Linda Herrick: More spice please, Sugar

When your guests slag off your new show before it even starts, is it irony - or do they mean it? Irish-import radio host Noelle McCarthy certainly didn't look thrilled to be on Ric Salizzo's latest vehicle, ho ho, staged in a caravan-set in the clumsily named Sugar Shack on TV3.

Salizzo informed the audience, "you know who I am", which he must know he can't count on, before introducing actor Kat Browne, whose CV includes the long-dead TV series City Life.

She told him, presumably with a touch of irony, that they were about to make the second series.

That sailed right past Salizzo, who murmured that that was good as he turned to McCarthy. Browne looked astounded and McCarthy riposted that she wished she was back home in Cork.

Naked Samoan Dave Fane made his stance clear from the outset - as a career move, this sucked.

But on the scale of what sucked in the debut, Fane was the least, er, sucky, dominating the entire show with interjections shot through the caravan's window.

It's a tricky format, a whole hour of "what's interesting this week", and last week's show would suggest that one hour is far too ambitious.

Aside from a very patchy pace, Salizzo's trademark po-faced persona occasionally slid into blankness, which is a strange presentation because he is at his most charming when he is smiling and having a laugh.

And, with the exception of Fane, his panel didn't have much to contribute. Peter Vegas, surprisingly, barely made himself heard when previous appearances on Max TV and TV3's previous The Panel have made it clear he can be clever. Browne did little more than show off her cleavage and twiddle the knobs on the keyboard to -, ta da - introduce guests like Aussie comedian Charlie Pickering.

The show would have been really struggling to spark if the Comedy Festival hadn't been in town. Or Dave Fane. Pickering told a good Shane Warne joke, and had a moan about how New Zealanders love to put down Aussies. So live with it, Chazza.

But it was a dumb call to get a mime artist on to pretend to be one of the Tasmanian miners. Laboured; not funny.

Segueing between topics ranging from Mark Inglis, Eurovison and Britney Spears, Sugar Shack was more interesting when it left the studio, such as scouting for the big Lotto winner in Kaeo.

The reporter scooting along doing a vox-pop on chequebook journalism wasn't very good, but Tripod singing in the studio were, and Salizzo thanked them for saving the show.

However, the stunt with the body art paintjob was long-winded and pointless; at the end the guy came out blinking like mad - paint had got into an eye.

One of the better bits was Fane in the pub with two psychics. When he showed them a mugshot of Salizzo, the comment was Ric "wants to be taken seriously". Does he?

That would be ironic.

When the show finally wrapped - good call to show footage of the Band of Strangers gigs at the Town Hall - Salizzo turned to Fane and told him it was his show.

"No," Fane shot back, "it's your show and it's shit."

It wasn't quite that bad. But Salizzo will have to work harder to make his mark, and make his panel more proactive as well.

Otherwise it's going to be Dave Fane Sugar Shack - and it is doubtful even Fane would want to put that much energy into it.