Nick Grimshaw's Sweat The Small Stuff: a day in the life

http://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2014/may/23/sweat-the-small-stuff-day-in-the-life

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It's Friday afternoon and Nick Grimshaw is eating some duck ("my worst meat") in a pokey, windowless upstairs room at Hammersmith's Riverside Studios, where the final two episodes of Sweat The Small Stuff's third series are being taped. "Every time I do this show I feel like I'm ripping off the BBC," he declares. "I turn up and laugh for hours. It's just people talking. I don't really do anything."

This doesn't make it sound very promising, but the Grimshaw-helmed BBC3 panel show, themed around life's little annoyances – team captains are Rochelle from the Saturdays and Kiss 100's almost indecently likable breakfast host Melvin O'Doom – is between three and four times funnier than it looks on paper. Where else would Rochelle's bandmate Mollie own up to eating food out of bins? Where else would Caroline Flack throw small bottles of piss at James Arthur's face? And where else would Example be guaranteed a desk to sit behind at least once a year, even if he never made another record? Well, Celebrity Juice, yes, but nowhere else on the BBC.

This afternoon, Grimmy estimates that series two's Flack/Arthur face-off, Urine The Line Of Fire, probably cost "about £130" to stage. "One licence fee," he perkily explains, "and worth every single penny." His parents, he accepts, aren't huge fans. "They don't watch Sweat The Small Stuff; they think it's awfully crude. Jeremy Paxman and John Humphrys are so not going to be into this. It's nonsense. But I like Rita Ora coming on and talking about having a poo at Jay Z's house. I like that it's got the word 'stuff' in the title."

Before the first of today's two tapings, I wait by the props table while semi-hits by the Wanted and Pixie Lott blare from the soundsystem and the audience warm-up guy – apparently not Sweat's usual booking – is showcasing a disdain for studio audiences that under the circumstances is, in its own rather unpleasant way, quite impressive. "Some are obviously unemployed, some are obviously OAPs," he announces to everyone within earshot. "But at least it's not the cast of Cocoon like you get on the Alan Titchmarsh show, know what I mean?"

Like all panel shows, this lot shoot far more than they'll ever use: half an hour into recording, they still haven't finished introducing the guest panellists. Over the next few hours I'll witness the depiction of Gary Barlow avoiding tax in a Pictionary round, Outnumbered's Tyger Drew-Honey executing a Phil Collins drum solo on a miniature drum kit, a woman who claims to resemble Jedward being accused of looking like Myra Hindley, and an almost certainly award-winning joke about Solange and Jay Z's elevator fracas (punchline: "Humiliating on every level"). Throughout, there are relentless gags about Rochelle's band splitting up.

Afterwards, while guests such as David Haye and Tamara Ecclestone mill around, I meet up with Grimmy and the team captains. When Melvin appears, he sports a Pharrell-inspired hat that has been another prop in one of the recordings. I note that it is, quite obviously, not a Vivienne Westwood original. "That's because BBC3's closing!" Grimmy shouts. "We can't afford it!" I helpfully point out that BBC3 is not closing. It's moving online. Right? "Yes!" Grimmy hoots. "It's 'moving online'."

The quote marks he seems to be applying to "moving online" echo widespread scepticism regarding the BBC's future vision for Three. It's a plan that, if genuine, still seems to be three to five years ahead of actual viewing habits. Still, Grimshaw thinks it could work. "When people used to say to me that people would watch telly online, I'd go, 'Are you fucking mad. Nobody's going to watch telly on the internet. That will not be a thing.' Then I got a telly with the internet on and it's brilliant." He's so impressed with this whole internet-in-tellies business that he's even had an idea for a Netflix chatshow. The pitch is impressively direct. "No regulations, get sponsorship, quite a good idea, right?" he beams. "Don't steal it."

Rochelle Humes appears. The first time I met Rochelle on Guide business, she was Rochelle Wiseman, age 13 – one eighth of S Club Juniors – and she was wearing an eyepatch following the removal of some sort of lump. "Rochelle mings," one of her colleagues informed me in 2002. She's 25 now, and I'm pleased to see that Rochelle continues to command a strong sense of respect from her co-workers. "Are you sad that it's the end of the Saturdays and the end of BBC3?" Grimmy teases.

"Oh shut up!" she screams, much as she did in 2002. "You're so annoying!" I ask Rochelle, Melvin and Nick what sort of hole would be left in popular culture if BBC3 decided to "move online" earlier than expected, making these the very final Sweats. "They won't do that," Rochelle declares.

"Well," Grimmy splutters, "they might."

Rochelle suddenly seems worried: "I hope that's not true. Do you think they might? I love my Friday nights! I get out the house and I get to have a drink!"

And that hole that may or may not be left in popular culture?

"Turd-shaped!" Grimmy decides.