Dirty somethings

It was only a matter of time before MTV UK attempted to replicate the success of Jackass with a home-grown show. After all, Jackass succeeded despite (or perhaps that should be because of) minimal financial outlay and resolutely lowbrow, scatological humour. Perhaps inevitably, the network has once again turned to skate culture for its latest comedy venture.

A four-strong team comprising three Welshmen and one Londoner, Dirty Sanchez should hit the spot with viewers who found Jackass just a little too highbrow. In the first episode, we saw one quarter of the Sanchez team suffer through the novel interface of his arse and a makeshift flame-thrower, another have industrial-strength clothes-pegs clamped to his genitalia, and a final member bravely battle through the unimaginable trauma of "cock on wood". Undoubtedly, all good mindless, outrageous fun, but surely sceptics will struggle to find a single defining feature to separate the programme from the adventures of Johnny Knoxville and co.

"Well, I wouldn’t say it’s a rip-off of Jackass," argues Lee Dainton, a 29 year old skateboard fanatic whose friendship with fellow Sanchez member, Matt Pritchard, goes back 14 years. "We brought out a video in 2000, which we’d been filming for two years, so that goes back to ’98. But the thing to remember is that we’re skateboarders, everybody in Jackass are skateboarders, so what we do is just a part of that culture. The stunts and the wild behaviour is just what skateboarders get up to, it’s always been a part of the experience."

Bored with their monotonous existence in the Welsh valleys, Dainton and Pritchard eagerly sought escape in the skate-punk lifestyle. They participated in numerous events around Britain, making videos of their extracurricular activities along the way. It was whilst touring the circuit that the duo met and befriended future Sanchez members, Dan Joyce – a former travelling rep turned reprobate – and fellow Welshman Pancho, at 23 the youngest member of the group.

"The others tend to pick on me, because I’m the youngest, and also the shortest," laments Pancho. "I’m also the one whose probably most prone to aggro as well – it’s called ‘short man syndrome’. So I probably need kicking into line every now and then. And probably the worst mistake I ever made is falling asleep in front of those bastards, ’cos they’re just lethal with shaving foam. I’ve had pretty much everything happen, from eyebrows going missing to large sections of my hair disappearing. I actually ended up with a kind of Sven Goran Eriksson ’do."

But Pancho’s hair-loss is small-fry compared to the horrors suffered by Matt Pritchard. In the first episode alone, Pritchard submitted to having his most precious appendage u-nailed to a two-by-four, and, most horrifyingly, getting his bare arse dragged along a roll of sandpaper.

"That actually wasn’t too bad until they doused my arse with salt and vinegar," Matt reflects. "I was running around the room in absolute agony, trying to hide in the corner so they couldn’t put any more on. But the worst aspect of it didn’t even make it onto camera. In the next few mornings after I’d done that stunt, I’d wake up, and because the condition of my arse had worsened, I’d have to rip my arse-cheeks away from the bloody bed-sheets!"

It would be remiss of me not to enquire about "cock on wood". It would appear to be everyone man’s worst nightmare.

"Did you see the look on my face?" Matt replies. "I think that said it all. The thing was that the u-nail went in so far, I really did think, ‘This is a catastrophe, I’m not gonna be able to get it out.’ But what I was actually most worried about was walking into the hospital and saying, ‘Excuse me, can you please remove this?!"’ But, y’know, all throughout the series, as the stunts kept getting more extreme, we kept saying to ourselves, ‘It can’t get any worse than this.’ And it did!"