Mad for It
Encyclopedia
Mad For It was a British
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

 game show
Game show
A game show is a type of radio or television program in which members of the public, television personalities or celebrities, sometimes as part of a team, play a game which involves answering questions or solving puzzles usually for money and/or prizes...

 for children which was produed by Carlton Television
Carlton Television
Carlton Television was the ITV franchise holder for London and the surrounding counties including the cities of Solihull and Coventry of the West Midlands, south Suffolk, middle and east Hampshire, Oxfordshire, south Bedfordshire, south Northamptonshire, parts of Herefordshire & Worcestershire,...

 broadcast on CITV
CITV
CITV is a British television channel from ITV Digital Channels Ltd, a division of ITV plc. It broadcasts content from the CITV archive, as well as commissions and acquisitions. CITV itself is the programming block on the main ITV Network .The CITV channel broadcasts from 06:00 to 18:00...

 from 1998–2000. Series 1 was hosted by former Nickelodeon presenters Yiolanda Koppel and Mike McClean. In 2000, Yiolanda was replaced by Nigel Mitchell and Danielle Nicholls
Danielle Nicholls
Danielle Nicholls is a British television presenter, best known for her presenting of CITV from 1998 to 2001.-Personal life:...

. There was also a regular character called Pie Boy, played by Alex Verrey, who would go around hitting random people in the studio with flans in a manner similar to The Phantom Flan Flinger from Tiswas
Tiswas
Tiswas was a Saturday morning children's British television series which ran from 5 January 1974 to 3 April 1982 and was produced for the ITV network by ATV Network Limited....

.

Games in the show

Games included were
  • Stars Up Their Noses: Contestants are given 30 seconds to demonstrate their particular talent. The name of the game is derived from impersonation talent show Stars in Their Eyes
    Stars In Their Eyes
    Stars in Their Eyes is a British television talent show that ran on Saturdays nights from 21 July 1990 until 23 December 2006 in which contestants impersonate showbiz stars...

    . This competition was won at the end of the second series, by the then fifteen year-old Katie Melua
    Katie Melua
    Ketevan "Katie" Melua is a British-Georgian singer, songwriter and musician. She moved to Northern Ireland at the age of eight and then to England at fourteen. Melua is signed to the small Dramatico record label, under the management of composer Mike Batt, and made her musical debut in 2003...

    .
  • Box Clever: Contestants answer questions, and pick a prize from a box if correct.
  • That's My Pet: Contestants need to guess which is their pet amongst several similar looking animals.


Much beloved of children's television, a frequent feature of Mad For It was "gunge
Gunge
Gunge as it is known in the British Isles, or slime as it is known in America and other parts of the world is a thick, gooey, runny substance similar in consistency to paint. It has been a feature on many children's programmes for many years around the world and has made appearances in game shows...

", a green slimy goo which was regularly poured onto losing contestants and occasionally on the hosts themselves. Those who lost the games were sent to a "Dungeon of Gunge" – an enclosure directly beneath a large nose, which expelled gunge onto the hapless prisoners. In the last episode, the tables were turned and the pie boy ended up getting shoved in the dungeon.

The most notable contestant on "Mad For It" was Katie Melua
Katie Melua
Ketevan "Katie" Melua is a British-Georgian singer, songwriter and musician. She moved to Northern Ireland at the age of eight and then to England at fourteen. Melua is signed to the small Dramatico record label, under the management of composer Mike Batt, and made her musical debut in 2003...

, who appeared on the show when she was fifteen. She won the "Stars Up Their Noses" game after singing "Without You" by Badfinger
Badfinger
Badfinger were a British rock band consisting originally of Pete Ham, Ron Griffiths, Mike Gibbins and Tom Evans, active from 1968 to 1983, and evolving from The Iveys, formed by Ham, Griffiths and David "Dai" Jenkins in Swansea, Wales, in the early 1960s. Joey Molland joined the group in 1969,...

. If she had lost the challenge, she would have been gunged.
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