Steph and Dom Parker reveal they reach for the stars in their new makeover show, and are also getting hunted down for charity…
We’re used to seeing Gogglebox’s Steph and Dom Parker on the sofa having a giggle over a drink. But prepare to see them in a fresh light in two different C4 shows this week, when the pair star in new makeover show, Steph and Dom’s 1-Star to 5-Star, and go on the run in C4’s Stand Up To Cancer Celebrity Hunted.
Here, TV Times caught up with the couple, who reveal viewers will see them propelled from one extreme to the other this week…
Why did you put yourself up for Celebrity Hunted?
Dom: "We’re great fans of the original show and thought we’d love to do it. We were very inexperienced and the stress becomes very real! I wouldn’t want to experience it for real." Steph: "We had an absolute blast making Hunted but we didn’t enjoy the stress of moving on every two days and the paranoia. We were gibbering idiots! I wouldn’t do it again."
Is Steph and Dom’s 1-Star to 5-Star more within your comfort zone?
Dom: "Yes! We’d a lot of fun along the way – it’s light-hearted with a solid base." Steph: "It’s Come Dine With Me meets The Hotel Inspector meets The Apprentice meets Four in a Bed, meets everything! We visit B&Bs and hotels around the country and set them challenges. We really roll up our sleeves and do it with them. It’s hard graft. They want help on how to run their business and we can show them how to do it – and more importantly how not to do it!"
What does it involve?
Dom: "We set them challenges to give them the confidence to update areas of their hotel. We absolutely muck in with cooking, painting, sewing, ironing – all the things we don’t do in our own hotel! We’re there for a whole week and help them realise you don’t have to spend £5000 – you can makeover a normal room into something really nice, very economically… if you get Steph to paint for eight hours!"
How do you figure out if the makeover has been a success?
Steph: "At the end we discover if they got their five-star rating from the guests or not. We help the hotel try things they may not have thought of before, whether it works or not! It’s a very honest, real show."
If you could choose celebrities to help in your own hotel, who would you pick and what would you have them doing?
Dom: "Prince Phillip on reception!"
Steph: "And Catherine Tate as Bernie being useless and entertaining everybody. I’d also get Aggie MacKenzie as my head of housekeeping, Gordon Ramsay in the kitchen and Lewis Hamilton as the chauffeur!"
Are you planning on doing any more Gogglebox?
Steph: "No, we’ve taken a break. We think it was probably the right move for us at the right time. It’s one of those shows you need a rotation of people’s opinions and voices. Other people should be having an opportunity. We’d said pretty much everything there was to say about stuff. You got the measure of what we’d be saying. It’s like we served our purpose and it was time."
How do you feel about the TV opportunities that have come your way as a result of Gogglebox?
Steph: "If all these TV opportunities ended tomorrow that would be all right – it’s not something we ever wanted but it’s happened. The experiences we’re having – who gets to do that in their 50s? And to do it together. It’s life’s rich tapestry!"
Steph and Dom’s 1-Star to 4-Star is on C4, Monday to Friday at 5.30pm. Celebrity Hunted airs on Tuesday 10th October at 9.15pm on C4
Interview by Victoria Wilson
