I’m a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here! goes Down Under

Even a pandemic couldn’t stop one of Britain’s most popular reality shows – but it could keep it a little closer to home.

In 2020, it was announced that instead of taking a group of famous faces to the Australian jungle, I’m a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here! would instead be putting them up in a Welsh castle.

The following year, Ant and Dec returned to Gwrych Castle amid continuing uncertainty around travel restrictions. (As it turned out, Covid wasn’t the only threat to the production – Storm Arwen led to the campers being removed from the historic building and episodes being cancelled amid safety fears and technical difficulties.)

However, this year, the show is once again free to go jet-setting – and it’s making up for lost time. Not only is the current run heading back to Australia for the first time in two years, but in September, Ant and Dec took to Twitter to reveal they were in South Africa to film an All-Star version of the show.

That’s set to air early next year and will be a reminder of just how many memorable characters have graced I’m a Celebrity since it first aired all the way back in 2002.

Although that initial series was a hit with viewers, few people who tuned in to see Tony Blackburn being crowned the first King of the Jungle would have expected it to still be going strong – and winning National TV awards – 20 years later.

For a start, some people may have thought that watching famous faces dealing with meagre rations and bickering fellow campers, not to mention those infamous Bushtucker Trials, might have put other stars off signing up.

Yet even in its 22nd series, it seems there are still plenty of celebs who are willing to risk eating bugs or being dangled from great heights in the name of reality TV.

DJ Chris Moyles, who has long been tipped as a contestant, was spotted arriving in Australia recently, and told reporters: “I have absolutely no idea what my family and friends would think of me doing a show like I’m A Celebrity. I have never asked them. But I think they would be much more nervous about me doing Antiques Roadshow.”

Hollyoaks actor Owen Warner has also been noticed at Brisbane airport, along with Coronation Street’s Sue Cleaver and reality star Olivia Attwood.

Culture Club singer Boy George is also widely expected to take part – there have even been claims that he’s set to become the highest-paid contestant in the show’s history. Meanwhile, if the rumours are true that former England rugby player Mike Tindall (aka the husband of Princess Anne’s daughter Zara) is heading Down Under, we could be in for our first king of the jungle with genuine royal connections.

We’ll get to see just who the celebs are tonight, as Ant and Dec officially introduce the line-up and find out how they settle in during their first night in the camp.