The Masked Singer’s Gregory Porter reveals biggest struggle while wearing 14kg costume

Gregory Porter has spoken about one of the hardest aspects of wearing the Dressed Crab costume on The Masked Singer UK.

The show’s costume designer Tim Simpson revealed to Metro that it was the heaviest garment at 14kg, even admitting that he’s amazed that stars don’t collapse on stage. For reference, 14kg is the equivalent of a medium-sized dog, several gallons of milk, or two hefty bowling balls.

However, for Gregory, 53, it was another issue entirely that caused him the most grief while participating in the ITV show.

What he found particularly hard about his choice of character was having claws instead of hands. Gregory is accustomed to using the body part to further animate himself during performances but that privilege was taken away.

‘That was difficult for me because I like to have a connection with my audience. I like to express myself with my hands,’ he explained on This Morning.

‘I can’t tell you how difficult it is. If you’ve ever seen me perform live I have to have my hands which is why I always sing with a mic stand.’

Despite the obstacle, Gregory was one of the standout performers since the beginning, previously astounding the audience with renditions of Lean On Me, Let’s Groove and Are You Gonna Go My Way. He finished as runner-up just behind Pufferfish, who turned out to be West End superstar Samantha Barks.

Tim, who’s the creative director of Plunge Creations, spoke in further detail about the crustacean’s costume, which boasts ornate red ruffles from top to bottom in a flamenco dress style.

‘I would say Dressed Crab is the heaviest. It’s got a huge crinoline, which essentially comes up to your chest, which is a fairly excessive height for a crinoline frame to come up to,’ he shared.

‘It’s a big hoop frame, and then there’s lots and lots and lots of fabric in it. So yeah, I think Crab needs quite a bit of strength from the performer.

‘Even just the pincers with their movement, that’s a big, heavy thing to have on the end of your arm.’

Having not known which celebrity was hidden in Dressed Crab’s costume when it was being made, Tim added that whoever was under the mask was ‘giving it a lot of energy to both perform in it, sing in it and not collapse on stage’.

‘None of them collapse on stage, I’m always amazed,’ he said.

‘We still haven’t had a point where somebody’s actually turned around and gone, “I’m going to drop,” because they’re hot and they’re restrictive and they’re weird and they’re claustrophobic and yet, the performers just soldier on.’

In 2023, Tim revealed to Metro that Knitting – who turned out to be Steps singer Claire Richards – boasted the heaviest costume of the year.

‘It’s probably bordering on about 20 kilos. It’s a heavy thing. I think Knitting was the heaviest,’ the costume designer said at the time.

On top of the weight, Tim revealed that just under 350 metres of wool was used to create Knitting.

In the previous series, the heavy Robobunny was ‘quite a formidable thing for the performer to wear’, aka Westlife’s Mark Feehily.

‘They’re not only dealing with a really big costume, where they can only see out past a bunny rabbit’s ears, they’re also trying to make sure that bunny rabbit comes alive and sings,’ Tim said, after explaining the puppet mechanism of the rabbit’s mouth moving during performances.

‘So I think Robobunny has the toughest call in the costumes overall. And they’re just absolutely rocking it.’

The Masked Singer UK is available to watch on ITVX.

A previous version of this article was published on February 8

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