‘Undercover Boss’ will be Ten’s next big thing
May 4, 2010 in News by Cameron
'Undercover Boss' is coming to Ten.
‘Undercover Boss’ will be a ratings blockbuster — at least according to David Mott, Ten’s Chief Programming Officer.
The exec, who’s just returned home from the MIPTV conference in Cannes, France, was singing high praise for the reality format during a pre-Logies Mediaweek podcast over the weekend.
“We’re proceeding with Undercover Boss,” said Mott. “Which is a great success in the US”.
The format, which was originally created by Stephen Lambert (‘Wife Swap’, ‘Super Nanny’) for the UK’s Channel 4, sees the CEO of a company go undercover as a new entry-level hire to see the inner-workings of their business.
The network originally optioned the idea from Lambert a few years ago, but were waiting to see a version go to air before making any decisions on the project.
“We saw the UK version, but thought it needed to be upscaled a little bit,” explained Mott. “That’s what the American version was.”
With runaway success of the US series, Ten have bought both the CBS version and rights to a local version, which will commence production “in about six to eight weeks”.
Ten are hoping ‘Undercover Boss’ will become Australia’s next big thing, following the phenomenal success of ‘MasterChef Australia’.
“We’ve defined a few iconic Australian companies. It’s a great series. It’s a real eye opener. It’s a little ripper.”
‘Undercover Boss’ will go to air towards the end of this year or early next year.
