A date someone usually sets you up on, where you have never seen the person, or you met them through a personal ad and you haven't seen their picture.

How has no one yet noded the ultimate populist British TV show, Blind Date?

Presented by ex-singer Cilla Black, it's the program they can't replace. The format has become the blueprint for copycat shows on every channel, but the original is still the best.

All TV companies, when recruiting researchers ask candidates to submit a 500 word pitch for a program like Blind Date, then carefully file away the ideas to use as their own at a later date!

Black presides over a female contestant picking one of an unseen line-up of three lads, and vice versa. The two couples from last week also return to discuss how much they hated the others guts. Unless they get on famously, whereupon Cilla makes a joke about buying a hat. Cue uproariously laughter from the entire country.*

The three questions are in fact written by the researchers, as the contestants are often so mind-numbingly stupid that they can't even come up with the base double-entendres required.

Of the three people concealed behind the screen, one is often a "madcap" personality, put in to entertain the audience, and standing little chance of winning the Date due to being blatantly pathetic / a psycho / living with his mum, aged 39.

People always end up picking the prospect with the most similar accent to themselves, as they tend to feel safe if they stick to their own class - toffs pick Sloanes, Essex lads pick Cockney lasses and so on. Alternatively, someone with a spookily similar passion for pet tarantulas will be planted in the line-up by the mischievous researchers.

While the contestants don't always shag the person they were matched to, they often end up shagging a third party. Unless they're the Golden Oldies, who no-one really wants to watch, and whose appearance creates a power surge, around the country - "Oh no, it's old people. Fuck this, I'll make a cup of tea"

*One Blind Date resulted in a Wedding - Cilla wore a hat, which became the talk of the tabloids. I think it had been a quiet week.

Also a comedy (about a blind date) released in 1987. This movie stars Bruce Willis and Kim Basinger, but also features Phil Hartman (you may remember him from such roles as Troy McClure on The Simpsons), John Laroquette, and William Daniels.


The story is about a "workaholic," named Walter Davis. His company is conducting business operations with a Japanese man, Mr. Yakamoto. Mr. Yakamoto is old world Japanese, as the movie describes it, and he believes that women should stay in a subordinate position, speaking only when spoken to. Walter, being the workaholic that he is, doesn't have a date to a business dinner that is conducted between his company and Mr. Yakamoto's company, and his boss wants him to bring one.

He talks to his brother (Phil Hartman), who fixes him up with one of his wifes' cousins. He is warned (sort of) not to let her drink because she "gets crazy," but naturally, he does anyway, not thinking that it would be too big of a problem. She hardly has anything to drink, but is still totally nuts by the time that they arrive at the dinner.

After this, Walter's life takes a rapid turn for the worse, and by the end of the night, his nice sports car is totally beat up, he has lost his job, and been arrested for assault with a deadly weapon. Overall, a pretty funny movie.

Log in or register to write something here or to contact authors.