Mike Rowe on Returning to ‘Dirty Jobs’ & Finding New Gigs
Preview
Turns out the toughest part of rebooting Discovery’s gloriously grimy reality hit, Dirty Jobs, which sends host Mike Rowe out to apprentice with skilled laborers, is finding enough grubby new gigs for him.
“The challenge now is not to get dirty and work hard; the challenge is to apply it to jobs that we haven’t done,” says the king of crud in his distinctive baritone voice, one that bounced off mine shafts, septic tanks, and other filthy surfaces during the series’ initial 2005 to 2012 run.
(Credit: Discovery)
With more than 170 episodes and the 2020 reunion series Dirty Jobs: Rowe’d Trip under his tool belt, Rowe felt now was the right time to hit the grit again because the global pandemic had put the spotlight on essential workers. It’s a group he champions with Mike Rowe Works, a foundation that promotes careers in the skilled trades and provides scholarships. “I started getting literally thousands of people on Facebook and social media straight up asking me to bring the show back,” he says.
Luckily, the Dirty team’s job search was successful. In six new episodes, Rowe tries his (callused) hand at being, among other things, a water tower cleaner, an escalator maintainer, an epoxy installer, an iguana wrangler, a monument carver (on the massive Crazy Horse Memorial being chiseled out of South Dakota’s Black Hills), and even a combat medic. For that, he practiced with a scalpel on a rubber “cut suit,” which simulates skin, organs, and a circulatory system!
“It’s not just about exploding toilets and misadventures in animal husbandry,” he says of this round. “I’m older and wiser. There’s more biography, more trying to get to the root of why these people do what they do.” That’s true in the premiere, when Rowe returns to a show mainstay, construction, and gets to know the family behind a rebar-laying business. He labors alongside a crew of “rodbusters” working on a bridge in 100-degree Florida heat. “It was a reminder of the second law of thermodynamics: I’m living in a disintegrating body,” cracks the 59-year-old. “I don’t have to succeed, but I have to try.”
Dirty Jobs, Season Premiere, Sunday, January 2, 2022, 8/7c, Discovery
Conversation23 Comments
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R
What about the cleaning crew in a sports stadium?
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G
I love this show like that before love it again. I was watching tonight and when he was up in the cleaning of the water tower with a guy named George. At the end it says in memory of George what happened to him?
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O
I was wondering the same.
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G
Please check out campbullwheel.org to see Joy in the faces of our guest floating the Madison River in wheelchairs, wheels on water!
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G
Cleaning the poles in a strip club or cleaning the booth and floor of a peep show.
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O
Why don't we get Mike to work with Moonshiners and do some of the dirty jobs on the show. A lot of Heritage and I think Mike would fit perfectly in this Quest to show that we all come from different ages and backgrounds.
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T
Would love to see Mike come to Gillsville Ga to Craven Pottery and go through the process of making Folk Pottery, Face Jugs and other red clay products. Joe Craven is a legendary artist and is focused on personal hand made pottery. The Pottery , Joes business was once a multi million dollar industry of imports and handmade products. Now the business is family run and a great asset to the community. Would be glad to introduce you to him anytime.
Trent Strickland
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Would love for him to work with my niece who is a beekeeper and has bee hives all over Florida. Hard and dirty work hauling and setting up yards of bees , harvesting the honey from spinning the frames to bottling the natural bee honey for sale. In the Florida sun in a bee suit. Also drives a huge truck and trailers her bees from one end of the state to the other end mostly by herself.
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B
Can Mike help our 900 plus worker clean and maintain the beaches in Biloxi Ms
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R
Perhaps you should meet Caitlyn Doughty, a funeral home owner who does excellent videos on youtube called "ask a mortician" about grave matters. She is in Los Angeles, a place where they believe there is no such thing as "Bad Publicity"
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I think there is a Dirty Job that has not been covered, digging a grave.
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R
Mike why not go and do the gold thing in Alaska, then go to North Carolina dig some jewels, then hit Colorado for a few Dino bones... Heck take one of these guys that never miss a show with you.. Love show please continue!!!
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O
Has Mike ever worked in the Soo Locks doing maintenance during winter when the locks are shut down? I watch the lock action quite often...they mentioned recently, probably because the locks just reopened for the season, what an arduous job it is to maintain the locks while they are closed in the winter.
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O
How do I make a suggestion for dirty jobs??
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C
Great show, great people, great host, great jobs. Such a blast to see it on screen again.
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B
How about working with a cemetary crew digging and filling graves??
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North American industrial servece Ballston spa ny a garbage burn plant cleaning severe 24 7 on call explosive Servace I worked there definitely a dirty job but get to travel with there plans and trucks
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R
Cleaning the robots at Toyota Bodine Aluminum, in Jackson, Tennessee is the dirtiest jobs I've ever done. The rake-outs are the funnest, hahaha.
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G
I am so glad that "Dirty Jobs" is back on the road. Scorpions that glow. Jelly balls. Wisecracks and plumbers cracks. Good stuff!
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G
How about cleaning out a cement kiln or painting a tall stack at any industrial facility.
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B
I think it would be cool to see Mike go back to some of the job's he made the owners wish they would have never done it and see if he can do it any better than he did the first time and I would also like to know if Discovery has to pay for things he messes up or for money lost for the day they were there.
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B
When I was 19 in the Air Force in 1966 I was working on 1/4 million dollar jet engines . We were all young and responsible for them . Mike would be great working on them
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R
What about alternative energy, those solar panel installer where solar farms are being developed?
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