After a long period of disappointment, Les Dennis fans will be hoping that his new ITV gameshow,
“How Far is Your House from the Station?”, will rejuvenate the career of the Celebrity
Masterchef and Celebrity Big Brother runner-up. Dennis, 62, has recently fallen short as the front man of numerous TV flops, with many wondering as to where and how he finds funding
for his shows.
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| Running out of ideas? |
Homophobia aside, contestants of the show even grew tired of Dennis after his meagre matchmaking success rate. During the show, contestant Cindy Helmets did not hold back her lack of faith in the host, asking “why would we take relationship advice from a C-list celebrity whose wife cheated on him with Bob the Builder?”.
The move towards making “Les Finds Love” could not have come at a worse time, as Dennis had already been in trouble over a recent ITV 2 channel show titled “Les Been”. “Les Been” involved Les Dennis travelling to various places across the Merseyside region, interviewing locals and getting involved in local events. Although the show made no reference whatsoever to its homophobic title, it was generally agreed upon that purely naming a show in this manner portrays a great deal of impertinence and an overall lack of respect.
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| Upset Dennis must reflect on and learn from past mistakes |
“I have no idea why he persisted with this whole Les/Lesbian gag”, says long-term Les Dennis critic, Frasier Pyramid-Bag. “It keeps landing him in trouble, and it’s not as if it’s even remotely clever in any way. Completely not worth it”.
After offending large numbers of the lesbian community, Dennis finally abandoned the Les/Lesbian gag, replacing it with another gag; this time based on the notion that “Les” sounds somewhat similar to “Let’s”. A move in the right direction perhaps.
Below is a full list of Dennis’ recent unsuccessful ventures:
Stiffen that Dynamism – A gameshow based entirely around stopping objects from moving
Les Tennis - Les Dennis, coached by British number 7, Colin Fleming, embarks on a career in tennis, with the ultimate aim of qualifying for Wimbledon
Disguise and Amaze with Les Dennis - A hidden camera show in which Dennis dresses in disguise whilst talking to members of the general public, before eventually revealing his true identity (this backfired as most people failed to recognise him)
Scrupulous – A gameshow based on day-to day routines, in which contestants competed against each other in tasks such as cleaning, car parking and putting the bins out
The Best Dennis - Les goes on a journey through history to definitively determine which Dennis is the best Dennis
Les Get Real - An attempt at a serious political panel show discussing current affairs
Les Dennis Gets Lost – Les Dennis purposefully gets lost and has to try and find his way back home
Les Dennis Off the Rails – Les Dennis sees how far he can travel on trains without paying for a ticket
Dapper and Dennis on the Pull – With the guidance of Dapper Laughs, Les Dennis tests his flirting abilities on various nights out across the UK
We asked self-proclaimed TV enthusiast, Macaulay Binbag, about Dennis' recent shows. “Disguise and Amaze, yeah I vaguely remember that. It was very cringey.”, says Binbag with a sour wince. Binbag added that he “remembers an in-studio section of the show called 'Whes Dennis?' where Les Dennis hid somewhere and contestants had to find him. It was obviously supposed to be ‘Where’s Dennis’ but Where’s and Wes don’t sound enough alike, so they had to force it. Terrible idea. Whes isn’t even a bloody word. Desperate.”
Others on the other hand are less cynical. The ever-outraged Paul Armpit defends Les, stating that “British TV nowadays is full of immigrants”, before adding that it is unfair that “British TV legends like Les Dennis can’t even get a look-in”.
After the failure of Dennis’ most recent show, Les Dennis
Gets Lost, Dennis found himself lost in a much realer sense. Dennis has been
visiting the Liverpool Jobcentre on High Street, seeking jobs in TV-hosting. Regular High Street jobseeker, Dave Radius, was particularly star stuck when seeing Dennis enter the Jobcentre for the first time. “I loved family
fortunes so you can imagine my excitement when Les walked in through that
door!”, exclaimed Radius.
More recently, rumours about Dennis’ state of mind have circulated viciously. “I saw him in Iceland buying some crispy pancakes”, says local shopper, Gordon Organ. “It was very sad to see. The way he bought those pancakes, it was like he’d given up on life”, he added.
“I heard that he struggles for any high so much, that for a small adrenaline rush, he sometimes puts his hand out for a bus but then doesn’t get on”, says Liverpool resident, Morgan Spacebar.
Listed below are the other most commonly accounted Les Dennis rumours:
- He flosses his teeth with guitar strings
- He has been spotted stealing bread from, and shouting expletives at ducks in his local park, making children cry in the process.
- He tests himself to see how long he can go for without urinating, until the point where he eventually wees in his pants
- He writes on slices of ham, addressing them to local schools and posts them. He then goes into the schools demanding that they give him back his ham. The children are reported to be terrified of him.
More recently, rumours about Dennis’ state of mind have circulated viciously. “I saw him in Iceland buying some crispy pancakes”, says local shopper, Gordon Organ. “It was very sad to see. The way he bought those pancakes, it was like he’d given up on life”, he added.
“I heard that he struggles for any high so much, that for a small adrenaline rush, he sometimes puts his hand out for a bus but then doesn’t get on”, says Liverpool resident, Morgan Spacebar.
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| Whes it all gone wrong? |
Listed below are the other most commonly accounted Les Dennis rumours:
- He flosses his teeth with guitar strings
- He has been spotted stealing bread from, and shouting expletives at ducks in his local park, making children cry in the process.
- He tests himself to see how long he can go for without urinating, until the point where he eventually wees in his pants
- He writes on slices of ham, addressing them to local schools and posts them. He then goes into the schools demanding that they give him back his ham. The children are reported to be terrified of him.
Dennis’ 2008 autobiography, titled “Must the Show Go On?”,
indicated that even he knew his time in the limelight had come to an end. But all is not yet lost for Dennis, who has been handed a lifeline by ITV, who have granted Dennis an outlet for his new gameshow, “How Far is Your House from the Station?”, which he hopes will be a crucial
turning point in his career.
“How Far is Your House from the Station?” is a geographical gameshow, in which contestants will compete against one another based on how far they live from various stations (Train, Bus, Fire, etc.). At the start of each round, Dennis enthusiastically shouts, “Will you win that prize vacation? Well how far’s your house, from the station?”. The audience frequently accompany Dennis in shouting the latter half of his newly adopted catchphrase.
Fellow TV personalities, Sam and Mark, have been given a section of the show titled “Inside the Station with Sam and Mark”. In this segment of the show, the affable duo will visit a different station each week, getting to know the staff, as well as the general ins and outs of station life. The pair’s smash hit, “With a Little Help from My Friends” plays in the background throughout this section of the show.
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| Sam and Mark also hoping that this show will provide a long-term steady future in TV |
Dennis says that he is “excited to start the new show” and adds that he “can see a long future for himself in presenting it”. “HFIYHFTS” will air on ITV2 at 1pm every weekday.
