Comedian Faces Midlife Head on With Extreme Challenge in Hilarious TV Premiere Pilot
Local comedian, Maddi Sharkey has turned her hand to docu-making with the help of local filmmakers Richard Pinches and Liz Madgwick-Howard from Meadows Farm Studios and she premiered her pilot episode of Stuck in the Middle at the Regal Cinema last week.
Stuck in the Middle will be a series of programmes that is a light hearted look at midlife and how to remember who you are again with Maddi taking on challenges that really are outside the box. In the pilot episode Maddi entertains with a funny, realistic take on trying to complete the Engadin Ski-marathon with very little training and not the right skis (no spoilers here)! She did however raise £5,000 for the Royal Papworth Hospital where her father was treated for quadruple heart bypass.
Maddi said, “I’ve worked with Richard and Liz on a number of things over the years. I wanted to do my first documentary and it’s a light hearted look at challenging yourself in midlife so you don’t get stuck in the middle. When we were filming it we had many an up and many a down on the making of the documentary. It’s basically a pilot that hopefully will get commissioned so that we can start making the others which will see me challenging myself in various different circumstances, challenges and locations all around the world. By doing unusual things you meet people you wouldn’t normally meet and by doing something extra-ordinary you really expose yourself.”
Maddi invited friends to watch the pilot along with 40 local people who signed up on Facebook to give some feedback. Maddi said, “I wanted to get an honest opinion on whether they would like to see more episodes, can they relate to it, did they enjoy it and to come up with an idea for one episode that we haven’t decided on yet.”
Richard Pinches said, “We meet Maddi 4/5 years ago when she came to the studio asking Liz to photograph her comedy sketches. We’ve done many jobs since, including live-streaming her show, stills and video shoots together. She thought we would be too busy so she didn’t ask us originally but we really wanted to do it as we love working with her. It was a real blast to go to Switzerland to work with someone of her calibre.”
Maddi added, “All of us got a lot out of it and I think it would be a great thing to keep doing it. We really worked together. Liz did a lot of editing of over a lot of hours to get it down to 30 mins. Coming from an entry level of film-making I had to learn a lot on the job, particularly saying a lot less which would Liz’s job easier. I’m really pleased with the final cut but I would love a million quid to make it amazing but I think for our budget, what Liz put together, how hard Richard and Liz worked and for first documentary I’ve produced I’m delighted with it.”
There’s some classic comic lines from Maddi including “all the gear and no idea!” and when it all went a bit Pete Tong Maddi still could make a joke of a killer blow on completing her challenge. She’s starting to look at her other challenges which include learning to fly (even though she hates flying!), motor-crossing across Europe and swimming the English Channel.
