Keep ‘JUBY’ in the Jungle

It’s only been a week, but we’ve become very attached to two contestants on I’m A Celebrity Get Me Out of Here! – Ruby Wax and Jack Osbourne.

Why? Because they are our faith reps and they’ve been a force since the day they landed in Australia. So much so we’ve dubbed them “JUBY” (Jack and Ruby), because after seven days they have provided most of the entertainment.

From the start Jack, the son of Sharon Osborne has been quietly leading the camp and winning most tasks. That Jack agreed to appear so soon after the death of his Black Sabbath father Ozzy was quite a coup for ITV and his most powerful and moving moment was discussing his dad with Emmerdale’s Lisa Riley.

Understated and sincere when he is chatting, Jack is very different when he is competing; his focus might be inherited from his grandfather, music manager Don Arden, who had a very tough reputation.

By winning the first major challenge — the bolt-unscrewing snake trial — Jack got a luxury bed in the posh bit of camp and a steak dinner. Sharon must have been watching and Jack said that before flying out: “My mum told me not to reveal what I’m really afraid of because they’ll make me do it.”

Sharon has taught Jack well and raised a mensch because the father of four (Pearl, Andy Rose, Minnie and Maple) with wife Lisa, has kept the campfire going, cooked the most appetising meals, made people laugh and handled the jungle like a Jewish Tarzan.

Ruby Wax has shown us that she is not only a celebrity that we don’t want out of the jungle, but one that we need back on TV regularly.

The daughter of Austrian Jewish parents who fled the Nazis, Ruby has admitted in the past that she knows about survival and that may be why she’s unfazed by things that terrify others in the camp. (Like having several snakes wrapped around your head while trapped in a box. That was task one on day one).

Ruby asks the most questions and gets the campmates sharing such personal stuff they may have forgotten they are on camera, but she has also shared her own stories about the A listers she met when she had the show Ruby Meets.

Considering some of the younger contestants didn’t know who she was, they quickly realised once she told them about interviewing not only OJ Simpson, but Donald Trump, when she joined him on his private jet, laughed at his presidential ambitions, and was then asked to leave his plane.

Gen Z viewers took an instant dislike to Ruby after the first episode, because she asked Angry Ginge to move out of her light because he was “casting a shadow.”

But she won back their respect when she ate everything on the menu at the eating trial — possibly the most revolting since the show began with cockroaches, camel toe, pig’s testicle, giant mealworms and vomit fruit.

Ginge gagged but Ruby soldiered through and won the stars. And so to last night’s instalment, which was a hideous live drinking trial, that has resulted in both Jack and Ruby being up for eviction.

This feels wrong as they have been responsible for the heart, humour, trial victories and interview revelations. It would be a much duller show without them and so for week two to be any fun at all we need ‘JUBY’ to stay in the jungle.