ITV's The Fortune Hotel's Stephen Mangan: His famous wife and 'terrifying' personal tragedy

Stephen Mangan's showbiz career has been a varied one. From being the 'new' voice of Postman Pat to now fronting a new reality TV series where contestants have to cunningly work against each other for a chance to win a life-changing sum of money.

Stephen will appear on ITV screens from tonight (Monday, May 13) hosting The Fortune Hotel, an eight-part reality/ gameshow series based at a luxurious Caribbean resort. Following a similar theme to BBC One's The Traitors, the contestants have to go through a series of challenges in the hope of duping each other into who holds that all-important briefcase containing the cash.

Speaking about his involvement with the show, he said: "People are endlessly fascinating to me as an actor and the reason you become an actor is because people and how they get on with each other, especially in moments of high stress is deeply fascinating. Human beings are complex and interesting.

READ MORE: ITV's The Fortune Hotel: How it works, host, line-up, prize and when it's on

"So The Fortune Hotel felt like the perfect mix of entertainment and drama. It’s a way of putting people together under pressure set amongst a stunning location. The whole package was just incredibly intriguing to me so I had to be a part of it."

But were it not for the actor and comedian's personal tragedies, he may not have ever graced our TV screens in the first place. Stephen, who has more recently starred in TV show The Split, said losing his mum to cancer when she was just 45 made him pursue his acting dream.

The 55-year-old, whose dad died at 63 from a brain tumour, credits the early tragedy for pushing him. Stephen, who also appeared in Green Wing, told the Mirror: “I had never really considered [acting] as an option, but it gave me the courage to try it because, frankly, it was such a wake-up call that I might have maybe only 20 more years.

He revealed he also visited a geneticist to see whether he was at a higher risk of cancer. He said: “It had a huge impact on me. You start to think, is that something in our family? Is that going to be my story? What’s going to happen to me? That can be terrifying.”

He said doctors told him: “Unless you have your mum’s bowel cancer – that is possibly a hereditary thing, possibly not – then you have no greater chance of dying from cancer than anyone else.”

Now the star, whose wife is Holby City actress Louise Delamere, has regular colonoscopies. The dad of three reveals: “Every five years the NHS, not to put too fine a point on it, shoves a camera up my backside.”

Stephen took part in the London Marathon to raise funds for charity Marie Curie, who cared for both his parents. He said: “I can’t tell you what a privilege it is to be able to bring your parent home from the hospital so they can die in their own bed, in their own bedroom, with their family around them – and Marie Curie made that possible.”

And so as well as raising vital awareness about cancer and early detection, Stephen has since brought smiles to many audiences. Speaking about being the voice of Postman Pat in the film version, he told the Mirror in 2014: "You grow up thinking you might be James Bond one day and you turn out to be Postman Pat. There has only been three Postman Pats - two guys on the telly did it and me - so there are fewer Postman Pats than James Bonds out there.

"It never occurs to you that you might be asked to be Postman Pat, but as soon as I was asked I said yes."

Stephen, who is privately educated and started out on stage. His breakthrough television performance was as Adrian Mole in the six-part BBC TV show series Adrian Mole: The Cappuccino Years in 2001. That same year he appeared in Sword of Honour on Channel 4, alongside Daniel Craig.