A director terrified of snakes and a former five-star pastry chef turned Weight Watchers ambassador doesn't sound like the perfect combination for a show called Snake Sheila.
But it might just work when the director is determined to overcome her fear and the star is a charismatic British-German woman who has been catching the slippery creatures for the past four years.
At least that's what director Mandy Lake and snake catcher Julia Baker are hoping for their Animal Planet project, which debuts in 167 countries later this year before coming to Australia in early 2016.
Ms Lake started the series so scared of snakes she couldn't even be in the same room as one.
"Call it aversion therapy," she said.
"I just thought it was incredibly interesting. It's got to be one of the more interesting jobs going around and uniquely Australian too I guess.
"I'm at the point now where I can touch a carpet snake. I still run when there's a deadly one."
'Snake Sheila' Julia Baker's path to potential stardom was perhaps even more surprising.
Ten years ago she was working as a pastry chef in five-star hotels, loving her job but overweight and unhappy outside of work.
The Eatons Hill woman left her job when she had kids and went through a divorce about six years ago before falling into a rough patch.
"I looked at my daughters and thought 'well I've got to be a role model for them. I can't be this victim'," she said.
"I needed to get my self esteem up there so I wrote a bucket list of all the things I wanted to do."
Among other things on the list were get a motorbike license, learn to act and buy a pet snake. From there it wasn't long before Ms Baker heard about a course to become a snake catcher and started volunteering with wildlife organisations.
Then it was on to her own small business, which eventually became a sort of dial-a-snake-catcher service operating all over Brisbane.
"It just hit me one day this would make a perfect reality show," she said.
The mother of two set about finding someone who could turn her job into a TV production right around the same time Ms Lake and her production house, Flickchicks, were looking for a star.
They eventually came together after a production assistant read an old magazine article waiting for a doctor one day.
Snake Sheila is funded by Screen Queensland and filmed in Brisbane, Ipswich and the Gold and Sunshine Coasts by Flickchicks and WildBear Entertainment.
The show's star wants it to change people's attitudes to snakes.
"I can't make them like them and that's OK. We don't have to like everything but to change that perception of a good snake's a dead snake," she said.
"I would love if I could get parents to teach their kids to respect snakes, not fear.
"We need to take the fear away because… if you're scared of something you're going to hate it.
"I'm equally as passionate about inspiring people to go out and write a bucket list and go do some crazy things in your life."
