Latest news with #CelebrityInfestedWaters
The Sun
21 hours ago
- Entertainment
- The Sun
Shark! Celebrity Infested Waters slammed by viewers as ‘pointless TV' after debut episode
VIEWERS watching Shark! Celebrity Infested Waters slammed the series as 'pointless TV' after its debut episode. Shark! Celebrity Infested Waters sees seven famous faces embark on a dive expedition to The Bahamas. 4 4 The line-up includes Lenny Henry, Rachel Riley, Dougie Poynter and Helen George. Rounding out the group are Ade Adepitan, Lucy Punch and Ross Noble. Some viewers were left unimpressed with the programme, branding it "pointless". Taking to X, one person wrote: "Ok I get it, they're huge with razor sharp teeth but why is they're always that one f*****g celebrity that cry's/shakes/ terrified… "They're not going to let you die, ( saying that i wouldn't do it) #sharkcelebrityinfestedwaters." Another wrote: "Shark! Celebrity Infested Waters is single proof that television is at an all time pointless low." While a third remarked: "So ….. i probably won't recognise any celebrities, the sharks will find them tasteless….. and none of them are gonna be eaten. #pointless New TV series tonight." Others were more complimentary, as one shared: "Celeb Shark Infested Water is nay too shabby TV tbf." A second penned: "This new show is very eye opening and I have already learnt a lot about sharks on the first episode….." Leading the expedition are shark experts including Dr. Tristan Guttridge. Ross Noble is bitten by a shark on new ITV show Shark! Celebrity Infested Waters It comes as Call the Midwife star Helen George, 41, opened up about facing her biggest fear upon joining the show. Speaking to The Sun on Sunday ahead of the first episode on ITV1, Helen revealed that she developed the fear, known as aquaphobia, after experiencing a horrendous near-death experience in a swimming pool as a child. Helen said: 'I was terrified of putting my head underwater. I have a real deep-rooted fear. 'I used to love the water when I was really young, but I went to a swimming party when I was six. 'They put those weird Nineties foam mats down. They're massive yoga mats, really. 'I just remember this moment of being stuck underneath one and not being able to get out. There was that fear of being trapped. I finally made my way up to the surface. 'But I remember no one noticing that I'd gone, and no one really believing what I said, because no one had seen it. From then, I got it in my head about not putting my head underwater. 'I have a really strong image of looking up to the top of the swimming pool and the mats were on top and no one knew I was down there.' 4
Daily Mail
a day ago
- Entertainment
- Daily Mail
ITV's new show Shark! Celebrity Infested Waters branded 'boring' and 'unwatchable' as viewers declare one 'annoying' star an 'attention seeker'
Shark! Celebrity Infested Waters failed to impress viewers who branded it 'boring' and 'unwatchable' following it's first episode on Monday. The new series, which coincides with 50th anniversary of Jaws, sees a bunch of famous faces, who are terrified of the sea, face their fears head on by taking a plunge surrounded by the scary predators. The line-up included Rachel Riley, 39, Lucy Punch, 47, Dougie Poynter, 37, Ade Adepitan, 52, Sir Lenny Henry, 66, and Ross Noble, 48. However it was Call The Midwife 's Helen George, 40, who rubbed viewers up the wrong way with her tearful and fearful reactions branded 'attention seeking' and 'annoying'. Taking to X fans fumed: 'TV execs are now so bereft of ideas that they're literally feeing celebrities to sharks for our entertainment': 'This is pretty unwatchable because there's one celebrity on there who wants the entire programme to be about "me me me"'. 'WTF is she crying for FFS. You're on a f*****g show called Celebrity Infested Waters what did she think it was, swimming with Dolphins. Seriously waits the point of this tho, boring concept for a show': 'Helen just stick to acting': 'What is the point of this sown actually?'. The BBC actress, who plays nurse Trixie in Call The Midwife, previously revealed she has a lifelong phobia of the ocean. She told how she had only 'been up to her knees' in the water in the last 20 years after an incident when she was younger. Helen previously explained: 'When I was very young I was at a swimming party. I remember going underwater, looking up and foam mats had been chucked where I was coming up. I couldn't get out.' It comes after another clip showed the star shrieking as a stingray took aim at her nether regions in an unfortunate attack. While she was submerged in the ocean off the Bahamas, a stingray took a keen interest in Helen. The Sun reported the actress said during the encounter: 'Jesus Christ, it's coming right at my vagina! It's there. 