The stars of The Masked Singer have opened up about life after the show. Photos / Supplied
Joe's secret struggle: The TrueBliss babe reveals her backstage health crisis
Coming third on The Masked Singer NZ is impressive enough, but to do it while suffering from a severely herniated disc in your back is quite another – yet Joe Cotton was determined to find the silver lining in her painful situation.
"I found all the handsome dudes!" the More FM Nights radio presenter laughs.
"Turns out, they're all working at North Shore Hospital. Every single doctor I had… Phwoar!"
But jokes aside, Joe, 42, reveals that she turned down spinal surgery so she could compete on the show – and making it worse was the fact she couldn't even tell her husband Daniel Shields why.
"The pain was so intense," she tells Woman's Day.
"I was fully prepared that I might have to have surgery because it was that bad, but when I asked the surgeon if there were any alternatives, luckily, I could have a giant needle into my nerve and shoot it full of steroids. So that's essentially what happened – I got shot full of steroids by the world's most giant needle!"
Joe had ruptured the disc while picking up a heavy clothes rail, "of which I had absolutely no business trying to pick up", and felt the pain get progressively worse over a few weeks, until parts of her body – "my downstairs, essentially" – went numb.
But the steroids worked and while she was in significant pain on stage as Medusa, the star was thrilled she could go on with the show, even if it meant she could barely move.
"I was terrified in those heels!" Joe exclaims.
"I was a walking pharmacy during filming, let me tell you. I was a bit gutted that I couldn't really perform to the best of my ability, but I'm still pretty happy I made it.
"And it looks like I don't need surgery now, which is great … although I wouldn't mind maybe going back to the hospital one more time!"
Masked Singer's Jason: The Opshop star opens up about his rural retreat from the spotlight
The supposedly glamorous life of a pop star is an unfamiliar concept to chart-topping Kiwi singer Jason Kerrison, who found himself drenching and deworming alpacas on his Northland farm just 24 hours after being unmasked as the victorious Tuatara on The Masked Singer NZ.
The Opshop frontman, 44, lives on a secluded rural estate just outside of Kaitāia with his partner Adele Krantz, who was the only one Jason told about his reptilian role on the Three reality series.
"I figured she'd notice if I disappeared for weeks!" he laughs.
"She was super-supportive, but I thought other people would cotton on when they heard my voice – like my parents. Well, I'd hoped they would, anyway!"
The glitzy world of a reality show is a far cry from Jason and Adele's usual life on the farm, which doesn't even have a TV. In fact, they don't have any power when it's cloudy.
"It's a massive challenge living off-grid," he tells.
"Like huge. I wonder, if I knew what I was getting myself into, if I would have done it. I had to learn how to use an excavation machine, I've done two years of a building course so I can build my own everything, and we have all the alpacas. It's crazy, but I love it."
Jason – who released new single The Timing last week – has long been an advocate for sustainable living, and has big plans to turn his remote property into an eco-sanctuary and hauora (Māori wellbeing) retreat. And while he relishes his new life as a farmer, he admits his relationship with the alpacas is, er, complicated.
The Invercargill-born star laughs, "We got them because we needed a lot of grass got rid of and I'd heard that alpacas sing to you when they're sick, so I thought, 'Oh, that's nice'. Turns out they do, but they also sing when they're making love, which is a whole other thing!
"And they only eat short grass, so the short grass is very short and the long grass is very long. But they're great and my partner has given them all names now, so we're stuck with Clementine, Alice and the rest of them!"
At this point in our chat, Jason – currently shoe shopping in Auckland before the five-hour drive home – bumps into Six60's Chris Mac, who congratulates him on Masked Singer and says he knew it was Jason all along.
"Well, there you go," laughs Jason. "A little bit of pop-star glamour!"
Timothée Chalamet had long been interested in playing Bob Dylan.