Broadcaster and national TV treasure Anneka Rice broke her silence yesterday (Monday May 23) to reveal she is returning for a new series of her hit show, Challenge Anneka, on Channel 5. It has now been more than 30 years since the original series first appeared on our television screens.
The popular TV presenter, now 63, once had the most famous bottom in Britain when she won the nation's hearts climbing in and out of helicopters for Channel 4's Treasure Hunt. Her new series will see Anneka and her trusty Dave "the Soundman" take on some new challenges.
The pair will lead a team of volunteers on a series of quests, roping in some inspirational everyday heroes to help tackle various problems faced by different communities across the UK. Anneka announced her return in a light-hearted message shared to her followers on Twitter.
READ MORE: Challenge Anneka is coming back to TV screens with new episodes
"All you have to do now is get that Lycra out and await instructions," she told fans, in a nod to the brightly-coloured jump suits and other garish outfits she was renowend for wearing in the eighties and nineties. The new, four-part series is due to be broadcast later this year, confirmed Channel 5.
In the meantime, you may want to know a little more about Anneka. Well, here is a short profile we've put together charting the star's life, loves and career.
Who is Anneka Rice?
Anneka was born Anne Rice in Cowbridge, in the Vale of Glamorgan, South Wales, in 1958. Anneka later became her professional name. That is because when she joined the British actors' union, Equity, she was told there was already an 'Anne Rice' registered on their books.
Her family left Wales for Surrey when she was a young girl and that's where she grew up and went to school. She trained as a radio journalist and broadcaster with the BBC's World Service.
After joining BBC children's TV, where she worked as a production assistant, Anneka moved to Hong Kong, aged just 19. She ended up reading the evening news for English-language TV station TVB Pearl.
While in Hong Kong she also dubbed kung fu films into English, wrote A Children's Guide to Hong Kong and, at one point, was a fittings model for Gloria Venderbilt jeans during her lunch breaks.
Returning to the UK in the early eighties, her big break came when she starred in Treasure Hunt. It was a game show where contestants in a studio had to use maps to solve a series of clues. Anneka was the "skyrunner" whose job it was to follow the clues in a helicopter.
It made her a household name in Britain and was nominated for a BAFTA in 1986. It regularly attracted more than 7 million viewers and is still the highest-rated show ever to be on Channel 4.
An early version of Challenge Anneka, which she devised and owns the rights for, appeared when she hosted BBC's Children in Need in 1987. The show's first episode proper debuted on BBC1 two years later and ran for a total of six series. It cemented her place as one of the UK's favourite TV personalities.
Other popular shows she presented in the eighties, nineties and noughties included ITV holiday programme Wish You Were Here, BBC1's Holiday and TVAM. Anneka has also hosted the Children's Royal Variety Show, and was a contestant on Strictly Come Dancing, in 2019.
Anneka has worked as a TV critic and travel writer and has a passion for art, occasionally exhibiting her work. She has also appeared in several pantos through the years, and had a garden at the Chelsea Flower Show in 2017.
She married theatre producer Nick Allott in 1988, with whom she has two sons. The couple split in 1992 but didn't get divorced until 2014.
Anneka has a third son from a relationship with TV executive Tom Gutteridge. She it reported to have started dating comedy writer Simon Bell in the early 2000s. The couple are believed to stil be an item as she prepared for her TV comeback.
