<\/p>\n
A<\/span>ll I can hear, above my thunderous heartbeat, is the stomp \u2026 stomp \u2026 stomp of Claudia Winkleman\u2019s boots as she approaches the round table to determine my fate. It sounds as if she is treading unevenly, maybe even skipping slightly, to throw us off \u2013 but maybe that\u2019s just my nerves, fraying by the second.<\/p>\n I became a fan of The Traitors<\/a> with the first UK season in 2022. I\u2019ve since watched as many of the 30 international adaptations of the (originally Dutch) format as I\u2019ve been able to track down. Though I know better than to apply myself, I\u2019ve naturally debated whether I\u2019d want to play as a Faithful, tasked with flushing the Traitors out; or a Traitor, with more control but vulnerable to backstabbing. Now, I\u2019m going to find out.<\/p>\n Ahead of the BBC\u2019s first celebrity season, a small group of journalists have been invited to the Scottish Highlands, to go behind the scenes and \u2013 the real sweetener \u2013 play a game overseen by Winkleman herself.<\/p>\n Ardross Castle is a 19th-century, privately-owned mansion, a 30-minute drive from Inverness. For most of the year it\u2019s a wedding venue, but since 2022 it\u2019s been booked up for three to four months for Traitors business.<\/p>\n Even the tree-lined drive leading up to the castle is instantly familiar from the players\u2019 conspiratorial convoys to and from the challenges off-site. Our minivan falls into jittery silence, at odds with the serene parkland.<\/p>\n We pull up beside a line of foreboding black 4X4s with TRAITORS numberplates. Any semblance of journalistic neutrality is flung off like a Traitor\u2019s cloak as we pile out of the van, emitting squeals of delight.<\/p>\n To the left are the formal gardens, featuring the fire pit where the last players standing cast their final votes, and the bush into which UK season three fan favourite Alexander famously careened.<\/p>\n To the right is the terrace, looking out over verdant rolling hills, where players convene to forge alliances. I can even hear the caw of the resident peacocks. \u201cThey always go to the catering tent,\u201d executive producer Mike Cotton tells me.<\/p>\n The castle is a hive of activity as the production team \u2013 having just wrapped The Celebrity Traitors \u2013 prepare for a fresh batch of civilian players. At this very moment, they are meeting each other for the first time, being filmed on the train for the first episode of season four.<\/p>\n Tomorrow they will descend upon the castle, and a select few will be shoulder-tapped to be Traitors by Winkleman at the first round table. Today, however, it\u2019s our turn.<\/p>\n We\u2019re led into the breakfast room to find the table laden with the same spread laid on for those players who survive each night: pastries, deli meats, dried fruit, some cupcakes. Watching at home, I\u2019ve always thought it looked somewhat wooden, but I take a plate, hoping to settle my nerves, and sit down with my fellow players.<\/p>\n We size each other up. Our professional headshots are framed and mounted on the wall just like the contestants\u2019 on the show, reminding us of the treachery to come.<\/p>\n <\/span>Claudia Winkleman and Elle Hunt with the giant, gleaming pile of gold AKA the prize pot.<\/span> Photograph: Ruth Roxanne Board \/ BBC<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s all friendly now,\u201d says one man darkly, between bites of ham.<\/p>\n We continue on our castle tour to the library, where players gather their allies for cosy chats, and the billiards room, wallpapered in tartan, where Winkleman conducts her interviews, which is a secret room \u2013 concealed behind a bookcase in the bar.<\/p>\n I\u2019m more surprised to find the bar stocked with real booze, including mini bottles of wine and a brandy decanter. Cotton won\u2019t be drawn on the rules for contestants, saying only that there are limits and they\u2019ve \u201cnever had an incident\u201d with drunkenness.