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He may have hosted a series called The Late Clive James back in the late 1980s, but sadly, it irony of its title is now true - Clive James is indeed the late Clive James for real, for he has passed away at the age of 80. Just a few weeks after we lost Gay Byrne, famous for his Late, Late Show, ironically enough.
Australian born James was diagnosed with leukaemia a few years ago, I was very surprised that he lived for a few years after his diagnosis but he carried on for a long while afterwards - he came to Great Britain from Australia and became the TV critic for the Observer newspaper in the 1970s, and as he started to do more TV himself, by 1982 he decided to abandon his Sunday newspaper column as he felt that he would be in danger of reviewing his own programmes.
He made his niche as a writer and broadcaster in Great Britain, being the first presenter of the Sunday night "10.00 pm Spitting Image-slot" ...On TV series in which Keith Floyd and Chris Tarrant took over when he left in 1988 - his main legacy was probably introducing Japanese clips into the programme, as well as the game show Endurance which was late seen on the game show channel Challenge. He was just as much a big star at LWT in the 1980s as Bruce Forsyth, Cannon and Ball and Michael Aspel. Watching Clive James on TV was one of the many excuses I had for being late for school on Monday, and there is some irony there as well considering that I had recently bumped up the That's Life! thread a few hours ago.
Clive James stayed at LWT until the start of 1988 where he moved to BBC 2 and made some series for that channel. Needless to say, that he also presented The Late Clive James as well - a title which feels more than ironic now considering the news of his demise - indeed, someone did write to a newspaper on receipt of his new programme title wondering whether James had passed away even back then, taking the title too literally. They were assured that he was still alive at that point. Nevertheless, he continued to be on British TV screens - his Australian accent was often mimicked by impressionists such as Rory Bremner.
Clive James was often also both the first and last person seen on BBC 1 in each calendar year for he presented many of the New Year specials for the channel while Hogmanay celebrations were going on in Scotland, until Angus Deayton took over in the years before 2000 Today beckoned at the end of the last millennium.
I saw him interviewed for BBC Breakfast around three or four years ago, and he was looked in a sorry state, but thankfully, his trademark Australian accent was intact - something that he didn't lose after all these years residing in Great Britain. I was amazed that he soldiered on for a few years after that, but sadly, as we know, the soldering has now ended.
I have to admit that there have been so many celebrity deaths which have come in during the last 24 hours or so, and I think that I now know which ones will feature on Friday's edition of BBC Radio 4's Last Word - they do deserve their own threads of course, but I will also briefly mention Gary Rhodes' and Sir Jonathan Miller's passing as well.
Such a sad day for so many people who are obviously familiar to us to leave us.
Australian born James was diagnosed with leukaemia a few years ago, I was very surprised that he lived for a few years after his diagnosis but he carried on for a long while afterwards - he came to Great Britain from Australia and became the TV critic for the Observer newspaper in the 1970s, and as he started to do more TV himself, by 1982 he decided to abandon his Sunday newspaper column as he felt that he would be in danger of reviewing his own programmes.
He made his niche as a writer and broadcaster in Great Britain, being the first presenter of the Sunday night "10.00 pm Spitting Image-slot" ...On TV series in which Keith Floyd and Chris Tarrant took over when he left in 1988 - his main legacy was probably introducing Japanese clips into the programme, as well as the game show Endurance which was late seen on the game show channel Challenge. He was just as much a big star at LWT in the 1980s as Bruce Forsyth, Cannon and Ball and Michael Aspel. Watching Clive James on TV was one of the many excuses I had for being late for school on Monday, and there is some irony there as well considering that I had recently bumped up the That's Life! thread a few hours ago.
Clive James stayed at LWT until the start of 1988 where he moved to BBC 2 and made some series for that channel. Needless to say, that he also presented The Late Clive James as well - a title which feels more than ironic now considering the news of his demise - indeed, someone did write to a newspaper on receipt of his new programme title wondering whether James had passed away even back then, taking the title too literally. They were assured that he was still alive at that point. Nevertheless, he continued to be on British TV screens - his Australian accent was often mimicked by impressionists such as Rory Bremner.
Clive James was often also both the first and last person seen on BBC 1 in each calendar year for he presented many of the New Year specials for the channel while Hogmanay celebrations were going on in Scotland, until Angus Deayton took over in the years before 2000 Today beckoned at the end of the last millennium.
I saw him interviewed for BBC Breakfast around three or four years ago, and he was looked in a sorry state, but thankfully, his trademark Australian accent was intact - something that he didn't lose after all these years residing in Great Britain. I was amazed that he soldiered on for a few years after that, but sadly, as we know, the soldering has now ended.
I have to admit that there have been so many celebrity deaths which have come in during the last 24 hours or so, and I think that I now know which ones will feature on Friday's edition of BBC Radio 4's Last Word - they do deserve their own threads of course, but I will also briefly mention Gary Rhodes' and Sir Jonathan Miller's passing as well.
Such a sad day for so many people who are obviously familiar to us to leave us.
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