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Beat the Chasers set in Sydney, control room in Melbourne

Seven game show is spread across 2 states in order to work around COVID restrictions.

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Upcoming Seven quiz specials Beat the Chasers has come up with a unique way to solve a COVID challenge.

While the set has relocated to Sydney, the show’s nerve centre remains at a control room in Melbourne.

ITV Executive Producer Deb Stewart told a Media Mentors panel, “It’s the first time I’ve ever done it in this genre. The way we’re doing The Chase at the moment is the same. The control room is here in Melbourne and the set for The Chase is in Sydney. All of the contestants, the Chaser, the host, everyone is there. But the game engine, the control room crew, and the questions are all in Melbourne.

“It’s actually working, it’s quite extraordinary. I thought that we would have a problem with our final Chase, because that’s against the clock. I thought we might have that delay that you get…. but we haven’t. The brilliant people building the game engine managed to work around that lag, and it really is next to non-existent.

“So it’s a fantastic way to keep a crew that’s been working on The Chase for five years, the majority of them employed. It’s very sad for the studio crew, of course, but then there’s work in Sydney as well.”

Stewart explained that the show had tried to work within Melbourne’s Stage 4 restrictions, but it proved too difficult.

“We were recording in the height of COVID and we just couldn’t get contestants,” she continued. “We were trying to follow the postcodes and the hotspots, cancelling people and trying to book other people. We’re trying to be very considerate about the demo that we were picking. Trying to keep people within a 5k radius. We were sending Ubers to pick them up that were being deep cleaned after and trying to do all of this stuff. In the end it was actually easier to put the set on the back of a truck and send it up to Sydney.”

Beat the Chasers will air in primetime on Seven in November.

You can hear more on TV formats here.

18 Responses

  1. Would be nice to see a non-reality show do well in primetime. As much as everyone complains about the lazy scheduling of the commercial networks they rarely seem to be rewarded when they do something different.

      1. Consistently winning the 5pm slot, and often rating higher than many primetime offerings. Can’t believe it’s been going for 5 years already. Andrew O’Keefe is still as enthusiastic as he was at the beginning 👌

        1. Only time will tell. It’s not the first prime-time edition as there has been a celebrity series. I preferred Andrew on Deal or No Deal and Rich List.

          1. What on earth gives you that idea? The Chase has been a long-term time slot winner and even outrates some prime time shows. Nothing suggests these specials will flop. Stick around if you preferred AOK on those other shows though because I suspect this format will encourage that kind of hosting style… unfortunately.

  6. If Seven wants this to rate well then cut back on episodes of The Chase weekdays. UK version 2pm-4pm then Chase Australia 5pm-6pm is a bit much.

  7. … 7 Brisbane did something similar in 1987 … the whole news set was built in the Exhibition grounds in the city and the presenters – complete with autocue – for the one-hour news, sport and weather did their thing for ten days in front of cameras and a live audience at the Ekka while the program was controlled – including tape stories, graphics, etc – from Studio 2 control room on Mt Coot-tha as usual … all live to air …

  8. Amazing that a production workflow developed for sport (game in one location, control room in another) is now lending itself to other genres.

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