Coronation Street star Sue Cleaver has advised the incoming I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out Of Here! contestants not to be “seduced” by their fears or take themselves “too seriously”.
The soap actress, who competed in the ITV reality show in 2022, revealed she had a phobia of snakes before entering the Australian camp but confronted her internal worries.
Appearing on ITV’s Good Morning Britain on Thursday, the 61-year-old said: “Don’t believe your thoughts. I thought I had a phobia of snakes, then I realised it’s just a thought.
“I’d never been attacked by a snake, I’d never spent time (with a snake). It was just my thinking. I thought I was afraid of snakes, and I wasn’t afraid of snakes.
“It was just being seduced by my thoughts. So I’d say – don’t get seduced by your thoughts, don’t take yourself too seriously.
“Have an amazing time. Sleeping in that jungle with those sounds is a privilege and don’t sweat the small stuff.”
A number of celebrities have been rumoured to be entering the jungle when the show returns on November 17, including former Strictly Come Dancing star Oti Mabuse, champion boxer Barry McGuigan and N-Dubz band member Tulisa Contostavlos.
Coronation Street actor Alan Halsall, Loose Women’s Jane Moore, McFly singer Danny Jones, and former BBC radio host the Rev Richard Coles are also reportedly set to join the 2024 line-up.
They will be joined by Love Islander Maura Higgins, radio stars Melvin Odoom and Dean McCullough, and internet personality GK Barry, according to reports by The Sun newspaper.
ITV is yet to officially confirm any of the 2024 cast, with a spokesperson saying: “Any names suggested for I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out Of Here! are just speculation.”
Cleaver appeared on the ITV morning show to discuss her new book, A Work In Progress, in which she discusses how she still feels she is not past her prime.
She said: “I think you get to a certain age, we get 50-plus, maybe our roles as parents have come to the end, we’ve got empty-nest syndrome, I think society would quite like us to just shuffle off quietly.
“I’m saying we do not need to buy into society’s bias. It’s all about empowering yourself and realising this can be a really exciting time.”
The actress, best known for playing Eileen Grimshaw in Coronation Street, said she has approached this by challenging her negative thoughts, saying: “Thoughts are not facts. They are just thoughts, they pop in and they pop out, and we choose which ones we hang on to.
“Unfortunately, humans tend to hang on to the most negative thoughts. By their very nature, thoughts are like taxis, there’s always a new one coming all the time, you can choose which one you jump into.”
