What It Was Really Like To Go on ‘Dick and Dom in Da Bungalow’ as a Kid

If you were a kid in Britain in the late nineties and early noughties, certain TV shows likely loomed large in your childhood. Maybe you were a fan of Raven and host James Mackenzie’s weirdly prophetic emo haircut, or decided that being in a care home looked pretty fun after watching Tracy Beaker. 

Among the most popular CBBC and CITV programmes of this era were the competition shows. Get Your Own Back, Jungle Run, 50/50 and Dick and Dom in Da Bungalow pitted kids against each other for the chance to win an iPod Nano or a pair of Heelys – or at least gunge an unwitting grown-up. What was even better was the fact that these contestants were usually normal kids, allowing you to dream of one day flinging cold Ambrosia custard at Dick and Dom. 

But what was it like for the children who actually got chosen to go on these shows? VICE contacted some to find out.   

We didn’t have to apply for the show, we were scouted for it. Two people from the show came to watch us complete our Scouts snorkelling badge, as that was one of the challenges for the show. I was ten when the episode was filmed but it wasn’t released for another three years. They filmed so many episodes in the space of several months, and ours was one of the last to be aired. 

One of my favourite challenges was the pendulum, where I got hit off. I was promised a slow-mo of me getting whacked which I thought was amazing at the time. Another memory that sticks out was how funny Sid and Elvis – the sabotaging monkeys – were. The two guys that played them were brilliant and spoke to us a lot in breaks. It really made the day.

Sadly, we were one of the teams that got trapped. Saying that, we still all received a certificate, a monkey statue and a Jungle Run teddy – all of which I still have. Danni.

I was the one being pranked but my reaction was so unusable we had to film the entire thing again. I was told to sign for some valuable items which got delivered to a warehouse. Then some guy came along to help, and he told me about how valuable this particular vase was before immediately dropping it. The guy continued to break a bunch of things and when the owner came to see what was going on, the man blamed all the broken stuff on me because I signed for it. I started crying and saying it wasn't me who broke them. When we re-filmed it, I was told to look “cheeky” at the end instead. Callum.

I was an addition to the family as I was friends with the girl from school. Her older brother was doing his GCSEs while filming, so they needed an extra kid. We were only nine at the time, so it was all very exciting. I would walk around and hope to get noticed from the show.

I remember the funniest thing was that none of us knew of our celebrity, [EastEnders actor] Nadia Sawalha, so the big reveal to us at the beginning had to be re-filmed because we just looked so unimpressed. Our challenges weren’t particularly hard but there were a lot of times that we took far too long doing them. We weren’t ever told there was a time limit, that was just added on in post-production. 

In our case, the mum who was having Nadia hidden from her really didn’t know what was going on and believed the cover story. Obviously, towards the end, she was getting suspicious and we got caught, but it was all true. Sarah.

I had my 13th birthday when on set for filming. The production team had sent a camcorder to my family so they could record a birthday message for me – and they got me a cake. 

We were staying in an old castle in Scotland when filming, which added to the whole medieval theme of the show. We would hear footsteps and it felt like something off a horror film. The place even smelt like ghosts – whatever they smell like, that was it. I’ll never forget the night when I couldn’t sleep, as all I could hear was a “sssss” noise. I eventually plucked up the courage to confront the sound and realised it was just my Walkman fuzzing about as it wasn’t connected to a radio station.

 The guy who played Raven was such a laugh. It has always stuck with me how great he was, and his hard work ethic of grind and hustle has rubbed off on me. I almost drowned in one of the activities, which required us to swim 50 metres. I wasn’t that strong of a swimmer, but I was OK once I realised I could touch the floor. But hey, I got a PlayStation 2 out of it. It also set me up for my career as an actor. Lladel.

Our primary school was chosen at random and six of us were picked by the production team. The craziest bit was filming this TV show with all my best friends. We got to have three days off school – that was such a big deal at the time. The day when we got back, I felt like such a diva. We even had an assembly dedicated to us. I've never felt more famous in my life.

Filming for the show took a long time, given that it was set in a tower. This meant we had to film the jump sequence from floor to floor in three separate parts – jumping onto crash mats and boxes to make it seem like we had just jumped from floor to floor. The “whisper clips” we had in our ears were so painful to wear. I had to keep mine in the longest because I succeeded the most rounds. 

I've had some very strange experiences over the last five or six years due to being on the show. The funniest one is a group of university students messaging me from Oxford or Cambridge informing me that they created a society called "Nathan's done it again”, which had a drinking game attached to it. I've also had a few experiences where people have noticed me randomly in person and I've had so many Instagram DMs asking if I am Nathan from the show. There's even a Wiki page about me. 

In 2019, I made a TikTok about being on the show and gained over 15,000 followers. It has absolutely changed my life. It's always the best ice-breaker or fun fact in the room. I stayed in contact with two other contestants from the show – I even went to Sophie’s wedding a couple of years ago. We’ve remained best friends since. Nathan.

I used to watch the show with my dad, and we decided to email in as a joke. It led to the producers coming to visit my school and film me and some friends being daft as a bit of an audition. Next thing we knew, we were in London for the weekend, sat behind the cameras loading up on sugar to make us hyper for when the show began.

I was far too competitive for my own good when it came to the games. One of them consisted of wearing giant clown trousers and trying to throw balloons inside them for Bungalow Points. I threw one in after the time had stopped, which led me to being brought back to the show for “interrogation” about five years later.

Some of the challenges definitely wouldn’t be allowed today. One was the cereal race, which is disgusting but hilarious to watch back. We had to see who could eat a bowl of Cheerios the fastest. I did win a bike though from winning the “do not laugh or you lose” game. My resting bitch face came in handy. Amy.