<\/p>\n Paintings throughout, of skulls and cloaked figures, aren\u2019t just spooky set dressing: they conceal mirrors that would otherwise reflect cameras. More cameras are integrated within the set, such as in the roundtable room: the castle\u2019s Great Hall, made smaller with extra panelled walls, enables crews to move around undetected.<\/p>\n The table\u2019s centrepiece conceals a camera and rotates like a lazy Susan, capturing players\u2019 fleeting reactions. The goal is to create as immersive an experience as possible, to encourage the players to live the game. The groundwork is laid with casting, says Sarah Fay, another executive producer: \u201cWe want people who purely want to play the game.\u201d<\/p>\n They are sorted into Faithfuls or Traitors based on what they say in their interviews with Winkleman and players\u2019 individual preferences \u2013 if only to avoid an apathetic villain. \u201cYou\u2019ve got to want to be a Traitor,\u201d says Cotton.<\/p>\n <\/span>\u2018We still can\u2019t believe we got Stephen Fry to come to the castle\u2019 \u2026 the star in The Celebrity Traitors.<\/span> Photograph: BBC\/Studio Lambert\/Euan Cherry<\/p>\n Once roles are assigned, producers let the action unfurl. Only the challenges and certain set-pieces, such as the \u201cdeath match\u201d<\/a> card game from last season, and season two\u2019s funeral, are prepared in advance, says Cotton. \u201cWe\u2019re really hands-off \u2026 Once we\u2019ve set it up, we just let them go.\u201d<\/p>\n Players sleep off-site and are kept apart when not on set, but are otherwise free to roam the castle. Cotton shakes his head exasperatedly, recalling their frequently futile attempts to find a private corner to scheme: \u201cI often think: \u2018Just go outside!\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n There was no special treatment for The Celebrity Traitors \u2013 despite the big names<\/a> on the cast, among them Stephen Fry, Charlotte Church, Tom Daley, Jonathan Ross and Alan Carr.<\/p>\n Some were approached to take part, but there is such buzz around the series, \u201cthere were some people who did come to us,\u201d says Cotton. (He won\u2019t name names \u2013 but Sarah Ferguson, Duchess of York, reportedly<\/a> declined an offer.) \u201cWe still can\u2019t believe we got Stephen Fry to come to the castle,\u201d adds Fay.<\/p>\n The only difference from the civilian series, they say, is that the celebrities had their public personas and in some cases preexisting relationships to play with, creating more opportunities for subterfuge. \u201cI don\u2019t know what beasts lie within me,\u201d muses Fry in the show\u2019s first trailer<\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s designed to be psychologically intense,\u201d says Cotton. The entire production is set up to minimise interactions with the contestants, lest they risk giving a Traitor away. Their only regular connection on-set is with the welfare team, with whom they meet twice daily.<\/p>\n \u201cThe cast are looking for clues all the time \u2026 who we interview; how long we interview them for,\u201d says Cotton. The worst-case scenario, Fay adds, would be for a production slip-up to be brought up at the round table as evidence. \u201cWe shouldn\u2019t ever be a player in the game.\u201d<\/p>\n They are summoned to the nightly round table remotely, by a song \u2013 The Hanging Tree, the theme from The Hunger Games films \u2013 playing through the castle.<\/p>\n The Big Brother-style \u201cdiary room\u201d, where players record their bits to camera, is also unmanned. Just outside, he points out a grille in the ground: the dungeon, where players were held during a season-two challenge \u2013 I can glimpse the dingy cell beneath my feet.<\/p>\n The producers didn\u2019t even know it existed during season one, Cotton tells us. He is more vague about the location of the \u201cTraitors\u2019 tower\u201d, no doubt wanting to keep some secrets back \u2013 rumour has it, it\u2019s closer to ground level (and potentially not even at the castle).<\/p>\n Cotton has also heard the speculation online that the roundtable room is deliberately kept cold, so tempers run hot. \u201cIt\u2019s just a big castle \u2013 it\u2019s really hard to heat!\u201d he says.<\/p>\n