OHMYGOSSIP — Dame Arlene Phillips wanted to be voted out first on ‘I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here!’, because she felt “anxious” over upcoming work commitments.
The 78-year-old choreographer – who last year became the oldest ever contestant to take part in the ITV show, which was won by former ‘Emmerdale’ star Danny Miller – admitted that being eliminated first was exactly what she wanted because of her upcoming jobs, and she was keen to be reunited with her family.
She said: “I’d always wanted to be the first one out, partly because I had a lot of work waiting for me that I felt anxious about, but I also missed my family and needed to tell them how much I really loved them.
“It’s nice to go out of a show and not feel depressed.”
The former ‘Strictly Come Dancing’ judge went on to claim that while she is “scared of everything”, she found the courage to appear on the show after a young dancer she had been mentoring was diagnosed – and eventually succumbed to – cancer.
Speaking to the Metro newspaper, she added; “For five years, I had been mentoring a beautiful dancer called Lily Douglas, who I met when she was nine and won a dancing competition. At he end of a wonderful day, her mother told me that Lily had just been diagnosed with fourth stage Ewing sarcoma cancer.
“I kept in touch with the family and would see them every year, so we became very close. Sadly, Lily recently passed away at age 14 and she made me think about bravery in everything.”
Source: VacationHunter.Online