Thousands rush to join ‘Big Brother’

4 August.2004

MADRID – The Spanish version of the ‘Big Brother’ television reality show is not losing its fascination – at least not for those extroverts who want to take part in the programme.

Telecinco, the Spanish TV channel that airs ‘Gran Hermano’ as it is called in Spanish, says it has received a record number of calls from people to participate in the casting for the sixth edition.

In the space of a month, it clocked up 130,000 telephone calls from people eager to join the show, and nearly 50,000 more over the Internet.
That is more than 18 percent up on the previous record set by the fourth edition of Gran Hermano.

The biggest number of aspiring stars is from the province of Barcelona, from which Telecinco has received 8,214 applications; the lowest is from the Spanish African enclave of Melilla with just 43.

Now the lines have been closed, the TV company will begin interviewing and camera testing candidates. A team of psychologists will also check out the applicants.

For the five editions of Gran Hermano shown so far, more than 435,000 people applied to take part.

[Copyright EFE with Expatica]

Subject: Spanish news