'It gave me a tickle. I've never been tickled by a stingray before... it was actually quite pleasant.' She added: 'Didn't Steve Irwin die of a stingray?'. The BBC actress, who plays nurse Trixie in Call The Midwife, previously revealed she has a lifelong phobia of the ocean Helen was referring to the conservationist and TV star who died in 2006 and was affectionately known as The Crocodile Hunter. Teasing what's to come, a ITV spokesperson said: 'The show will dare a group of ocean-phobic celebrities to confront their greatest fear – sharks. 'Throughout their adrenaline-fueled, challenge-heavy journey in the Bahamas – the shark capital of the world – these A-listers will push past their limits to come nose to nose with nature's 'villains.' 'Their firsthand experiences will provide immeasurable excitement and new perspective. 'They'll come to appreciate sharks' valuable place on the food chain and in our ecosystem, recognising that a world devoid of these notoriously terrifying creatures is downright frightening. 'Those taking part will be getting up close and personal with a number of different breeds of sharks throughout filming.' Head of Factual Entertainment at Plimsoll Productions, Karen Plumb, said: 'The team at Plimsoll is uniquely positioned to pioneer this format that blends conservation with wildly entertaining pop culture. 'We're constantly looking for innovative approaches to wildlife storytelling and are certain that our fish-out-of-water spin – delivering 50 years after Jaws – will transform the world's perception of these critical predators before it's too late.' Head of Entertainment Commissioning ITV, Katie Rawcliffe, said: 'We're super excited to be combining the work of Plimsoll - a Blue Chip natural history production company - with the expertise of ITV Entertainment. 'SHARK! Celebrity Infested Waters promises to be a once in a lifetime challenge for some of the bravest celebrities out there.'
The Guardian
a day ago
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Shark! Celebrity Infested Waters review – a lovely watch … despite the stars' total fear and panic
On paper, Shark! Celebrity Infested Waters sounds as if television has evolved into a more extreme, more dangerous beast. If you think I'm A Celebrity's snakey, spidery hellholes are too soft on famous people, get a mouthful of this. Seven famous people, each with varying degrees of phobias about sharks, open water or both, will be thrown into the ocean, ie the natural habitat of sharks, those magnificent apex predators. Could this be the way Lenny Henry goes out? Disappointingly, it turns out to be far more sensational in concept than execution. The show is timed to mark the 50th anniversary of Jaws, the film which cemented a fear of sharks in the imaginations of the general public. The idea is to correct the record and adjust perceptions of a creature that has come to be seen as 'public enemy number one'. Anyone who sees that exclamation mark in the title and tunes in expecting a high-stakes version of Splash!, the campy ITV reality show in which the Olympian gold medallist Tom Daley taught a bejewelled Gemma Collins to dive off a not-very-lofty board, will be crushed. Shark! uses celebrities as a way in to a series that is really about conservation. That may be why the celebrities are on the more respectable side – none of your reality TV alumni here – and why it moves at a sedate pace, even when there is a serious possibility of comedian Ross Noble getting his foot nibbled in the mangroves. It is difficult to imagine what first attracted the celebrities to the prospect of a TV show requiring a decent stint in the Bahamas. I can't quite put my finger on why they would sign up. Most are there to conquer their fears, while one or two simply seem keen on the idea of an adventure, and vaguely reach for a discomfort that they can overcome on telly. Joining Henry and Noble are Amandaland's Lucy Punch, McFly's Dougie Poynter, Paralympian and presenter Ade Adepitan, Countdown's Rachel Riley and Helen George from Call the Midwife. Presumably Gemma Collins couldn't find a wetsuit sparkly enough. George is the character to watch. She is anxious and