By now you're probably well into BBC Three's new reality show South Side Story. If you've missed it this far (then what have you been doing with yourself instead?) it's basically what happened that time that TOWIE met Glee in South London and everyone had a totally great time.
We talked to director Jonathan Stadlen about how he made the show, what happened behind the cameras and whether it's all as real as it seems.
Hello Jonathan! How did you pick the cast of South Side Story?
We did eight or nine weeks casting in South London. The only criteria was that they needed to be a great character with an interesting back story and they needed to be able to hold a tune. We weren’t specifically looking for rapper and singers but it turned out that lots of people of that age living in South London were pursuing creative paths.
How close to real life is it? Is this the Made in Chelsea OMG I CAN’T BELIEVE I JUST BUMPED INTO YOU OF ALL PEOPLE or is it more organic than that?
Well there’s two ways of looking at it; it is all based on real life so we’ll sit down and ask them, ‘What’s going on in your life?’ So for instance Ny is struggling to get a record deal and a lot of the things we filmed were around that.
And what’s the other way?
So we’ll look at someone like Jayden who has a ‘certain’ type of personality and we say, ‘What would happen if a person like this met a person like that’ and then we’ll go and find out what happens if we put those personalities together. Most of the time we’re dealing with real life stories that have been produced up for dramatic value. The storylines definitely come from real life rather than a script writer.
Was it inspiring spending so much time around the cast and the area?
Its got a completely different attitude and soul to other parts of the city and the cast have a whole different way of expressing themselves; to add music onto that and allow them to express themselves in song (which they seemed to already be doing anyways) was really lovely. It was an amazing cast to spend a year with.
Which story line do we need to keep an eye on?
I think you want to keep an eye on Mim and Shahnequa. It starts in show three and that’s a really great storyline that develops there. Also the Trilogy storyline with Gilly and Fayy.
And have any of the cast had and exciting prospects since the show aired?
I mean if the show really takes off it’s a huge platform for their talents. A lot of them are established rappers or singers but some of them have never sung before and are totally incredible. Shahnequa is an actress but when she starts to sing the world stops. I hope they all get the success they deserve because rather than a lot of reality stars they have a talent that they actually do something with.
*Catch South Side Story on BBC iPlayer.
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This article originally appeared on The Debrief.