BGT gets a new Judge as David Walliams' mum joins the panel
On tonight's episode of Britain's Got Talent, a very special judge joins the panel when Simon Cowell is delayed to the London auditions.
When the other Judges took their places on the panel, David decided to invite his mum up on stage to stand in for Simon...
Speaking to the audience and his fellow Judges Amanda and Alesha, David says: “I think we really need someone to fill that seat. Actually my mother is here today, she’s going to be Simon Cowell if she doesn’t mind. Come on mum!”
And Kathleen proved to be quite a match for Simon, as she wasn’t afraid to use her buzzer on a number of acts, giving straight talking, no-nonsense critiques. In fact it takes several acts before Kathleen decides not to use her buzzer and actually put someone through to the next round.
Speaking off camera about his mum’s special guest appearance, David commented: “Once a year Simon is always very late to the recording so we have to start without him. This year it coincided with my mother being in the audience. So I wondered whether she would want to take Simon’s chair.
"What I was really hoping was that she would use Simon’s Golden Buzzer in his absence but she didn’t. She was great actually, she was very quick to press the buzzer, of course that’s the thing people often don’t want to do. She was great with her critique and actually some of the audience thought it was Simon! There was no difference.”
Amanda agreed, adding: "Kathleen is quite hardcore! David is quite a wuss about pressing his buzzer, he’s always last and he never says no. He just doesn’t seem to be able to give any criticism that’s bad, he’s sweet really.
"But Kathleen, she pressed hers first once, I was like, ‘Woah!’. She was like, ‘Well no, I just don’t think the audience warmed to you!’. She is basically David in a dress and went down like a house on fire. I can see a future for her.”
And Ant later joked: "She’s like a silent assassin you see, because she’s doing it all with a great big smile on her face so you don’t mind. Simon could learn a thing or two from her!”
You can see more from Kathleen when Britain's Got Talent airs tonight (April 30) at 8pm on ITV!