Is this the Ultimate Big Brother line-up?
John McCririck, drama queen Nikki Grahame and former cheat Nasty Nick Bateman are among the housemates who could be joining the Big Brother 11 winner in the house for Ultimate Big Brother. Channel 4 today unveiled a promotional poster for Ultimate Big Brother, with a selection of past Big Brother and Celebrity Big Brother contestants - all memorable, but some for all the wrong reasons. They include former winners Craig Phillips, Nadia Almada, Brian Dowling, Pete Bennett, Brian Belo and Celebrity Big Brother surprise winner Chantelle Houghton. Clean freak Alex Sibley, glamour girl and man-eater Michelle Bass, no-nonsense Aisleyne Horgan-Wallace and trouble maker Charley Uchea are also in the mix, along with last year's stylish runner-up Siavash Sabbaghpour. Craig, 38, has confirmed he will be taking part in Ultimate Big Brother, which begins on August 24. But Big Brother insists the number of returning faces and their identities is yet to be revealed, so not all of them are among the line-up in the poster. There have been 186 Big Brother housemates and 68 celebrity housemates in the past 11 years who could take part in the series. And all returning housemates who enter the house will have to submit themselves to Big Brother's control once more. But, as ever, the true power lies with the viewers, whose votes decide which former housemates are evicted and who will be crowned the Ultimate Big Brother Housemate.
Get the What to Watch Newsletter
The latest updates, reviews and unmissable series to watch and more!
Patrick McLennan is a London-based journalist and documentary maker who has worked as a writer, sub-editor, digital editor and TV producer in the UK and New Zealand. His CV includes spells as a news producer at the BBC and TVNZ, as well as web editor for Time Inc UK. He has produced TV news and entertainment features on personalities as diverse as Nick Cave, Tom Hardy, Clive James, Jodie Marsh and Kevin Bacon and he co-produced and directed The Ponds, which has screened in UK cinemas, BBC Four and is currently available on Netflix.
An entertainment writer with a diverse taste in TV and film, he lists Seinfeld, The Sopranos, The Chase, The Thick of It and Detectorists among his favourite shows, but steers well clear of most sci-fi.