Michael Parkinson, the British chat show king who was confirmed dead on Thursday, will be remembered as one of the outstanding interviewers of his generation. During his show’s 36-year run across the BBC and ITV, Parkinson sat down with some of the biggest stars of our time, attracting acclaim and sometimes controversy. Scroll on for some of his most memorable moments.
Muhammad Ali
Parkinson had three significant encounters with the greatest boxer of all time, the first of which took place in 1971. The interview, in which Ali reflected on his skill in front of the camera and in the ring, was organized before a time when publicists heavily policed celebrity talk show appearances. On hearing Ali was in the UK to promote a soft drink, Parkinson’s producer snagged the boxer on a trip to a bottling factory for a “news interview.” In reality, Parkinson and a studio audience were eagerly waiting.
Muhammad Ali
Parkinson had three significant encounters with the greatest boxer of all time, the first of which took place in 1971. The interview, in which Ali reflected on his skill in front of the camera and in the ring, was organized before a time when publicists heavily policed celebrity talk show appearances. On hearing Ali was in the UK to promote a soft drink, Parkinson’s producer snagged the boxer on a trip to a bottling factory for a “news interview.” In reality, Parkinson and a studio audience were eagerly waiting.
- 8/17/2023
- by Jake Kanter
- Deadline Film + TV
The Word was a magazine-style entertainment show that ran from 1990 to 1995 on the UK’s Channel 4. It was helmed by Mancunian motormouth Terry Christian and a medley of once and future stars, including Amanda de Cadenet, Dani Behr, Katie Puckrik, and Mark Lamarr. The show was the brainchild of Charlie Parsons and Terry Christian, who were tasked with filling the hip, cultural hole left behind by the departure of music-oriented, youth-skewed shows like The Tube.
The Word began life in August 1990 as a tame, tea-time shadow of the fearlessly innovative show it would later become. What saved it from becoming a real-life version of Nozin’ Aroun’ – the spoof youth show so insufferably condescending it prompted Rik to destroy his TV set in the anarchic 1980’s BBC sitcom The Young Ones – was the decision by Channel 4’s Chief Executive Michael Grade to shift transmission from 6pm to late-night. Unmoored from pre-watershed restrictions,...
The Word began life in August 1990 as a tame, tea-time shadow of the fearlessly innovative show it would later become. What saved it from becoming a real-life version of Nozin’ Aroun’ – the spoof youth show so insufferably condescending it prompted Rik to destroy his TV set in the anarchic 1980’s BBC sitcom The Young Ones – was the decision by Channel 4’s Chief Executive Michael Grade to shift transmission from 6pm to late-night. Unmoored from pre-watershed restrictions,...
- 11/18/2022
- by Louisa Mellor
- Den of Geek
Back in the early 2000s, it seemed like Steve Coogan might kill off Alan Partridge. He’d spent a decade playing the hubristic Norwich broadcaster in TV and radio projects like On the Hour, The Day Today and Knowing Me Knowing You, culminating in a second series of BBC sitcom I’m Alan Partridge. The series had brought him two Baftas, but Coogan would later admit that there was a time he considered the character to be an “albatross” around his neck. But 20 years later – after numerous TV series, a feature film, a book deal, a podcast, and two live shows – the idea of Partridge simply disappearing in the early Noughties is impossible to imagine. The character has become Coogan’s life’s work. Far from an albatross, he’s become an inseparable part of Coogan’s identity – like Rod Hull and Emu, if Emu was surgically grafted onto Rod Hull’s face.
- 11/3/2022
- by Louis Chilton
- The Independent - TV
When you look back at what passed for kid’s TV in the UK back in the day, it’s a wonder we aren’t all in therapy. Oh sure, the 80s and 90s might have looked all innocent with its Art Attack and Pingu, but dig a little deeper and you’ll find some frankly harrowing children’s television output, quite literally the stuff of nightmares.
If you’re feeling brave, let’s take a quick nostalgia trip and revisit some of Britain’s most terrifying kids’ TV moments:
The Demon Headmaster
Even the theme tune to this BBC children’s TV classic was scary, with its ominous beat and whispering voices, but the reason The Demon Headmaster shook 90s kids to the core lies in Terrence Hardiman’s truly sinister performance as the headmaster himself. The deep menace to his voice was only intensified by his billowing black...
If you’re feeling brave, let’s take a quick nostalgia trip and revisit some of Britain’s most terrifying kids’ TV moments:
The Demon Headmaster
Even the theme tune to this BBC children’s TV classic was scary, with its ominous beat and whispering voices, but the reason The Demon Headmaster shook 90s kids to the core lies in Terrence Hardiman’s truly sinister performance as the headmaster himself. The deep menace to his voice was only intensified by his billowing black...
