If it’s early August, it must be Celebrity Hunted’s annual series in aid of the charity Stand Up to Cancer. The dozen famouses must evade capture for two weeks, which is a shorter time than civilians are required to manage it. Is it because celebrity schedules are fuller or their brains emptier? By the end of the first couple of episodes, I know which way I’m leaning.
The contestants, working in six pairs, include Britain’s last vaudevillian Brian Conley (“I’m like a coiled sponge!”) and his daughter Lucy (“Dad! Stop being funny”), TV property presenter siblings – a sort of hyphenate from hell – Scarlette and Stuart Douglas, plus comedians Jen Brister and Laura Smyth. In a game where predictability is the greatest – well, predictor – of failure, they may have the best plan. “I’m just not going to take my HRT for a week and let’s see what happens,” says Jen.