The Transvestite Lesbian Disabled Satanist With No Legs Who Has Sex With Animals on Thursdays and is Bald Dating Show
December 17, 2001
Approximately a month ago, I was lying mute and pickled with bourbon on our couch in the middle of the night, observing a channel-flipping combo of late night talk shows, infomercials and wacky Christian evangelistic ‘miracles’. In the midst of my listless flicking around, a booming ad suddenly blared forth at me.
‘Do you want to be in the studio audience of an EXCITING new Channel 9 show? Ring this number now!’
Although the evangelist on television had managed to will a suspiciously fit-and-healthy-looking woman to walk from a wheelchair - immediately healing her previously incurable crippling inability to walk - I couldn’t make it to the other side of the room to grab my mobile phone without stumbling, dangerously swaying, then smacking my cheekbone into the carpet. But I knew that I had to reach the telephone: it was immensely important that I secure tickets to this, this… well, I didn’t have any idea what it was. It was usually the shithouse shows they were vague about, wasn’t it?
I received a phone call from Channel 9 the next day and they collected further details from me, provided a time and date and told me to turn up to the studios.
‘What’s the show?’ I requested, a little suspicious at being dragged into something absolutely woeful that’d involve me being keeled over more by the pressing need to empty my bladder after being locked in a taping studio for hours, than to be knocked out with blockbuster television entertainment.
‘We can’t say just yet, all confidential,’ she cooed down the line at me, and that was all the information they were providing me with. I decided to let it go - I wasn’t going to turn up to something as vague as this.
Yet on Friday I received a phone call from the audience co-ordinator again. ‘We can tell you who’s hosting the show on Sunday now!’ she chirped. ‘It’s just been all rather secret up until now.’
‘And the host is?’ I prompted.
‘Jerry Springer,’ she informed. ‘So turn up at 2.30pm… actually, you might want to turn up at 2.00pm, we’ve been getting really big crowds for the shows over the past week, and had to turn some people away yesterday, so get in quick.’
‘Will do!’ I hung up with a new sense of curiosity, and promptly located Adam for a proposal.
‘Who’s doin’ it?’ he mumbled, absently clicking away at his computer.
‘Jerry Springer!’ I exclaimed in my best television voice-over voice. ‘Although I’m trying not to get my hopes up that it’s a full-blown trash talk show, because I know he did a late-night interview show in the UK.’
‘Hmm,’ Adam thought. ‘I actually have to go into work on Sunday. Anyone else who can go with you?’
I racked my mind - then it hit me. McCraig! We used to watch Jerry Springer on our lunch break together at the job I had around this time last year. Eagerly dialling his number, I hoped he’d be as enthusiastic as I was.
I’d barely managed to get half a sentence out before he cried ‘JERR-YYY! JERRRR-YYYY! JERRR-YYYY!’
Which explained how we found ourselves milling around the entrance of Channel 9 this afternoon, one hour before the time we’d originally been told to get there. We sure weren’t going to miss out on seeing our quasi-hero in the flesh.
A security guard grunted at us that he couldn’t let us back in until an hour later, so we sat around and McCraig chainsmoked as I methodically destroyed a number of leaves lying around on the ground. Eventually the guard relented and admitted the small crowd which had begun to gather.
As we settled ourselves into Cafe 9 to wait to be admitted into the studio, we watched some of the cricket that happened to be on the TV screen on the wall. Then, on a commercial break, an advertisement for A Current Affair appeared, listing all their upcoming stories this week.
‘Jerry Springer!’ McCraig exclaimed, stabbing towards the television over our heads. A number of people turned their heads at the mention of his name. Although the volume was muted, it appeared Jerry was to be interviewed on A Current Affair this week. Promisingly, the promotional footage showed lots of brawling and fighting from his show in America.
‘Maybe it really is going to be a trailer trash show!’ McCraig tittered excitedly.
‘Don’t hold your breath,’ I advised. ‘I don’t really think that kind of show would work here. You’d have a hard time getting anyone to go on it… people just aren’t that instant-fame hungry, I don’t reckon. Not that desperate.’
‘Enter through here, please,’ a security guard boomed out from the other end of the cafe. As if drawn to a magnet, every person in the room attempted to funnel themselves through the cacophony of hundreds of bodies which were forcing themselves through a single door.
‘Quick,’ I prodded McCraig, and we joined the line of people. Slowly, we were lead up a dirty old set of stairs and into an interesting props storage area.
