Stephen Mulhern faces phobias in ‘most exposing show of his career’

Stephen Mulhern is riddled with phobias, but the Deal Or No Deal host confronts them in South Korea in a new show – with help from pals Ant & Dec

For more than 20 years he’s been one of Britain’s best-loved entertainers – cheeky magician, cosy Saturday night host, safe pair of hands who can rescue a chaotic moment with a mega-watt smile and a well-chosen one-liner.

But off screen Stephen Mulhern couldn’t be more different. He describes himself as ‘like a 70-year-old man in a 47-year-old body’, fearful of trying anything that is out of his comfort zone.

In his new ITV show, Accidental Tourist, Stephen, now 48, confronts his demons, and we see him like we never have before – frightened, raw and overwhelmed as he embraces new foods, cultures, emotions, and the terror that has gripped him all his life… swimming in the sea.

The Stephen who emerges from his extraordinary journey to South Korea is not the man his friends, fans or even Ant and Dec – who put him up to the ordeal – thought they knew. 

What unfolds on screen isn’t a prank, a challenge show or a travelogue. It is something altogether more personal. 

Stephen reveals: ‘I think this is the most exposing thing I’ve ever done on TV.

‘This isn’t me presenting. This is me being myself. And that’s something people have never seen before.’ 

Having begun his career as a magician, winning talent competitions and performing on the London cabaret circuit before being spotted by ITV, Stephen became a household name fronting hit shows, including Britain’s Got More Talent, Deal Or No Deal, Catchphrase, and Ant & Dec’s Saturday Night Takeaway.

And yet Stephen’s life up until now has been one of comfortable repetition. He and his family – two brothers, a sister and his beloved mum Maureen – have always returned to the same destinations. Holidays meant Florida. Portugal. Familiar places. Predictable meals.

‘We’ve always done the same thing. Same places, same food, same pattern,’ he says, as Ant and Dec tease him affectionately, marvelling that he won’t even try hummus.

Their good-natured ribbing frames the heart of the series: the realisation that Stephen’s avoidance wasn’t quirkiness but fear of the unfamiliar. 

‘I’ve been frightened of food, scared of strange places, terrified of the sea,’ he admits. ‘There’s never really been any risk in my life. I’ve never had the guts.’

Accidental Tourist begins with Ant and Dec plotting how to prise Stephen out of his routines, admitting that he’s ‘odd’ and ‘stuck in his ways’. 

 Thinking that if they don’t push him, no one will, they come up with an inspired solution: send him to South Korea, a country of live-fish eaters, fearless freedivers, naked bath houses and spiritual rituals.

Stephen’s stunned. ‘What do they eat in Korea? Cabbage, bean sprouts?’ he asks. ‘I’m a little bit worried. I think there’s going to be a lot of tears.’

He isn’t exaggerating. From the moment he lands in Seoul and checks into a hanok – a traditional Korean house, the opposite of the five-star hotel he longed for – the discomfort begins. 

With him is a letter from his mum, urging him to ‘see the magic in this trip’. Just reading it brings Stephen to tears.

The most intense moment comes when Stephen visits a Korean mudang, a shamanic healer who tells him something only known to his close friends and family – that he was seriously ill three years ago. 

Stephen is astounded. ‘It was very, very serious… a massive operation. I’ve never discussed anything about my personal health and I was just like, ‘Oh my God.’

The mudang then performs a bizarre ritual involving a pair of his worn underpants – used because they’ve been close to his body – saying it will protect him for a year. 

The underwear is wrapped around a wooden fish and tied up with coloured threads. 

She beats his back with the wooden fish, clunks wooden knives around his body and a fire stick is waved over him.

The ritual culminates in the mudang showing him the wooden fish which, she explains, now contains his ‘bad spirits’. 

He’s rattled but says, ‘I’ve definitely had a spiritual experience. There is something she’s done that’s made me feel better.’

It also had Stephen reflecting on the devastating loss of his father in November last year, and the health scare weeks later when he fainted in a pizza restaurant and was taken to hospital. 

It turned out he’d suffered a bad reaction to an anaesthetic for a minor medical procedure earlier in the day.

‘The ritual brought everything back,’ he says. ‘It reminded me how fragile life is. How important time is. That’s stayed with me. It’s one of the reasons I feel so different now.’

It empowers him to tackle his food phobia and his fear of the sea – and for the latter he heads to Geoje Island to join freedivers, who don’t use oxygen tanks.

As they kit him out to take the plunge, Stephen pleads, ‘Please, just stop for two seconds,’ and begins to cry. 

At first he refuses to get in the water. But then, alone on the raft, he says, ‘I don’t want to do it for the TV show. I want to do it for myself.’

He forces himself into the water, dives down and grabs the sea floor with both hands. 

When he surfaces, gasping, he begins to weep again. ‘I’ve never felt so happy or tired in my life,’ he says. ‘I didn’t think I’d swim in the sea. I’ve changed.’

Stephen tells me, ‘It was the first time I’d ever felt actual anxiety. I’d heard people talk about panic attacks, but until then I’d never understood what that meant. 

‘I’ve done a lot in my life, but that was a turning point.’

To tackle his food phobia, Stephen takes on Korea’s mukbang culture, which sees enthusiasts devouring mountains of seafood. It turns his stomach. 

‘I’ve never had a prawn,’ he confesses. ‘Even the sound of someone crunching crisps makes me feel sick.’

Plates of raw seafood are brought to him, including the infamous ‘penis fish’, a sea worm that has a phallic appearance. 

He’s panic- stricken but forces himself to take tiny, trembling bites. ‘I ate a prawn. I ate an octopus and I ate a penis fish,’ he later tells Ant and Dec, who of course find it hilarious.

‘I’m embarrassed to say it, but I’ve always been frightened of food,’ Stephen says now. ‘The idea of trying even one thing was terrifying.’

Back home, his friends tell him, ‘You’re a lot more chilled out.’ He takes life more slowly now, and says even a simple walk has become precious.  

‘I took my mum and sister to Ireland,’ he says, ‘and I realised for the first time I didn’t want to do anything. I just wanted to walk. Before Korea, I’d have thought that was ridiculous. Now it feels important.’

He is seeing his family more, and letting himself rest, something he never used to give himself time for. ‘Everything doesn’t have to be a million miles an hour,’ he says. ‘That’s been a huge revelation.’

Since the age of 11, when he worked with his dad at London’s Petticoat Lane market, he’s had a relentless work ethic. 

‘We are a working-class, market-trading family. Set the stall up, get down to the wholesaler, learn the demonstration, learn the script, learn the patter. 

‘If you didn’t make it happen, we wouldn’t make any money. It’s always been like a machine.’

But Korea changed that. ‘I knew I hadn’t gone there just to make a TV show. I wanted to change something in my life. I realised I’ve missed things. And I don’t want to miss them any more.’

As for the future, he says, ‘If I can be myself on screen like this, then maybe that’s the direction I go in now. It feels like a new chapter. 

‘I’m over the moon I did it. To change a pattern in your life is a big deal. Taking a chance is sometimes worth the risk. And I’ve only found that out from going to Korea.’

So what message does he hope viewers will take from it? ‘If I can do it, someone who could barely try a prawn, then honestly, anyone can.’

And that is the true magic.

Accidental Tourist, Sunday 14 December, 9pm, ITV1 and ITVX.