I’m A Celeb contestant Ian ‘Dicko’ Dickson on the highs and lows of his reality TV career
In a remarkably candid interview, Ian ‘Dicko’ Dickson reveals what he’s loved and hated about his various stints on reality TV.
Entertainment
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At this point, Ian ‘Dicko’ Dickson is an Australian reality TV veteran – but up until very recently, the British-born talent scout thought his on-screen days were behind him.
All that changed when Dicko entered the jungle for the latest season of I’m A Celebrity … Get Me Out Of Here.
Nine seasons in, Dicko’s one celeb that Ten’s head of entertainment Stephen Tate had trying to snag for the show since the very beginning.
Meeting Dicko in pre-show isolation the day before he went into the jungle – and the day after spending his 60th birthday alone in a hotel room – I find the former Australian Idol judge in typically unfiltered form. He opens up about why he’s worried doing I’m A Celeb could be a mistake, what he’s loved and hated about his past forays into reality TV – and what he thinks went wrong with the recent Idol reboot.
I’m A Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here
Dicko says he’d knocked back I’m A Celeb time and time again, saying in the past he was worried it was show that “can’t be trusted.”
“I don’t really want some 25-year-old producer sitting in the control room pushing my buttons,” he says of his prior thinking.
Eventually, though, the show’s “guilty pleasure” status started to wear him down, and he was drawn to the “honesty” of the premise.
“I know it’s a conceit and there’s an artifice there, but you really are in the camp. You really are covered in horrible bugs. You really are eating ostrich a**ehole. And you really do have to get along with some f**king unknown fish-lipped influencer who might give you the shits.”
Dicko, who has spoken publicly about his struggles with alcohol dependency in the past, says booze is not among the creature comforts he’ll miss while in the jungle: “I’m a binge drinker, but I binge on abstinence as well. I stop for months at a time.”
Tougher to give up: Music, which usually fills any silences in his day.
“Listening to some idiotic celebrities wittering all day, and not being able to put the noise-cancelling headphones on, I think is going to be a bit tough,” he says.
But Dicko’s reservations about the show are bigger than just dealing with annoying C-list campmates. His last big TV judging role was on the 2016 season of Australia’s Got Talent, and since then, he’s “made the long trek back to being a normal person.”
“I really think I’ve washed fame and celebrity out of my hair, which is a big reason why I didn’t want to go on this show for a long time. Because I just thought it would derail me and I just didn’t think it was worth it,” he explains.
The anticipation of what might happen has taken a particular toll on his wife Melanie, who has been “really nervous” about what might happen. “She knows how unfiltered I am, and I sometimes forget that she’s part of that equation. And I’ll be sitting in the jungle, telling all these stories that may or may not have an impact on her or my kids,” he says.
“I’ve really gone back to being a normal person, we live a beautiful normal life in a fantastic little town in the Sunshine Coast, and life is bliss. The one thing I’m nervous about is derailing that and putting her under pressure. It’s pressure that she doesn’t need and didn’t ask for.”
The Australian Idol reboot
Dicko doesn’t hold back when asked what he thought of Seven’s recent Australian Idol reboot, which saw the much-loved franchise return to screens after a 14-year absence with an all-new judging panel. Ratings were middling, and the live finale was labelled a ‘trainwreck’ on social media.
Dicko didn’t watch any episodes – until he was stuck at an outback motel with nothing but free-to-air a few weeks ago.
“It just felt a bit creaky, to be honest. Production values felt really poor, and the voices did not inspire me. On a show like that, they should hold (the contestants) to a high standard. And the fact is, I don’t think they did.”
Dicko also says it was a “big mistake” following the show with episodes of the UK talent show Starstruck, which he says “sparkled” by comparison.
“I think it was a mistake bringing it back, frankly. I don’t think the numbers were great, so I can’t imagine they were thrilled that … it’s an expensive show.”
He also says he was “deeply sad” when he discovered the new judging panel had borrowed original host Mark Holden’s legendary “touchdown” catchphrase.
“I rang Mark up and I went, ‘Man, that’s f***ed.’ Why would you do that? Because Mark was intuitive enough to take something as dumb as that, and weave it into a meaningful piece of entertainment currency. There’s genius in that; it’s part of Australian TV fabric. And it just looked so poor to see it in that show.”
His final Idol complaint? The show’s filming location, at Rooty Hill in Western Sydney.
“It’s not the Opera House, is it? Come on: ‘You are going to go all the way to Rooty Hill, young lady! Stick with me, and I’m going to take you all the way to Rooty Hill!’”
Don’t mistake this spray for bitterness that he, Mark Holden and Marcia Hines were not asked back to reprise their original judging roles. Dicko scoffs at the suggestion.
“Let’s meet our judging panel: Two 70-year-olds – one of whom is deeply confused – and a bitter and twisted 60-year-old. Who’s going to enjoy that?”
Celebrity Apprentice
He might have won his season, but Dicko doesn’t have fond memories of his 2012 stint on the show.
“Celebrity Apprentice gave me the s**ts, really. A lot of the worst aspects of television come out in those sort of shows,” he says.
He complains the show’s rules were constantly changing, and he struggled to keep up each day.
“They create an artifice, and there’s a set of rules, but it’s your job to try and win. I would try and take it to the very, very letter of the law. And then, the next day, they’d provide an extra set of rules just to cut that off,” he explains.
“So it was a game of cat and mouse … And I couldn’t help feeling that they were trying to push our buttons a bit too much.”
The OG Australian Idol
One reality show Dicko has nothing but praise for is the one that made him a household name way back in 2003.
He credits Stephen Tate with taking him from “middle-aged obscurity” to national TV star.
“It was golden times really: Making great shows and finding real talent who are still selling records … it was magical.”
And while they’ve had a “chequered” relationship over the years, Dicko says fellow judge Mark Holden was the “genius” of the entire show.
“Mark understood TV in a way that I didn’t … I was so naive. I thought it was an A&R process that they were filming. And he knew, right from the start, this was television, with its own agenda, and its own needs, and its own logic. I caught onto that probably halfway through the second series.”
Cheesy as they might have been, Holden’s catchphrases and animated reactions helped turn the show into a pop cultural juggernaut – one that Dicko still can’t escape today.
“I can go round Splendour (in the Grass) and have groups of kids following me going, ‘TOUCHDOWN!’ I go, ‘That was f**king Holden, f**k off!’” he says with a laugh.
“But I’ll take it, because I was jealous of it.”
I'm A Celeb airs 7:30pm Sundays to Thursdays on Ten.
Nick Bond travelled to South Africa as a guest of Ten.
Originally published as I’m A Celeb contestant Ian ‘Dicko’ Dickson on the highs and lows of his reality TV career
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