The show must go on!

We preview the changes to expect in BGT’s semi-finals – including no studio audience or head judge Simon Cowell…

- Victoria Wilson

BRITAIN’S GOT TALENT

NEW SATURDAY / ITV / 8PM / ENTERTAINMENT

Lockdown meant that the live semi-finals of Britain’s Got Talent, planned for spring, had to be postponed – and there were fears that they might not happen at all. But, as the old showbiz saying tells us, the show must go on and that’s exactly what it does this Saturday when ITV screens the first of those delayed semi-finals.

Ant and Dec are back to host proceedings, as the best 40 acts from the auditions, including the five Golden Buzzer choices, take to the stage again.

‘What we’ve had this year more than the last few series is people just giving it a go; it’s like we’ve gone old-school Britain’s Got Talent,’ says Ant, 44. ‘It’s like people are just walking in from their bedrooms and showing us their talent. Thankfully, a lot of them have been good!’

Given current circumstances, understandably some changes have been made to the format of this year’s semi-finals to ensure production can go ahead safely. And so, for the first time in the show’s 13-year history, the semis will air every Saturday for the next five weeks, instead of being stripped across a single week, and they will be pre-recorded with no studio audience.

Here, we reveal more about what to expect…

NO SIMON

For the first show at least, there will be no Simon Cowell, as he recovers from breaking his back after falling off an electric bike in California last month.