Samantha Barks has revealed that she was forced to endure a cruel comment about her body when she left a BBC reality show. The Manx actress, who won the latest series of the Masked Singer, made the revelation to West End star Kerry Ellis during an unearthed episode of the Keep Calm And Kerry On Podcast from 2020. Samantha shot to fame at age 17 after securing third place on the 2008 BBC talent series 'I'd Do Anything', which featured Andrew Lloyd Webber and John Barrowman as judges.
She explained that the show had a profound effect on her life but she would be criticised "in front of everybody". However, she conceded that it gave her a "thick skin". When asked about the positive and negative aspects of leaving the show, Samantha said: "Well, the positives were all the things I've talked about and all of a sudden, I got to, you know, go to auditions that I never dreamed I'd get to go to and it did open up so many doors, which I'm just forever grateful to.
"But massively challenging in terms of the personal side of it because where I'm thankful for it was - this was before social media properly blew up - but it was still like very...a lot of people online, a lot of stuff, and the first time you're like, 'Oh', realise how nasty people can be.". Samantha then recounted an incident where she faced a cruel comment about her physical appearance after she had to perform a number in a "little pair of hot pants".
She went on to say: "Somewhere I read this and someone was like, 'Oh my god; how bad like - she's got awful cellulite and she's only 17, and I was like, 'Do I?' Looking back, I didn't have a scrap of cellulite. Do you know what I mean?. "When you're 17, it's like, be grateful because it's all coming! You know what I mean? It's like, I remember thinking, 'Do I?' And I don't think I did but it's just like, and then I sort of, so for years, I was just like, 'Well, I can't because of my cellulite', and people would be like, 'You don't have cellulite'.".
In the finale of the Masked Singer, the final three celebrities, Wolf, Pufferfish and Dressed Crab, fought it out for the crown after eight weeks in the popular ITV contest. However, it would be Pufferfish who was named the 2025 winner, with fans discovering that it was the Mamma Mia: I Have A Dream host underneath the mask. Speaking to the panel, Samantha said: "For me, because I've played Elsa for three years, it's been so fun to do lots of different stuff and each week, I wanted to do a new kind of style and new kind of song.".
