CELESTE BARBER Challenge ACCEPTED

THE COMEDY QUEEN RETURNS TO ACTING WITH HER OWN SHOW - AND SHE'S NEVER BEEN HAPPIER

- Naomi Toy

As one of Celeste Barber’s 9.5 million Instagram followers, I’ve grown accustomed to seeing her with her undies wedged up her bum and a goofy look on her face. Perhaps that’s why when I meet her for the first time at an exclusive health and wellness centre in Sydney’s CBD, she feels like an old friend. She’s not there to work out though, but to work it – promoting her new TV series, Wellmania, with back-to-back interviews and photo shoots, which includes one of her aura. But you don’t need a special camera or ‘the gift’ to see that, right now, Barber is ecstatic about helming her first TV show and returning to her passion of acting.

“I’m very happy,” she shares. “Oh my God, I’m so happy mate. Acting is my love, my first love, and I’m so happy to be back doing it ... this is kind of where I started. I love it.”

It’s easy to forget it was acting that first brought her to our attention, when her Instagram “side hustle” of recreating absurd celebrity photos went viral. She was also on the long-running show All Saints for four years from 2005, appearing in almost 90 episodes, and was amassing a solid collection of credits – but she wasn’t breaking through in the way she wanted to.