visibly terrified before she even dons her flippers, attributing what appears to be a debilitating fear of water to an incident in a swimming pool as a child. (Similarly, Henry explains that he almost drowned when he was in primary school, making him a reluctant swimmer.) She is the one who would be voted for in every task in week one of I'm a Celebrity, and the fear she displays is so palpable that you can't help but feel for her. What she pushes herself to do, despite her terror, is extraordinary. Ultimately, though, the sharks upstage the celebrities. No wonder they get top billing. This is a nature documentary by stealth, and a plea for respect for these ancient fish. The Bahamas are the shark capital of the world, we are told. They are a vital aspect of the ocean's ecosystem, and many species are at risk of extinction. The three experts on hand to help soothe the celebrities into the water are fantastic, but my favourite is Paul, an ex-military Australian who lost a leg and a hand in a shark attack and subsequently dedicated his life to the conservation of sharks. He describes the attack in gory detail as the celebrities go quiet, but Paul is adamant that it is shark extinction, not sharks themselves, that is the real danger to humanity. For a show about predators, Shark! is surprisingly calm, the progress slow and as safe as it can possibly be. There is no voting off here, says scientist Tristan, only teamwork. They will 'go on this journey together'. First, they lower themselves into shark cages, in a dock frequented by bull sharks, which are number three on the list of best-known species, behind tiger sharks and the mighty great white. Pound for pound, bull sharks have the strongest bite of any shark, which makes them an ideal starter species for the celebrities. Later, the celebrities feed stingrays, the cousins of sharks, then stand in a mangrove as lemon sharks swoop around their legs. One celebrity asks if they could be bitten. 'Hopefully not,' says Tristan, which is less reassuring than he thinks. These experiences look wonderful and transformative for the celebrities. For viewers, it may have the faint ring of looking through someone else's holiday videos and snaps when you don't know them very well. But as a gentle corrective to the villainy of Jaws' mechanical monster, and an alternative take on the nature documentary, this is quite lovely. Shark! Celebrity Infested Waters aired on ITV1 and is on ITVX now.
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Terrifying reason Shark! Celebrity Infested Waters is much riskier than I'm A Celeb
Dougie Poynter has admitted filming Shark! Celebrity Infested Waters was much scarier than his time on I'm A Me Out of Here!, saying there was no contest between sharks and jungle critters. McFly star Poynter was crowned King of the Jungle in 2011, but confessed that although he may have looked brave facing down snakes, rats and bugs, the experience was very tame compared to his latest ITV show where he swims with sharks. He appeared on Lorraine on Thursday, 10 July along with fellow contestant Ross Noble to talk about the terror of getting into the water with sharks and why he had found I'm A Celebrity so much easier. King of the Jungle Poynter might seem like he's used to braving close encounters with wildlife after winning I'm A Celebrity, but he has said there was "no comparison" between the reality TV show and his latest series, Shark! Celebrity Infested Waters, when it came to which one was scarier. Speaking to Lorraine host Christine Lampard on Thursday, 10 July about the two wildlife-filled shows, he said: "Compared to I'm A Celebrity? There's nothing in I'm A Celebrity that could potentially eat you, so it didn't really compare. "I used to breed lizards when I was a kid, and a lot of the stuff that they would use in I'm A Celeb is the food that I would feed my lizards." But despite the potential risks of swimming with sharks, he said of the new series: "It was one of the most amazing things I've ever done. I was so bummed out when I came home, I had such a great time." Read more: I'm a Celebrity 2025 rumoured line-up includes Liam Payne's girlfriend Kate Cassidy I'm A Celebrity's best ever contestants over the years Why Piers Morgan will never do I'm A Celebrity as he turns down ITV reality show again Poynter has opened up more on the experience ahead of Shark! Celebrity Infested Waters making its TV debut. "There were a couple of hairy moments, but I was never really