TV legend Michael Buerk, 77, reveals he turned down huge BBC reality show – but wants to appear on The Traitors
TELLY legend Michael Buerk has admitted he turned down a huge reality TV show - yet still has his sights set on The Traitors.
The well-known BBC newsreader, who anchored the BBC Nine O'Clock News and BBC News at Ten, is eager to star on the gripping programme of the moment.
Solihull-born Michael, 77, who now works at BBC Radio 4, has even suggested he'd be up for being one of Claudia Winkleman's scheming, cloaked Traitors as opposed to an unassuming Faithful.
The Moral Maze anchor joked how his roles at the BBC had prepared him well and told The Mirror: "If you survive 50 years at the BBC, you can stab people in the front.
"I do think it will fit my skillset, being treacherous."
A celebrity version of the series - whose second instalment wrapped this month with OG Traitor Harry Clark scooping the cash - has long been rumoured.
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We previously reported how the names likely to be a target are Wagatha Christie rivals Coleen Rooney and Rebekah Vardy, former Health Secretary Matt Hancock and Match of the Day host Gary Lineker.
A TV insider was first to tell us: “Bosses want big names as the show is getting big viewing figures, and they know they’ll have plenty to choose from as The Traitors has huge fans within the showbiz world.
“But they also want stars who are likely to be great game-players and who have great survival skills, the ability to double-cross or a way of sniffing out a back-stabber."
Yet one show you won't see Michael on - despite repeated efforts by TV executives - is Strictly Come Dancing.
Michael revealed how he had snubbed a chance to bid for the Glitterball trophy numerous times.
He admitted to the publication: "I am the only one who hasn't done it. I have been asked four, five times maybe. But I can't dance.
"There is an element of humiliation there but I can handle that.
"The small problem is that there is a strategy about these things and I kind of think the only role I could play is the bumbling, knob-footed idiot. It has been done. John Sergeant did it.
"I don't feel there is a gap for me. I would be a gap you see, and not a star. I think I will save the public from the embarrassment.
"I believe it is intense. I did cast an eye over it in earlier years. And it did seem to be hard work.
“I thought the whole point of reality TV was that you just hung around, showed off, got humiliated, well paid and b***ered off. But Strictly Come Dancing struck me as a bit more effort.”
Michael is no stranger to reality TV and, in 2014, appeared on I'm a Celebrity.
Since then he has starred on Countdown, When Television Goes Horribly Wrong, Dispatches and Royal Recipes.
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More recently, he has been appearing on Richard Osman's TV show House of Games.
Michael also fronted hard-hitting series Britain's Great Pension Crisis where he put the spotlight on families struggling to live on £3.50 a day.
