Adele Roberts: 'Big Brother was a big mistake'
Adele Roberts took part in the 2002 series of Big Brother.
Adele Roberts has declared doing Big Brother in 2002 a "big mistake".
The star had a "painful" time on the then-Channel 4 reality TV show because she used it to escape from the heartbreak of her auntie Aliyah's sudden death from pneumonia in 2001, aged 42.
Appearing on the latest episode of HELLO! Magazine's Second Act podcast, Adele told host Ateh Jewel: "Big Brother was a big mistake. Big Brother happened when I lost my auntie."
The star "couldn't deal" with Aliyah's death coming three months after 2,977 victims died during the terrorist attacks on September 11, and Adele felt "guilty" for grieving because her cousins "lost their mum, and my mum lost her sister".
Shortly after Aliyah's passing - which came three days after she contracted pneumonia - Adele saw an advert for Big Brother and applied because her aunt "showed me that life can change like that at any time".
Adele added: "Big Brother is not something I ever thought I would do. And I remember seeing the advert, and it was a spider crawling across a web, and I hate spiders. That's what got my attention. And I almost thought, 'Do something that scares you.'"
The BBC Radio 1 star thinks she got onto the social experiment programme because she signed up as a reaction to her grief, rather than choosing to do it.
Ateh asked if she did Big Brother to "hide and run away and be somewhere safe", to which Adele replied: "Absolutely. Yeah, I didn't want to deal with reality.
"And I knew that going on reality TV isn't real. You would be stuck in this house. It'd be a little adventure. I'd meet 11 other people, and I just remember thinking it will change things for me.
"And I never sort of wanted a career in broadcasting or anything. I just wanted to DJ. So as long as I could go in as a DJ and come out as a DJ, I was happy."
Adele was on Big Brother with Jade Goody, who made their series "the biggest Big Brother", and the pair and their fellow housemates "didn't realise how big" the show was on the outside until they got evicted.
And Adele claimed the programme's bosses provided "no aftercare" as they tried to navigate the intense fame the show had now put on them.
She said: "The overnight notoriety from Big Brother was too much for me. I was a bit overwhelmed and like, 'Wow.' I'd gone on this show to hide."
Adele added: "I remember them saying before you go in, 'It's a mirror, Big Brother.' And they said that you might not like what you see in the mirror, and I think I didn't.
"I think I was struggling. I was obviously grieving, and I was OK at first, but I think not having my family, not having music, after about four weeks, the wheels fell off, and, obviously, going through this grief and people not really knowing.
"I wasn't a very nice person, wasn't a very happy person. They always say hurt people, hurt people, and I wasn't very good."
The radio presenter admitted she was "quite sad for a long time after" Big Brother, but said the experience made her a "better person".
Adele added: "I'm grateful for the journey, but at the time it was hard."
The entertainer found happiness again after she was diagnosed with bowel cancer in 2021, which she beat in 2022.
Adele said: "What my illness symbolised for me was that my body had given up trying to hide the grief I'd been storing inside myself.
"Having the tumour removed, it felt as though it was removed from my life, in a weird way... I feel reborn."
