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Gogglebox: How the show’s producers help stars forget about the cameras

Celebrity Gogglebox star said that contributors ‘genuinely forget’ they’re being filmed

Isobel Lewis
Wednesday 21 April 2021 09:02 BST
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Gogglebox's Jenny Newby engages in detective work for Line of Duty episode

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Gogglebox viewers have finally found out how the show’s stars act so naturally on camera.

The popular Channel 4 series has been running since 2013 and sees families across the UK watching the week’s TV from their own homes.

Appearing on Esther Rantzen’s podcast That’s After Life, writer Gyles Brandreth, who has appeared on the spin-off series Celebrity Gogglebox, admitted that the contributors are given food to help them forget they’re being filmed.

“This is how it’s done,” Brandreth said. “They come to the house at the beginning and they set up the cameras in the room. They then go away for two months. The cameras are permanently in the room and you genuinely forget they are there.”

He continued: “You are alone in the building and that lulls you into a false state of relaxation… They send round Deliveroo with different treats – fish and chips… chocolate eclairs, the crisps and all of that.

“So these little sweetmeats arrive and they like you to be seen bringing it in and you can hear that little chit-chat and then you have the snacks together."

Viewers of the show have been entertained in recent weeks by star Jenny Newby, who has been writing names down in a notebook while watching Line of Duty.

The reality TV star was then shown to have “joined” AC-12 in a hilarious photoshopped image shared on social media.

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