JUST how stylish could a beach wedding in Pretoria possibly be?
South Africa will find out in the latest TV series to cash in on viewers’ appetite for watching strangers take their vows.
In Wedding Bashers, which will hit M-Net screens in September, a celebrity panel attends and critiques weddings from the dress to the flowers and the venue.
On the panel are former Miss South Africa Cindy Nell-Roberts, party girl Denise Zimba, celebrity chef Siba Mtongana and wedding planner Zavion Kotze. They will attend 24 nuptials in search of “the wedding of the season”.
With Survivor South Africa’s Mark Bayly as the host, the concept is the brainchild of Idols South Africa executive director and producer Gavin Wratten.
“Weddings are one of those things everyone goes to and everyone has an opinion about, and Wedding Bashers is different to the other shows, it’s got its own unique twists and turns,” said Wratten.
“We’ll have traditional weddings, very expensive ones, poor weddings, city weddings, just to give a nice spectrum of what goes on in and around South Africa,” he said.
Unlike popular wedding show Our Perfect Wedding, which raked in more than one million viewers in the December ratings from the Broadcast Research Council of South Africa, the new show will cover a diverse pool of weddings, costing between R20000 and R1-million.
In each of the 12 episodes, two weddings will be showcased and the “bashers” will share their opinions of the events and give them a rating.
Wratten said the aim was not to “bash” the ceremonies but to showcase “how other local people have weddings” .
“We are whittling down the numbers, deciding which weddings we want to do, while we wait for entries to close on February 14.
“We’ve received entries that include a Hindu wedding and a beach wedding in Pretoria.”
Nell-Roberts, who won Miss South Africa in 2002, said it was the “fashion and beauty” of weddings that she liked.
“I’ll also be looking for the glamour, which comes from the beautiful bridal dresses, as well as hair disasters and stressed bridesmaids. I really don’t like pretentious weddings. I am an Afrikaans girl, we say what we think, we don’t sugar-coat it.”
Zimba, the V-Entertainment presenter and singer who used to have a role in Generations, said she was “in it for the entertainment”.
“The song of the first dance, the DJ, the lineup, the band, the orchestration of the wedding and how the programme flows — that’s what I am keen to see at each wedding,” said Zimba.
Mtongana said she was excited as the show was different to what she does on Cooking with Siba.
“I do menu curation for weddings and work with wedding chefs and sometimes we find that brides forget about the food or doing the tasting of their menus before their wedding day. My eye will be on the food and wine,” she said.
Kotze, who recently tied the knot himself, said he’d be looking at the planning of the weddings, while keeping an eye on the flowers.
“When brides sweat the small stuff, that’s when things fall apart,” he said. - article was published in Sunday Times
