Denise Drysdale breaks silence on rumoured Ita Buttrose feud

DENISE Drysdale was silent during Ita Buttrose’s Studio 10 farewell — but a lot more vocal about their issues during a very frank radio interview this morning.

AS Ita Buttrose made her hasty exit from morning show Studio 10 yesterday, just hours after her departure was announced, all eyes were on fellow panellist Denise Drysdale.

The pair’s frosty relationship was rumoured to be the cause of much discord behind the scenes — and while Buttrose’s co-stars Sarah Harris and Joe Hildebrand showered their departing colleague with praise, Drysdale’s on-air silence was deafening.

In a candid radio interview this morning, Drysdale blamed her silence on the emotions stirred by Anzac Day — but also freely admitted she won’t miss Buttrose, and instead praised Jessica Rowe, who left the show last month.

“The show as we know it is not the same any more, with Jess [Rowe] going. Jess and I hit it off really, really well. And now Ita going, well — it’s a different show. You’ve got two totally different people that have gone ... I’m sure we’ll pick up,” Drysdale told Grant Denyer, in a phone interview broadcast on 2DayFM Breakfast with Em, Grant & Ed today.

Asked about her lack of input as her fellow panellists bid Buttrose a fond farewell, Drysdale pointed to her visible emotion during an earlier Anzac Day segment.

“That was because of Anzac Day. Having a close association with the Vietnam vets, that feeling gets stronger every year. It really gets me. As you get older, you get more emotional,” she said.

Some say the feud started when Denise copied Ita’s signature ‘hand on chin’ publicity shot pose

Tensions between Drysdale and Buttrose were rumoured to have erupted late last year, when Drysdale hurled a Brussels sprout at her colleague during the taping of a Studio 10 Christmas song.

Mere mention of the dreaded vegetable had Drysdale emitting an audible groan.

“Oh, bloody hell,” she sighed, as Denyer asked how she felt about Buttrose leaving.

“Oh, I’ve got a big bag of brussels sprouts and nothing to do with them,” she said with a cackle.

Denyer asked if Drysdale was going to miss having her “sparring partner” on Studio 10 — a question that was met with an immediate “no.”

Drysdale then confirmed sprout-gate, putting her behaviour down to a mix of tiredness and champagne consumption.

“Look, I threw that Brussels sprout because I’d got up at four in the morning to come in and do the Christmas song. And at about four o clock in the afternoon, [after] we’d had a couple of champagnes for lunch, I was feeling ... The Christmas party was that night, so I’d had my party in the afternoon!”

Buttrose bid farewell to her on-air role of five years yesterday, telling viewers she wanted to spend more time with her grandchildren and work as an author again.

She also said that, while her exit had only been announced the day before, she’d actually resigned before Jessica Rowe, who announced on-air at the start of March that she’d be leaving Studio 10 and left the show at the end of that month.

“I resigned two days before Jessica did, but given her announcement, I left mine until it was more convenient because I didn’t think you wanted two of us to go together. I didn’t really ‘spring it’,” she said.

L-R: Joe Hildebrand, Sarah Harris, Denise Drysdale and Ita Buttrose. Not pictured: The Brussels sprout. Picture: John Feder