TV star Tyra Banks has confessed to fans she's nothing like her America's Next Top Model "character", confessing she invented an alter-ego to score better ratings.
The beauty launched the reality TV competition show in 2003 and has since developed a reputation as a confident and sassy pioneer in the modelling industry, but Banks insists it's all an act for the cameras - because she's shy and insecure in real life.
Speaking during CNN's U.S. TV special Dinner with the Kings, which aired on Sunday (04Dec11), she said, "When I did my show, created my show or whatever, I also created a persona on Top Model. And it's a character. So when I'm sitting there and I have all this make-up on, and I'm like, 'Your picture's not fierce...' talking all that and reprimanding the girls, that is a character.
"I don't do that, like, in real life; I'm passive aggressive. I'm anti-confrontational; I'm even in coaching to learn how to be confrontational.
"So it's a character, but people think it's real. I'm so not sexy. I know how to turn it on for a picture but I'm not sexy in real life."