Television presenter
Born: February 22, 1928
Died: August 18, 2017
SIR Bruce Forsyth, who has died aged 89, was the ultimate showbusiness professional. He first appeared on a television talent show at 11 and began touring at 14, as Boy Bruce – The Mighty Atom, tap-dancing, playing ukulele and displaying feats of strength. He spent years in music halls, theatres and circuses and was in his early thirties when he got his first real break in TV.
Over the next half-century he became one of the most familiar faces on the small screen, presenting a string of game shows, including The Generation Game. But he was old-school and became considered sexist in a 21st-century society where it was no longer acceptable to refer to women as “dollies” or invite them to “give us a twirl” to show off their figure and latest dress.
Forsyth had his share of setbacks – few remember his sitcom Slinger’s Day (1986-87) or his attempt to conquer American television. But he always seemed to bounce back.
His star had dipped by the time he was asked to do a one-off stint as host of Have I Got News for You? in 2003. It revived his career and the following year he began his long stint as host of Strictly Come Dancing, perhaps the most famous of all his shows.
In 2012 he earned a place in the Guinness Book of World Records for the longest career of any male television entertainer – 72 years.
He was born Bruce Joseph Johnson in Enfield in north London in 1928. His father owned a garage. One of his forebears was William Forsyth, the 18th-century Scottish botanist, who gave his name to the genus Forsythia.
Other children went to the cinema and fantasised about being John Wayne but Forsyth’s hero was Fred Astaire. He said: “As soon as I got home from school, I’d take the carpet up because there was lino underneath, and I’d tap away.”
He started taking dance lessons when he was eight. “I started going to a teacher in Brixton, a journey of two-and-a-half hours each way,” he said. “My mother would take me. They couldn’t really afford the lessons either. We weren’t well-off. But they were so encouraging.”
He appeared on a BBC show called Come and Be Televised at 11, before launching his full-time professional career at 14. He was to spend most of the next 16 years trailing up and down the country, singing, dancing and joking, a period that was interrupted only by national service in the RAF.
It was a long apprenticeship that was to stand him in good stead when his television career did eventually take off after he became compere on the ITV variety show Sunday Night at the London Palladium, which he did from 1958 until 1964. It made him a star.
He played Julie Andrews’s father in the big-budget film musical Star! (1968) and appeared in Disney’s Bedknobs and Broomsticks (1971) and The Magnificent Seven Deadly Sins (1971). But his future lay back in television and specifically in game shows.
As part of the mix, Sunday Night at the London Palladium had featured a popular game show element called Beat the Clock, which may have helped inspire a Dutch team to develop a full-length programme with the feel of a party game. The format was picked up by the BBC in 1971, with the title The Generation Game and Forsyth as host.
The Generation Game helped refine his image as he alternately encouraged and goaded the contestants, while sharing his faux exasperation with the audience. He also introduced several catchphrases, including “Nice to see you, to see you…”, with the audience responding “Nice!”, “Didn’t they do well”, and “Give us a twirl”, directed to hostess Anthea Redfern. She became his second wife in 1973, though like his first marriage that union ended in divorce.
He switched to ITV in 1978 to present Bruce Forsyth’s Big Night, while The Generation Game continued in direct competition, with Larry Grayson as host, and won bigger audiences.
Forsyth returned to game shows with Play Your Cards Right in 1980, which ran on and off until 2003, the year in which he appeared on Have I Got News for You? There were various other hits, revivals and flops along the way.
He was a surprise choice to host Have I Got News for You? The show was topical, satirical, a little dangerous and often cruel. Forsyth was cosy, cheesy and seemed to belong to another age. Paul Merton revealed in an interview some years later that his fellow panellist Ian Hislop was very unhappy at Forsyth’s invitation on to the show. But it was a triumph for Forsyth.
Forsyth was no comic genius. He did not create any memorable characters, other than himself. Perhaps his greatest talent was to sense how he was coming across and to engage with his audience. He was slick, and when he was not slick that became part of the joke.
Latterly there was perhaps a fine line between laughing with him and laughing at him, but it was a line he skipped along with the confidence of a trained dancer.
Strictly Come Dancing was a celebrity version of the earlier show Come Dancing. That show and the very notion of ballroom dancing seemed part of another age and so Forsyth seemed a logical host. It became one of the most popular prime-time Saturday night shows of recent times, cementing Forsyth’s place in the hearts of the nation, or at least a large section of it.
He won numerous awards and was knighted in 2011. He is survived by his third wife Wilnelia Merced, from Puerto Rico. She was Miss World in 1975 and they met when they were judges for the 1980 event.
He is also survived by six children from the three marriages.
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