- 10/22/2022
- by Lauravickersgreen
- Den of Geek
This weekend sees the debut of a brand new Saturday night entertainment show with a twist - it has puppets!
To mark the launch of BBC One's That Puppet Game Show on Saturday night (August 10), Digital Spy compiles a list of just some of TV's greatest ever puppets.
Andy Pandy
One of the leading children's characters of the early 1950s, Andy Pandy's 26 episodes were shown continuously until 1970, when a new series was made. The sweet marionette and his friends Teddy and Looby Loo lived in a picnic basket, and chilled out to the dulcet tones of Maria Bird. A new stop-motion series returned in 2002.
Animal
One of the best-loved Muppets, Animal is a drummer for the band Dr Teeth and the Electric Mayhem. He's surely up there with Dave Grohl, John Bonham and Ringo Starr as also one of the best-loved drummers of all time. Despite having a limited vocabulary,...
To mark the launch of BBC One's That Puppet Game Show on Saturday night (August 10), Digital Spy compiles a list of just some of TV's greatest ever puppets.
Andy Pandy
One of the leading children's characters of the early 1950s, Andy Pandy's 26 episodes were shown continuously until 1970, when a new series was made. The sweet marionette and his friends Teddy and Looby Loo lived in a picnic basket, and chilled out to the dulcet tones of Maria Bird. A new stop-motion series returned in 2002.
Animal
One of the best-loved Muppets, Animal is a drummer for the band Dr Teeth and the Electric Mayhem. He's surely up there with Dave Grohl, John Bonham and Ringo Starr as also one of the best-loved drummers of all time. Despite having a limited vocabulary,...
- 8/9/2013
- Digital Spy
Eric Bristow has claimed that the late Rod Hull would often grope fans during his act. Bristow described the Emu puppeteer as a "pervert" and once threatened to punch him while appearing as a guest on the 1983 Bullseye Christmas special. "I didn't like Rod Hull. He was a pervert who was getting away with something that wasn't right," the darts player wrote in his autobiography The Crafty Cockney. "He used the puppet to feel up women and stick his hand between people's legs. It was out of order." He added: "We'd all had a drink, perhaps one or two more than we should. "I went straight up to Hull's face and said, 'Now listen, pal. When you come out on set later with that f**king silly (more)...
- 11/18/2012
- by By Tom Eames
- Digital Spy
Louisa Mellor Aug 1, 2016
With Steven Spielberg's The Bfg in cinemas, we look back at the 1989 Cosgrove Hall adaptation feat. David Jason…
On Christmas day 1989, ITV premiered the most charming child abduction story ever told: Cosgrove Hall’s animated adaptation of Roald Dahl’s The Bfg.
Directed by Brian Cosgrove, co-founder of the UK animation studio behind The Wind In The Willows, Danger Mouse, Count Duckula and a whole raft of the sort of kids’ TV that thirty-somethings still get excited about in pubs, The Bfg was, and is, a lovely thing.
Imaginative, funny, and just on the trippy side of weird, the film tells Roald Dahl’s story of orphan Sophie and the titular Big Friendly Giant’s scheme to stop bigger, much less-friendly giants from roaming the globe and gobbling up human beans. But before Cosgrove and co-producer Mark Hall could relay that tale, they had their own...
With Steven Spielberg's The Bfg in cinemas, we look back at the 1989 Cosgrove Hall adaptation feat. David Jason…
On Christmas day 1989, ITV premiered the most charming child abduction story ever told: Cosgrove Hall’s animated adaptation of Roald Dahl’s The Bfg.
Directed by Brian Cosgrove, co-founder of the UK animation studio behind The Wind In The Willows, Danger Mouse, Count Duckula and a whole raft of the sort of kids’ TV that thirty-somethings still get excited about in pubs, The Bfg was, and is, a lovely thing.
Imaginative, funny, and just on the trippy side of weird, the film tells Roald Dahl’s story of orphan Sophie and the titular Big Friendly Giant’s scheme to stop bigger, much less-friendly giants from roaming the globe and gobbling up human beans. But before Cosgrove and co-producer Mark Hall could relay that tale, they had their own...
- 9/12/2012
- Den of Geek
One of the great things about Doctor Who is that it always champions the underdog. The evil tyrants are never allowed to win the day (except on rare occasions) and so it's left to the Cordos, Vishinskys and Jagos to stroll off into the sunset with their heads held high.
