Remind me never to watch telly with Gogglebox’s Steph and Dom Parker.
They may have quit the show some while back, but that habit they became famous for, of keeping up a non-stop, booze-fuelled if hilarious commentary on every show they watched – is one it seems they’ve never shaken off.
“No, that’s exactly how we still watch TV!” Steph chuckles when I ask if maybe they were playing up to the camera. “We’re just so used to doing that. We’ve been together a long time.”
“It doesn’t irritate us, but I’m sure it irritates anyone else in the room!”
Not that this should surprise me, I guess. This loveably “posh, p***ed couple”, as they’ve been labelled, will clearly never be short of an opinion or twelve.
If you don’t believe me, try randomly chucking any subject into the conversation. Brexit’s a good one.
“There’s far too much airtime being given to the opposition parties,” argues Dom when I dare bring it up, “to object and complain and try to slow things down.”
And he adds: “We voted go, then we go.”
“We want to move on,” agrees Steph. “People are bored now.”
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And moving on is one thing Steph and Dom know plenty about. Heaps of telly opportunities have come their way since Gogglebox, the latest being The Great Hotel Escape, going out each weekday afternoon on Channel 4.
It’s a show where they can be both opinionated and genuinely helpful, as they meet people ambitiously trying to set up hotels of their own, just as Steph and Dom themselves did 14 years ago in Kent.
“One or two regret it from day one,” says Dom. “They’ve completely underestimated how much work is involved.
“It’s every day, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year.
“And loos don’t break down at 11 in the morning. Loos break down at 11 at night, or at midnight. Boilers break down just when everyone’s wanting a bath.
“It’s a living nightmare if you’re not prepared.”
These days Steph and Dom, aged 53 and 55 respectively, pick their TV projects on the basis of what they’re likely to enjoy and learn from.
“It has to be fun,” Steph insists, “or we’re just not going to play anymore. We’re at the age where it has to be easy on the body and easy on the mind.”
To learn new stuff is why Dom says he signed up for Celebrity Masterchef, returning tonight. (He makes his first appearance next Monday.)
But it also sounds like another opportunity for him to sound off on a pet subject.
“A lot of food we get in these days is utter filth,” he’s telling me, with little prompting. “It’s over-poncified. I like my beef to taste of beef. I want a chicken to taste like a chicken.”
It should be said, mind you, that the public’s perception of Steph and Dom has moved on a bit lately.
“The idea that we’re always there with a glass in hand,” says Steph, “well, only fools would still think that after seeing the documentary we made about Max, our 18-year-old disabled son.
“That programme raised some really important issues. It also helped people view us in a slightly less frivolous way.”
It’s not so much that they’ve revamped their image, however (“There’s nothing contrived about what you see, that’s always been important to us…”), as that they’ve simply let it evolve.
“It’s happened at a pace we’re happy with,” says Steph.
So we shouldn’t go thinking they’ve turned tee-total, or anything quite that mad.
When I ask them, for example, about their visits to other people’s hotels – along with their beloved dachshund Gigi – it occurs to me that their arrival might strike fear in hotelier’s hearts. When the famously outspoken Steph and Dom turn up in reception, is everyone suddenly on tenterhooks?
“Oh, no!” laughs Steph. “They just shut the bar as soon as we walk in the door!”
* The Great Hotel Escape continues daily at 4pm on Channel 4. Celebrity MasterChef starts tonight at 9pm on BBC1.
