Scarlette Douglas said she was "devastated" to learn about her A Place In The Sun co-star Jonnie Irwin's cancer, after leaving I'm a Celebrity.
Jonnie, 49, revealed last week that he has lung cancer, which has now spread to his brain. He told Hello magazine last week that the first warning sign of his illness came while he was filming the Channel 4 show in August 2020 in Italy, when his vision became blurry while driving.
His former colleague Scarlette Douglas knew Jonnie "wasn't well" but did not know he had terminal cancer because she was appearing on I'm A Celebrity in Australia.
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After being voted off, Scarlette said she was informed of Jonnie's prognosis. She told the Daily Mail: "I did know he wasn't well, but I didn't know this. I didn't realise it was terminal...I have come out and been told but I didn't know the true extent of it so of course, I'm going to drop him a message because that's devastating."
She added: "When I did my screen test I watched a lot of his shows because he was confident with the house hunters and on it, he knew everything and you never questioned Jonnie, he was so knowledgeable, any questions the house hunters had, he knew the answers.
"I remember taking a lot of inspiration from him when I first did the screen test and even still doing the shows, still watching his episodes and saying Jonnie has done it like that and I love how he's done that, so I want to add a bit into that with how I present."
Jonnie shares three-year-old son Rex and two-year-old twins Rafa and Cormac with his wife Jessica. When asked if he would be capturing memories on camera and video over Christmas on Good Morning Britain, Jonnie said: "Absolutely, now's about making memories, of course it is...I'm sure most people in my positions think the same.
"I'm probably going harder on it because I know my children are so young, they probably won't remember me. I want to at least (be) on camera, on film, to be able to not (just) remind them but show them that the early days were brilliant."
He added: "So (my children are) so young, but at the moment, I'm me, a version, and I don't think there's any need to tell them. I think it'd be a lot for them to get their heads around so for now, let's let the good times roll for as long as possible."
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