Featured Image Credit: BBC
Topics: Celebrity, Crime, The Traitors
Anish Vij
Sir Stephen Fry surprised fans of The Celebrity Traitors after admitting that he went to prison many years ago.
The British broadcaster, 68, has joined the likes of comedian Lucy Beaumont, YouTuber Niko Omilana and TV presenter Jonathan Ross on the celebrity version of the deceptive game show.
Since Fry is known to many as a talented actor and mental health advocate, Omilana asked him what it was like to be knighted.
Earlier this year (25 March), he received the honour at Windsor Castle from King Charles for his services to charity and mental health advocacy.
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"My mother was there, and given what a dreadful child I was, I went to prison and things like that," the Jeopardy! host replied.
"It was like this troubled child has been less of a disgrace."
Fry was imprisoned at the age of 17 for credit card fraud after being expelled from several schools. In 1975, after failing his A-levels, he stole a family friend’s credit card and used it for a brief spending spree on hotels and taxis after running off to Swindon.
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After he was caught, he was charged with fraud and spent three months at Pucklechurch Prison, a youth detention centre.
Viewers were stunned by the admission, as one person wrote on X (formerly Twitter): "Wait! Stephen Fry was in prison? How did I not know this? #CelebrityTraitors #TheTraitorsUK."
Another added: "Stephen Fry spent three months in prison!"
And a third said: "Today I learned that Stephen Fry has been to prison."
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This isn't the first time Fry has opened up about his time behind bars, as he'd previously said that as a teenager, he had 'galloping kleptomania', which is a mental health disorder that enables the urge to steal things.
The QI host has also spoken about his time in prison, telling the Radio Times in 2023 that he shared his cell with a 'young Welsh man' who was 'illiterate'.
He said: “I started to teach him to read and write, and that was an extraordinary experience. I was known as ‘the Professor’ in prison.”
Fry further revealed to the Diary Of A CEO podcast in 2022 that he felt 'lost and adrift' growing up.
"I was a deeply difficult child that my parents took me to a psychiatrist when I was 14," he shared. "That started my journey into my mental health.
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"I started doing weird things. I was sent to prison, so the best I could do after a disastrous childhood, I decided, was now concentrate on getting into Cambridge."
The broadcaster realised that a lot of his disruptive behaviour was later explained when he was diagnosed with bipolar disorder at 37.