I was sacked, suicidal and in deep despair, until a change of drug saved my life
result was I didn’t get asked to do TV regularly after that.”
The following year, Rochdaleborn Bill made two suicide attempts. “I was twice admitted to hospital in 2009 and stayed for a couple of months. I was diagnosed with bipolar disorder,” he says.
Bill believes he inherited his depression from his late mother Lillian who spent most of her life, and his, in a mental asylum.
He says: “There’s no question my depression was inherited from my mother. She was in a shocking way and I hardly knew her because she was in a mental asylum.”
Bill’s depression has been tough for his second wife, Laura Beaumont. The couple have a grown-up daughter Rosie together and Bill has two daughters from his first marriage.
He says: “I know there’s a bad mood upon me if I don’t want to go for a walk on Hampstead Heath.
“In other words my enthusiasm goes, which is not a bad description of what happens when you get into a depression.
“It’s been hard on Laura because when I’ve been in a depressed mood, I stay in bed.
“The last time I had a depressive episode was two Christmases ago and I was in bed for a week.”
It’s 50 years since Bill first came to fame in iconic TV series The Goodies, yet he says he still gets stopped in the street: “I do get recognised less and less because I haven’t been on television much for a long, long time.
“But the other day a group of teenage schoolboys were walking past and I could feel they were staring at me and muttering to one another. One of them came over and said, ‘Here mate, did you used to be Bill Oddie?’ and I replied, ‘Yeah I still am actually’.
“I think the younger generation have watched The Goodies because their dad has told them it’s funny.”
Despite reports he never saw eye-to-eye with Springwatch cohost Kate Humble, Bill insists they had many laughs together.
He says: “It was quite funny that the public decided there must be something bad between there was no one funnier.
“There were plenty of moments where we got the giggles and neither of us could speak because we were laughing so much.
“And there were times when she said she could have cheerfully murdered me. But I don’t blame her at all – I did interrupt her a lot!”
Bill says he keeps in touch with Chris Packham, who replaced him on the show, and insists there are no hard feelings.
Bill did appear in the BBC reality series, The Real Marigold Hotel in 2017, where he travelled to India and nearly died after accidentally swallowing a bottle of turpentine. He thought a waiter had bought us, but him water, but it was brush-cleaner for his paint brushes.
Now he says he would never do any other reality show. He has turned down I’m A Celebrity, because when he was offered it they were still eating live bugs.
He says: “I have to say – and this echoes what Chris Packham has said – I won’t go on a show and start eating live insects, which I regard as wildlife.”
“I was asked to go on Strictly a couple of years ago.
“My middle daughter is a choreographer and I asked, ‘Bonnie, do you think I should do this?’ and she replied, ‘It will kill you.’
“But I was never going to be another Ann Widdecombe. I don’t want to be the token comedy part.
“And don’t even mention Celeb Big Brother. I was like, ‘Over my dead body!’”
APASSIONATE conservationist, Bill reveals how he jumped at the chance when Channel 5 asked him to be part of Wild Animal Rescue.
The show sees him and other presenters, including Steve Backshall, meet people who spend their lives caring for the animals in Northumberland’s Kielder Forest.
He says: “I haven’t had a regular gig for years, the format is different and they’ve got four different presenters, including me.
“But it’s a nice background to be in the woods and I know it’s going to engage viewers.”
Bill has come a long way since he studied English at Cambridge University in the 1960s and was a member of the Footlights alongside Tim Brooke-Taylor, Graham Chapman and John Cleese.
This year marks the 50th anniversary of The Goodies and Bill laments the fact the trio are no longer together.
“I don’t see Graeme (Garden) and Tim (Brooke-Taylor) that much. Geography keeps us apart.
“But we’re reuniting at a comedy festival in Bristol this year to talk about 50 years of The Goodies.”
He continues: “I’m at the age now where a friend or relative croaks it every week and you look at the paper and think, ‘Oh God he is two years younger than me’.
“I don’t want to go. It’s as simple as that – because I do enjoy life.
“I’m not a very outgoing person, but I enjoy having a chat like this and being in the entertainment industry is really not that bad.”