Martin Kemp Reveals Wild Island Secrets Including Pig Funeral and Shark Bites in Bond with TOWIE Star
Martin Kemp has shared the wild and emotional behind-the-scenes moments from his time on Celebrity Island with Bear Grylls, and it turns out his unlikely friendship with TOWIE star Pete Wicks was forged in some seriously intense conditions.
The 63-year-old former EastEnders star opened up on the FFS! My Dad is Martin Kemp podcast, which he co-hosts with his son Roman, about the unforgettable experience. It all came up after Roman bumped into Pete Wicks in a coffee shop and admitted that Pete still seemed “rattled” by a joke he’d made at an event, suggesting the reality star was “skint.”
But Martin jumped to his mate’s defence, saying, “I love Pete. He’s a lovely guy.” Roman replied: “It’s a weird friendship you guys have. It’s because you did Bear Grylls’ Island together.”
And weird might be an understatement, based on what they went through together on the show back in 2018. Martin said the show was “a bonding four weeks that I will never forget” and called it an “experience you can’t pay for.”
One of the most surreal moments involved a pig—and yes, it gets emotional. Martin recalled how the group hadn’t eaten properly in weeks and were desperate for food. “I’d lost three stone in three weeks,” he said. “There was nothing left of me.”
So when a pig turned up on the island, the group saw it as dinner—except Pete had just become a vegetarian and was adamant the pig would be spared. “He said, ‘We’re not killing the pig. We’re not killing it.’”
To make it harder for anyone to go through with it, Pete even named the pig. Then, in a twist that sounds like something from a bizarre survival film, he tied it up to protect it while the group went off on a trek.
Martin continued: “Later on in the afternoon we heard the pig squeal and he’d strangled it.”
What followed was something none of them expected—Pete was devastated. So much so, he arranged a funeral for the pig. The group built a raft, placed the pig on it, and pushed it out to sea at sunset while Pete mourned the loss.
Roman, laughing in disbelief, called it “amazing telly” and said he understood how the intense environment messed with people’s emotions.
And if that wasn’t enough for one survival story, Martin also revealed Pete was “bitten by a shark” on the finger while on the show. “It all became a little bit messy,” Martin said. “It was a real experience, a joint bonding experience that me and Pete have.”
From starvation and shark bites to a pig funeral on the beach, it’s safe to say Martin and Pete’s friendship was forged in some of the strangest and most emotional moments reality TV has ever seen.
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