Amanda Holden’s co-star has revealed he was targeted by a “gangster” in Sicily where her BBC show was filmed.
The 53-year-old Britain’s Got Talent star teamed up with comedian Alan Carr for two series of Amanda and Alan’s Italian Job so far and have transformed derelict buildings purchased for one euro into stunning properties.
Whilst trying their hand at everything, the duo also drafted in local tradespeople to show them the ropes before the resonated building goes on sale. Scott Thompson, a Sicily-based project manager and maker, moved to Italy in 2007 in search for sunny holiday escape and ended up purchasing a house for cheap, just like Amanda and Alan do in the hit BBC series.
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However, things didn’t get off to the best start as he started off his new adventure abroad after he was targeted by a “gangster”. Speaking on the Soap From The Box podcast with host Lee Salisbury, Scott said: “I was a builder in Manchester doing basement conversations. It was always raining and I was underground. I really needed a sunny escape and I ended up in a tiny little town in Sicily with the intention of saying for three months and renovating a little house, a bit of a summer project, and moving back to England.
“But when I was here I fell in love with it. I’ve been here nearly 16 years now. I had a really bad experience with the guy I bought the house from initially. I’d been here a couple of weeks and and he was playing the role of some sort of gangster, playing on the old Mafia, and he threatened me at one point but the whole town rallied around me and helped me out that made me fall in love with the place.”
“I thought I’m not having this guy trying rip people off coming here and making the most of the fact that he’s one of the only people who speaks English so that’s when I started looking after properties for people and making sure no one else went through what I went though.
Scott also opened up about meeting his co-stars Amanda and Alan for the first time. The handy man said: “Meeting them for the first time was really funny. So that first scene in the first season where I come in that’s actually where I met them. The production team were very convinced that I shouldn’t meet them before live on camera for the first time but we had to do two takes. Amanda and Alan had been there doing some cleaning and then I came in. I was so nervous that I leant in to kiss Amanda on the cheek and I kind of headbutted her.”
(Image: thesicilyprojects/Instagram)
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Despite appearing on both series, Scott revealed that he took some convincing to sign up for the show. He explained: “I don’t think I was convinced straight away because I had quite a bit of stuff on. I think I took a bit of convincing to do the first one. I don’t really watch much TV so I didn’t know anything about it, I hadn’t heard anything about it. So I wasn’t sure at first but i’m glad I did because it’s such good fun.”
Soap From The Box is available to stream now
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Source: Celebrities - dailystar.co.uk
