I’m A Celeb’s Ruthie Henshall has ‘eaten her body weight’ and ‘been talking to herself’ in isolation

Ruthie Henshall is one of two latecomers heading to Gwrych Castle for this year’s I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out Of Here! and has detailed her ‘boring’ two weeks in isolation.

The theatre star, 53, has been in lockdown ahead of her stint on the celebrity endurance show, and spent a week of it without a phone or computer.

In a chat on Tuesday, Ruthie told us how she had planned to cut back on coffee and food in preparation, but has been so bored her plans to do so have ‘gone up the swanny’.

She also claimed to have ‘gone bonkers’.

‘I am addicted to coffee,’ she said. ‘So I have been trying to cut it out. I am down to a double espresso a day. I just know I’ll have headaches! 

‘I have gone bonkers doing this two weeks in lockdown. I mean talking to myself type bonkers.  

‘I was planning on getting myself into gear to cut down on food. But I have been so bored I’ve eaten my body weight in food.

‘So all the things I was going to do to prepare have gone up the swanny!’

Ruthie claims her lack of access to the internet has stopped her from researching the show, the contestants and the Welsh castle. But she maintains she wants to go in with fresh eyes and no preconceptions.  

‘The only person in there I know already is Shane Richie. Shane is a diamond. He made me laugh a lot when I worked with him,’ she said. ‘I love laughing and making people laugh; but I’m the first person with my arms out if someone is upset. I cant bear it!’

The first task, aired on Monday night, saw Shane and Jordan North locked in vaults under the ground, filled with 30 snakes each.

Speaking of her fears, Ruthie revealed: ‘I am scared of the dark. And of confined spaces – put me in something confined where I can’t get out…

‘And everyone’s scared of anything that crawls any faster than a sloth and can move quickly in any direction aren’t they? I will try to be a brave tough cookie.

‘I think it is such a life experience. How often are you ever going to get someone coming to you and saying “we’re going to put you through your paces, scare you silly, test everything about you”? I think it will be a real hoot!’

Ruthie signed up for the show earlier in the year, prior to the revelation that it would take place in Wales, not Australia.

‘I had no idea when I said yes it would be in Wales. I thought I was going to a nice hot jungle,’ she said. ‘But I think it’s brilliant that this British show that is so loved has come home.

‘For how long – we don’t know. But how lovely that a bunch of people in the UK are getting paid. It’s fantastic that we are in beautiful Welsh countryside in an old castle, a big part of history.’

Ruthie made her name on the stage, starting out in 1986, before making her West End debut in Cats in 1987.

And commenting on the closure of theatres and shows across the world amid the COVID-19 pandemic, she said: ‘It’s heartbreaking. Most of us in the business are self-employed. Everyone from backstage, to costumers, dressers, Front Of House, producers, actors…

‘It is already very much a life where we don’t know what’s coming next. But this is on a whole other level.

‘I know we are not saving lives but we have trained and honed our skills for all our lives. It’s just devastating that the something where magic happens is not able to go ahead.’

But the five-time Olivier nominee – and one-time winner – seems optimistic about the future of the theatre.

‘It always survives. And I can’t wait for it to begin again. It’ll be like coming home.

‘There are so many devastating things going on – so many jobs being decimated – and it does feel a bit like we in the theatre are being forgotten about. That the bottom has fallen out of it…’

I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out Of Here! airs at 9PM on ITV.