The Celebrity Circle: Who’s catfishing and who’s playing as themselves?
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Your support makes all the difference.The Circle is back with its first ever celebrity line-up.
Beginning on Tuesday (9 March), The Celebrity Circle will see a group of famous faces taking over Channel 4’s social media game show in the hope of being voted most popular.
On the programme, the contestants live in a shared building but can only speak through an internal messaging service called The Circle. This allows them to catfish and play as other celebrities in order to win the prize.
Talking over group chats, private messages and taking part in challenges together, the contestants rank their fellow competitors along the way, with the least popular players at risk of being blocked from the game entirely where their true identities can be revealed.
The Celebrity Circle is taking place in aid of Stand Up To Cancer, a Channel 4 initiative funding life-saving research. The six-part series was filmed in the autumn, with social distancing measures in place.
Read more: Full of loneliness and boredom, The Circle USA is perfect pandemic TV
Here’s who’s playing (and who’s catfishing) on The Celebrity Circle...
Baga Chipz (playing as Kim Woodburn)
RuPaul’s Drag Race UK finalist Baga Chipz will be catfishing as How Clean is Your House? star Kim Woodburn, who she’s friends with in real life.
“I want to go in there and try and be the Kim I know,” Baga said. “Obviously, I’ll be saying, ‘Hey, be cleaning up after yourselves’ and ‘Oh, you’re a lovely... What a good-looking fellow you are. If I were 20 years younger’ and all that.”
The drag queen said that her plan is to “flirt with the lads and be a mother to the girls”.
Charlotte Crosby (playing as Peter Andre)
Charlotte Crosby is best known for her time on Geordie Shore, but she’ll be taking part in The Circle as Australian singer Peter Andre.
She’ll be joining the game midway through as a new player.
“I need to go into The Celebrity Circle as someone who is popular, talented,” she said of her choice to play as Andre.
Denise Van Outen (playing as herself)
Fresh off her short lived run on Dancing on Ice, Denise Van Outen is taking part in the celebrity series of The Circle.
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However, she will be playing as herself, rather than catfishing.
“I think there will be people in The Circle who I will know know and if they’re pretending to be somebody else that I do know, I’m going to catch them out,” she said.
Blue singer Duncan James will also be playing an honest game of The Circle and not catfishing.
“I’m going to play this game as me because I can be charming, I can be polite and respectful,” James said.
Kaye Adams and Nadia Sawalha (playing as Gemma Collins)
Loose Women panelists Kaye Adams and Nadia Sawalha are the first duo to appear on The Circle’s celebrity line-up, where they’ll be collectively playing as The Only Way is Essex star Gemma Collins.
“I think we may have made complete fools of ourselves. But hey, what’s new?” Adams told her fellow Loose Women last week.
Lady Leshurr (playing as Big Narstie)
Another Dancing on Ice star, rapper Lady Leshurr will be taking part as her fellow musician Big Narstie.
Discussing her decision to play as Narstie, she said that she picked him because he “has a sense of humour” and is “popular on the outside world”.
Rickie Haywood-Williams and Melvin Odoom (playing as Will.i.am)
DJs and presenting duo Rickie Haywood-Williams and Melvin Odoom are set to catfish on the show as rapper and The Voice UK coach Will.i.am.
Odoom has insisted that the pair are “mad competitive” and hope to win the competition.
Saffron Barker (playing as herself)
YouTuber Saffron Barker, who’s best known for taking part in Strictly Come Dancing 2019, will be appearing on The Circle as herself.
“Trusting someone and getting to know them, then finding out it’s not actually them, that’s going to be quite gutting,” Barker said.
Sam Thompson and Pete Wicks (playing as Rachel Riley)
Our final duo, Made in Chelsea’s Sam Thompson and Towie’s Pete Wicks, are playing the game as Countdown’s Rachel Riley.
Thompson has described his time on the show as “the best week of my life”.
The Celebrity Circle begins Tuesday 9 March on Channel 4.
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