scared," he said previously. "And it's not because the sharks were going to attack. I guess I had this retrospective fear when I was like, 'I was in a dangerous position and didn't really realise.' You're down in the ocean with an apex predator, the second to the Great White. There was this adrenaline and it just made you feel alive. "You would never go running next to a pride of lions. But sharks are villainised and everyone hates them compared to lions that get Disney movies made out of them. People are just fearful of sharks and I don't blame them. Sharks are not as cute as Simba and Mufasa, but I'd quite happily dive with Tiger sharks over running with lions!" The show left such an impression on the musician that he added: "I learnt how to scuba dive which I'm now totally obsessed with and have bought loads of my own professional gear. I'm only looking at holiday destinations that have great scuba diving now." The new ITV series sent a group of celebrities to the Bahamas to learn how to swim with a range of sharks, which got bigger and more dangerous as the stars gained confidence. Poynter and Noble were joined by Lenny Henry, Rachel Riley, Helen George, Ade Adepitan and Lucy Punch for the programme. They travelled to Bimini, a shark sanctuary that is home to Hammerheads, Bull sharks, Tiger sharks and Lemon sharks, to learn from experts and divers about their importance and how to safely swim with them. It was a nerve-jangling trip for many of the cast, many of whom had a fear of sharks or water, but they all said that they had learned a new respect for the creatures and their place in the environment. Karen Plumb, head of factual entertainment at Plimsoll Productions who made the series, said: "We're constantly looking for innovative approaches to wildlife storytelling and are certain that our fish-out-of-water spin — delivering 50 years after Jaws — will transform the world's perception of these critical predators before it's too late." Shark! Celebrity Infested Waters airs on ITV1 at 9pm from Monday, 14 July.
Daily Mail
03-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Daily Mail
I was so scared of dying in a shark attack I made a will: Countdown's Rachel Riley reveals her fears she'd be a 'goner' during filming for shocking new show
Rachel Riley was frightened before she even flew out to film new reality show Shark! Celebrity Infested Waters. But here she reveals the sheer euphoria of going eyeball to eyeball with ferocious maneaters... We were thrown in the deep end, literally,' says Rachel Riley after being challenged to swim with the most frightening creatures in the sea. 'I was scared, but I was also really excited. You don't know how you're going to react until you're in there doing it!' Shark! Celebrity Infested Waters is the breathless name of a new reality show in which seven men and women fly off to Bimini in the Bahamas to go nose-to-nose with the ocean's apex predators. Rachel says she expected a nice gentle start, but on the first day she and the others were told to put on a wetsuit and scuba gear and get ready to dive. She then had to climb down a ladder into deep water with nothing but a heavy-duty metal cage between her and the killers about to approach. 'Keep your hands and feet inside the cage or the sharks will have them,' said one of the experts from above. Then out of the haze of the Caribbean waters came not one or two but a host of ruthless-looking bull sharks with their sharp teeth and hunger for prey. 'I did feel fear at seeing a shark up close for the first time, my heart was racing but I didn't freak out,' says Rachel, who was still startled as the bull sharks came straight at her and banged into the bars of the cage. 'We later learned that every kind of shark has a different personality. The bull shark is a sneaky f*****. The experts don't trust them. 'You can see their eyes. You can sense their movements. And you're in their world.' She had a huge rush afterwards. 'It was glorious. There's a feeling of euphoria. You can really feel the chemical reaction in your body.' After that shocking first day she was dared to go on and swim with other kinds of shark without a cage, but that only highlighted the danger of her first encounter. 'If a bull shark turned up when we were in the water without a cage they would want to get us out quick.' The maths genius who co-hosts Countdown and its late-night spin-off Eight Out Of Ten Cats admits she was afraid before even getting on the plane. 