Doctor Who even has its very own group of underdog stories – some of these fall into the underrated but brilliant strand like The Ambassadors Of Death, Image Of The Fendahl or Frontios. Then there are the tales that used to be slated but are getting reappraised by fans like The Horns Of Nimon or The Gunfighters. And then there are the tales that are seemingly beyond redemption like The Twin Dilemma, Time And The Rani and Timelash.
Ah, Timelash. Nobody seems to like it. Some clever soul found that if you rearrange the letters, they make up Lame Shit, which...
Doctor Who even has its very own group of underdog stories – some of these fall into the underrated but brilliant strand like The Ambassadors Of Death, Image Of The Fendahl or Frontios. Then there are the tales that used to be slated but are getting reappraised by fans like The Horns Of Nimon or The Gunfighters. And then there are the tales that are seemingly beyond redemption like The Twin Dilemma, Time And The Rani and Timelash.
Ah, Timelash. Nobody seems to like it. Some clever soul found that if you rearrange the letters, they make up Lame Shit, which...
- 2/21/2011
- Shadowlocked
Its a well rehearsed tradition by now. The interviewer pretends that they are speaking to the most fascinating film-star in the world and the film-star laps up the praise whilst plugging their latest film. Nothing is too personal and the enthusiasm is easily faked.
This is the standard rule for most dull and formulaic film interviews although occasionally we get the rare treat when things go a little off script. The following list highlights five occasions where egos, lack of research and just general idiocy turn a regular interview into a cringe-worthy piece of car crash television.
5.) Interviewer Mistakes John Cusack For Kevin Spacey
You’re a film student whose about to interview John Cusack. What should your first line be? A down to earth joke? A standard bit of banter about travel? Gush that it’s such an honour to meet your favourite actor (probably a lie but most...
This is the standard rule for most dull and formulaic film interviews although occasionally we get the rare treat when things go a little off script. The following list highlights five occasions where egos, lack of research and just general idiocy turn a regular interview into a cringe-worthy piece of car crash television.
5.) Interviewer Mistakes John Cusack For Kevin Spacey
You’re a film student whose about to interview John Cusack. What should your first line be? A down to earth joke? A standard bit of banter about travel? Gush that it’s such an honour to meet your favourite actor (probably a lie but most...
- 1/18/2011
- by Laurent Kelly
- Obsessed with Film
Yes, Tom has much to share with us about foreign conflicts. But Karl, aka 'Bush's brain', has some thoughts of his own . . .
Lost in Showbiz knows you only come here for the glamour – but hopefully stay for the hugs – so today we have Tom Hanks, Karl Rove, and a somewhat dysfunctional analogy between the war on terror and the Pacific theatre of operations in the second world war. I do hope you wore heels.
To summarise: this week, Tom Hanks mentioned the war, and Karl Rove – the Rod Hull to George Bush's Emu – didn't let him get away with it, and now they're having a media spat in which racism and Barbra Streisand are hot button issues.
And so to the extended version. You might know that Hanks, along with Mister Spielberg, has produced a new 10-part HBO miniseries called The Pacific, which is set during the...
Lost in Showbiz knows you only come here for the glamour – but hopefully stay for the hugs – so today we have Tom Hanks, Karl Rove, and a somewhat dysfunctional analogy between the war on terror and the Pacific theatre of operations in the second world war. I do hope you wore heels.
To summarise: this week, Tom Hanks mentioned the war, and Karl Rove – the Rod Hull to George Bush's Emu – didn't let him get away with it, and now they're having a media spat in which racism and Barbra Streisand are hot button issues.
And so to the extended version. You might know that Hanks, along with Mister Spielberg, has produced a new 10-part HBO miniseries called The Pacific, which is set during the...
- 3/18/2010
- by Marina Hyde
- The Guardian - Film News
With warts, green skin, a plump figure and an ear-bleeding cackle, Grotbags remains one of the scariest and most bizarre children's TV characters of all time. Played by Carol Lee Scott, who has sadly since retired from showbiz, Grotbags was created as a villain to play against the spindly but heroic Rod Hull and his pet puppet Emu. First seen on Emu's World in 1982, she was so popular that she went on to secure her own series in 1991. Grotbags's main activities consisted of scaring young kiddywinks and attempting to rob Hull (more)...
- 11/27/2009
- by By Alex Fletcher
- Digital Spy
IMDb.com, Inc. takes no responsibility for the content or accuracy of the above news articles, Tweets, or blog posts. This content is published for the entertainment of our users only. The news articles, Tweets, and blog posts do not represent IMDb's opinions nor can we guarantee that the reporting therein is completely factual. Please visit the source responsible for the item in question to report any concerns you may have regarding content or accuracy.