Ant McPartlin’s presenting partner Declan Donnelly was “angry” with him following his drink-driving conviction.
The 43-year-old television host took almost a year off work when he checked into rehab after pleading guilty to drink-driving following a car crash in March last year, and he has now admitted his actions caused “tensions” with his presenting partner Dec, which he believes were completely “justified”.
Ant said:
“I saw Dec the day after the crash and we didn’t even speak work. It wasn’t about that. It was about, ‘How are you?’ I said: ‘I’m not right.’ You know, mentally I wasn’t in a good place.
“We’re friends first and foremost. And we’re friends from the age of 13. But of course there’s going to be tensions there. Because this is not just getting p****d and making a fool of yourself at the office Christmas party – this is drink driving.
“He’s angry, of course he’s angry. But it’s justified and I understood it. Underneath all of that is love and still is love. And that’s what we talked about more than anything.”
Ant left Dec to present their shows, including ‘Ant and Dec’s Saturday Night Takeaway’, ‘Britain’s Got Talent’, and ‘I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here’ – for which he had help from Holly Willoughby – on his own, but Ant believes it was “absolutely the correct decision” for the programmes to continue without him.
Speaking to Dan Wootton for The Sun newspaper, he added:
“It was absolutely the correct decision for Dec to carry on with Takeaway. If it had been the other way, I would have done the same. But I was taking time out of life, not just work. Work was secondary.
“I said to Dec, ‘I just need to take time out and re-evaluate and get better and deal with things going on in my life. It will take as long as it takes.’
“I’m very lucky that I’ve got an understanding business partner and best friend who said, ‘Absolutely, your head is more important than anything.’ I had to lock myself away.”