Phillip Schofield has expressed his feelings of “utter betrayal” by his TV colleagues, stating that it has made him reconsider ever returning to daytime presenting. The 62 year old former This Morning host will be back on screen in Channel 5’s Phillip Schofield: Cast Away, marking his first TV series appearance since his departure from ITV in May 2023 following an admission of an “unwise but not illegal” affair with a younger male colleague.
When he resigned over a year ago, he refuted claims that he was “forced out” of the ITV daytime show and expressed deep regret for lying to the channel, his colleagues, wife and friends. However, during his time on the small island of Nosy Ankarea, off the coast of Madagascar, Schofield alleges he was “chucked under a bus”, adding that he could do the same to others, but he is “not that sort of person”.
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In the second episode, he also reveals that he had once envisioned dying “die on live television at 93”, but now he doesn’t think he wants to “do it any more”, as he has been “hurt so badly” by being a presenter, and “some of the people on that sort of telly”. Schofield reminisces about his early days at the BBC as a booking clerk at 19, when he first got the chance to visit Television Centre, where ITV’s This Morning was later filmed, and how much he “loved being there”.
He said: “When what happened to me happened to me, it screwed up my favourite building in the world, and it pretty well blew away all those happy memories, and suddenly the place became hostile to me, and that was heartbreaking.”
“And the people who did it to me know, they know how important that building was to me.”
“They know that when you throw someone under a bus, you’ve got to have a really bloody good reason to do it. Brand, ambition is not good enough. It’s not a good enough reason to throw someone under a bus.”
He described how “people can be so fake with you when it’s all going well, and suddenly utter, utter betrayal” can occur. “When the tidal wave washed through and it washed everybody away,” he reflected.
“The ones that are still standing. They’re the ones that matter. And I thought: ‘How many friends do you need? I don’t need 200 fake friends’. I’ve got, what? Ten, 15 friends that I would die for, they would die for me.”
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He also touched on the subject of his sexuality, implying a double standard when he added: “I think another TV presenter or two might have done exactly the same thing, difference is heterosexual, it’s not an unusual thing in the gay world, for there to be a difference in age groups.”
On day six of his challenge, Schofield takes on the towering mountain of the island, musing over life beyond his television career.
A video from before the challenge shows him reflecting: “You’ve got to look elsewhere, and you’ve got to see, where does that path go? Because I can’t go down that one any more.”
Upon reaching the summit, Schofield referenced the “Welcome To Holland” poem by Emily Perl Kingsley, a metaphorical piece his therapist shared with him, describing an unexpected journey not to Italy, but somewhere differently rewarding. Gazing at the scenery, he observed: “Holland is a lovely place, with lovely people… and it’s not quite where you thought you were going to go, but it’s rewarding and it gives moments like this.”
ITV has been approached for a statement.
Phillip Schofield: Cast Away is scheduled for broadcast at 9pm on Monday on Channel 5, with the programme set to continue on Tuesday and Wednesday at the same time.