{"id":253921,"date":"2026-01-20T08:32:15","date_gmt":"2026-01-20T08:32:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/253921\/"},"modified":"2026-01-20T08:32:15","modified_gmt":"2026-01-20T08:32:15","slug":"wild-party-antics-of-traitor-rachel-ahead-of-fridays-final-we-reveal-bizarre-toilet-stunt-why-shocked-friends-told-her-to-behave-herself-her-parkinsons-stricken-mums-advice-and-more","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/253921\/","title":{"rendered":"Wild party antics of Traitor Rachel: Ahead of Friday’s final, we reveal bizarre toilet stunt, why shocked friends told her to ‘behave herself’, her Parkinson’s-stricken mum’s advice and more"},"content":{"rendered":"

She has divided the nation with her manipulative and ruthless behaviour as she murders her way to The Traitors<\/a>\u2019 top cash prize.<\/p>\n

But while many viewers have accused Rachel Duffy of being \u2018smug and cocky\u2019, others are hailing her as one of the hit show\u2019s best-ever traitors.<\/p>\n

When the BBC<\/a> cameras aren\u2019t rolling, Rachel, a mother of three from Newry in Northern Ireland<\/a>, is a fun-loving party animal with a penchant for knocking back shots, performing karaoke and dolling herself up in glitter.<\/p>\n

An associate of the 43-year-old communications director told The Mail on Sunday: \u2018Rachel is the life and soul of any party. She gets on with everyone and just loves having a good time.<\/p>\n

\u2018She is not afraid of being the centre of attention. She loves the craic and a giggle.<\/p>\n

\u2018She\u2019s definitely got a penchant for shots and karaoke. She takes the view<\/a> that life is for living and enjoying yourself. She loves nothing more than a big celebration.\u2019<\/p>\n

For her 40th birthday, instead of blowing out the candles, she plonked her head into her birthday cake to take a big bite as her husband Seamus \u2013 a lawyer \u2013 looked on.<\/p>\n

In the video uploaded to her Instagram account, someone is heard saying, \u2018Rachel, behave yourself\u2019 as if they knew exactly what she was going to do before she did it.<\/p>\n

Friends say she enjoys nothing more than a \u2018girls\u2019 trip\u2019 away, and in one picture on Instagram is seen wearing a pair of white heart-shaped sunglasses during a trip to Paris.<\/p>\n

She was also the life and soul of Marbella\u2019s star-studded Ocean Beach club where she knocked back champagne with friends.<\/p>\n

\"Rachel <\/p>\n

Rachel Duffy in Marbella in 2019… where she was the life and soul of the star-studded Ocean Beach club<\/p>\n

\"An <\/p>\n

An associate of the 43-year-old communications director said: \u2018She\u2019s definitely got a penchant for shots and karaoke\u2019<\/p>\n

\"For <\/p>\n

For her 40th birthday, instead of blowing out the candles, Rachel plonked her head into her birthday cake to take a big bite as her husband Seamus \u2013 a lawyer \u2013 looked on<\/p>\n

In another picture, she is shown enjoying a day out at a tea party, where she posed with a teapot on her head, before heading to a gin party.<\/p>\n

And she is much the same at work events. As the head of marketing and communications at Clanrye Group, she helps to plan overseas youth programmes and to manage community family support services.<\/p>\n

At the Irish News Workplace & Employment Awards 2022, she performed a handstand in the ladies\u2019 toilets to mark the occasion, with the picture captioned: \u2018Who doesn\u2019t love a good awards ceremony?! Although when they ask for creative tweets I find it very difficult to sit in my seat. Maybe this year I\u2019ll behave.\u2019<\/p>\n

So it was only right that Rachel got all her friends and family together for the opening episode of The Traitors, where they discovered she had been chosen by host Claudia Winkleman to be one of the traitors.<\/p>\n

It is this friendly, happy-go-lucky demeanour that has helped her gain so many friends among the Faithfuls.<\/p>\n

Despite the efforts of both Fiona Hughes, 62, and Harriet Tyce, 53, to try to get her to reveal her game plan, there appears to be no stopping her. Rachel is one of the favourites to win in this Friday\u2019s finale. And she has steely resolve.<\/p>\n

She has made no secret of the fact that she wants to win the six-figure prize money. So determined is she to succeed that she has revealed she had four months of FBI training before filming.<\/p>\n

She told fellow contestants at least part of this guidance was in \u2018the beauty of micro-expressions and people\u2019s ability to lie\u2019.<\/p>\n

\"In <\/p>\n

In a poignant photograph, Rachel\u2019s mother Anne, who has dementia and was diagnosed with Parkinson\u2019s when she was in her 40s, is seen proudly holding up a T-shirt which says \u2018My daughter\u2019s a traitor\u2019 on the front<\/p>\n

\"On <\/p>\n

On her Facebook profile picture is a photograph of her beloved father walking her up the aisle on her wedding day. He died in 2016, aged just 67<\/p>\n

