Kerry Katona blasts Phillip Schofield's TV comeback as 'tone-deaf'

Kerry Katona has slammed Phillip Schofield's TV comeback, branding it 'self-indulgent' and 'tone-deaf'.

The 62-year-old presenter's much-anticipated TV comeback finally hit screens this week, with the disgraced star vowing to tell his side of the story in an 'unedited and honest way.'

And TV personality Kerry, 44, risked reignited her long-running feud with Phillip as she gave a scathing verdict on the show - which comes 16 years after her infamous This Morning interview.

Writing in her OK! magazine, Kerry penned: 'Phillip Schofield is back on screen this week with his Channel 5 show 'Cast Away' and I was quite surprised at his return to television. If I’m honest, I think it’s a really self-indulgent move to have him alone on a desert island, playing the pity card.'

Laying into the host, she continued: 'He talks about living with absolutely nothing on this island, but then he goes back to his big house, wealth and home comforts. I think it’s really tone-deaf. Saying that, we’re obviously all watching it, aren’t we?'

But while Kerry did not approve of Phillip's TV comeback, she did give a suggestion on what his next TV move could be. 

She remarked: 'I think Phil will do Celebrity Big Brother next and I’d love to go in with him. Big Brother, if you’re casting, please put us in – I’d be brutally honest with him.'

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Mere minutes into the first episode of his Channel 5 series Cast Away, viewers were quick to accuse the presenter of being 'less remorseful than he claims,' after he made a supposed dig at his former This Morning co-host Holly Willoughby. 

During the show, Phillip discusses his bitter parting of ways with ITV and This Morning, which he hosted for 21 years, while fending for himself on a remote island paradise, located off the coast of Madagascar.

Phillip was ousted from This Morning in May last year, after he admitted to lying about his relationship with a much younger male colleague. 

Kerry's jibe at the star comes after she last year accused Phil of 'belittling' her in an infamous 2008 interview as she waded in on the 'toxic' culture at This Morning.

The former pop star broke her silence by talking to Dan Wootton on GB News in June last year.

In the interview on This Morning 15 years ago Schofield queried her slurred speech live on air and told her she didn't seem 'right'. 

Kerry accused him of 'belittling' her and being 'condescending' with his comments and explained that her bipolar medication was affecting the way she spoke at the time.

She also claimed she was left suicidal following the TV appearance and criticised ITV for allegedly not reaching out to her following the car-crash interview.

Kerry told Wootton: 'People don't understand what that interview did to me emotionally.

'Even now, when I go back to ITV - which isn't very often - there is a sense of snobbery and that I'm not good enough,' she added. 'I feel like I have to impress them, I've got to watch my speech, I can't slur.'

Saying the interview left her at 'rock bottom', Kerry revealed: 'It was just awful. I was suicidal. I wanted to die, I wanted to kill myself. It was everywhere.'

Kerry, who has been sober for 14 years, alleged that nobody wanted to work with her following the interview. 

She broke down in tears as she explained how she still has to defend herself over the interview more than ten years later. 

She said tearfully : 'Even now, when I look at that video, I feel so ashamed and so hard done by, even now. For ten years, I've had to justify myself.'

'I've got no reason to lie [about the medication], even today I have to justify myself for that interview,' she added.

The infamous live 2008 interview saw Schofield question Kerry about her slurred speech and ask her if she was 'OK', despite her insistence it was due to her medication.

He asked her: 'You don't seem right to me sitting here now, your speech is a bit slurred, how are you feeling now?'

Kerry then insisted that she was absolutely fine and had never been healthier or happier as she explained it was due to her medication.

In her interview on GB News, Kerry went on to claim that she has met the younger This Morning colleague Phillip confessed to having an affair with.

She told how she met with him during her time on Loose Women, adding: 'I met the young runner several times, lovely lad.'

MailOnline has contacted ITV for comment at the time.

Last year Schofield quit ITV and was dropped by his talent agency YMU after admitting in the Daily Mail to an affair with a younger male This Morning colleague.

He confessed to having the 'unwise but not illegal' relationship with a man during his marriage to Stephanie Lowe. He had previously denied the affair when asked about it by his agent.

Phillip said he was 'so very sorry' for being unfaithful. Stephanie has two daughters, Ruby and Molly with Schofield.

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Schofield said in his statement last week: 'I am making this statement via the Daily Mail, to whom I have already apologised personally for misleading, through my lawyer who I also misled, about a story [sic] which they wanted to write about me a few days ago.

