EXCLUSIVE
He was once the BBC’S most toxic radio star, but that didn’t stop
from boasting that he was Radio 2’s first choice to replace on the popular breakfast programme.
The 57-year-old TV presenter told the audience of his ITV chat show how he turned down the position insisting he was “too old” and “rich” to do early mornings.
He quipped: “They asked me and I said, ‘No. I can’t do early mornings at my age because I’m lazy and rich’.”
Ross’ agent insists he wasn’t offered the job – which has been earmarked for a woman, with Zoe Ball, 47, and Sarah Cox, 43, in the frame. And the Beeb was quick to insist it hadn’t offered such a thing to its former arch-nemisis.
A source tells me: “The BBC did not approach Jonathan Ross about presenting the Breakfast Show. The new presenter of the Radio 2 Breakfast Show will be announced in due course.” Such a vehement denial STORY and Chris suggests there is no love lost between Ross and the Beeb. Maybe that’s because Wossy left his €18million contract with the organisation in 2010 where he had been hosting a Radio 2 Saturday show, a Friday night chat show and a film review show.
His card was marked even though he escaped being sacked over the abusive messages that he and Russell Brand left on the answerphone of the Fawlty Towers actor Andrew Sachs.
Recently, Wossy has been filling in for different slots on BBC Radio 2. If the Beeb had signed him up permanently, I’m sure Andrew Sachs’s family would have something to say about it...