Article #4955

It seems that even the Traitors host can’t save the ailing chatshow format. As her series ends, it’s hard not to feel that she never quite got out of Graham Norton’s shadow

Six weeks ago, before Claudia Winkleman launched her BBC One Friday night chatshow, media profiles regularly referenced her “Midas touch” with TV formats. She had left one golden programme, sashaying away from Strictly Come Dancing, but her portfolio still included three other winners: the mega hit The Traitors, its celebrity spin-off for the BBC, and Channel 4’s The Piano.

Half a dozen sofa chats later, Winkleman hasn’t exactly suffered the fate of the mythic King Midas, but The Claudia Winkleman Show can fairly be seen as her least glittering work for several years.