Masterchef (BBC1) is a total waste of life — and I should know, because I’m addicted to it. It came to me suddenly and I’m still not sure how it happened. All I know is that one year I was like: ‘Masterchef. Ah, yes, it’s that foodie programme Loyd Grossman presents, which critics always call things like “Moaasterchoif” and “Mxxrgrghstrchrrxff” to show how amusing they can be about the presenter’s pronunciation.’ And the next I was: ‘Noo! Noo! No way was cloudberry coulis on calf’s brain carpaccio an ejection offence! That boy’s got talent. You should have got rid of the woman with her crappy tarte au citron…’
Actually I’ve just done another thing critics always do when writing up Masterchef: competing to see who can conjure up the most imaginatively ludicrous dish to represent the kind of imaginatively ludicrous dishes they tend to imagine get served up on Masterchef.
Regular viewers will know, however, that this is a fake observation. Yes, the competing amateur chefs do try to push the boat out with their recipes — and are penalised for not doing so: one poor chap in this new series served up a very homely steak and chips, then broke down in tears as he belatedly sensed his fatal error — but their adventurousness almost never results in the kind of road-crash dog’s breakfast dishes for which the show’s producers no doubt continually yearn.
For example, one of this year’s contenders — the one who looks like the once-vicious now-benign old lag who runs the lifer’s wing in a maximum security prison — has a thing about mackerel. Worse, of his own volition, he actually decided to serve up some of this mega-pointless greasy scum-feeding crap fish with a kind of foamed-up cold sauce made of oysters whizzed with cream. Naturally, this prompted enormous quantities of eyebrow-raising from judges John Torode and Gregg Wallace, who claimed to be able to see a disaster waiting to happen. But the disaster never materialised. Everyone who tried the dish said how good it was. So, panic over.
A lot of Masterchef’s appeal lies in this manufactured tension, of course. As with all successful format TV — from Time Team to Wife Swap — the key ingredient is ‘jeopardy’. Jeopardy is the artificial tension that the programme-makers inject into the narrative to make everything more tense and exciting than it would be if they were a bit more honest.
So you’ll have a scene where the surviving contestants are granted the coveted opportunity to work briefly in the kitchens of top chef Luc Picholine. ‘Oh, my God. I can’t believe it. Luc Picholine is my inspiration,’ a contestant will gasp. Then there’ll be a short interview with Picholine, glowering, in his kitchens. ‘My cuisine is more important to me than life itself; each one of my dishes is like a tender child to which I have personally given birth while experiencing more pain and joy than a mother could ever know. These amateurs must understand this: if they kill or maim any of my children, then the only penalty can be death…’ Cut to shot of terrified contestant, dripping sweat: ‘Chef! Chef! I’m really sorry. Can you help me? I think I’ve burned the pastry…’
In real life, I dare say, Luc Picholine is positively gagging with gratitude at the opportunity Masterchef has afforded him to plug his restaurant and fully expects the contestants to make cock-ups because, hey, they’ve never worked in a professional kitchen. And in real life too, I’m guessing, the cooks in the giant Masterchef studio-set kitchen all beaver away quietly and industriously at their dishes with hardly any mishaps or anxiety about their recipes. The tension will have been edited in afterwards: Torode wearing that ‘God-aren’t-I-a-bastard?’ sharky smile as he announces ‘tin minnuts’; Wallace mugging — with all the tasteful understatement of an eye-rolling black-and-white minstrel singing ‘Ole Man River’ — as he variously conveys ecstatic joy at the deliciousness of a pud, or abject fear and dread that such-and-such’s dish may turn out to be less than triumphant.
But all this pantomime is part of the fun. As, too, are all those tragic pieces-to-camera where the contestants tell you how oh-so-very-much they want to win. And you do want them to win, all of them: the 50-year-old mother of grown-up boys who wants a new life after parenthood; the young plasterer; the chirpy, frightfully well-spoken young Japanese astrophysics PhD called Aki…Over the course of the series’ 15 hours you really become attached to these people — much more, actually, than you do to The Apprentice candidates, because they all have genuine talent and they’re not a bunch of evil, management-speak-spouting, backstabbing tossers.
My money’s on the one who looks like the bank robber in the high security wing: I like that combination he has of rugged and gentle; I like his grace under pressure; I like the fact that he’s my age and that he believes there’s still time enough left to begin a new life…Go, whatever your name is, go!
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