Dancing On Ice’s Rufus Hound ‘locked in a secret eight year feud with Holly Willoughby’s best pal Keith Lemon’
DANCING On Ice's Rufus Hound 'has been locked in a secret eight year feud with fellow comedian Keith Lemon'.
The funnyman, 41, was a regular panellist on ITV2's Celebrity Juice since it first aired in 2008.
Yet, Rufus left viewers stunned when he walked out of the comedy quiz mid-series in 2012.
At the time, the comedian reportedly branded the popular pop culture series as "the Keith Lemon show" leaving many to believe that backstage beef between Rufus and Leigh Francis, aka Keith Lemon, was behind it.
Following his pal's sudden departure, Keith addressed Rufus' claims in a 2012 interview with.
He said seriously: "I don't know. I honesty don't know.
"I text him and said, 'I don't know what happened but I hope you're happy with whatever you're doing next'. I don't know. I haven't seen him since either."
Keith than addressed speculation that Hound was annoyed it was turning into "The Keith Lemon Show".
He said: "Well it is. Course it is. One time it was going to be called Keith Lemon's Celebrity Juice but I thought it sounded like I was blowing my own trumpet.
"I suppose it is, but I have no control what they put in the edit. I watch it like how you watch it and I enjoy it. But if it's 'The Keith Lemon Show' that's fine by me. I like it!"
Then in 2013, Rufus revealed he quit Celebrity Juice following an explosive row with Kim Woodburn and a lack of support from the show's producers.
Speaking to stand-up comedian Richard Herring on his podcast, Hound said he had no choice but to leave after a "personal" row spiralled out of control.
Rufus told Herring that not only did he feel "marginalised" on the show, but the lack of support from the producers helped make his mind up to leave.
He said Kim was chatting to host Lemon who asked her if she had much work coming up.
When she replied that she didn’t think she was wanted on the TV any more, Hound said to her: "Don't put yourself down. People will always need a cleaner.”
But Kim didn’t see the funny side and retorted: "When I want an opinion of a fat man, I'll stand outside Gregg's."
Hound said her response was "a proper f*** you, an old-fashioned f*** you" even though he hadn’t meant anything insulting by his comment.
Adding that it then "spiralled out of control", he added: "It ended up really horrible.
"She was trying to be deliberately personal, and by the point it got to that place, I was like, 'OK, because I'm a stand-up comedian and if you want to start heckling, I'm good at this'.
"And so I was personal back. She basically kept saying I was fat. But I did end up saying, 'that's a bit rich coming from a woman who looks like a face drawn on a deflating party balloon'."
The comedian then told Herring that Kim left the building without offering an apology but producers insisted he said sorry to her.
Rufus said he would as long as he was given a copy of the tape of the row, which was edited out of the show that was aired.
However he said he never saw the tape, and added: "They had this sense of, 'I should be grateful of being on this big hit show', but what they never understood was, the thing I set out in comedy wasn't about being on a show like Celebrity Juice."
After he was advised to take a fortnight off to "think about it", Rufus quit instead.
Since the fallout nearly nine years ago, Rufus hasn't been back on the show, which Holly's husband Dan Baldwin produces.
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Recently, Rufus has found himself in hot water for posting outrageous claims about the Manchester Arena attack, which has left many urging Dancing On Ice bosses to axe him.
Read More on The Sun
Bomb survivors and MPs rounded on the comic — already in hot water for political barbs on the ITV1 show’s launch on January 17.
Elsewhere, Hound missed last night's Dancing On Ice after being in contact with someone with Covid. He tested negative but is isolating for ten days.