Emmerdale legend Dominic Brunt opens up to the Mirror about Lisa Riley’s jungle heroics, saying she is a force of nature and ‘one of the kindest people he’s ever met’
13:58, 30 Nov 2025
Lisa Riley and Dominic Brunt in Emmerdale(Image: ITV)
It was one of the most tender moments of the series so far as Lisa Riley gently encouraged Jack Osbourne to open up about the death of his dad Ozzy. Lisa, too, shared how she was bereft by the passing of her beloved mum Cath as the two campmates quietly bonded. For her on-screen Emmerdale husband Dominic Brunt, it was a side to Lisa he’d seen many times before.
“I thought the first time when she sat with Jack was a real look into the real Lisa,” he says. “She spots things that other people don’t and is really empathetic. As soon as she sat down with him, I thought, ‘oh, this is really going to be good.’ “You know, two people that have suffered quite greatly in their lives. I don’t think Lisa will ever get used to the loss of her mum.”
Before she went into the jungle, Lisa told how she was going on the show to make her mum -who died of cancer in 2012 – proud. She said: “I can’t help feel that maybe it is my mum in heaven giving me a message to do the show. She would be saying: ‘go on, knock them dead and just have a laugh’.”
READ MORE: I’m A Celeb Alex Scott reveals the truth behind Aitch and Shona McGarty romanceLisa comforts Jack in the jungle (Image: ITV/Shutterstock)
Soap legend Dominic Brunt, who plays Paddy Kirk opposite Mandy Dingle, was the only person other than her partner that Lisa told of her jungle plans. Lisa confided in him several months before the line up was announced.
“I thought, right, if you’re telling me, I’m not even going to tell my wife,” he says. “I don’t keep any secrets from my wife, so it was very strange. But it was great. It was really exciting as well.” Lisa first rang him from work to test the water about heading into camp, before admitting she was in actual fact signed up.
“She called me on set one day,” he recalls. “She said that she’d been asked to do the jungle, and she wasn’t sure, what did I think? And I was going, you’d be brilliant. You should do it. And then later she said, I’m actually doing it. I was really flattered that she told me. We have a very, very close relationship, and we have since 1997, but I was really flattered by the fact that it’s only me and her fella, who knew, and to be trusted like that.”
He was also very aware how quickly a secret like that could spread on a busy soap. “Obviously we work in a place full of actors, and there are very few secrets there. I just thought, I better keep it to myself,” he laughs.
Before she went in, Lisa said she could “go full Mandy Dingle” if she got tired and grouchy. Given the lack of food and sleep in there, that sounded like a real possibility. But Dominic says viewers should not expect to see Mandy marching through camp every night.
Lisa Riley wowing in the jungle (Image: James Gourley/ITV/Shutterstock)
“I’ve very rarely seen that side of her, I have to say,” he explains. “She’s not a moody person. She’s a very upbeat person, and I think even when she’s tired, that’s the only time that you’ll really see her quite quiet.” Dominic, who has played Paddy since 1997, first married Mandy on screen back in 1999. After years apart, the pair finally tied the knot again in a 2024 storyline.
From his sofa, Dominic says he has loved watching Lisa gradually settle into jungle life. He said he knew Lisa would wow viewers because she was a “force of nature.” He added: “I think she’s getting better and better and better. She’s a very, very honest person, and she’s always herself, and she wears her heart on her sleeve. And I could see she wasn’t pretending to be anybody else but herself, and she wasn’t prepared to show off or start dancing on the first day. She sat there and waited and listened.”
Viewers have also seen flashes of Lisa’s humour, from admitting she weed herself after a trial to announcing she fancied Ant. “Well, we get that all day, every day,” he laughs. “She’s like that always.”
What he really hopes viewers see is the thoughtful woman he has worked with for so many years. “Well, for Lisa, she’s a very genuine soul who listens more than she talks, and she cares for people,” he says. “She’s incredibly funny, and she’s selfless and kind. She’s one of the kindest people I’ve ever met. And whether that’s material or spiritual, hopefully that’s kind of seeping out now that people are seeing that.”
As for whether he would ever follow her into camp, he is crystal clear. “I wouldn’t really do anything like that. I do the odd quiz show when they say it’s like a charity quiz show, and do all that, like general knowledge stuff. I think it’s brilliant that Lisa does it, but she’s built for that. But I just can’t see myself doing that. I haven’t got that in me. I think I’d be the one that sits in the corner very quietly, doesn’t get involved, is very shy, very, very quiet, and I think I’d get voted off first.”
Asked if Lisa could become Queen of the Jungle, he says she is in with a chance. “Oh, you never know,” he says. “It does feel like Aitch and Angry Ginge are absolutely to the fore, and people love them but you never know. I hope so….I’m voting for her, the whole building is voting for her.”
