Duncan James ('Scream If You Know The Answer')

Duncan James ('Scream If You Know The Answer')

Friday, April 30 2010, 06:28 BST

By Mayer Nissim, Entertainment Reporter
Duncan James ('Scream If You Know The Answer')

Duncan James has kept pretty busy since his exciting days as a member of '00s boyband Blue. After a brief solo career he took to the West End stage in Chicago and is now starring in the critcally-adored adaptation of Legally Blonde. 'Lest we forget, he also made the final of Dancing on Ice in 2007 and is carving out a decent career for himself as a TV presenter. His latest project? Scream If You Know The Answer, a delightfully old-school celebs 'n' civilians gameshow with a twist. Quite a lot of twists, in fact. We hooked up with Duncan at Thorpe Park to find out more.

What was your initial reaction when you heard the idea for the show?
"I just thought it was brilliant. It's never been done before, and I thought it was a really unique concept. My agent said, 'Watch the demo of it - it's quite fun'. It looked like it would be a really good show to be a part of. They said they had some really good names lined up. I just thought 'I get to spend two weeks in Thorpe Park, go on the rides every day, brilliant!'"

Are you a rollercoaster fan?
"Well, I used to be! But I think you get to the point when you're doing them over-and-over, you start feeling a bit sick, and you think 'Oooh, I don't want to go on that one again'."

Did you throw up?
"No. On the show they wanted me to do Vortex, which is a big round one that spins. The first day I had to do it twice and I was horrifically ill. I said to them, 'I can't do that twice in a row, it's horrible'. The next day we had Katie Price down here and that's the ride she went on and puked up in a bush after. It's a horrible ride!"

What was Katie like on the show?
"I know she gets a bad time in the press, but she was brilliant. She was very professional, she was bang up for it and she was a very polite person. She was lovely to all the fans, she made time for everybody, had her picture taken. I've never, ever, ever, seen that amount of paparazzi in my life, popping out. They were just everywhere! And they just don't leave her alone. She is a bit like a freak show, in the sense in that everybody stops to stare at her."

Do you think she likes the attention?
"Alex was here as well, so it was quite a 'look at us' sort of thing. But I've never seen anything like it. It was quite scary, and she has to deal with that every day. I actually felt quite sorry for her, but I don't know if she enjoys it or not."

Did she and Alex go on the rides together?
"Yeah, she was like an adrenaline head. She wanted to go on more all the time. She was saying, 'Let's go on this one, let's go on this one'. Even on their lunchbreak they went off together round the park going on all of the rides."

Did Alex put up a fight about going on the rides?
"No. I think he just does what he's told, doesn't he?"

Was anyone else particularly good or bad?
"Jennie Bond was actually quite hilarious. I'd heard that she could be a difficult one, but she wasn't. She was lovely, she was really up for it and she was really how you saw in I'm A Celebrity. She was being hurled around up and down all these bloody rides and she was like, 'It's fine, it's fine, I'm fine, it's all fine!'"

Did she swear?
"She did actually. I think she said 'f**k'. She sounded quite funny when she swore, because we didn't expect it."

Were you pleased at how much the celebs got into it?
"I really enjoyed Cleo Rocos. She was exactly what the show's about. The terror on her face, it was just brilliant! She was shaking and having a huge meltdown!"

We couldn't work out if she was pretending...
"No, she was genuine. I thought maybe at first that she was putting it on, but she was trembling. It was a big thing for her."

Who else was that scared?
"Anthea Turner was really scared. Anthea threw up as well, in a bin! But she managed to find a bin to put her head in and be sick, rather than Katie, who just found a bush."

Scream If You Know The Answer premieres Sunday, May 2 at 7pm on Watch.