Paul O'Grady

Desert Island Discs

BBC

Society & Culture, Music Commentary, Music, Personal Journals

4.4 • 13.7K Ratings

🗓️ 28 December 2003

⏱️ 34 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Sue Lawley's castaway is the entertainer Paul O'Grady. Best known as the 'Blonde Bombshell', Lily Savage, he's one of the most popular figures on television with his outrageous clothes and wigs. Originally from Tranmere in Birkenhead, Paul worked as a social worker for Camden Council as well as working part time in pubs around London in the 1980s. His talent as a drag artist was discovered at the Royal Vauxhall Tavern in South London after he stood in for the compere who'd rung in sick.

He got his first big break on Channel 4's Big Breakfast replacing Paula Yates in 1995. Since then he's hosted Blankety Blank and his own Lily Savage Show as well as the sitcom Eyes Down, set in a bingo hall in Liverpool. He'll also be following in the footsteps of Bruce Forsyth, Larry Grayson and Jim Davidson by fronting a new series of the show the Generation Game. Paul's recently scaled down work commitments after suffering a heart attack last April. He was given angioplasty and has made a full recovery but he now says he's taking life easier and cutting down on drink and cigarettes.

[Taken from the original programme material for this archive edition of Desert Island Discs]

Favourite track: Meditation from Thais. Act 11 by Jules Massenet Book: The Borrowers by Mary Norton Luxury: Skin so Soft - Avon

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hello I'm Krestey Young and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive.
0:05.0	For rights reasons, we've had to shorten the music.
0:08.0	The program was originally broadcast in 2003, and the presenter was Sue Lawley. My castaway this week is a comedian he made his name with a highly original comic creation, a
0:34.6	Liverpool tart with a platinum hairdo and a fondness for drink and drugs. He developed this act in pubs and clubs,
0:41.0	took it to the Edinburgh Festival and then started getting his own
0:44.0	shows on television. These days he's stepping out of drag more and more and has recently
0:48.8	starred in a sitcom for the BBC as a bad-tempered bingo caller. But the
0:53.2	scouse lag with the acerbic tongue remains his tour de force. She
0:57.2	even became BBC personality of the year a few years ago. I think people thought
1:01.6	I was a one-trick pony he says they thought
1:03.9	Lily would soon wither and die but she didn't yes he's the man behind the makeup and
1:08.6	the miniskirt of Lily Savage Paul O'Grady she Grady. She is, I mean, an extraordinary creation, Paul. I mean, not least because, you know, before her all drag acts were kind of slinky like Shirley Bathy, weren't they?
1:21.0	They're also matronly and sexless. We had
1:23.7	hinge and brachts who were fantastic, but they were two very nice matrons.
1:27.3	Dame Edna was a matron. And the Les Dawson winning and the... That's right.
1:31.6	Nobody was ever sexual. You know know there was never a drac and
1:34.4	Lily was she was unassamed yes and that she did she turn tricks for money and
1:38.7	all that business but I presume that's not least because of the nature of your physique. I mean you could hardly be a kind of lumpy,
1:46.8	strange bosomed matron. You couldn't do an Einicharpals act. Not really, no, so you bung it all on me and people will say, oh, you've got fabulous legs.
1:54.2	I've got really, I want Will Carling's legs.
1:58.1	I've got these, my mother's side legs, like two woodbines hanging out the pakis.
2:02.0	I've got these two skinny legs so
	...

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