Five Guys a Week commissioned to series by Channel 4

2 May 2019

Five Guys a Week, a new dating show produced by Label1 for Channel 4, has been commissioned to series.

Channel 4 has ordered an additional 9x60” episodes to accompany the pilot, filmed earlier this year, creating a 10-part commission.

Gilly Greenslade, Factual Entertainment Commissioning Editor for Channel 4 said: “This simple format goes well beyond the realm of a traditional dating show. The pilot was hugely entertaining, but also explored what people actually want from their partners as well as offering a revealing – and sometimes surprising - insight into the male psyche.”

Five Guys a Week is the latest factual entertainment show from Label1. The series is an antidote to traditional dating shows, offering the ultimate test of romance, compatibility and stamina by providing one singleton with five trial live-in boyfriends for a week – all at the same time.

The locally-sourced men, all meeting the picker’s exacting standards, will jostle for supremacy as they compete for admiration from the moment they set foot across the threshold.

The format fast-tracks the ‘getting to know you’ phase of a relationship and gives the dater a unique opportunity to compare and contrast five suitors in real time. 

The men will go everywhere with their host en-masse: whether that’s to work, on a night out with mates, or for dinner with the parents, with a combination of fixed rig and roaming cameras following all the action. There is only one rule - the picker must eliminate four of the men by the end of the week, whittling them down to the last man standing. Will he turn out to be the perfect match?

Casting and pre-production has now started on the series, which enters production this summer.

The executive producers are Barnaby Coughlin, Simon Dickson and Lorraine Charker-Phillips. Series Producer is Helen Richards. Five Guys a Week will be the first Label1 show to be executive produced by Coughlin, who joined Label1 from Twenty Twenty where he executive produced First Dates and First Dates Hotel.

Label1 Head of Factual Entertainment Barnaby Coughlin said:  “We’re delighted to be going to series with Five Guys.  It’s a format that speaks to a universal concern – being loved -  that will work in any language, in any country in the world where people long to find their soul mate”.

The show is a further addition to Label1’s increasing factual-entertainment slate, which also includes the Dara O’Briain-fronted Family Brain Games (BBC Two, TX summer 2019) and eccentric travelogue Monkman & Seagull’s Genius Guide to Britain (BBC Two).

Label1 are known for award-winning popular television series, including agenda-setting documentaries, Hospital and School (BBC Two).  

Five Guys A Week is their first major series for Channel 4 since 2018’s The Job Interview.

ENDS