Jamie Theakston

Jamie Theakston
Born Jamie Barker Theakston
(1970-12-21) 21 December 1970
Cuckfield, Sussex, England
Occupation Presenter, producer, actor
Spouse(s) Sophie Siegle (m. 2007)
Children 2
Website Official website

Jamie Barker Theakston (born 21 December 1970)[1] is an English television presenter, producer, and actor. He is best known for hosting Top of the Pops, co-hosting the breakfast show with Emma Bunton on Heart FM and also for narrating the BBC documentary series Traffic Cops and Motorway Cops. He has also hosted several television programmes for the BBC, ITV and Channel 4.

Education

Born in Cuckfield, Sussex, Theakston was educated at two independent schools: the preparatory school of Hurstpierpoint College near the village of Hurstpierpoint in West Sussex,[2] followed by Lancing College in the village of Lancing,[3] and Brighton Hove & Sussex Sixth Form College in Hove. He joined the National Youth Theatre at the age of 13[1] where he appeared in plays including Murder in the Cathedral and Marat/Sade alongside contemporaries such as Daniel Craig, but was put off from pursuing a full-time acting career by the financial hardships that he encountered.[4] After leaving college with nine O-Levels and one GCSE in Maths, he joined the North London Polytechnic,[5] from which he graduated with a first class degree in business studies.[1] Whilst at university, he read traffic bulletins on BBC GLR as he wanted to get into sports reporting.[5][6]

Life and career

Radio

Before embarking on a broadcasting career, he worked for auctioneers Christie's, and was going to study art history at the Courtauld Institute.[6] After undertaking football and cricket reports for both GLR and Radio 5 Live, he was spotted by the BBC's head of sport and presented GLR's Saturday Sport Show at the age of 23.[6] He then presented numerous shows for Radio 5 Live including Sportscall, The Jamie Theakston Cricket Show and Sport on Wednesday. Theakston joined Radio 1 in April 1999 to present the Sunday Lunch show. He fronted the 'One Big Sunday' events during 2000. He moved to a Saturday morning slot in 2001.

He left Radio 1 in 2002 to pursue an acting career, his last show being broadcast on 28 September. He joined Heart 106.2, a London radio station in May 2005, replacing Jonathan Coleman on Heart Breakfast with Harriet Scott, which won Gold for Best Music Personality Show at the New York Festivals, 2007 and the Silver Entertainment Award at the Sony Radio Academy Awards, 2007. In June 2009 he (along with Scott) won the Radio Presenter of the Year award at the Arqiva Commercial Radio Awards.[7] In 2013 Harriet Scott Left Heart Breakfast and was replaced by Spice Girl Emma Bunton who already has a show on the Heart network.

Television

On television, after presenting The O Zone with Jayne Middlemiss,[6] he has most notably hosted Top of the Pops (1998–2003), Live & Kicking (1996–1999) and The Priory. The latter two shows he co-presented alongside Zoë Ball. Other presenting work includes fronting the Glastonbury Festival coverage for the BBC, the Oscars, the Grammys, A Question of Pop, UK Music Hall of Fame and Guinness World Records.

He hosted the Channel 4 reality TV show The Games alongside Kirsty Gallacher. He was also the host of a 2004 game show, Beg Borrow or Steal. He presented the ITV Saturday night show With A Little Help From My Friends. He also appeared in a 2004 episode of the ITV series Agatha Christie's Marple.

Theakston also played himself in the mock-interview series Rock Profile in which he interviews "celebrities" impersonated by Matt Lucas and David Walliams. The programme was shown on the now defunct channel UK Play. He also appeared alongside Walliams in an episode of Little Britain.

The Priory was commissioned by Chris Evans's then production company Ginger Productions. Despite initially strong ratings, the show failed to capitalise on the demise of TFI Friday (also a Ginger production), and figures slowly dropped; a fourth series was never commissioned.

More recently Theakston has hosted the prime-time Saturday night show The People's Quiz and produced and presented on Channel 4's The Search, which was nominated for a Rose d'Or award at the International Television Festival.

He played himself in the episode "Video Killed the Radio Star" in the TV series FM in March 2009.

Theakston featured beside Zoë Ball once again in Channel 5's Britain's Best Brain series, which aired in October 2009.

Theakston has narrated all episodes of Traffic Cops and its spin-off show Motorway Cops.

In July and August 2013, Theakston along with Emma Bunton presented ITV's This Morning Summer on Friday mornings. Since 2015, he has narrated episodes of Caught on Camera for ITV. In 2016, he presented Dogs Might Fly for Sky1.

