Craig Charles' wife Jackie has entered the fray following the explosive conclusion of I'm A Celebrity: South Africa, appearing to endorse the description of Adam Thomas as 'passive aggressive'. The live final descended into chaos on Friday night, and Adam has since maintained a low profile as former campmate John Barrowman and Jackie Charles weighed in.
Jackie's Response to John Barrowman
Jackie responded to John Barrowman's remarks on social media, where he criticised the ITV show and Adam's behaviour. Barrowman, who finished third in the 2018 series, wrote on X: 'Oh my oh my… another scandalous situation. @itv @imacelebrity @antanddec it seems you have a crisis in your hands. Editing to make someone look good as a winner is really bad form #adamthomas seems like a classic passive aggressive. I love that the other celebrities were not having it.'
Jackie backed his points, replying: 'I love you said that because you know thank you.' She also commented on a clip of Adam being crowned winner, writing: 'Oh it will all come out in the end karma.' Furthermore, she demanded that ITV release the unaired footage, stating: 'Play it, then let us judge.'
The Controversial Incidents
The row stems from an exchange involving Jimmy Bullard and David Haye, where Adam was allegedly aggressive, abusive, and intimidating. Craig Charles, star of Red Dwarf, described the incident as 'deeply traumatic' and claimed the broadcast was 'watered down'. He said: 'ITV have got a duty of care. They’ve got like 24/7 people on high-definition close-ups picking it all out. They didn’t think he was getting bullied enough to step in. They would have stepped in if they thought he was being bullied, right? We didn’t see it until that final morning, when I thought David got a bit nasty, and I thought, ‘this is turning into bullying this now’.'
He added: 'And that brings us to the Jimmy Bullard incident. They watered down the Jimmy Bullard incident, they watered it down. It was un-broadcastable as it was. It was deeply traumatic and it was really upsetting. Adam was so wound up. He was so aggressive. It looked like he was going to attack Jimmy. He was dropping F bombs and C bombs.'
Impact on Campmates
The former Coronation Street actor appeared emotional as he defended his fellow finalists, noting that they have suffered reputational damage since the show aired. He said: 'The thing about it is, these guys, Mo by association, have suffered reputational damage with this social media campaign where they’ve given this 80-year-old man [Harry Redknapp] dog’s abuse on social media, just because he said, ‘I don’t like the way that Adam reacted’. We didn’t like the way Jimmy reacted. We didn’t like the way Adam reacted. I’m not denigrating Adam. If Adam needs to go to therapy and stuff like that, then fair enough but he internalised it all. We didn’t know it was going on and we just saw banter, not bullying until the last day.'
