Developing my career alongside a Riddiculous quiz show

Riddiculous aired last week and marked the fruition of two years’ work for the East Media team. We spoke to Producer Kirsty Proffitt who has worked on all aspects of the show. Here she tells us about her role and how ITV’s latest quiz show was made… 

My Background in TV and Progression  

“Before joining East, I worked predominantly on entertainment programmes, including five series of The Royal Variety Performance, three series of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire, Tonight at the London Palladium and All Star Musicals, so lots of different ITV shows. 

“I was working at Whisper when I heard that East Media (a part of the Whisper Group) were looking for a Development Assistant Producer (AP). I hadn’t done a purely development job, but was interested to learn more and luckily, Nathan and Michelle took a chance on me! 

"Shortly after joining East, Nathan (MD of East Media) asked where I wanted to be in a year. The plan was to pitch directly to commissioners, get promoted (to Producer) and get my first show commissioned. 

“I was hoping I could earn the promotion. I’d heard how hard it is to get ideas through, so getting a show commissioned was a dream. It turns out a year later I had done all three! We now joke we should write down ‘win a BAFTA’ as my next target.”

How it Happened  

“I had been working at East as a Development AP for about six months when Covid hit and we started working from home. My flatmate was being sent a riddle a day from her work, as a little brainteaser to help with the lockdown boredom, and it gave me an idea for a new format.

“I pitched that we should do a quiz show about riddles. At first, I’d thought it might be more of a comedy panel show, but Nathan suggested we did a contestant-based show for daytime. We pitched it to ITV who were very interested and came back asking us to do a run through – that’s just a stripped back version of the show, the idea being to run through all the beats without the lights and cameras from studio. We learnt a lot during the process and went on to develop the format further before hosting another run through a couple of months later.

“My role as AP, was to collate all the riddles and questions, write the briefing documents for our host and design the basic visual graphics. I also cast the contestants and managed them on the day. 

“We invited the commissioners down to the second run through so they could sense the atmosphere and get a better flavour of the show. They loved it and commissioned a full pilot, which was very exciting.”

Making a Pilot

“A pilot is basically a test show, it’s made under studio conditions with studio cameras and lighting so the finished article should be pretty much TV ready. I was promoted to Producer for our pilot and was responsible for all the question and riddle content. I also oversaw our graphics and music and created a cue sheet to ensure everything was played at the right time.

“After the pilot we heard quite quickly that ITV wanted to do a series – our lockdown idea was going to be on TV! 

“For the series we needed a much bigger team. My role became more overseeing the process leading up to filming. I was managing the graphics team and writers and the system into which all questions are placed ready for filming. We also had to get everything verified and adjudicated and licence all our riddles. Once we were in the studio I was positioned in the gallery with comms to Ranvir and Henry for any pronunciations or queries on questions, riddles or answers.”

Looking Back… 

“I’ve been really lucky on Riddiculous, thanks to Nathan and Michelle, as I’ve been able to work on every aspect of making the show. Normally a Development AP or Producer wouldn’t get to work on the filming, as they’d stay in development, working on more ideas. So, it’s been quite unique that I’ve been able to work on a show from conception to edit. In fact, letting me work as Edit Producer was a surprise as I didn’t have a great deal of edit experience, though I knew the show back to front. But Nathan and Michelle let me run with it and I don’t think many companies would do that.

“I’ve also been a part of bigger conversations along the way and privy to things like commissioner meetings, budget discussions and even the pre-TX promotion of the show. Nathan and Michelle have kept me across it all and I’m so grateful for that.” 

Looking back at the growth of the series and Kirsty’s progression, Nathan says “It’s amazing, Kirsty has grown in exactly the same stages as this programme has, and I can honestly say that I don’t think we’d have got it to series without Kirsty’s diligence, drive and professionalism.” 

You can watch Riddiculous every weekday at 3pm on ITV.