Travel Channel Seeks America’s Worst Driver
Premiering on The Travel Channel on March 14th at 10pm, “losers” get prizes while “winner” worst driver will have his or her car crushed by 40-foot tall Robosaurus *** Three Stars
By Robin Rowe
Robosaurus crushes a boat in America's Worst Driver
HOLLYWOOD, CA (Gosh!TV) 3/14/2010 – “I knew they’d be bad, but not this bad,” says America’s Worst Driver co-host Jill Simonian. “They made me feel much better about my own driving, as pathetic as that sounds. I’ve always loved cars and racing, but my mom and sister hate driving with me because I make them nervous.”
Simonian was picked by the show’s producers after seeing her in an old audition tape. They contacted her through Facebook. “For my next audition they put me in a car with Alonzo and said drive and talk,” says Simonian. “I was petrified I was going to get into a fender-bender.” Production started shooting three days after her wedding, postponing a honeymoon to Greece. Meanwhile, Simonian was on the road shooting for five weeks. “I kept picturing my husband at home, and thinking he hates me now,” says Simonian. “He says he doesn’t!”
The format of the show is four drivers, nominated by friends or family to be America’s worst driver, spend a day in city driving and a second day on an obstacle course to determine who’s the worst. Show hosts Alonzo Bodden and Jill Simonian explain each challenge. What makes the show funny is the person who nominated him or her as worst driver has to ride in the car. Also riding with them is an off-duty traffic cop who deducts points every time the driver makes a driving mistake. In the process of driving around the city, we learn something about each city, starting with San Francisco in the first episode.
America's Worst Driver co-host Jill Simonian
Simonian says she’s not known for being a good driver herself, that her parents, sister, friends, and husband have all said she’s a terrible driver. Her faults include running over a 4-foot tall bush in a parking lot, knocking off her side- mirror twice and countless traffic school attendances. “Watching the drivers on this show made me a better driver,” says Simonian. “Now, I’m more cautious, drive slower and have given up texting on the road.”
America’s Worst Driver is based on a successful British show produced by Mentorn and broadcast in many territories. TV production company A. Smith, whose flagship show is Hell’s Kitchen, noticed the UK version of Worst Driver at MIPCON, a TV industry tradeshow.
“Obviously the whole mission is to find bad drivers,” says A. Smith & Co. Properties COO Frank Sinton. “The lack of skill in driving really shocked me. It’s a very challenging show to produce. Safety is very important. Bad driving is funny, but a serious subject. The last thing we wanted to do was glamorize bad driving or take it lightly. My biggest critic of my own driving is my 7-year-old daughter who now gives me demerits every time I take a hand off the wheel. My son just got his driver’s license.”
“There’s a real joy in producing America’s Worst Driver,” says Sinton. “Technology was a big challenge. We used a brand new technology for the in-car cameras. We were able to have three cameras in the car for all our shoots. The technology of the small cameras really made the show work, getting inside the car.”
Sony HXR-MC1 crash cam
The America’s Worst Driver cameras are Sony HXR-MC1 High Definition POV “Crash Cam” recorders. The $2,500 camcorder, designed to be strapped to a motorcycle helmet or skateboard, features an outboard LCD monitor to frame the shot or check it for playback. The camera records in AVCHD High Definition H.264 video format on MemoryStick flash media at up to 16Mb/s.
“We had cameras everywhere, including in the mouth of robosaurus, our 40-foot car-crushing robot,” says Sinton. “There was drama finding a location that could handle a fire-breathing car-crushing robot.”
America’s Worst Driver almost came to nothing, not from an errant robot, but due to a driver. “The stress got to one of our drivers, who got very ill the night before the final challenge,” says Sinton. “We were afraid we weren’t going to get through our first show. We’d built an obstacle course and scoured the country for months looking for the worst driver. We almost lost the whole show right there.”
America’s Worst Driver is A. Smith’s first show with The Travel Channel. “They were one of the last networks we thought of taking it to,” says Sinton. “What’s really fun about America’s Worst Driver is once we started talking to The Travel Channel they made the show better by taking the show from city to city. You learn about a city, which is why we travel. It made the show more interesting and relevant.”
Exploring a city by car is a truly American travel experiences. So is being annoyed by bad drivers. The Travel Channel America’s Worst Driver explores the worst drivers attempting the some of the best driving locations in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, Chicago, Boston, New York City, Miami, and Dallas. Premieres March 14 at 10pm, with new episodes through May 9th on the Travel Channel. The Travel Channel is provided by Scripps Networks Interactive, which also provides the Food Network, HGTV, DIY Network, Great American Country, and the Fine Living Network. Full episodes are also available anytime On Demand.