The Chase star Jenny Ryan has revealed she was initially given a rather inappropriate nickname when she first joined the show.
Jenny became a permanent Chaser in 2015, and took on the moniker “The Vixen” when battling contestants on the ITV quiz show.
However, in an interview with Lorraine Kelly on Tuesday morning, Jenny revealed presenter Bradley Walsh had to come up with a new name for her, after she was unhappy with producers’ first pick.
“When I first started I had a bit of a screen test in the studio with Brad hosting just as a chemistry test, really,” she explained.
“The producers had been trying to work out what my nickname should be and they wanted something animal-y, because I like a lot of animal print. They suggested ‘The Cougar’, and I said no, because I’m too young to be a cougar.”
She revealed that Bradley eventually came up with The Vixen, because of Jenny’s red hair and the fact foxes are “really intelligent animals and are cunning and can be quite fast”.
In November, The Chase welcomed a new quiz master into the fold with former contestant Darragh Ennis joining the show.
Like Jenny, he was unhappy with the nickname he was first given, with producers initially labelling him The Professor.
He explained: “I work in the university here in Oxford and professor is a title that you really have to earn. I think people would be very annoyed if I started calling myself the Professor.”
Dennis didn’t hear his actual nickname, The Menace, until he was on set during the filming of his first episode.
The Chase launched in 2009 with just Mark Labbett and Shaun Wallace before Anne Hegerty joined the group a year later.
Paul Sinha was then added in 2011, followed by Jenny in 2015.
The Chase airs every weekday from 5pm on ITV, while Lorraine is on from 9am.