Who will play the eponymous hero in 2015's most hotly anticipated biopic, The Mitch
Winehouse Story? I only ask because a few months ago,
Amy Winehouse's dad was a taxi driver. Today, he has his own chatshow, a forthcoming documentary, a record deal, makes regular sofa TV appearances, and was currently invited to testify as an expert witness before the home affairs select committee. Face it, within two years, he'll be rivalling Viacom. Mitchcom: a multinational conglomerate with its tentacles in every aspect of your media experience.
Once upon a time, you see, "a Mitch
Winehouse vehicle" meant a black cab. These days, a Mitch Winehouse vehicle would be a chatshow, or a documentary, or a family caper movie in which the lovable celebrity parent is drawn into a madcap race across the capital to retrieve some stolen museum artefacts, and ends up discovering the true meaning of Christmas.
Before we continue, let us take stock of these various entertainment properties. First up is the soon-to-be-aired Channel 4 documentary My Daughter Amy, which is one of those pseudo- investigative efforts along the hallowed lines of Peaches Geldof on Islam. It was this forthcoming project that drew
Winehouse père to the attention of the hopelessly publicity addicted chairman of the home affairs committee, Keith Vaz, who called him to give "expert testimony" at his hearing into the cocaine trade – a somewhat grim irony, given it all happened a few days before the government sacked a genuine expert on drugs.
Needless to say, Mitch's testimony consisted of policy shifting observations such as, "
Amy has been drug-free for a year", but you know what they say – when you're hot, you're hot. And so it was that yesterday brought confirmation of his record deal, which will look
Amy Winehouse's dad record an album, a decision as logical as getting Wayne Rooney's dad to play for England.
"It's a Sinatra-ish album," explained Mitch – a surprise to those who'd assumed it would be experimental electronica. "There will be six covers of Sinatra."
As for the rest of his output, Lost in Showbiz honestly hasn't the energy to run through Mitch's current chatshow appearances, but suffice to say he does not operate on a need-to-know basis. He operates on a actually-don't-need-to-know basis, explaining that his daughter's new boob job "looks great", or that if John and Edward should win The X Factor, "Simon Cowell and I will leave the country together to set up shop somewhere." Mmm. One more hellish character and you'd have a Sartre play.
And so to Mitch's own chatshow, Mitch
Winehouse's Showbiz Rant, which began last night on Living TV's online spin-off. It is Living TV, of course, to which humanity owes the greatest cultural debt. Rehab, Just Jade, Jade's PA, Jade's Shape Challenge, Living with Jade, Jade's Progress, Jade: Bride to Be, Jade's Wedding, Jade: With Love, Jade: As Seen on TV, years of Derek Acorah – I think it's safe to say that without Living TV there would be no Philip Roth. And please don't forget its flagship show Most Haunted, whose apparent premise is to make Lord Reith turn in his grave and then ask his spirit, "What do you want from us?" while trembling stagily in night-vision.
You'll be thrilled to learn Mitch
Winehouse's Showbiz Rant will run for 13 weeks – 13 weeks! – including a festive special, and consists of in-car footage of Mitch driving a celebrity around London in his cab. A format that should make Come Dine With Me look like the most lavishly budgeted television since Planet Earth. Yet given the aforementioned Living canon, it's perhaps no surprise to find the programme's commissioner declaring this week that securing Mitch's services was "a coup" – as though it were not an experience any viewer could replicate simply by flagging him down on the Marylebone Road.
The first guest was David Hasselhoff – "we had a lot in common," Mitch explained – with whom the hackney-carriage Parky apparently discussed "the perils of the music industry and the pressures of being a showbiz father".
But enough. By now, you might be wondering how in the name of sanity this has all happened. Alas, I'm afraid there is nothing about it in this column's well-thumbed copy of the Book of Revelation, nor has any terrorist organisation claimed responsibility for Mitch's showbiz career. I must confess, when I first heard the premise of Mitch
Winehouse's Showbiz Rant, I had hoped it was merely a plot to smoke out the demographic to whom this stuff might appeal, track them down using some sort of state-of-the-art detector technology, and then strip them of the right to vote.
That appears to have been optimistic. The only thing of which we can be sure is that Mitch
Winehouse has managed to parlay his daughter's heroin addiction into a media career for himself, so let us simply concede that this is a county where dreams come true, and let that be an end to it.
