Diary of a Britain’s Got Talent Runner: Part 1

  Britain’s Got Talent is back on telly (or so I’m told) and in celebration (or acknowledgement at least) I thought I’d make this week’s blog entry about my time working on Britain’s Got Talent as a runner. If the word runner is leaving you confuddled, the runner is basically the lowest rung on the television career ladder. Runners make tea, run papers around the building, clean and do any other jobs those above them want doing.

  My first few days working for the show was at Blackpool for the first stage of auditions. However I’m going to skip this bit since my time at Manchester was slightly more interesting. During our first briefing at Manchester there was a list of runners who had been asked to man the cameras. One of the producers was annoyed at the fact they were all boys and asked if any girls had been with them before. And wouldn’t you know it I qualified.

  My luck didn’t end there either. First let me explain a little about how this stage works. For first auditions Simon Cowell and friends (this was a few years ago now) were absent. The closest I came to meeting him was when he rang one of the producers. So at this point producers and researchers rule the roost. Each producer is given a room and a looong line of people to watch audition. Strangely the number of singers always outweighed the number of variety acts several times. I think there were about 4 rooms just for singers, 2 for dance groups and only 1 for the variety acts. You’d think the singers would maybe have a go at the X factor, the SINGING competition but oh no, they have to try any opportunity.

  Obviously the variety acts were the ones most people would want to see and guess who got assigned to that room. My job would be to film the auditions (not for going on proper TV but so the producers could look back at what they’d seen). And it was my home for the best part of a week. Even the producers had to switch rooms to give each other a break from god awful child singers. In fact the head Producer moaned about them saying “If I have to hear one more kid singing ‘The sun’ll come out tomorrow’ I’m going to kill someone”. But not me. Variety acts of Manchester, you were mine.

  The most exciting thing about watching the auditions in that room was that I got to witness several acts that made it not only on to the show but on to the final stages of the competition. There was the dancing dog (probably long forgotten now after years of the buggers), the sexy karate men and a few others forgotten in time.

  In an effort to be strict about my 500 word count I’ll leave this diary here. Come back for part 2 when Susan Boyle fights a rhino, Simon Cowell makes everyone cake and a runner makes it to the finals (warning none of these things may happen).