Anne Hegerty: ‘Fans tell me I’m fabulous!’
Anne Hegerty, star of TV’s The Chase, talks about being happily single – and how I’m A Celeb... changed her life
Back this month with a new series of ITV’s The
Chase, Anne Hegerty, 61, has dominated the nation’s favourite teatime quiz show for years in the fearsome guise of ‘ The Governess’. On Loose Women in 2017, she revealed her diagnosis with Asperger syndrome. Her struggles with the condition left her with crippling debts, but a social worker helped her resolve her finances and also got her an audition for The
Chase, which she joined in 2010. Anne showed fans a different side of her personality in the
I’m A Celebrity… camp last year. They loved her,
we loved her, and she finished fifth! Anne, who is single, talks to
best about dating, guilty pleasures and how much she’s loving fame…
Tell us what it’s like being on The Chase!
Fantastic! My favourite thing about the show is actually doing it. Feeling there’s something I can do well, that people seem to like, and will pay me for! I’ve spent so much of my life just trying to make a living. It’s like, oh, I can do this. This is fun! Who’d imagine that this kind of job would even exist? Amazing. I’m doing The Chase Australia again in mid- September.
Do you get on with your fellow Chasers?
Oh, yes! I am close friends with Mark [The Beast] Labbett, Paul Sinha is my quizzing pairs partner, and Jenny Ryan is my Monday night team captain in the Bolton Premier Quiz League. We all get on so well. I’m godmother to Mark’s son, Laurie. He’ll be three in November, and I’ve already got his birthday present. I don’t see him that often but, now my brother’s kids are grown up, he is the only child in my life. Mark keeps sending me pictures of him!
How has I’m A Celeb… changed your life?
It’s been bonkers. It’s like everybody wants me, which is lovely. It’s opened up a lot more opportunities. I was incredibly lucky to be in there with 10 brilliant people who all looked out for me. We have a WhatsApp group and we message each other all the time. When I saw on the news
that Emily Atack] was going to do [spin-off series] Xtra Camp, she’d told me a few days previously but said, ‘It’s a secret.’ She’ll be great at that.
Emily has a new ITV2 dating show, Singletown. Would she ever set you up?
No! Relationships are not really my style. My longest was four months, and I am amazed it lasted that long! I prefer my own company – I feel intruded on by other people, even the nicest! For years, people have been politely and courteously making passes at me, and I have been, politely and courteously, saying that, if I’m interested, they will find out!
Any celebrity crushes?
My ideal bloke is the actor Tommy Lee Jones. And I’ve got a massive crush on Stellan Skarsgård, who’s in the HBO TV series Chernobyl. I like them a bit older and grizzled… alpha males.
Do you enjoy fame?
It’s lovely. Before the jungle, people would look at me quizzically. Now, they seem more certain of who I am. They’re more likely to touch my arm and say, ‘I thought you were fabulous!’ And I love having money – there are very few problems money can’t solve! Since work has got busier, I’ve semi-relocated; I still live in Manchester, but am currently renting a house in Watford as well, as I need to be nearer London for work. It’s nice to be able to afford both.
How does Asperger’s affect your life?
Stuff takes me a long time. I have to stop and think about things. If I’m interrupted, I generally have to go back to the beginning. People say, ‘ What do you do with yourself all day?’ Well, I read, and I think. I do a lot of quizzing – but if a film crew were to follow me around for 24 hours, they’d see an awful lot of not very much! I’d be thinking and processing things. I did it a lot in the jungle, sitting on a log or my bed, staring at a eucalyptus tree.
You lost weight while you were in the jungle. Have you kept it off?
I only lost a stone. I’ve probably put it back on! But I don’t care. I didn’t go in there for that. I have many guilty food pleasures… always, always cheesecake! I don’t think about getting older, as I am really enjoying my sixties. My fifties were great, and this decade looks positive, too. I always think life gets better!
l The Chase airs weekdays, 5pm on ITV.