'I was starting to look really ugly!' Joel Dommett went 'absolutely feral' filming Survivor

24 October 2023

Joel Dommett went “absolutely feral” filming ‘Survivor’.

Joel Dommett went 'absolutely feral' filming Survivor

The 'Masked Dancer' presenter loved fronting the BBC One version of the adventure programme - which will see 18 contestants fight it out in a series of challenges to win a cash prize - and he didn’t realise how “unclean” he was until his agent visited him on the set.

The 38-year-old comedian told The Sun newspaper: “I grew my beard out until about halfway through, then I realised I was starting to look really ugly, so I thought, ‘I need to trim this back’.

“I speak for a lot of the crew here, we became absolutely feral.

“Every now and again someone new, like my agent, would come to visit and you don’t realise how unclean you are until someone clean arrives ... we really enjoyed it.”

Joel - who recently became a father for the first time when his wife model Hannah Cooper gave birth to their son Wylde in September - wanted to shake off his “shiny suit” persona that he has on ‘The Masked Singer’.

He said: “For 'Masked Singer' you’ve got the shiny suit, stood next to an Octopus, which is so different from 'Survivor' and it’s a huge departure for me.

"I really love that.

“But then again it’s quite hard to be funny when people are punching each other in the face.”

Joel insisted the show’s “endurance challenges” were the best bit of filming.

He said: “My favourites are the endurance challenges, which get bigger as the series goes on.

"But what the contestants put themselves through is insane. No food, no sleep.

"I can’t even hold my coffee cup if I’ve had less than eight hours.

“I would enjoy the physical challenges more than the mind games, I’d fall apart on those.

“You’re trying to get rid of people without p****** them off.

"You’re trying to play three different games at the same time, that’s why viewers get obsessed with it.”