TV presenter Melanie Sykes has opened up about the moment she finally decided to quit telly after years of experiencing 'toxic culture'. It came in 2021 when she appeared on BBC cookery competition, MasterChef and co-host Gregg Wallace made a comment which saw Mel decide to pack it all in.
Speaking in an interview with The Guardian, Mel, who first shot to fame in the 1990s as the face of Boddingtons, said that Wallace told her the show would “do a lot for you”, but actually it made her “decide to end my television career once and for all. I was done".
She added that she was finished “tap-dancing for corporations who couldn’t give two hoots about my wellbeing”, and told the publication that mainstream TV “just doesn’t interest me … I’m out of that game”.
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A face on TV since the 1990s, with hosting gigs on The Big Breakfast, I'm a Celebrity, The Vault, and, of course her daytime show with friend Des O'Connor, Mel has also revealed that she was diagnosed with autism and spoke about her experiences during her career of sexism, racism and more, in her new autobiography, Illuminated: Autism & All The Things I’ve Left Unsaid.
She hopes her book, and the two films she is making, would “shine a light” on autism and issues affecting vulnerable women, such as coercive control. “I want to help protect children and women and anyone who’s vulnerable … I’m just a tool in order to facilitate it.”
In the new book she details times she felt 'thrown under the bus' by the industry, alleging that a game show she co-hosted with Mark Wright was canceled because it broke TV gambling rules, but the PR line given was that the hosts 'failed to understand the concept of the game.'
Mel also detailed inappropriate behaviour from agents and photographers she had experienced, including upskirting. Mel appeared on Celebrity MasterChef in 2021 and was eliminated in the semi-finals. Illuminated by Melanie Sykes is out now from HarperCollins Publishers. For more showbiz and television stories get our newsletter here
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