The Traitors contestants hadn’t even had a bite of their croissants before Harriet Tyce revealed her true feelings in a memorable showdown at the breakfast table. But viewers weren’t the only ones watching through their fingers – Harriet herself was left mortified by the scenes.
The former barrister-turned-bestselling crime author took centre stage in Wednesday night’s episode (14 January) after she won the chance to speak to the traitors. The following morning, she shared her experiences with her fellow contestants, throwing suspicion on Rachel, but she grew bizarrely irate in the process and ended up shouting at her fellow faithful, Roxy.
When Rachel jumped in to question how the latest twist benefited the traitors, Harriet interrupted her: “I’ll tell you the benefit.” However, this frustrated Roxy, who said: “Rachel was speaking – you’ve said a lot, let Rachel speak,” but Harriet shouted back: “The benefit is to set the cat amongst the pigeons, Roxy!”
Harriet said she felt “awful” watching the moment back, confirming in a new interview that losing her temper wasn’t, as some viewers suspected, a performance, but a result of her being “so deep in the game”.
“Unfortunately, and I’m not proud of it at all, I did lose my temper, and I really wish I hadn’t,” she told Metro. “I wish that it had gone a different way.”
Roxy was left upset by her encounter with Harriet, telling her afterwards: “I don’t want to hear anything you’ve got to say. I think the way you spoke to me at the table was disgusting. To say that we’re actually friends in this game, that went past the friendship thing for me.”
Harriet said she has since met up with Roxy and was prompted to apologise to her after the scenes aired earlier this week.
“I messaged her again, saying, ‘God, this is awful. I’m so sorry that I shouted. I really wish that I hadn’t.’”
Harriet revealed that Roxy replied by saying she had found it “hard to watch”.
“There was a lot of emotion going on there and you don’t really want to show that level of raw emotion on television to the nation.
“But I think what it demonstrates is the power of the game, and why The Traitors is such an incredible programme for viewers … some people handle stress better than others.”
Harriet’s outburst resulted in her downfall at the roundtable, and she ended up urging the others to vote for her as an inadvertent way of proving her theory that Rachel is a Traitor.
However, the contestants immediately appeared to forget Harriet’s sacrifice and, the following day, banished Sam, who was a faithful.
Despite Harriet’s unravelling, many have branded her “the best faithful” the show has ever seen, mostly thanks to her ousting of traitor Hugo early in the series.
The Traitors continues on Friday (16 January) and will conclude with three episodes next week, ending on 23 January – and it might possibly end with a wild twist that would change the face of the game.