As the line stopped moving and stayed stationary for ten minutes, we realised we must be in for more waiting. We couldn’t quite see the line ahead of us as it curved around into the studio, but there was a lot of energetic dance music pumping out. I started observing the conversations around us - the lady behind me was pointing out a set of frilly cushions locked in some cages to our right.
‘What a goddamn fashion faw-paw,’ she observed.
Faw-paw? I ran it over in my head a couple of times, before realising she had intended to point out a faux-pas. Although it felt horribly snide and nasty, I had to bite my tongue to stop myself from laughing out loud. Looking up, I noticed McCraig was doing the same thing. The loud group of girls in front of us, however, couldn’t contain their laughter.
Smiling up at them, one of them pointed out a gaudy pastel-and-gold wooden construction looming over us on the left. ‘Don’t ya think that’s from The Price Is Right?’ she asked. ‘My friends don’t think so.’
McCraig studied the structure. ‘I think The Price Is Right has been cancelled for some time now.’
‘Oh!’ I exclaimed. ‘It’s gotta be Burgo’s Catch Phrase. Love a bit of Burgo action!’
After collapsing into laughter, one of the girls surfaced to express her love of the show. ‘There’s nothing funnier than seeing an old person’s face light up on that show after they win $20 for getting a question right. I mean… $20!’ Further laughter.
Then, the line lurched forward and we began progressing further towards the studio. After we stopped once again, I realised I could crane my neck around the corner and see inside the studio.
‘What’s it look like?’ McCraig asked eagerly.
‘It looks like a giant circus tent, and… there are three stools down the front of the stage!’ I exclaimed. ‘This does look like trailer trash material!’
‘Oooh,’ McCraig rubbed his palms together as we moved forward slowly once again. The only people between the studio and us were the giggly girls and a producer-type with clipboard in tow.
‘What’s the show about?’ one of the gigglers asked the clipboard man.
‘It’s called It’s A Love Thing,’ he advised her. ‘Dating show with a couple of twists, going to be on in the UK and Australia.’ He then turned his head to the rest of the crowd. ‘Riiiight, I need a group of three,’ he requested of the remaining queue of people. The giggly girls shrieked their way to attention, and galloped into the studio, which appeared enchanted - it was meticulously decorated with thousands of tiny winking fairy lights. As McCraig and I attempted to enter, we were stopped with a forceful shove back from a security officer.
‘Not yet,’ he frowned, then returned to the man with the clipboard, who was now standing on the stage and pointing at certain people to swap seats. ‘We just need a good gender balance in the front row,’ he yelled to the crowd.
‘Hang on,’ I mentioned to McCraig. ‘This doesn’t look good - all the seats look really full.’
‘I think we’ll be right,’ he replied uncertainly, as the security guard returned, frowning harder now.
‘Uhhh,’ he announced to the remains of the queue. ‘We’ve got a full house guys, can you just, uhh… follow me outside over here.’ A muttering, angry group of around fifty people shuffled through a door into the carpark.
As he began to open his mouth to explain, a pug-like little unwashed woman behind me piped up. ‘I drove for hours down the Central Coast just to fuckin’ come here today, I fuckin’ love Jerry Springer, fuckin’ rip off, fuckin’ ridiculous! I want some fuckin’ compensation!’ Others in the crowd murmured their agreement as my stomach sunk, and I realised that we wouldn’t even have a chance of getting into that studio.
‘I’m really sorry about this, but they’ve basically passed responsibility down to me to explain all this to you guys, and, uh… well, they’ve overbooked the show, which is a standard practice for all TV tapings, but they’ve overbooked this show like never before. I’m really sorry, but it’s not really my fault, uhm…’ he trailed off.
A couple of people grunted in annoyance and began walking back to their parked cars, but most started voicing their opinions of this process. ‘You guys should know how many people to book, you’re all fuckin’ idiots,’ one woman declared.
‘Look, all I can recommend that you do is to ring up Channel 9 and make a complaint,’ he offered.
‘What good will a complaint do?’ Pug-woman demanded behind me. ‘I want fuckin’ petrol money as compensation.’
‘This is a really bad situation for me too, guys,’ he insisted. ‘This isn’t much my business at all - it’s the producer, and he refuses to come out here to talk to you guys, and I’m really sorry.’ With this, the crowd seemed to collectively shrug, fumble for their car keys in their pockets and head out back past the security boom gates at the front of the television station. However, a small group of around five people - including myself and McCraig - remained.
‘Why don’t we go?’ McCraig sighed. I waved him away - ‘I’ve got an idea,’ I winked at him.
