5 things we learned from our chat with Stephen Mulhern
While most of the attention maybe on the main show, Britain’s Got More Talent is also celebrating the big 10 year milestone, with host Stephen Mulhern stating it feels “nuts” to have been on air that long!
But, which Judge did he used to be petrified of? What has left him “mortified” this year? And, what’s all this about Simon Cowell talking to goldfish? Find out below…
1. He used to be scared of Simon!
Speaking of how his relationship with Simon has changed over the years, Stephen confessed: “When the show started I was petrified of Simon, I really was. He’s got such an aura around him, he does command the attention of any room he walks in. But it’s funny how as the years have gone on he’s gone from being a boss to actually someone I can really rely on. He’s so supportive, he realises that it’s all about having a good time on our show and he’s relaxed with us as the years have gone on. This year we have had some really good chats.”
2. His favourite ever BGT memory involves The Hoff
When asked to recall his funniest moment through out the ten years, Stephen said: “Well, it was actually something that happened backstage and it makes me smile just thinking about it. When David Hasselhoff was a Judge he came backstage after his first day on the panel and was like, ‘Stevo, did you hear the crowd? They kept chanting ‘Hoff, Hoff, Hoff’, it’s brilliant, I love it’. He honestly thought people were shouting his name rather than ‘off, off, off’, talk about ego! It was genius!”
3. He’s mortified he doesn’t get a Golden Buzzer!
With the Judges and Ant & Dec all able to send an act through to the Semi-Finals, Stephen has revealed he feels “mortified” at not being able to press the coveted Golden Buzzer. He said: “People laugh about it backstage but I am genuinely mortified that I don’t have my own Golden Buzzer. I did question Simon the other day about what it would take to get my own Golden Buzzer, and he went, ‘Stevie, I’ll give you a bronze buzzer. When you press the bronze buzzer they are guaranteed to appear on your show’. But I do genuinely believe that I should get a Golden Buzzer, I don’t understand why I haven’t. Ant &Dec are on one side of the stage, I’m on the other, it’s not going to hurt, it’ll just make it more exciting. We need to start a campaign now. I had a bit of a rant about it on Twitter during the auditions!”
4. Introducing… Handy Mandy
The Judges are set to be more involved in BGMT than ever before, with Stephen revealing: “We have a running thing called Handy Mandy, where every week Amanda will solve a problem for one of the viewers. We will present her with problems and then Amanda will give what she thinks is the right solution. David is brilliant this year, he’s on fire! We’ve also got Ant versus Dec, and I can’t tell you how competitive those two are and, of course, loads of stuff with Simon.”
5. Simon can talk to fish?
When asked what’s the weirdest thing to happen on BGMT, Stephen recalled: “Simon loves his animals and at one point, he was desperate to find a good animal act. He walked into his backstage room and said, ‘Where’s Mulhern?’ and then told me I had until 4 o’clock that day to find an animal act. So we came up with four goldfish, we put the tank on a trolley and covered it. I walked into the Judges’ room and said, ‘We’ve done it', and Simon was like a kid in a sweet shop, until he saw what we actually had. I told him they were special goldfish, that the person we bought them off had taught them the Macarena. But you should have seen his face when I then said, ‘The problem is, it’s taken us five minutes to wheel them in here and they’ve forgotten how to do it!’ I leave them in the room and as I get to the door I turn around to see Simon talking to the fish. He spoke to them for about five minutes, going, ‘Come on, do a dance for me, come on, you can do it’. So seeing Simon talking to fish was a bit weird!”
You can catch more from Stephen when Britain’s Got More Talent returns to ITV2 this Saturday (April 9) at 8.25pm.