FROM Sooty and Sweep to Kermit and Miss Piggy, our screens were once full of innocent romances between puppets.
Now a new generation of felt-covered figures are set to get down and dirty on a new Channel 4 show fronted by former Great British Bake Off presenter Mel Giedroyc.
The Really, Really Rude Puppet Show will see her host a different celebrity every week reading out erotic fan fiction — about the stars themselves.
Every lurid detail will be acted out, with celebs providing the words which will be lip-synched by the puppets.
A TV insider said: “This is arguably one of the most bizarre and brilliant shows ever devised — and it’s certainly a departure for Mel.
“She’ll be joined by a famous face who’ll have to recall some of the saucy stuff that’s been written about them over the years.”
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The six-parter will see each celeb join Mel for a “private book club” session, with both host and guest unaware of which story they’re about to be confronted with.
Mel said: “This is going to be a celebration of erotic fan fiction. With puppets. Imagine a world where Jackie Collins meets Thunderbirds. I’m so looking forward to a trip to Love Island...via Tracy Island.”
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The show will air later this year, and viewers should bank on plenty of laughs, with celebs including Harry Styles and The Chase’s Anne Hegerty at the forefront of fans’ fantasies.
So perhaps it’s better we only see these steamy thoughts portrayed by puppets...rather than the real thing.
SELLING MORE
SELLING Sunset has been renewed for a sixth and seventh season, it was announced yesterday. Production on the next instalments of the Netflix favourite will start this summer.
The show follows the wild lives of real estate agents selling glamourous properties in Los Angeles, and has turned many of its central characters into stars.
WHICH CORD DO I PLAY?
WITH his success on The Late Late Show, you’d forgive James Corden for getting a big head.
And that’s what he and comic Ben Falcone got on the latest edition of his show as they sang Puff The Magic Dragon in a skit which saw them joined by Melissa McCarthy.
Just a heads-up: There are more big names when he brings the chat show to London next week, including President Joe Biden, Vin Diesel, Jamie Dornan and John Boyega.
C4 HUNT FOR TOP TOURIST
CHANNEL 4 hopes to take the notion of competitive holidaymaking to another level with a new daytime show called Strangers On A Plane.
At the start of the week, five holiday-hungry Brits will jet off to the same hotspot, with each taking control of the group’s activities for 24 hours.
The sunseeker whose day is crowned the best will win another week in the sun to enjoy with their friends or family.
Gill Brown, from Channel 4, said of the show, which is casting now: “Strangers On A Plane is set to be a wild and raucous daytime delight.”
Come Dine With Me, but adding tan lines and pina coladas? Count me in.
FLOELLA ABUSE HELL
DAME FLOELLA BENJAMIN is a highly respected broadcaster.
But the Play School great has revealed the horrifying sexual abuse she suffered on her rise to the top. Writing in her new book, What Are You Doing Here?, Floella told how she was compromised by a BBC producer in the early 1970s.
She said: “I’d gone for a job and another powerful producer auditioned me alone in his office. ‘Can you move, Floella?’ he asked, and I began to dance.
“He threw himself on top of me. I was horrified but my fighting instincts hadn’t died. I kicked him as hard as I could and ran away from the building, devastated.”
Elsewhere in the book, she details how a director on another show cut her scenes after she turned down his advances. Almost 50 years on, it’s hard to know how much has really changed.
Taskmaster line-up
NO LOVE IN BRUV — RYLAN
IT was inevitable he’d be in the running to host the mooted reboot of Big Brother on ITV, but Rylan Clark is a long way from getting the job.
He told tonight’s The Lateish Show with Mo Gilligan on Channel 4: “I keep hearing the rumours but no one has called me. I have campaigned since the day we found out.”
But Rylan, who won Celebrity Big Brother 11, made it clear he hoped it wouldn’t come back to ITV as a hybrid of BB and the channel’s other big reality TV show.
He said: “It has to go back to basics. We have got Love Island and it is amazing and it works but I don’t want Love Islanders in the Big Brother house.
“I want real people living in that house like Jean from Wolverhampton.”
Rylan added: “I want Big Brother back where there is no interference and no outside contact.”
NANCY’S WALFORD GOODBYE
MADDY HILL’s final scenes as Nancy Carter aired on EastEnders last night – leaving fans shocked as she had only just returned to the role.
Nancy decided to flee Walford for a new life in Manchester after boyfriend Zack Hudson cheated on her.
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Maddy told me: “It’s been great revisiting Nancy and the Square over the past year but it felt like the right time to move on for now. I already miss everyone and feel so grateful to work with people I have so much love for.”
Maddy’s on-screen dad Danny Dyer will also leave the soap this Christmas. And it comes after The Sun revealed how actress Danielle Harold was devastated to be told she was being axed.
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