‘But fuck, man,’ McCraig raised his voice. ‘They told us to arrive super-early, which we did, we knew they were turning people away, and we went out of our way so we could come and see Jerry Springer… and all this to be turned away by a matter of THREE people.’
‘Hang on,’ I dismissed him, and approached the security guard, now shielding his face from the irate Pug who’d travelled from the Central Coast. Desperately, he turned his gaze to me.
‘Can I make a small request?’ I offered, in my most confident voice.
‘Sure,’ he asked, ready to defend himself from more criticism.
‘Well, I’ve done a lot of work in customer service,’ I began, before realising that this sounded like more complaining. ‘I think I know how you could fix this. Really, all we came to see was Jerry Springer. To be completely honest, I don’t really care that much for dating shows, no matter how twisted they apparently are. We just wanted to see the man in the flesh. Do you think that it’s possible - at all possible - he could quickly just say hello to us before he starts his show? That way, everyone goes home happy.’
The security guard cocked his head at me and smiled as the Pug relented. ‘Let me just go and check,’ he assured me, rushing back into the building.
‘As IF,’ the Pug criticised me. ‘He’s not coming back out,’ she pouted at the locked door in front of us, and stormed out past the security gate. McCraig, myself and a young boyfriend-and-girlfriend remained, milling around.
Fifteen minutes later, I began to feel a little disappointed in Channel 9 as an entity - we still hadn’t heard anything.
‘Should we go?’ I began to ask McCraig, when the door clicked itself open, and there was the man himself. The master of chaos I’d seen so many times on daytime television, surrounded by two rather beefy security guards.
‘Hi, guys!’ he smiled at us, having charmed us over already simply by being there. ‘I heard what happened - I’m really, really sorry. If I had my way, you guys would be in there too, but I’m not the producer of the show.’
We all grinned dumbly at him, not one hundred percent sure what to say. The boyfriend-and-girlfriend immediately presented a pen with a request to have their arms autographed, for lack of any paper at all. As they underwent this, I racked my brain for something both immensely witty and intelligent to impress Mr. Springer with.
As the boyfriend and girlfriend slowly walked off, rubbernecking over their shoulders, McCraig suddenly spoke up.
‘I’m really sorry I’m not a transvestite lesbian disabled Satanist with no legs who has sex with animals on Thursdays and is bald,’ he grinned insanely. ‘Is that why I wasn’t allowed into your dating show?’
I gaped at him. How the fuck do you say something like that to someone like this?! I mean, he’s Jerry Springer and all, but… he’s Jerry Springer in the flesh. Standing right in front of us. The gravity of it all began to hammer home - normally I’m not fazed if in close proximity to a celebrity, but this was all so unreal, such a one-on-one situation!
‘I’m really sorry, but we have certain rules on this show I’m hosting,’ he responded, laughing it off. ‘We only allow transvestite lesbian disabled Satanists with no legs who have sex with animals on Thursdays who have hair. Ratings,’ he nodded at McCraig. Collapsing into laughter, I felt relieved that he didn’t take things too seriously.
‘I’m Jeb,’ I introduced myself. ‘I saw you’re being interviewed on A Current Affair this week,’ I observed.
‘Well, they’ve already interviewed me, a lovely young lady last week. Why?’
‘Oh,’ I replied. ‘I was going to say, if you come into contact with the host of that show, Mike Munro… just run for your life. I imagine you’ve seen many soul usurpers in your time, but this guy tops the lot.’
‘Thanks for the advice,’ he smiled. And we continued with some more small talk about his time in Sydney for five minutes. Just little things about how much he’s enjoying the weather, how nice it is for him to be able to walk around here without having people follow him around, and all that kind of thing.
‘I really should get back in there,’ he admitted, as the producer appeared in the doorway and urgently motioned at Jerry.
‘You know what, I really do fucking appreciate this,’ I said. ‘Not many people really would have done this.’
‘No, the pleasure’s all mine,’ he replied. ‘Now I have to go and deal with dating desperadoes for the rest of the afternoon,’ he whispered secretively so the producer couldn’t hear. With that, he disappeared back into the darkness, and a security guard remained to walk us out of the station.
‘How goddamn surreal,’ McCraig looked up at me after a few moments of silence.
‘I met Jerry Springer, and all I did was warn him not to go near Mike Munro,’ I noted.
‘Your work here has been done,’ McCraig grinned at me. Nodding wholeheartedly, I walked outside Channel 9 in the knowledge I’d saved at least one soul that day.
