I’m The Chase’s newest chaser – I got a big shock when I joined the show & I didn’t get here because of my intelligence
THE Chase star Darragh Ennis has confessed that it was not his impressive knowledge and intelligence that landed him his coveted TV role.
The Irish star is the latest addition to the quizzing brainboxes on the ITV show.
Hosted by Bradley Walsh, Darragh, whose nickname is The Menace, sits alongside fellow quiz superstars Mark Labbett, Jenny Ryan and Anne Hegerty.
However, he has admitted that whilst his wealth of knowledge has helped him to work his way up to the top ranks of the quiz show, it was not what helped secure him the job.
Chatting to Irish publication Her, Darragh admitted that there are far more better quizzers than him but his lack of nerves and desire to be on camera are what set him apart from the rest.
He said: “One of the main reasons I got this gig was because I’m not nervous, there are plenty of people who are better quizzers than me but they get very nervous on TV.
“Part of it is entertainment, there are always lots of people who have the quizzing knowledge but having both of them, that’s actually quite rare.”
Darragh started out on the show as nothing more than a contestant himself but has admitted that he has yet to come across anyone on set he thinks ITV bosses will be plucking out to sit alongside the show’s formidable cast.
He added: “I’ve seen a few with others but not with me, I’ve had a couple of really, really good people but there’s a certain breadth of knowledge allied to a certain presence on camera that you need and I’ve never seen someone who has had both.
“I had one contestant who did extremely well but was very nervous and they’d have to get over that in order to do it.”
Elsewhere, he confessed that he finds it much easier being a Chaser than a contestant as a result of the lesser amount of pressure he faces.
Adding he gets paid no matter what the outcome, he said of the ‘easier’ situation: “Being on the show as a professional is way easier than being a contestant.
“It’s so much easier because I work at it, it’s literally my job and I get paid whether I win or lose so.”
He also revealed the biggest surprise he found walking on set, adding: “Anybody who has done TV knows that everything takes longer when you’re recording it so there’s stops, the independent adjudicator steps in if there are any doubts and that slows things down, so it takes a lot longer to record, so that was the big shock that I got.”
The Chase airs weekdays at 5pm on ITV.