Donna Preston is criminally underappreciated on Celebrity Big Brother

We and Donna deserve so much more (Picture: Shutterstock for Big Brother)

Celebrity Big Brother is about to get rid of three housemates and I fear the worst – we could be about to lose the most underappreciated star of the whole series.

Like so many others, I admittedly spent this year’s CBB launch night googling ‘Who is Donna Preston?’

She’s an actress, star of two of the biggest fantasy series in recent memory – Good Omens and Sandman – and a comedian who regularly pops up on TV shows.

For the first week of this series, still she was hardly on my radar.

If this particularly headline-grabbing edition of Celebrity Big Brother will be remembered for one thing, it will be the car-crash that was Mickey Rourke.

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The first few days of CBB were completely dominated by the Mickey Rourke show with very little – if any – room for a laugh.

Eventually, he was kicked out after a string of offences, the dust settled and some of the cast who seemed destined to remain background characters, leaving the house to a few minutes of airtime, were able to get their overdue spotlight.

Donna was among those who it seemed wouldn’t get the chance to prove their worth. She was lovely but we didn’t see anything else.

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Thankfully, and with just five days left until we will know who is crowned this year’s Celebrity Big Brother winner, she has become one of this year’s shining stars – but we and she deserve more.

Last night’s Celebrity Big Brother was CBB at its finest.

There was enough tension brewing between The Only Way Is Essex star Ella Rae Wise and Jojo Siwa to immediately grab the popcorn, but not too much that it felt uncomfortable to watch.

But more importantly there was so much fun.

Donna was among those who it seemed wouldn’t get the chance to prove their worth
(Picture: ITV)

For this week’s shopping task, the house had to play the perfect family.

Chris Hughes and Ella were snotty toddlers; Chesney Hawkes, Angellica Bell and Patsy Palmer were miserable teenagers (not exactly a stretch for Patsy, whose sulks have been a real highlight of the series); Danny Beard and Jack P. Shepherd were mum and dad, and then the crème de le crème of the casting was Jojo and Donna as knackered grandparents.

After a turbulent start to this series of CBB, impressively ITV has managed to shake off the Mickey Rourke hangover.

There is more joy to be had than we’ve seen on a Big Brother – celebrity or otherwise – in years and now we’re in the final stretch, for me so much of that has come from Donna.

Donna has been another deserving contender to win, we just haven’t seen enough of her
(Picture: Vianney Le Caer/Shutterstock for)

More often than not, watching housemates get into character can be a wince-inducing hell but grandma Donna was hysterical, falling asleep on the spot, falling over because she was so exhausted walking from the kitchen to the Diary Room.

Yes, Donna is a comedian, but she’s somehow been the most entertaining housemate with subtlety – a quality rarely celebrated on a television show which traditionally crowns the loudest person in the house as its champion.

Danny will win CBB – and rightly so. He’s been true to himself, his razor-sharp sense of humour that won him Drag Race has been exactly what this series needed, and he’s brought wisdom and empathy to others when perhaps they least expected it, like Daley Thompson.

Grandma Donna was hysterical (Picture: Shutterstock for Big Brother)

He deserves a Bafta for falling into a pile of boxes last night alone.

But Donna has been another deserving contender to win, we just haven’t seen enough of her.

She’s been consistently entertaining, her dry sense of humour getting lost in the noise of Danny Beard and Jojo Siwa.

I always think a Big Brother housemate should be judged on their ‘best bits’ highlights reel. Donna’s will be up there as one of the all-time greats: her deathly reaction to eating a scotch bonnet chili that took her off guard, belting out What The Fox Says with full force without cracking a smile.

Put ‘I didn’t peg Chesney Hawkes’ on a T-shirt and it would fly off shelves.

Donna is arguably the only housemate with absolutely zero ego and isn’t even remotely bothered about her celebrity status (Picture: Shutterstock for Big Brother)

But her wicked sense of humour aside, Donna is arguably the only housemate with absolutely zero ego and isn’t even remotely bothered about her celebrity status, public perception or winning.

She’s always fair and reasonable, she’s stayed completely true to herself and while that doesn’t always make her the most memorable housemate, Donna has brought both more sanity and standout moments for me than anyone else in there.

Throughout every row or bicker, of which there have been plenty, she’s said her piece without getting wrapped up in the chaos.

At this late stage I can’t see her having enough time to go all the way and win, but if she’d been given the same airtime as others and we had just another week or two to go, she could well have emerged a dark horse.

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She deserved more from this Celebrity Big Brother. Perhaps, if we hadn’t endured Mickey Rourke for the first week there would have been more time for the Donnas of the house to really shine through.

Celebrity Big Brother understandably feeds on drama but when fans look back at their favourite moments it’s always the times they laughed out loud. Donna has made me howl more than any housemate since Tiffany Pollard.

She might not win this series but at least, in time, I think Donna will be remembered for being a truly great Celebrity Big Brother housemate – one who will be celebrated more than they were during their stay.

Celebrity Big Brother airs tonight at 9pm on ITV

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