Charlie Brooker has had quite the year. His comedy panel show You Have Been Watching was recommissioned for a second run, he's been lined up to present a one-off show on election night, and he triumphed over X Factor and Britain's Got Talent at the recent RTS Awards. With Watching due to return to our screens this week, we caught up with Brooker to talk Big Brother, Dead Set, and his hate for House.
We're on round two of You Have Been Watching. You must be feeling pretty confident?
"Well, yeah! I don't think I'm gonna have a massive mental breakdown when faced with a studio audience, which is what I thought might happen last time! I thought I might panic, pick my eyelids off and kick them over the back row! But no, I'm feeling good. I've proved I can sit in front of people and interact!"
Is anything different this time around?
"Every word is the same! No, there's no huge changes. We're still tweaking some things, but we'll have a bit more topical stuff and a few more clips. We'll shake things around a bit."
You had some good guest stars last year. Are they returning this year? Or are you getting bigger and better people in?
"I'm probably not allowed to say who the guests are yet because they're still wrangling them about. I think we've got the likes of David Mitchell and Robert Webb and Chris Evans - and quite a lot of women! I can't be more specific... It's like arranging a wedding!"
You take the piss out of a lot of TV on the show. Which programme winds you up the most?
"You'd have to be psychotic to get genuinely angry over a TV show, unless you're watching Fox News - because they're actively trying to bring about the end of the world! One show that I don't understand is House. Why do people rave about that?! It's been going for what, six years now? And every episode is the same! The story follows the same format each time. Surely once you've seen one episode, you've seen them all?!"
Channel 4 has dropped Big Brother. What do you make of that decision?
"I don't really have an opinion either way. I don't really care! It's very expensive, isn't it? I saw the first few episodes of Celebrity Big Brother this year and then didn't watch the rest. People who did watch it seemed to think it was funny. After Dead Set, I haven't watched much Big Brother. If I was running Channel 4, would I have run Big Brother for ten years? No."
So you won't be tuning in for the final series?
"Well, it's just not what it used to be, is it? When it first started, Big Brother was a social experiment, a fly-on-the-wall documentary, about how people interact. Now people are wise to the game and you get people saying, 'Oh he's perfect for Big Brother.'"
Are you tempted to rush and get another version of Dead Set out before BB finishes completely?
"No, not at all. Everyone's dead! We always said that if we were to do that format again, we'd set it in the world of I'm A Celebrity... or The Apprentice. Don't you think an Apprentice version would be great?!"
Would you ever do a reality show yourself?
"Would I? I don't think anyone would want me to! I'm really not that interesting. I wouldn't interact very well with people - I'd just sit in a corner on my own and mind my own business and I'm not sure that makes for great television. I don't know that I'm what anyone would be looking for!"
You beat X Factor and Britain's Got Talent at the RTS Awards. How did that feel?
"I felt ashamed! I think people expected me to be overjoyed, but I wasn't. It was weird - it felt odd. I thought, 'And what?' They gave me an award, but what am I meant to do with that? Is it a car? Is it a house? No. That sounds ungrateful. I suppose I was pleased for myself, but not for beating those shows."
You Have Been Watching returns tomorrow at 10pm on Channel 4.
