Cilla’s surgeon fixed my hated hooter
CILLA BLACK and I hit it off straight away when she came to Radio Trent to promote a tour in 1978. We chatted about her career, then I told her: ‘Cilla, we have something in common.’
I meant we were both Geminis, but Cilla studied my face closely and exclaimed: ‘Yes! We’ve both had nose jobs done by Percy Jay.’
It was true. I inherited my hooter from my dad’s family, the Winners, and it was just too big. A year before she died, Mum took me to Harley Street to meet Dr Jay, who had done her own cosmetic work in 1962.
He took one look and said: ‘Oh yes! We can certainly improve on this.’ But when I went in for surgery, I was terrified he might take off too much and I’d come out with a little snub nose. I pinned pictures on my pyjama jacket of stars whose noses I admired: Dirk Bogarde, Paul Newman and Sean Connery.
Dr Jay must have seen me lying on his operating table festooned in photos and thought: ‘I’m a surgeon, not a magician!’
After the op, my friend Lawrence and I went to Majorca on holiday and rented scooters. There was no legislation about crash helmets and little to ensure the bikes were safe.
The throttle on mine jammed and I couldn’t stop it. Dr Jay’s handiwork was about to hurtle into a concrete wall. With one hand on the throttle, I protected my face with the other.
‘If I’m going to be smashed to bits,’ I thought, ‘at least they’ll know the nose was sensational.’
When I finally managed to stop the bike I left it at the roadside — and got a cab back.