Before landing the role of host of Big Brother Australia, which premiered 25 years ago in 2001, Gretel Killeen thought she was both \u201ctoo old\u201d and not blonde enough.<\/p>\n
In a new interview with the Stellar podcast Something To Talk About<\/a>, the 63-year-old reflected on her game-changing role as the reality television series\u2019 first host. <\/p>\n \u201cTo have a female hosting, that was unheard of. Not as a sidekick, but hosting a live show,\u201d she told podcast host Sarrah Le Marquand.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen I was first asked if I wanted to audition, I remember thinking, \u2018I\u2019m 38. I\u2019ve got dark hair. And I\u2019m a woman. There\u2019s no way in the world they\u2019re gonna want me \u2026\u2019<\/p>\n \u201cBecause I thought 38 was too old and you had to have blonde hair to be a host. Those were the parameters in those days.\u201d<\/p>\n Listen to the full interview with Gretel Killeen on the Stellar podcast, Something To Talk About below: <\/p>\n Killeen told Something To Talk About that while she is aware of breaking down some barriers for women in media and entertainment, she also doesn\u2019t want to discount those who came before her \u2013 nor the men working behind the scenes who advocated for her to get the job. <\/p>\n \u201cIt was the first reality TV experience of that size, but also with a live audience. It was very empowering for the country to be looking at any woman with that position and authority,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n \u201cThere were other women who\u2019d come before me, hosting shorter shows or maybe prerecorded. I don\u2019t want to overlook the achievements of anyone.<\/p>\n \u201cBut that showed tremendous faith and feminist ways of the men that hired me. <\/p>\n \u201cBecause men had to support women to make those first steps, and there were men supporting me, who not only did that, but they weren\u2019t hovering.\u201d<\/p>\n Since leaving her role with Big Brother in 2007, Killeen has written numerous children\u2019s books and will soon return to television as the new host of Network 10\u2019s reality television show The Traitors, taking over in its third season from actor Rodger Corser.<\/p>\n Listen to the full interview with Gretel Killeen on the Stellar podcast, Something To Talk About below: <\/p>\n \u201cIn The Traitors, we give people permission to be a different version of themselves \u2014 the funny, the crazy. <\/p>\n \u201c\u2018Come into this wonderland \u2026\u2019,\u201d she said of the show\u2019s contestants.<\/p>\n \u201cI believe that people with vested interests encourage us to ignore that part of our lives.\u201d<\/p>\n Killeen added that along with her TV return, she still has items to tick off her bucket list \u2013 like writing songs, singing and continuing her foray into painting. <\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve realised people don\u2019t want perfection; they want imperfection,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n \u201cMy generation was raised to be superwomen. We had to do it all, and really we were crumpled heaps.\u201d<\/p>\n Listen to Gretel Killeen on a new episode of the Stellar podcast, Something To Talk About<\/a>, out now wherever you get your podcasts. For more from Stellar, click here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Before landing the role of host of Big Brother Australia, which premiered 25 years ago in 2001, Gretel…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":794617,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[64,63,37507,134,373798,87656,54532,427],"class_list":["post-794616","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tv","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-big-brother","tag-entertainment","tag-something-to-talk-about","tag-stellar","tag-the-traitors","tag-tv"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/794616","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=794616"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/794616\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/794617"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=794616"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=794616"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=794616"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}