Beat the Chasers star Darragh Ennis exposes 'ludicrous' rule to avoid Bradley Walsh

There's a major rule on ITV's The Chase, reveals show favourite Darragh Ennis, which producers enforce in order to retain the element of surprise.

All of the Chasers "get on great," Darragh says, and spend a lot of time together when episodes are being filmed. However, they are also under strict instructions to avoid host Bradley Walsh behind-the-scenes.

"We're around each other a lot," he explained on the Dempsey's Dozen podcast, "but, very boringly, we sit in Paul's dressing room and answer quiz questions. That's what we do when we hang out. We're proper nerds."

He went on to share that producers are keen to keep the quizzers away from Bradley and the contestants before the Chase phase of the show begins. "We have to go to, frankly, ludicrous lengths so that Brad and the contestants don't see us," Darragh says.

"We have to come in at very specific times. We're not allowed to leave our dressing rooms without permission because they have to check the corridors are clear, and all that kind of thing."

This means that not even show host Bradley knows which Chaser will be brought out to challenge the contestant.

Darragh explained: "We have to hide from Brad as well because we want the surprise to be real, you can't fake that, not with non-professional actors."

The star says the Chasers socialise together when they're off-duty too, with the quizzer attending co-star Jenny Ryan's birthday party.

He told the podcast host: "I went to Jenny's birthday party for her 40th birthday. We go to award shows together, and Beat the Chasers, of course."

He went on to tease the upcoming series of Beat the Chasers, which airs this weekend, revealing: "We just finished recording that today. It'll be out actually really soon, I think in the next few weeks."

Appearing on an episode of Jaack Maate's Happy Hour podcast last year, Darragh revealed that he and his fellow Chasers only rarely get the chance to get together for a "big night out."

He added: "I went to Paul Sinha's wedding, even though I hadn't appeared on the show at the point, it was very nice of him to invite me along."

When they're not working, Darragh explained that the Chasers live all over the country, and so meeting up outside of the show can be difficult. He divulged: "I live in Oxford, I've got small kids and Mark [Labbett] lives up in the north, or he lives in the Midlands."

"We live miles away from each other," he added "We're work friends and we get along and we have a WhatsApp group and we chat to each other, but we don't go out."

He says Jenny Ryan, known as The Vixen on the game show, is probably his closest friend on the show, because they're a little younger than their co-stars: "We're closer in age, so we're a lot younger than the others, so we're in our 40s and they're in their 50s and 60s."

"I'm pretty close to Paul as well, he's a really good guy and he really helped me out.

"And then, I spend a lot of time with Mark actually, because we stay over in the hotel when we're recording (the show) and we kind of hang out and have dinner."

Beat the Chasers airs tonight from 8pm on ITV1 and ITVX.