The Cutprice Guignol

But Lou, I hear you cry, it’s October! Is it not time for you to indulge your horror bullshit with some semblance of an excuse for once? And, my dear readers, you are completely correct. Because while this may seem like a post on a twenty-year-old British reality TV show, I am actually here today to talk to you about the finest piece of horror television ever to emanate from the craggy shores of the UK: Come Dine with Me.

For those not in the know (which would be quite a feat, given that the show has been running for the better part of two decades and has left barely a native tongue untouched with its various international iterations), Come Dine with Me’s premise is simple: five people who are condemned by the same postcode compete against each other to host the best dinner party, with the other contestants serving as both the guests and judges. Hosts are judged on their cooking abilities, entertainment provided, and the general atmosphere of their homes-turned-party-venues, with their opposition giving them scores out of ten in the taxi on the way home, much in the same way I did with one-night-stands at university.

Come Dine with Me was required viewing in my house growing up, and I soon became pretty much addicted to it. Not because of the food or the atmosphere or the chance to see disparate personalities overcome their differences and come to a deeper understanding in the process – no, because this show is pure British horror, no matter which way you slice it.

Take it from the perspective of the guests, to start with. In a room with people you don’t know, forced to spend an evening doing the usual “and what do you do?” talk, in front of cameras? In someone else’s house? Eating food they’ve made off their forks that don’t quite feel right? And doing all of it with the knowledge that you’re on national television and one wrong move will render you the social pariah of the week? The pressure, the pressure! It’s like waking up in a Saw trap, except instead of having to fish a key out of someone’s stomach to undo a device wired into your jaw, you have to figure out if the moderately good lemon meringue pie makes up for the fact that your host made you watch their nephew play the tuba for twenty-five minutes.

Which is, of course, if you choose to play fairly – because there’s always the threat of someone just annihilating your score for the sake of walking away with the thousand-pound prize money (not even remotely enough, and somehow marginally less impressive when it’s presented on a silver serving platter at the end of the five dinner parties). The equivalent of Leatherface peering out from beneath someone’s flayed face, only marginally less sympathetic, these villains will look down that lens and give someone a two out of ten when they clearly deserved at least a four for the table decorations alone.

And that is, of course, not even taking into account the sheer terror of actually hosting one of these events (confession time: I sincerely believed as a kid that I would eventually be called up for Come Dine with Me conscription, and had a general outline for my menu and light dinner party conversation lined up in preparation). Having other people in your house at the best of times is marginally hellish, but when you don’t even know them, when you have to serve them food you’ve vaguely guessed at them liking that they are going to be looking for any flaw in to knock down your score, and, on top of that, you have to find something that will entertain them all? I can imagine only those forced into gladiatorial bouts, facing the fatal punishment of a downward thumb, could have begun to understand that level of pressure.

While there are, on paper, far more disturbing things to come out of British TV than Come Dine with Me, I think we can all agree that, in terms of sheer social horror, nothing comes close to this dinner party clash of the titans. Are you a fan of the show? How well-cultivated was your plan for your dinner party when you were inevitably called up to serve in the Come Dine with Me trenches? Let me know in the comments!

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(header image via Vegan Food and Living)