JUNGLE FEVER

OK, I give in. MediaGuardian.co.uk’s editors have exerted considerable pressure on me to focus on something serious.

So: I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out Of Here! (aka “I’m a sad Z-list non-entity and I’m stupid enough to think that appearing on this rubbish will regenerate my career”). What of it?

Yes, what of it? Common wisdom has it that the only so-called celebrities prepared to appear on such shows are desperate, deluded or just plain dumb. Of course.

Let’s imagine for a moment that LWT decided to pitch the I’m A Celebrity… concept to Bumble Ward, Pat Kingsley at PMK, or Paul Bloch or Alan Neirob at Roger and Cowan.

These are the superpowers of celeb PR management, who control the careers of the 20-million-dollars-a-movie gang and every single recognisable face on the silver screen.

Jennifer Lopez – sorry, J Lo – in a jungle, sticking scorpions up her arse? Tom Cruise in a swamp? Ben Affleck chewing maggots? Great concept. Quick, send me the contract before Nicole Kidman’s agent gets wind of the idea.

This is obviously an absurd scenario. LWT’s fax would hold as much sway as the tea boy and sink without trace.

Celebrity careers are built on (a) talent (b) looks (c) hard work and dedication (d) astute career management and (e) luck.

This particular bunch of monkeys lacks four out of five of these. OK, so it’s all for “charity”, but they clearly think they’re going to benefit from so much prime time TV exposure.

The quick-fix approach might – just might – benefit one of the D-lebs involved.

But it’s a big gamble, given that being ritually humiliated in the company of seven other talentless egocentrics is guaranteed to rip apart whatever carefully nurtured formica veneer they’ve engineered in the pursuit of fame, fortune and a four-page feature in Hello.

Claire Sweeney successfully pulled off the stunt in Celebrity Big Brother. If there’s someone wholesome, genuine, pleasant or funny underpinning the public persona, the nation will take him or her to its heart.

If you’re just making a fool of yourself, you’ll be treated with all the contempt you deserve.

The only intelligence exhibited in this whole pathetic pantomime is the intelligence of the reality TV producers, who earn money for charity on the phone calls by taking a toll on celebrity stupidity and, in turn, earn audience share and an opportunity to proliferate further ridiculous realisations of this pop art phenomenon.

I think I read in the Sun that Princess Productions is planning a reality TV show that requires contestants to contract as many diseases as possible within a given period. Presumably the winner is the one who dies before the end.

This story is either an excellent stunt or a testament to – oh, I don’t know, the usual lament – the pure, unadulterated paucity of our communal intellect and imagination.

It’s a jungle out there. And it’s peopled and run by morons. If the maggots had any say in it, they’d refuse to degrade themselves by appearing in a programme alongside the likes of Christine Hamilton.

PS Melanie Griffith is apparently throwing open her home to Indian street children after being “moved by their plight” on a recent trip to Calcutta.

“They deserve a chance in life. The best thing I can do is use my celebrity and money to help them,” she is reported as saying – presumably to an assembled group of journalists.

The assembled celebs on I’m A Celebrity… would be impressed.