Deal at the Paintworks. It was remarkable how on this occasion Noel went from off-air to on-air mode, you didn’t even know when that they’d started recorded and suddenly Noel was doing his introduction with the title music playing.

The part that stands out was during a commercial break Edmonds was signing some autographs for members of the audience, one particular loud audience member who was saying things like “you’ve moved around a bit, first you had Swap Shop then a House Party then a dream factory” in very much a jovial way was met with Edmonds squaring up to him saying something along the lines of “I’ve got my eye on you”. It was hard to tell if Edmonds was joking or not but the mood briefly changed and needless to say that audience member didn’t say much in return.

I was also recently in a virtual audience for one of the episodes of Bank Balance and I got bored very early on.

I remember they were filming The Graham
Norton Show when I went to the Jack Dee Referendum show and remember walking past the big red chair and also some of the set for HIGNFY.

I don't know if this counts but this weekend actually, I was in the SNT virtual audience. Before the main show, they filmed the final link and we were told to just go wild whenever they said to. There was a producer guiding us along for when we need to clap and cheer and that stuff. I love SNT so it was great to watch and be part of the show in some way. Ant and Dec filmed a promo for next weeks show and they change from professional to presenter mode *extremely* quickly. They also thanked the audience in the final ad break.

I've been to TVC twice. Once I was invited by a BBC employee and managed to get lost around those infamous corridors, the other was an official BBC tour in 2009, so saw most of the studios and do a green screen forecast. It really felt like how television used to be made.

I've also been in BBC White City as well, up the road.

Yep, the Odd One In with Bradley Walsh in 2010 and Question Time in 2013 (below).



If you're including actually being on TV shows too, Subzero in 2001 and Storage Hunters UK as a guest bidder in 2016. Plus BBC Look East a couple of times (most recently last month as a contributor) and also Anglia News when I launched my college's student radio station in 2003.

In terms of tours, I went round TVC a couple of times. My first was in 2001 when I was on Subzero and again in 2008 and 2009 (mainly News) thanks to Media Boy and then again in 2012.

Also went on a BBC Tour round BBC Look East in Norwich. Was quite surprised at how small poor Julie Reinger's dressing room was!

When they got to that green screen bit on my tour, as I was one of the kids they asked me if I liked Harry Potter (I think because there's an invisibility cloak in the books) and I truthfully said no. So they chose another kid to do it! What a rebel.

Been to the following -

Today With Des and Mel (Pinewood)
The Paul O'Grady Show ( TLS)
The New Paul O'Grady Show (TLS)
The National Lottery Live (Pinewood)
Sport Relief (Copperbox)
Children in Need ( TVC)
The Cube (Fountain)
The X Factor (Fountain)
Britain's Got Talent (Fountain/Blackpool/Birmingham)
Catchphrase (TLS)
Saturday Night Takeaway (TLS, TVC & Disney)
The Chase Celebrity Specials (TLS)
EastEnders Sings for Children in Need (Elstree)
Loose Women (TLS)
Qi (TVC)
The Jeremy Kyle Show (Granada)
Judge Rinder (3sixty)
Big Brother (Elstree)
Greatest Musicals (Virtual)
....and a few random pilots at both TVC and TLS.

Did you happen to be at Disney at the time or were you a competition winner?

Been to quite a few all over the place.

In Glasgow, at BBC Scotland, I have been to Hole in the Wall, Who Dares Wins, In It to Win It, Secret Fortune, Perfection, The Link (one of only three audience members at that particular recording), Celebrity 15 to 1 and a quiz pilot with Sue Perkins and Moira Stewart which I can't for the life of me remember what it was called.

Been to Pointless at Elstree twice, to The Last Leg and Safeword at The London Studios and to The X Factor in Newcastle and two BGT auditions in Glasgow and Edinburgh.

I have also been lucky to freelance for BBC Scotland looking after studio audiences for the last few years so have been able to watch a lot more.