24 February 2024 , 11:03
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Ross Kemp's Channel 5 series has been suddenly axed halfway through filming over bosses' concerns, it has been reported.
The documentary presenter fronts the 72 Hours In... series but its future is currently up in the air after filming had to be stopped. He was due to film in South America this year but he and his filming team have been told to stand down as filming is no longer going ahead.
It's been rumoured that cost concerns could be behind the halt in filming, with bosses saying the series was becoming too expensive.
Kemp is said to have already filmed one of the episodes in Colombia in October last year, but that episode may never now air. It's been reported that plans were in place to film in Ecuador but a coup in the country stopped the team just days before filming was planned to go ahead.
Kemp's latest programme has stopped filming (©Sky UK Limited)Deadline reported that bosses of the series weren’t happy at how expensive the series was getting. The series was announced last year and explained that Kemp would be visiting high security prisons during the show and giving an insight into behind the scenes of jails.
Ross Kemp insists EastEnders can survive by tackling 'troubling' issues
It was said that he would be mixing with gang leaders, serial killers, violent criminals, drug lords and mass murderers "to see first-hand what it is like to live among society's most dangerous people."
A spokesperson from Channel 5 said: "Filming had begun on the series, but due to unforeseen production challenges, we made the practical decision to halt filming and will not be progressing further."
This isn't the first time that Ross has hit a bump in his career - as he recently revealed that one of his acting roles left children in tears.
He opened up about the first time that he performed for the public and how he went "full method" for the role and brought more than a heavy element of Al Pacino's gangster movies to his version of Punch and Judy, leaving many of the kids in tears as they were scared by what they saw.
In his memoir, Take Nothing For Granted, Ross admits that he was a little too serious with his acting after leaving drama school as he searched for his first role before becoming a household name in the BBC soap EastEnders.
Speaking about the moment that his Punch and Judy characters led to children wetting themselves in the audience, Ross wrote: "I was 20, fresh out of drama school and stuck in the classic Equity card Catch-22.
"The only way around it was to work in repertory theatre or theatre in education. For the younger kids, we were doing a play based on Punch and Judy. At a certain point, I steal the wizard’s sausages and, to teach me a lesson, he casts a spell to make me the size of a man."