UKTV invites Strongman Eddie Hall to have Christmas dinner with Dave

Eddie Eats Christmas

Tuesday 27 October 2020

UKTV's award-winning entertainment channel Dave, will again team up with the former World's Strongest Man, Eddie "The Beast" Hall and North One Television for a new series. Eddie Eats Christmas (4x30') will see the towering 6ft 3in, 26st colossus take on eating challenges featuring traditional Christmas foods from a variety of communities based around the UK in each episode. These include the '12 Dishes of Christmas', beloved of Polish families the world over, a colossal South American barbecue meat-feast and a famed three-kilo naan bread challenge at one of Bradford's finest curry houses. Eddie will also burn off the calories he has consumed with a festive-themed physical challenge - taking on tests involving yule-logs, Santa-van pushes and even good old Christmas trees.

Eddie Eats America

The new Christmas specials follow the UKTV Original series, Eddie Eats America, which saw the strongman from Stoke-on-Trent go Stateside to attempt a series of eating and physical challenges. The series had an impressive consolidated average of 412k viewers, as well as drawing a strong 16-34 audience profile. Despite launching in November 2019, Eddie Eats America powered its way into Dave's top ten performing series on UKTV Play by the end of the year.

Eddie Eats Christmas is commissioned for UKTV by head of comedy entertainment, Iain Coyle and ordered for Dave by Luke Hales, Dave channel director. Richard Watsham is UKTV's director of commissioning, and Steve North is genre general manager, comedy and entertainment. The series is executive produced by John Quinn for North One Television, with Chris Amess producing and directing. The series will be distributed by All3Media International.

UKTV's Iain Coyle said,

I'm delighted that Eddie's appetite is large enough to attempt another series with us. I'm really looking forward to seeing him chomp his way through some massive, culturally diverse, festive dinners.

John Quinn, executive producer for North One Television said,

Eddie's back in really serious training again - up to three hours a day - so we're fully expecting him to have an even bigger appetite than last time - he's certainly going to need it, with the gargantuan international feasts coming his way.

Dave channel director, Luke Hales, added,

Dave viewers love a character, and they literally don't come much bigger than Eddie! It's great to see Eddie taking on more food and physical challenges for the channel and it's a real pleasure to be working with him and North One again.

Eddie Eats Christmas is filming now, in-line with all COVID-related guidelines, and will TX on Dave later this year and will also be available alongside Eddie Eats America on UKTV Play. The new series follows the recent announcement of two specials for Big Zuu's Big Eats and a new two-part Christmas special for Meet The Richardsons also to air on Dave later this year.

For more information, please contact:

Dave Barnsby, Senior Publicity Manager, UKTV
Ali Laurie, Network Communications Executive, UKTV

About Dave

Sky 111/811, Virgin 127/194, Freesat 157, Freeview, BT & TalkTalk 19, Freesat 157 Dave Ja Vu: Sky 211, Virgin 211, Freeview 79, BT & TalkTalk 79 On demand on Sky, Virgin and UKTV Play.

Ever since it was knee high to a TV remote, Dave had an idea. It wanted to be the first place viewers would come for brand-new, award-winning comedy entertainment from the biggest and brightest stars and production companies in the UK. And in the years since, it has launched some of the most exciting and best-loved titles on TV, including the launch of BAFTA-winning Taskmaster. The channel's critically-acclaimed established comedy hits Hypothetical, Jon Richardson: Ultimate Worrier and Comedians Giving Lectures will shortly welcome Mel Giedroyc: Unforgivable. And it's not just in front of the camera where the comic genius lies either, with a wealth of scripted treasure such as Sliced, Meet the Richardsons and a first ever feature-length special for Red Dwarf.

Dave's not content on just making you laugh and share gags with your mates though. Expedition with Steve Backshall and Hurricane Man show off regions and aspects of the earth never before seen on TV while the resurrection of the hit series World's Most Dangerous Roads promises to test some of the UK's biggest comedic friendships to their absolute limits. Eddie Eats America and Big Zuu's Big Eats deliver mouth-watering food shows with a Dave twist while Red Bull Soapbox continues to delight with its boundless capacity for invention.

The partnership between Dave and CALM continues to grow, having launched the "Be The Mate You'd Want" campaign, the Conversations Against Living Miserably podcast and its first commission, Comedy Against Living Miserably for three stand-up specials.

Reaching 20million viewers a month, Dave's come a long way, but it's only just getting warmed up.

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About UKTV

UKTV has been at the forefront of branded television for over 25 years, entertaining the nation with programmes they love. Its leading brands - Dave, Gold, W, Drama, Alibi, Eden and Yesterday - span comedy, entertainment, natural history, factual and scripted drama, and are delivered to audiences through UKTV Play, Freeview, Sky, Virgin Media, BT, TalkTalk, YouView, Freesat and Amazon Fire. The broadcaster is a significant investor in British creativity and is committed to working with new and established writers, directors and programme-makers.

UKTV is part of BBC Studios, the UK's most-awarded production company, a world-class distributor with international branded services, and a commercial subsidiary of the world's leading public service broadcaster, the BBC.

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About North One

For nearly 30 years, North One Television has been a globally recognised producer of world class factual entertainment, sports and live event TV programming, winning scores of awards - including three BAFTAs for its production of Formula One racing for ITV. Starting out as the sports TV wing of the Chrysalis Media Group, building a name with shows like C4's Football Italia and NBA coverage, the company soon spread into other genres, with factual entertainment brands such as C4's 'Top Ten' archive shows and C5's long-running Fifth Gear and Gadget Show series. Among myriad other documentary, features and entertainment commissions, more recently North One has scored hits with Richard Ayoade: Travel Man (C4), all of the acclaimed Guy Martin TV projects (C4) - and several high profile series for UKTV, including Storage Hunters UK (Dave), The Story of Only Fools & Horses and How The Young Ones Changed Comedy (both Gold).