WATCH OUT.. FRED’S ABOUT
Flintoff set for ‘Beadle-style’ pranks series
ENGLAND cricket star and Top Gear host Freddie Flintoff is being lined up to be the next Jeremy Beadle. Production firm Zig Zag is making a new TV prank show for ITV in the mould of the hugely popular Beadle’s About.
And bosses want the Ashes player-turnedtelly star to front it.
Freddie has already worked with the production firm in the 2011 seven-part series Freddie Flintoff Vs. The World. In it he took on a series of extreme sporting challenges with stars such as footballer Dennis Wise, fellow cricketer Darren Gough and basketball star Dennis Rodman.
A TV source told us: “Freddie is the natural fit for the show.
“He’s a larger-than-life character who loves a laugh and a joke, and a show with him helping people to prank their friends would be a huge ratings winner. The makers want him to front the show and that would also go a long way to helping them secure the best slot on TV for the product.”
Beadle’s About ran for 10 years until 1996. It was watched by up to
15million viewers – making it one of TV’s most popular shows.
Beadle died aged
59 in 2008.
Zig Zag is now searching for contestants who want to fool their pals. They tell would-be contestants: “Do you have a mate who is larger than life? Does your mate deserve to experience the prank of a lifetime?
“Zig Zag Productions are looking to speak with people who want to stitch up their hilarious mate in the most memorable of ways – with the aid of a celebrity.
“This is for a new hidden-camera TV prank show on a leading UK broadcaster.” One of You’ve Been Framed host Beadle’s most famous pranks was when he and his team of actors had Dorset woman Janet Elford convinced that aliens had landed in her garden.
Only once did a prank backfire badly, when a man who was led to believe that the front of his house had been turned into a lorry park thumped Beadle in the back.