'I wrote my will before we went. This trip made me want to make sure everything was signed, just in case. They're wild animals. You're scuba diving. Anything could happen.' The 39-year-old had seen how brutal sharks can be while on holiday with Pasha Kovalev, her husband and former Strictly Come Dancing partner. 'We were in the Galapagos islands and we saw a bright pink thing in the water. We thought it was a discarded life jacket. It was a sea lion that had just been bitten in half by a bull shark, and it was trying to crawl out of the water,' she says. 'We had been snorkelling off the boat in those same waters.' She and Pasha met on Strictly in 2013 and married six years later. Their daughters Noa and Maven are three and five. 'I didn't tell them what I was going away to do because I didn't want to scare them. It was only when I was in Bimini on a video call by the water that I said, "Do you want to see some sharks?" They said, "Yeah!" If you fall in the water with a bull shark you're a goner, but the girls said, "You've got to go swimming with them, Mummy!" That reassured Rachel. 'They were too young to have any fear about what I was doing.' The rest of the celebrity shark-bait includes the great Sir Lenny Henry, comedian Ross Noble, Amandaland and Call The Midwife actors Lucy Punch and Helen George, Paralympian and presenter Ade Adepitan and Dougie Poynter from McFly. Weekend has seen the first episode and can testify to the shock and alarm on all their faces when Paul de Gelder walked in the room. The ex-Navy diver lost an arm and a leg during a frenzied shark attack in Sydney harbour, but has since become a conservationist and unlikely champion for the species. Still, he reminded the startled celebrities the aim was to swim in open waters, unprotected, with the same kinds of creatures that nearly killed him. 'Next time there will be no cage.' The plan was to get used to being in the sea with rays and lemon sharks, then rise up through the scale of danger from hammerheads to the mighty tiger. 'Tiger sharks are big, they can grow to more than four metres long,' says Rachel. 'They're the scavengers of the sea. They'll just eat anything. There had been fatalities from tiger sharks in that region not too long before we were there.' Helen George from Call The Midwife struggled the most at the start because of a phobia. 'Your subconscious does weird things to you,' says Rachel. 'If you're scared of the water then the rest of it – sharks and all – is so much more of a challenge, isn't it? But she's one of the strongest women I know. She was incredible.' Shark! is inspired by the movie Jaws, which turns 50 this summer and gave the Great White a bad name as a monstrous man-eater. 'I was seven when I first saw part of Jaws,' says Rachel, who grew up near Southend in Essex and has a poignant reason to recall that night. 'I remember watching half the film and then being told my grandad had died. I didn't ever return to it until now.' But actually Shark! is not as crass or cheesy as the reality shows it seems, at first glance, to outdo. There are no winners. The seven celebrities work together to overcome fears and learn more about what they're facing. The result is stunning underwater footage and an unexpectedly moving exploration of our relationship with sharks. 'We need them for the health of the oceans,' says Rachel. 'The sharks eat the pest fish that can destroy the coral reefs. If the sharks are not there the reefs are soon gone, they're not protecting the shoreline, you get erosion and extreme weather and everything is thrown out of balance.' So, surely the producers were not really going to endanger anyone's life making this? 'I've got quite a rational brain so on the way there I was thinking, "How can they get insurance for this unless it's safe? How bad could it be?" Also, I'm quite trusting,' says Rachel. 'But then Paul, who's been through the worst thing that could possibly happen, was like, "No, don't be complacent, these are real sharks".' The killer instinct was never far from the surface. 'Swimming with sharks was like being with the Mafia. Everything is fine while everything's fine and everyone's laughing, but they could turn in an instant and there would be nothing you could do about it.' Not every celebrity was brave enough to take the final dive. 