COOL JOB / CRAP JOB
DV Director Mikey Trotter on an assortment of TV jobs . . .
CRAP JOB
+ Celebrities Under Pressure asked to put name tags on all the celeb dressing rooms. Little did I know that I had spelt ‘David Seaman’ VERY inappropriately…. said dressing room sign was found first by my exec, who luckily saw the funny side!
+ Biggest Loser trying to find overweight contestant, without being allowed to actually approach overweight people, I spent days and days in south london handing out flyers near fast food shops and doing call outs actually on stage at Mecca bingo. “Two Fat Ladies” indeed.
+ Who You Calling Stupid my first EVER interview and directing job, turn up to punters house to find he is paralytically drunk, he attacks the camera man and can barely remember his own name let alone string a sentence together.
+ Undisclosed programme – holding punter auditions for top prime time TV show, for the door to open and in walks a guy I had dated nearly 10 years previously which ended on very bad terms. Que me VERY red faced and a VERY short interview.
+ Cash In The Attic – Worlds worst 24 hours. Went to wrong airport so missed our flight to aberdeen. Had to get middle of the night flight to Glasgow and drive the 5 hours to aberdeen. Arrived just before shoot started after having no sleep. Filming in gale force winds, My camera was blown over and hit the floor and split straight in two, we were over 400 miles from London with a Z1 in 100s of pieces at a cattle farm in the Outer-hebrides, we then ran out of petrol on top of Ben Nevis on the way back.
COOL JOB
+ Project Catwalk – The day It all paid off. . . I had done a degree, was working 1000 hour weeks as a runner trying to claw my way up to be an assistant producer ….Then, on this day I got to spend a day doing male model underwear casting, a day long conveyor belt of storm/select/premier male models for my entertainment.
+ MFI Advert – Runner – Kitchen advert – Art director asked me to toast a whole loaf of bread from “lightly toasted” to “heavily burnt” and line them up, he then picked out the piece he wanted, which was used in MFI add that ran for 2 years. My mum still tells people this story and shout ‘Its Mikey’s toast’ when EVER it came on the screen.
+ Glastonbury BBC - the wettest glastonbury in history, lightning hit the pyramid stage, all the generators washed away by river, looked like the end of the world. I had the best time though, with access all areas pass, a top of the range landrover with leather seats, and a hotel, watched Coldplay from the wings of the pyramid with Kate Moss and shared a plastic spoon with Jo Whiley.
+ Claire Sweeny ‘My big Fat Diet’ Being flown first Class to LA, driving a covetable mustang around, put up in swanky hotel on Sunset Boulevard with a wallet full of cash and the strict instructions to take Claire out to all the best restaurants and eat what ever we wanted… this job was worth every minute of all the crap jobs we have all done where you stay in a Travelodge on the edge of a motorway, eating stale croissants, driving a Kia people carrier filming punters you wouldn’t wish on your worst enemy.
+ Unknown project - A big bag of cash and a very exciting shopping list, a day at Tiffany’s Jewlers on Bond street picking out gifts for my exec, for punters who had won a show she was doing.
