Richard E Grant has confessed he "never thought anyone would take it seriously" when he inadvertently revealed his identity on The Celebrity Traitors.
Selected during the opening episode of the latest series alongside 32-year-old Love Island presenter Maya Jama, the actor was tasked with deceiving his fellow contestants as one of the titular Traitors.
However, almost immediately after receiving his role, the screen star admitted his true status to several cast members. The blunder sparked immediate suspicion, ultimately leading to him becoming the very first participant banished at the roundtable vote.
Reflecting on the error, Grant explained that he assumed the rest of the group would view his slip-up as a joke rather than taking the confession at face value.
Appearing on Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg in an interview with Victoria Derbyshire, the actor admitted: "I never thought they would take me seriously."
Detailing how the moment unfolded, he added: "When he (Joe Lycett) said ‘are you a traitor?’ we had just come out of the roundtable being nominated and I thought ‘yeah, isn’t everybody going to say that’ and they didn’t, so I paid the price."
Grant also discussed the intense psychological environment inside the game, which quickly distorts a player's perspective. He described how: "You are so institutionalised in that thing within 24 hours, because you are isolate, kept in a room, there is a guard outside your door, your food is delivered and there’s no internet access, so you are kind of shut down.
"You are also not told what time it is and are also proscribed on a daily basis what you are going to wear. So, you are kind of infantilised and institutionalised at the same time."
Before joining the show, Grant had been warned about his suitability for stealth gameplay. He disclosed that his daughter warned him he would be "slaughtered" because he was "incapable of hiding what you feel about people or anything".
Despite being sent home before anyone else, he harboured no resentment towards the game itself, stating: "I think it’s the most wonderful format of a game and I love it."
He has, nevertheless, chosen not to tune in to watch his brief stint play out on television.
"It’s a weird thing because as an actor it is very uncomfortable to watch yourself, and if you watch yourself unscripted – which Traitors is – there’s no place to hide," he explained.
"That is unequivocally you."
Following his initial slip-up in front of his castmates, comedian Lycett had advised him to backpedal and pretend he was merely joking as a faithful player.
"I think you’ve done something that’s never been done in the game. It’s a bold strategy," Lycett said.
Recognising the gravity of his misstep, Grant admitted to the camera: "That may have been the biggest mistake I’ve made in my life. I was so thrilled to be chosen that in my excitement I said I was a traitor. I need to defuse all of the heat coming in my direction."
His damage control failed to convince the group. At the roundtable, he received a sweeping majority of votes, including votes from Maya Jama and comedian James Acaster, whom the pair had recently recruited into their faction.
Standing before the assembled stars to reveal his secret role, Grant declared: "I am … an unfaithful traitor."
Speaking in a piece to camera afterwards, he reflected: "I have been annihilated. I have managed to checkmate myself, which, as far as I’m aware, has never been done."
His departure was met with cheers from the remaining celebrities, while host Claudia Winkleman remarked to the group: "Players, this has never happened before. Your first try and you got one."
Grant later conceded that exposing his identity in such a fashion was a "catastrophically idiotic thing to do".
"I suppose what I should have done in retrospect is go round everybody and say, ‘Are you a traitor? Yeah. I am a traitor, I am Spartacus. I am a traitor’, to try and make light of it, but that may have dug my grave even deeper.
"It was a completely catastrophically idiotic thing to do! I can only imagine the faces of the producers looking at each other and mouthing ‘he said what?!’. The strategy of no strategy is the strategy, clearly.’
The Celebrity Traitors continues at 8pm Thursday on BBC One.
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