'By then you really did feel like you had a responsibility to look after your life, because something bad could happen.' After getting a master's degree in mathematics from Oriel College, Oxford, Rachel's big break came after a night on the town when she finally gave in to her mother Celia's pressure to apply for the Countdown job, as Carol Vorderman was leaving. The form said they were big shoes to fill so a hungover Rachel wrote: 'I'm a maths geek, I love the show, I'm an Essex girl so why not fill them with some white stilettos?' She beat a thousand applicants and has been solving the maths problems on the show since 2009, as well as showing a dry and salty wit on Eight Out Of Ten Cats. Rachel was partnered with Pasha on 2013's Strictly and split up with her husband during the run, before marrying Pasha in a secret wedding in Vegas. Fame, success and a contented home life gave Rachel the courage to start speaking up on the things she cared about, inspired by her mother's work as a charity fundraiser. But it has led to a vicious backlash online. 'The more I speak, the more abuse I get, and the more abuse I get, the more I speak,' Rachel has said. She was given an MBE in 2023 for services to Holocaust education and anti-Semitism awareness. Sometimes she gets it wrong, like being too quick to link the stabbings in Sydney last year with Islamist terrorism. She deleted her post but cancel culture means some people now avoid controversy at all costs when they become famous. 'They might be wiser,' she says wryly. Does she have any regrets then, about being so vocal? 'It does come at a cost, but you don't necessarily know the cost until you've already paid,' she says, then checks herself. 'I don't like to do the whole hindsight thing, there's no point. When I do anything I think: 'Can I look at myself in the mirror if I do this or if I don't do this?' That's the only real decision. You've got to answer to yourself and to your family.' Her mother is Jewish and Rachel has embraced that identity more and more in recent years despite describing herself as an atheist. Her account on X – with more than 600,000 followers – is pinned with a post that says: 'OK Jews. Things are sh** right now. But we will get through this.' Everything has become more intense since the Hamas attacks on 7 October 2023 and Israel's response. 'I read recently someone talking about how it's no longer an irrelevance to be Jewish,' says Rachel. 'I was irrelevantly Jewish before all this. I've got a Hebrew name and a mezuzah [a small parchment scroll] on the door but it didn't affect me day to day. And now it does.' She has become one of the public faces of a community that feels severely under pressure. Rachel acknowledges that not everyone in it agrees with all her statements but says, 'I talk to a hell of a lot of Jewish people and they're really kind and supportive and grateful.' Another conflict has also affected her life deeply. Pasha is Russian – and when his home country invaded Ukraine in 2022 they took in a family fleeing the war. 'It goes back to the Jewish thing,' she explains. 'My family fled persecution in the pogroms in what was Russia but is now Ukraine and ended up here at the turn of the 1900s, with no one to help them. This time we were in a position to help.' Still, it's a big decision to open your home to strangers. 'I wanted my girls to see an example. Noa and Maven are of Russian heritage and I didn't want them to feel any sense of shame or guilt about who they are.' The refugees were a lawyer called Sasha, her ten-year-old son Mykyta, her mother and aunt. 'They're part of the family now. My little girls say Mykyta is their big brother. He says he's got little sisters.' Her body language has changed. When we started Rachel was chatty and relaxed. Now the stress on her face is a reminder these conflicts are personally painful. There's a photoshoot to do, so I end by asking how she trained for the Bahamas. 'I've always been sporty but it's just chasing after toddlers at the moment, that's where I get my exercise now.' Wearing a wetsuit on camera was no problem, she volunteers. 'Once you've had kids a lot of the hang-ups go. Your body changes in ways you've got no control over. I'm going to turn 40 next, I just don't really care. My one vain act for this project was to say, "I'm going to be in the water all the time, I'll get my eyebrows painted in".' Rachel relaxes again. These are safer waters. 'That's why Shark! was so wonderful, because sharks only care if they can eat you. Sharks couldn't give a t*** who you are!' Shark! Celebrity Infested Waters starts Monday 14 July at 9pm on ITV1, ITVX, STV and STV Player.
