Golden Buzzer: Sacred Riana’s Terrifying Magic Show Stuns Judges on Britain’s Got Talent 2024
Simon Cowell ‘heckled with savage insults’ during BGT auditions causing ‘headache’ for producers
Ekin Karasin
Simon Cowell was reportedly heckled with brutal insults during Britain’s Got Talent auditions in Blackpool.
The TV judge, 65, allegedly faced boos and yells of “you old fart” when he criticised any of the performers while filming the ITV talent show at Winter Gardens.
The interruptions and jibes from the “raucous” audience has caused a “headache” for producers as they struggle to edit out the taunts in the footage, sources claimed.
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However, Cowell and his fellow judges Amanda Holden, Alesha Dixon, and Bruno Tonioli reportedly saw the funny side and even “encouraged” the hecklers to “misbehave”.
“Simon isn’t vain in that way and found the heckling absolutely hilarious – even when they were calling him an old fart,” an insider told The Sun.
“He loves having BGT in Blackpool precisely because the crowds are so raucous and enthusiastic. And he knows that sometimes he might be on the receiving end of their passion.”
The insider went on: “He even encourages them to misbehave, even if sometimes the misbehaviour can cause a headache for the production team. Thankfully they were compensated for any hassle by a rare chance to have a good laugh at the boss’s expense.”
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The Standard has contacted representatives for Cowell and BGT for comment.
BGT will return to viewers’ screens with the series 18 premiere on February 22.
The episodes will reportedly run for double the usual length of time and see Ant McPartlin and Declan Donnelly returning as hosts.
A trailer for the upcoming series sees acrobatic acts flip across the stage, a drummer covered in paint as he rocks out on his kit and a pole dancer dressed in a bird mask.
It also featured a fire-wielding magician, dance tropes and a basketball player landing a slam dunk into a very high net.
Social media star KSI is also set to appear as a guest judge as he fills in for Tonioli on a handful of audition days.
What To Watch
The YouTube personality and boxer, real name Olajide JJ Olatunji, sat in on three audition days, including in Blackpool, while Tonioli fulfilled filming commitments in the US.
Singer Sydnie Christmas was crowned the winner of the show last year, winning a £250,000 prize and a spot at the Royal Variety Performance
The investment volume in early 2025 could reach €900 million; already half of 2024’s total of €1.8 billion
16 January 2025
According to Savills Investment Research, the commercial property market in the Czech Republic is expected to have a strong start in 2025, with investment volumes projected to reach approximately €900 million in the first two months alone. This figure represents about half of the total volume for 2024, which stood at €1.8 billion. Considering that after the conclusion of these early-in-the-year transactions, 2025 will still have ten months remaining. We are therefore confident that we have reached a turning point in the market and that we will be witnessing a return to higher trading volumes in Czech commercial real estate. In 2024, investment volumes grew by 40% year-on-year, driven by notable transactions, giving good indication of the pick-up in tempo and investor appetite.
Fraser Watson, Head of Investment at Savills, says: “There is a broad consensus that the European, and potentially global, real estate market will pick up in 2025. Interest rates are still expected to fall further, which will of course drive investor engagement. This is just one part of the puzzle though. Another couple of important things to consider are the amount of ‘dry powder’ waiting to be deployed and the FOMO, fear of missing out, effect that is currently building.”
“In 2024, the retail sector led investment activity, capturing 35% of the total volume. Offices followed with 19%, while industrial properties contributed 14%. The residential sector also performed robustly, accounting for 12% of total investment, marking its highest volume in the last four years,” adds Vojtěch Wolf, Senior Investment Analyst at Savills.
In terms of sector preferences for 2025, on a more macro level the ‘beds ‘n’ sheds’ (residential and industrial) trend persists with investors. However, in the Czech market, the residential segment plays a smaller role for institutional investors due to limited availability of opportunities. This to some degree is also true for the industrial sector, where transaction volumes are historically comparatively low. Savills anticipates an increase in office stock entering the market this year, as well as the continued churn of smaller volume retail parks and some select shopping centres being traded.
“We observe that the retail sector is rising in popularity. Shopping centres have come back in the post-covid years strongly in terms of performance and have shown that they continue to be relevant to consumers and can generate sustainable levels of income for investors. We are seeing that shopping centres coming to market are trading and can attract multiple bids from potential buyers, showing that there is a depth of market,“ comments Fraser Watson.
Czech investors remain the primary players in the retail segment, while foreign buyers are showing growing interest in other sectors within the Czech Republic. A similar trend is expected to emerge in the shopping centre market.
