As one of only 13 certified LEGO professionals in the world, Ryan McNaught, aka The Brickman, never thought he would be a TV star. But now he is starring as the judge on the hit show LEGO Masters. Here, he chats to New Idea all about his new role…
WATCH! The awkward moment Hamish accidentally clapped during Lego Master’s elimination!
Had you done any TV work before LEGO Masters?
I’d done plenty of things like being on the news or the Today show, but never anything near the size, standard or scale of what LEGO Masters was. It was quite a big learning experience for me, and I was very lucky that Hamish Blake was involved. He’s a fantastic guy and was willing to teach me. It’s funny, when we build a LEGO model, we just sit down and build it, but in television, you build the model then you’ve got to stop and get the wide shot and build the model again then stop and do another shot. Television is a very different beast to my normal life.
What are some of the best tips Hamish gave you?
He’s a very genuine and down-to-earth guy, and his advice was simple: just be yourself. Don’t be any different – you love LEGO and you love helping and coaching the contestants, so just keep doing that kind of stuff. It was good advice from somebody who’s done it all. Were you a little starstruck at first? I wouldn’t say starstruck, because Hamish is so disarming. He’s just a normal bloke. He makes you laugh, so it’s very much a fun sort of thing as opposed to stardom.
Are there any funny behind-the-scenes moments with Hamish that stand out for you?
Lots and lots of them. We had a lot of bets through the process – he’d bet that this would turn out like this or that would break or whatever. I think he lost every single one. I would never bet on anything television-related, and in the end he decided not to bet on anything LEGO-related.
What were Hamish’s LEGO skills like? Did he build anything on set?
We actually did quite a bit, because some of these challenges are really quite long and
there’d be times during the middle of a 12-hour challenge where we’d nick off to the brick pit and set some little challenges for ourselves. I think all of them got filmed.
So we’d often have a bit of a LEGO smackdown.
Both of you are dads. Did you both bring your kids to set?
We sure did. We did that many times. My kids built a few things that made some cameos on the show, so they’ll have some bragging rights at school. And [Hamish’s kids] Sonny and Rudy came along. Sonny in particular loves his LEGO.
How did you find the judging side of things?
The first elimination was really hard. I’ve never told anyone before that their LEGO wasn’t good enough, so that’s a really difficult thing, and it’s anti what LEGO is about, but it’s the television side of things.
It’s not that their stuff isn’t good – it’s amazing – but compared to the others, it’s
not as good as theirs.
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