Caroline Flack: How TV presenter's rise to Love Island made her household name

Former Love Island host Caroline Flack has been found dead, her family have confirmed in a statement.

The presenter, 40, was found dead at her east London home on February 15 after taking her own life.

Until she stepped aside from Love Island in December last year following an alleged assault on her former partner Lewis Burton, she had been synonymous with the ITV2 reality show.

Along with hosting Love Island’s weekly spin-off show Aftersun, Flack has hosted all five series of the popular programme, one of the most-watched reality shows in the UK since it launched in 2015.

She was often seen entering the dating show’s villa in slow motion shots to deliver the often bad news to the contestants, while the slogan “The Flack Is Back” is one of the programme’s best-known catchphrases.

Prior to becoming a household name, Flack had presenting jobs on E4 Music and on the CBBC channel before becoming the co-host of action game show Gladiators with Ian Wright in 2009 on Sky One.

In 2009, she became the presenter of I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out Of Here! NOW! alongside Joe Swash and Russell Kane.

She left the I’m A Celebrity companion show in 2011 to host another spin-off programme, The Xtra Factor for The X Factor, along with former contestant Olly Murs.

After leaving The Xtra Factor in 2014, Flack and Murs were promoted to host the main ITV show, replacing Dermot O’Leary.

However, the pair only hosted the main show for one year after being widely panned by critics and the viewers at home.

The following year Flack said she had learnt to ignore her detractors, telling The Sun: “Not everyone is going to like you so you have to filter it.”

Aside from her presenting jobs, Flack has appeared on the small screen in Strictly Come Dancing and on the celebrity version of The Great British Bake Off.

She took part in Strictly in 2014 and was partnered with Pasha Kovalev.

The pair won the series, fending off competition from Frankie Bridge and Simon Webbe.

Four years later, she talked about the difficulties she faced after lifting the Glitterball Trophy, telling The Sun that she felt as though her body was “covered” in “clingfilm” the morning after her dancefloor triumph, adding that she felt “ridiculous” feeling so low.

She added: “I couldn’t get up and just couldn’t pick myself up at all that next year.”

In March 2019, Flack took part in an episode of Channel 4’s charity show The Great Celebrity Bake Off for Stand Up To Cancer alongside other celebrities including journalist Krishnan Guru-Murthy, actor Greg Wise and boxer Nicola Adams.

Asked about the technical challenge and whether she was good at coping with pressure, she said: “I am good under pressure actually, because that’s the kind of job I do, there’s always pressure, like timings and stuff like that are quite important.

“I actually work better under pressure, I need it to stop from being lazy, so that’s good!”

Flack made her West End stage debut playing Roxie Hart in Chicago in 2018 having previously appeared on stage in a touring version of Crazy For You.

In 2015, she released an autobiography called Storm In A C Cup.

Aside from her career, Flack’s love life has made headlines over the years thanks to romances with the likes of Harry Styles and Prince Harry.

In 2011, she was linked to One Direction star Styles, who had been on The X Factor the previous year, when he was 17 and she was 31.

In her autobiography, Flack went into detail about how she met Prince Harry on a night out in 2009 through mutual friend Natalie Pinkham after she had split with a boyfriend.

She said they “spent the evening chatting and laughing”, but “once the story got out, that was it. We had to stop seeing each other.

“I was no longer Caroline Flack, TV presenter, I was Caroline Flack, Prince Harry’s bit of rough.”

Flack became engaged to former Apprentice and Celebrity Big Brother star Andrew Brady in April last year, but the pair split a few months later.

At the time of being charged with assault following a domestic incident earlier this month, Flack was in a relationship with former tennis player Lewis Burton.

Burton, 27, was reportedly involved in the incident and he recently spoke out about Flack, saying she has become the subject of a “witch hunt” following her arrest.

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