Acting

Theakston has acted with Amanda Holden in Mad About Alice (2004) and worked with Adam Faith on the series Murder in Mind in 2003, shortly before Faith's death. He has also starred in the West End in the plays 'Art' and Home and Beauty at the Lyric Theatre, Shaftesbury Avenue. In 2004 he appeared in Agatha Christie's Miss Marple: Body in the Library.

Personal life

Theakston lived for about ten years in Wings Place, a Tudor mansion in Ditchling, East Sussex.[8] Theakston married Sophie Siegle in Ditchling on 15 September 2007, and they live in west London.[9] The couple have two sons – Sidney, born 11 April 2008, and Kit, born 29 September 2009.[10]

He is a keen fencer and competed for Sussex in 1985.[11]

As captain of Ditchling Cricket Club,[12] Theakston was a member of the first cricket team from England to play the Afghan cricket team in Kabul.[13]

Theakston is a member of Mensa[14][15] and a supporter of Brighton & Hove Albion.

He once shared a flat with EastEnders actor Adam Woodyatt.

In 2002, Theakston was the subject of a Daily Mail article titled "The shaming of Jamie" which detailed his admission to visiting a brothel where he was allegedly blackmailed by a sex worker.[16]

Charity

In 2003 he took a break to travel to Uganda to meet with former child soldiers. Theakston is a patron for CANCERVIVE – a charity established to address the needs of anyone whose family or friends are cancer sufferers.

He played in his fifth successive Soccer Aid match at Old Trafford in June 2014.[17] Having, in 2010, saved four penalties for England against the Rest of the World in a penalty shoot-out, before missing a penalty himself in a defeat, he was later named man of the match for his performance in goal.[18]

Performance credits

West End theatre
Play Venue Year
Marat/Sade Playhouse
Murder in the Cathedral Spitalfields
'Art' Whitehall
Home and Beauty Lyric

Filmography

Television
Year Programme Channel
Drive BBC One
Afternoon Plays BBC One
Taggart ITV
1999–2000 Rock Profile BBC Two
2000 Bob Martin ITV
2001 Linda Green ITV
2003 Murder in Mind BBC One
2004 Mad About Alice BBC One
2004 Little Britain BBC Three
2004 Agatha Christie's Marple ("The Body in the Library") ITV
2009 FM ITV2
2013 This Morning Summer ITV
2015— Caught on Camera ITV
2016 Dogs Might Fly Sky1

Television presenting

Radio

References

  1. 1 2 3 British Broadcasting Corporation (1 November 2003). "Patrick Kielty, Almost Live – Guest profile". BBC. Archived from the original on 24 January 2005. Retrieved 15 January 2013.
  2. Caroline Grant (3 January 2009). "New Year reveller, 16, killed after fall on high-voltage railway line". Dailymail.co.uk. Retrieved 30 August 2013.
  3. "OL Successes and Stories". Lancing College. Retrieved 30 August 2013.
  4. "It's a stage they've all been through". Telegraph. Retrieved 14 January 2013.
  5. 1 2 "Jamie Theakston". BBC. Retrieved 15 January 2013.
  6. 1 2 3 4 Morris, Sophie (19 December 2005). "Jamie Theakston: My Life In Media". The Independent (London).
  7. John Plunkett (8 June 2009). "Jamie Theakston and Harriet Scott win commercial radio presenter award | Media | guardian.co.uk". Guardian. Retrieved 15 January 2013.
  8. "Jamie Theakston to sell his beautiful Sussex home". The Telegraph. 14 May 2014. Retrieved 27 August 2015.
  9. "Exterior | Jamie Theakston's quirky London home | housetohome.co.uk". Livingetc.com. 13 June 2011. Retrieved 4 June 2012.
  10. "Jamie Theakston becomes a dad for the second time". Dailymail.co.uk. 30 September 2009. Retrieved 15 January 2013.
  11. "Jamie Theakston Quick Q&A". Xfm. 2 December 2008. Retrieved 15 January 2013.
  12. "Village cricketers lose in Kabul". BBC News. 1 May 2009. Retrieved 14 January 2013.
  13. Boone, Jon (1 May 2009). "Afghans beat English side as village cricket comes to Kabul". The Guardian (London).
  14. Jones, Douglas (13 February 2012). "IQ of Famous People | Famous IQ Scores | Famous IQ's". Kids-iq-tests.com. Retrieved 4 June 2012.
  15. "The search for intelligent life – This Britain – UK". The Independent. 2 June 2004. Retrieved 14 January 2013.
  16. Mapstone, Lucy. "Soccer Aid 2012: MSN speaks to the stars raising money for UNICEF". Celebrity.uk.msn.com. Retrieved 15 January 2013.
  17. "Jamie's natural ability in front of an audience and vast presenting experience make him the perfect host or after-dinner speaker". Highperformanceuk.com. Retrieved 15 January 2013.

External links

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