Niamh Smyth, from Belfast, applied for BBC’s The Traitors but was rejected after a short phone call with a member of the team
A Belfast woman who applied for BBC’s The Traitors has revealed she “can’t stop” thinking about one particular aspect whilst watching the series she had hoped to appear in. Niamh Smyth was viewing last year’s The Traitors final alongside her in-laws when the BBC announced auditions were opening for the following series.
Keen to apply alongside someone else, her father-in-law volunteered to join her. Following their application, the young Mormon woman was requested to submit a video introduction about herself.
She explained: “You know the way they have people that are related, but they don’t say, like in secret on the show that’s the kind of route we were going down. I wanted to do it with someone, Justin [her husband] wasn’t really interested and his dad was like yeah we should go for it.
“Of course whenever it came down to the actual application process of it I applied and he didn’t. So it got to the stage where I think you have to create a video, a couple minutes talking about yourself. By that point I was like hmm I don’t know if I can be bothered with this so I kind of just stopped the application there and forgot about it.”
Meanwhile, her father-in-law submitted an application for Race Across The World on their behalf, leading to Niamh securing a telephone interview with a production team member. She described having an extensive conversation with the woman on the phone lasting “a good hour”.
Niamh shared: “The way I can describe it was like a job interview, but they wanted to know like every detail about your life, your family, your friends and I actually really enjoyed this phone call. The girl seemed super interested.
“When it comes to these things they’re looking for a certain kind of people, they want a storyline, so I was just throwing everything out there. So that kind of gave me the motivation to finish my Traitors application form.”
A few days after completing her application, Niamh received a callback for The Traitors, but she sensed something was off from the get-go. She noted that the call was brief, lasting only five or 10 minutes, and lacked the depth of her previous interaction with Race Across The World.
She reflected: “[I] Don’t know what they’re looking for, but she could obviously tell within the first couple of minutes that I was not it. As I said this is TV, they want a storyline out of this.
“A part of my storyline for both the applications a was, as the youngest of eight I’ve been very much babied my whole life [and] I wanted to show what I could do, I wanted to show what I was made of, but it just wasn’t enough.
“I was coming out with everything. Before the girl hung up for The Traitors I was like ‘oh by the way just let you know I’m a Mormon, you know diversity and all that. Bless my soul that’s probably why I didn’t get it.
“And that’s the story on how I got rejected from The Traitors.”
Niamh revealed she was also requested to provide her social media details to the programme, which left her wondering whether her online activity might have worked against her application. She feared producers may have suspected she’d “give away information” on her platforms.
However, since tuning into the latest series of The Traitors, broadcast at 8pm every Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday on BBC One, Niamh admitted one particular thought keeps nagging at her.
She explained: “You know that saying where it’s like what’s not meant for you won’t pass you… that is completely true in this case because all I can think about whenever watching this series is I would have been eaten alive at that round table by Fiona.
“Don’t get me wrong I can hold my own whenever it comes to my husband my family but anyone else I just would have cracked and crumbled.”
