Chat's What I'm Talking 'bout

The rise of the chat show seems almost unstoppable with two brand new shows of this genre launching in the last week. To find out what it really takes to even get one of these shows commissioned, we asked media mogul Horatio McNabb to look over what makes a great chatshow;

The most important experience that keeps people engaged in chatting to one another is the fact that they have to like the person they are talking to - it just makes perfect sense doesn't it?! Never mind the subjects they may talk about, or indeed you may take a vested interest in the people they chat to, so long as you like them then it doesn't matter. That's why Sharon "Shazza" Osbourne is perfect as the host of the latest and greatest chat show ever. I mean look at all the skills she has - parenting skills (as evident by her wonderfully behaved and brought up children), marriage skills (as evident by her wonderfully behaved and socially adequate husband), people skills (as evident by her wonderful personality evident every week on X-factor as well as the fact everyone can relate to her living in two mansions on either sides of the world) as well as computer hacking skills. All of these factors add up to one great package - someone you would definitely want to live next door to and be best friends with and thus they would make a great chat show host.

People often say to me "But Horatio, why choose a celebrity to host the show, when there are so many people who are good at chatting who aren't famous. Mrs.Dinkleweather down the local post office can talk for England, so why not give her a chance". Now, I don't know Mrs. Dinkleweather, but I can bet that she doesn't have two mansions, and even if she did, nobody would care as she isn't a celeb. Fact is people don't care for chat shows with interesting questions or exciting conversation topics. They just want to hear celebs talking about any old rubbish on their tv screen like a glorified version of heat magazine without the words. Sharon knows this and regularly mocks the "chat show" by acting as if she is reading everything in a monosyllabic mess from the dullest autocue known to man, well aware that people are sitting by their TVs, lapping it up like an elixir to increase your brain knowing power - ironic eh?

Charlotte "Chazza" Church is another who regularly flaunts the conventional rules of the chat show - she harshly takes the mickey out of the very celebs who exist to populate her chat show. Some may say this is a foolish move, as the celebs will take offence and not come on the show just for the sake of her trying to play up to her controversial image given to her by the tabloids, but of course those people are wrong as I have proved before people are only bothered about the pictures than any substantial content. She again puts two fingers up by stealing content from other shows, dressing up as a man (!!!) and doing pranks on the general public much in the same way that Ant & Dec as well as Friday Night Project do, except much worse. She knows she is isn't making anything that hasn't been done better on about 100 shows before and is purposely making an ironic show to make a statement not only about the chat show industry, but about the society we live in. That's why the shows of her and Sharon work as some of the best television this country has ever produced.

Horatio McNabb is Commissioning Editor for Deal Illusion Productions