'The first thing I want to say is: I am deeply sorry for having lied to them, and to many others about a relationship that I had with someone working on This Morning. 

'I did have a consensual on-off relationship with a younger male colleague at This Morning. 

'Contrary to speculation, whilst I met the man when he was a teenager and was asked to help him to get into television, it was only after he started to work on the show that it became more than a just a friendship. 

'That relationship was unwise, but not illegal. It is now over...

'I am painfully conscious that I have lied to my employers at ITV, to my colleagues and friends, to my agents, to the media and therefore the public and most importantly of all to my family. I am so very, very sorry, as I am for having been unfaithful to my wife...

'I am resigning from ITV with immediate effect, expressing my immense gratitude to them for all the amazing opportunities that they have given me. 

'I will reflect on my very bad judgement in both participating in the relationship and then lying about it.'

Responding to his statement, an ITV spokesman said: 'We are deeply disappointed by the admissions of deceit made tonight by Phillip Schofield. 

'The relationships we have with those we work with are based on trust. Philip made assurances to us which he now acknowledges were untrue and we feel badly let down.

'We accept his resignation from ITV and therefore can confirm that he will not be appearing on ITV as had previously been stated.'

Phillip Schofield Cast Away: The critics' verdicts are in

Daily Mail 

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Roland White writes: 'By far the most entertainment to be had from last night's episode of Cast Away (C5) was imagining the meeting which persuaded Phillip Schofield that it was a good idea to take part.

'This could really put you back in the public eye, Phillip love,' they might have said. 'Because what people really want to watch these days is a big celebrity feeling sorry for themselves for an hour'.

'Only an hour? It felt a lot longer. This could be the biggest television misjudgment since Prince Andrew smiled across at Emily Maitlis and said: 'That went well, didn't it?'

Evening Standard 

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Vicky Jessop writes: 'There’s no attempt at balance here, not even from the producers. This is the Schofield Show, and we’re just along for the ride. Schofield himself expresses hardly any remorse, settling instead for a sort of barely-concealed resentment at his perceived ill-treatment at the hands of the press and public. And while it might make for fascinating television, it’s doubtful that this is going to hasten along any kind of return to the small screen.

'Instead, this just reads as a desperate grab for public redemption. Queasy viewing, best avoided.'

The Guardian

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Stuart Heritage writes: 'Whatever you think of the man, you do have to grudgingly admit that the parts where he carries out the actual premise of the show – on an island, sunburned to hell, trying to Go-Pro himself boiling limpets for sustenance – are pretty entertaining.

'However (and this is a big however), the man absolutely cannot help himself. It’s one thing to fend for yourself in the middle of nowhere, quite another to do it without acting like the most bitter man ever to walk the Earth. And make no mistake, Schofield is an incredibly bitter man. 

'Before he even leaves his house, he’s comparing Cast Away to I’m a Celebrity, darkly muttering that he would never appear on that show because “there are just some channels, some people you won’t work for.”'

The Times 

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Carol Midgley writes: 'Did Schofield seem bitter or self-pitying as he prepared to spend ten days alone except for a camera on an uninhabited tropical island off the coast of Madagascar? Yes! “I think there’ll be an awful lot of people who hope that I never come back,” he said, melodramatically. 

'I hate to say it, Phillip, but most people have probably forgotten all about it and are more worried about their gas bill. “I know what I did was unwise,” he said, sitting cross-legged on a beach “but is it enough to absolutely someone?”

'I’m no fan of Schofield, but I don’t think it is, actually. Both parties were, it seems, consenting adults. Schofield was publicly lauded when he came out as gay but vilified when he actually had a gay relationship, the charge being that it was an “abuse of power"'

i News 

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Emily Baker writes: 'The jungle survival part of the programme was nothing we hadn’t seen before – comedian Ruby Wax endured the same experiment for Channel 5 last year, while Bear Grylls and co have been showcasing their own survival skills on screen for years. 

'Watching Schofield fish, start a fire and search for mangoes was much less interesting than what he had to say for himself. Plus, he hadn’t exactly been abandoned – his survival kit included a tent, knives, cooking equipment. He was not Tom Hanksing it. 

'Obviously – and depressingly – he came off incredibly well. Stories of his late father (who he sometimes speaks to, aloud), memories of feeling suicidal and his daughters pulling him from the brink, and ribbing himself (“I don’t quit – I’m fired, but I don’t quit”) all forced me to warm to him. But I shouldn’t have been surprised – the entire point of this series is to prime us for a Schofield renaissance.'