King of the gameshows who waltzed into the sunset
A born entertainer, Sir Bruce had the nation glued to their TV screens whether he was hamming it up on the Generation Game or compering Strictly
IT WAS a measure of his greatness that Sir Bruce Forsyth was one of the few stars of television who was instantly recognised by his silhouette – the iconic strongman fist-to-the-head pose. It was a much-loved trademark that endured for decades and a career that spanned 77 years, which earned him a certificate from the Guinness World Records as the man with the longest TV career.
Many entertainers had a catchphrase that captured the public’s imagination but Brucie had a whole library of them and no one has ever matched the Forsyth talent for creating memorable TV moments that had families glued to their sets. When he first presented Sunday Night At The London Palladium the pubs emptied just before the show aired at 9pm and publicans began a campaign to have it start an hour later.
That was the magic of Bruce Joseph Forsyth. He was Mr Showbusiness from top to toe – as he told one interviewer: “I just love making people happy. It’s what I was put on the earth to do and I’m so privileged that I can put a smile on so many faces. It’s not a job, it’s a pleasure.”
Bruce was born in Edmonton, north London, on February 22, 1928, where his father owned a garage. His parents belonged to the Salvation Army and sang and played music at home. Their son had natural rhythm as well as a famous surname – he was a direct descendant of William Forsyth, a founder of the Royal Horticultural Society, whose name was given to the plant forsythia.
AT THE age of eight he was found tap-dancing on the flat roof of his home after watching his first Fred Astaire film. “As soon as I got home from school,” he once recalled, “I’d take up the carpet – because there was lino underneath – and start tapping away.” It was obvious to his parents where Bruce’s career lay.
He first appeared on BBC TV in 1939 as an all-singing, all-dancing 11-year-old and made his stage debut at 14 as Boy Bruce, the Mighty Atom, appearing bottom of the bill at the Theatre Royal, Bilston near Wolverhampton.
Bruce had the perfect motivation to become top of the bill: “I wanted to be famous and buy my mum a fur coat,” he said years later. Despite his talents as comedian, singer and dancer he was no overnight success. For the next 16 years he performed in church halls and theatres, sleeping in train luggage racks and always waiting for the big break.
It came in 1958 when he had been out of work for three months and was seriously considering giving up. Forsyth was asked to present ITV’s new show Sunday Night At The London Palladium. His original booking was for two weeks but he stayed for five years, drawing in over 10 million viewers a week at a time when fewer homes had a TV set and becoming Britain’s highest-paid entertainer, earning £1,000 a week. Today that would be worth £18,700.
The strain of topping the bill in variety shows around the country and doing his high-pressure Sunday night compere role took its toll on his private life. He divorced his first wife Penny Calvert, a dancer he had met in the theatre, and she later wrote an account of her husband’s perpetual absence called Darling, Your Dinner’s In The Dustbin.
One of the most popular elements of the Palladium show was Beat The Clock, where contestants from the audience completed daft tasks, egged on by a frantic Bruce, as a giant clock ticked down.
It was a foretaste of the brilliant career that lay ahead as host of some of the most popular TV gameshows ever. For six years from 1971, and again at the beginning of the 1990s, he was the king of the BBC’s Generation Game, attracting more than 20 million Saturday night viewers. Bruce loved every frenetic second of the show and a highlight was the way he enthused over mundane prizes on the conveyor belt. He always seemed to be having more fun than the competitors.
Every week Bruce’s co-host on the show Anthea Redfern was encouraged to “give us a twirl” and the couple married in 1973 but divorced six years later. It was on The Generation Game that he introduced his famous “thinker” pose, appearing in silhouette at the beginning of each show. The idea came from the classic circus strongman pose.
He switched channels back to ITV and repeated his huge success on Play Your Cards Right where the audience joined in the cries of “higher” or “lower” as contestants tried to guess the value of a series of playing cards. In 1995, a year after his final Generation Game appearance, he received a lifetime achievement award for variety at the British Comedy Awards and began hosting ITV’s The Price Is Right.
By this time he was a RollsRoyce-driving multi-millionaire, had been married since 1983 to Wilnelia Merced, a former Miss World, and was a father-of-six, with five daughters from his first two marriages and one son from his marriage to Wilnelia, which lasted till he died.
Play Your Cards Right was axed in 1999 and, as public tastes in entertainment changed, his TV career hit a downturn. He returned to the theatre but then he experienced an unexpected revival after his wife watched an edition of the satirical quiz Have I Got News For You and suggested he could present the programme.
Bruce boldly called show regular Paul Merton, met the producers and eventually got the one-off job. He offered to be “a little bit deadpan” but the production team said: “No, be Bruce Forsyth.”
Bruce used the occasion to parody some of his old game shows, much to the ill-disguised disgust of team captain Ian Hislop, and the appearance led to Forsyth being offered the job of hosting Strictly Come Dancing, which began a year later.
The celebrity dance show was viewed with scepticism when it launched but became one of the most-watched programmes on TV by the time it reached its fifth series in 2007.
He brought his own brand of avuncular good humour to the
proceedings – reassuring many of the contestants with the phrase, “You’re my favourites”. Daily Express columnist Ann Widdecombe, a former contestant, said: “His particular character and personality went a long way to making the show what it is.”
But in an interview Forsyth revealed Strictly “was never the show that I thought it would be. I thought it would be a comedy show – me getting among the contestants and showing them how to dance and them all falling over.”
After missing a handful of episodes because of illness he decided to step down from the rigours of presenting Strictly, aged 86, in 2014. “But I’m not retiring,” he insisted. “That is the last thing in the world I want to do. This isn’t Brucie walking into the sunset.” He continued to host the Christmas and charity editions of Strictly – all of which were taped, as opposed to live broadcasts.
Away from showbiz, Forsyth’s biggest passion was golf and he took part in many pro-celebrity tournaments.
His house was next to the course at Wentworth where he played with many of the world’s best players, practising his recovery shots in the bunker in his own back garden.
Forsyth was knighted in 2011 after years of campaigning by his fans and a parliamentary Early Day Motion signed by 73 MPs. It was a well-deserved recognition of his journey from musical hall to TV star although in many ways his act never changed over the years – the same old corny jokes, the same toothy grin and the same manic enthusiasm.
“On stage I think I’m 35,” he once said. “Working takes over my whole body and I become a younger man. That’s why I won’t stop.”
Thank goodness he didn’t until the final curtain fell on a glittering career that can never be equalled. In his last televised interview two years ago he said: “Whoever leaves a show at the top? Well, I did.”