King of Christmas Lights

TX: Monday 19th December, 9pm, Channel 4

This film explores the world of extreme Christmas decorating, meeting some of the UK's most obsessive, eccentric and lovable people who simply live for adorning their houses in festive regalia every year. Throwing a spotlight on what Christmas means in contemporary Britain, this Cutting Edge film will find out what motivates people to cover their houses in Christmas every single year. Are these twinkly lights-enthusiasts in fact the last bastions of community and Christmas spirit?

Some may do it for fun, some may want to bring festive cheer to the neighbourhood, others maybe for charity, but none of them can get enough of the buzz they get when the neighbours coo at their displays. The programme follows them as they plan for months, buying the latest equipment and music sequencing software and spending a lot their disposable incomes on nothing but lights. This heart-warming, quirky and entertaining film offers both an eye-popping spectacle and also an insight into their true motives, relationships under strain from overindulgent merriment, households pitted against their neighbours in a bid to make their decorations outshine all others, and whole communities united in their desire to light up the night's sky.

Paul Toole, 36, from Somerset, has one of the biggest and best Christmas light displays in the country - on which he spends around £5000 each year.  This year he doesn't only want to decorate his own house, his ambition this year is to decorate all of the houses on the street, the problem is they don't know that yet.

Twenty-two-year-old Karl Beetson from Northants is one of the most impressive decorators in Britain, he experiments with the latest computer technology to create amazing sequenced displays.  This year the computer wizard will be introducing animatronics in his display.  His ambitious plans involve building a band of cuddly animals that will perform all the Christmas songs sequenced to his lights. However, his main challenge is motivating his reluctant father into helping him put up the display, as Karl won't go up a ladder.  There's rarely a day of putting up the lights without a family Beetson brouhaha. Mum Nicky acts as mediator between father and son, a battle which Karl's dad usually loses.

Brothers Paul and Lee Brailsford live next door to each other in Bristol, work together, their homes are identical and they both have girlfriends called Emma. The brothers decorate their mother's house across the street every year because it's detached and they can decorate all three sides.

Dir: James Routh
Prod: Kufena Coulter
Exec Prod: David DeHaney, Jane Root
Prod Co: Nutopia