The Chase star Anne Hegerty had a brutal response for a homophobic viewer
Quiz show champ Anne Hegerty had a withering reply for a viewer who was upset about a contestant in drag on The Chase.
The ITV daytime quiz show recently featured 24-year-old contestant Daniel, a drag queen from Cheshire who turned up on the show serving genderfluid realness.
Daniel explained: “I work in events as my boring day job, and I’m also a fabulous drag queen.”
He added that he performs as “Ivy League, like the American universities, because I always come out on top.”
Asked what he would do if he won the prize money, Daniel added: “Having boy clothes and girl clothes is expensive. I would love to buy some lingerie and treat myself.”
The contestant attracted compliments and banter from the show’s host Bradley Walsh, who quipped that he had also “worn a few dresses in my time.”
But a number of viewers on Twitter were not happy about the contestant.
One branded Daniel an “attention craving wankstain,” while another fumed “what the f**k is that thing on the chase?! Starting to fall out with this program now.”
A third wrote: “l really think it is mischievous and highly irresponsible of ITV to allow people of this sort to appear on a family show. I feel quite disgusted.”
But regular Chaser Anne Hegerty was not impressed by the homophobic responses.
In a withering reply, she wrote: “Oh, don’t be such a sad f**ker.”
Out Chase star Paul Sinha also called out the homophobia.
He said: “I can’t fathom the mentality of those genuinely angry about a drag queen on #thechase. We have always been inclusive.”
Sinha has never been in the closet on the show, and spoke about his sexuality in an interview with PinkNews in 2015 – though bizarrely much of the mainstream media claimed he had “come out” last year when he made a reference to his sexuality on air.
In an interview with GuysLikeU after the fact, he explained: “I assumed everyone knew I was gay. I have been on the show six years and I have made lots of references to being gay. But they mysteriously never made the edit.
“There was one time that did make the edit when I was asked how many pieces was there to a bikini. Now you couldn’t ask a question more simple and out of my comfort zone. But I got it wrong.
“Bradley looked at me at the end and said: ‘Bikini?’, and I said, ‘That question would fall to the only Chaser whose lifestyle choices means I don’t get to see a bikini.’
“So that was me ‘coming out of the closet.’ [But] I had gay on my Twitter feed for years.”
He added: “I am happy with a boyfriend. We are in an open relationship, but can’t say more than that.
“One of the advantages of being gay is that there is no traditional template for how you are meant to engage with your partner.
“Hetero relationships are supposedly based on the idea of procreation and offering a loving environment for your children, therefore by definition would mean monogamy.
“Being gay we can make our own template that works for us.”
