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September 23, 2004updated 22 Nov 2022 12:07pm

The good, the bad and the sub-editor

By Press Gazette

Pub quiz genius and Property Week sub-editor Daniel Blackburn appears as a contestant on Mastermind next week.

Blackburn braves the black leather chair and faces a barrage of questions from host John Humphrys in two two-minute rounds broadcast on Monday.

Blackburn said he contacted the programme last year after he bowled over his colleagues on Property Week by his pub quiz performances and “rather excessive” knowledge of James Bond films.

He was invited to take part in a test round and despite only getting 13 out of 20 questions right, made it onto the show.

He told Press Gazette: “I seemed to be really good at winning quizzes for Property Week and I thought I may as well try my hand at something a bit grander. I was too old for University Challenge so I thought I’d try Mastermind.”

Blackburn chose the films of Sergio Leone, the Italian film director behind ‘spaghetti westerns’ such as A Fistful of Dollars and The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, for his specialist subject.

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“I may possibly be the only person to say ‘Duck, you sucker’ to John Humphrys,” he added.

Blackburn will make his Mastermind debut on Monday, 27 September at 8pm on BBC2.

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