\"Rachel <\/p>\n

Rachel poked fun at her time on the show in a post on Instagram<\/p>\n

But heartbreak lies behind her drive to win. She revealed on last Friday\u2019s show that she wants to do it for her beloved mother Anne, 70, who has dementia and was diagnosed with Parkinson\u2019s when she was in her forties.<\/p>\n

In a poignant photograph, Anne is seen proudly holding up a T-shirt which says \u2018My daughter\u2019s a traitor\u2019 on the front.<\/p>\n

Rachel said: \u2018Mummy was just 47 when she was diagnosed with Parkinson\u2019s, four years older than I am now, and faces dementia, but still amazes me and my family every single day.\u2019<\/p>\n

It’s not just the Faithfuls who feel betrayed…\u00a0 <\/p>\n

It is filmed in and around the picturesque Ardross Castle, located in a tiny Highland region 30 miles north of Inverness.<\/p>\n

The Traitors, with its scenes of scheming and adventure, has for many of its eight million viewers, put the Scottish community of Ardross, Ross-shire, on the map.<\/p>\n

Yet The Mail on Sunday can reveal that the filming of the hit BBC show has left a lot to be desired for locals accustomed to a slower pace of life.<\/p>\n

Residents claim the production \u2013 described as akin to running a \u2018military operation\u2019 \u2013 brings \u2018chaos and danger\u2019 to their doors.<\/p>\n

More than 200 crew are said to descend on the area for filming \u2013 along with many vehicles \u2013 and locals claim the single track roads cannot cope with the traffic.<\/p>\n

One resident told this newspaper: \u2018It took us a couple of series to get used to filming.<\/p>\n

\u2018They keep props for missions at different locations and so they have to transport them all to the castle when they need them.<\/p>\n

\u2018It causes a build-up and could be quite dangerous at times.\u2019<\/p>\n

Locals are also frustrated by the crew and contestants being driven back and forth between the castle, the mission sites and their Inverness hotel.<\/p>\n

However, some residents are keen to look on the bright side. One said: \u2018It brings a lot to our area and is a positive thing, so we don\u2019t want anything to spoil it.\u2019<\/p>\n

The BBC said last year that The Traitors contributed \u00a321.8million to the Scottish economy.<\/p>\n

<!- – ad: https:\/\/mads.dailymail.co.uk\/v8\/us\/tvshowbiz\/none\/article\/other\/mpu_factbox.html?id=mpu_factbox_1 – -><\/p>\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n

She said that if she were to go all the way and win the money, she would spend it on Anne. Rachel added: \u2018I just want to create memories with her while I\u2019m still lucky enough to have her, and to create memories with my kids, because they just love their nanny.\u2019<\/p>\n

Rachel also lost her beloved father, Raymond Mullen, in 2016 when he was 67. Her Facebook profile picture is a photograph of him walking her up the aisle on her wedding day.<\/p>\n

The pair were exceptionally close and she was devastated when he died. Her older brother is Darren Mullen, who was the manager of football club Newry City, and she also has two other brothers, Neil and Shane, and a sister called Joanne.<\/p>\n

The whole family are said to be \u2018larger than life\u2019. A family friend revealed: \u2018The Mullen family are all very well known in Newry.<\/p>\n

\u2018Darren was at the heart of the city when he managed the football club but the whole family were too.<\/p>\n

\u2018They are all very close and supportive of each other, so of course they hired a local venue to watch Rachel become a traitor.<\/p>\n

\u2018It was a big deal for them all. She\u2019s got the backing of the whole city. Everyone is behind her, although we don\u2019t know how she managed to keep it quiet for as long as she did.<\/p>\n

\u2018She\u2019d told everyone she had to go to England for work when in reality she was in Scotland filming The Traitors.\u2019<\/p>\n

Rachel is now in the final stages of the fourth series of the show, which was filmed last summer at Ardross Castle near Inverness. Her last scenes are \u2013 say insiders \u2013 set to be explosive.<\/p>\n

While she is being tipped to win, eagle-eyed fans have spotted clues that suggest Faithful Jack Butler might snatch victory.<\/p>\n

The 29-year-old said on last Friday\u2019s show that if he won the prize money, he would like to put a deposit down on a house and propose to his girlfriend.<\/p>\n

Jack did indeed pop the question in Santorini in July after the series was filmed, sharing a series of photographs on social media.<\/p>\n

But should he snatch the title, he would have had to cross Rachel \u2013 and she\u2019s not to be messed with. Just ask her local friends.<\/p>\n

One meme that is being shared on Newry groups supporting Rachel says: \u2018You come for a Newry woman, you better not miss.\u2019<\/p>\n

With the final week of The Traitors approaching, the Faithfuls are struggling to beat this fun-loving, traitorous party girl.<\/p>\n

And that must make Anne proud. For Rachel reveals that her mother\u2019s words of wisdom for her have always been: \u2018Don\u2019t get caught.\u2019<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"She has divided the nation with her manipulative and ruthless behaviour as she murders her way to The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":253922,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[539,93,61,60,1489],"class_list":["post-253921","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-dailymail","tag-entertainment","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-tvshowbiz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/253921","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=253921"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/253921\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/253922"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=253921"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=253921"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=253921"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}