Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
I’m a tubby 55yr-old in a showbiz world full of beautiful girls. My ideal man? Someone breathing!
Father Ray to sing for sister ‘up in heaven’ Acts through to Sunday’s final...
then, some men gave her the cold shoulder. She says: “I’d be at a Magic Circle meeting and would go to see men showing their latest trick. Often they’d stop until I left.”
It made Mandy determined, and she put the hours in to ensure her magic, and jokes, were as good as they could be.
One man who showed kindness was the late Paul Daniels. She says: “Paul was incredibly generous in my early career.
“I bought an illusion which I couldn’t do and he spent time showing me how to perfect it. What a lovely thing to do – and a lovely man.”
Mandy has been single for more than 10 years, but that gave her plenty of material to co-write a play with friend, actress Claire Sweeney, called Sex and the Suburbs, based on her hilarious dating experithere ences. Mandy says: “At the time, I spent a lot of time watching Sex and the City and seeing incredibly glamorous women dating gorgeous, rich men. “Things weren’t quite the same. Men would turn up on dates in a beaten up Fiat Panda and didn’t even have the money to offer you a drink. No one tottered around in Louboutins. It was seriously unglamorous. “I remember one really lovely man agreed to come to my flat for dinner, and my West Indian friend showed me how to make a Jamaican curry, which was delicious.
“Only it wasn’t delicious when I made it. It was so awful my date was sick, then he pretended he wasn’t sick. But when I asked if he wanted any more, he said, ‘Oh, NO’.”
So she is still hoping – and perhaps BGT will improve her love life. She says: “Maybe David Walliams and I can hook up – we both like comedy. Failing that, I’d just like someone who is breathing.”
Mandy’s on-stage clumsiness is usually part of her act. But not always. She says: “I was performing in an Italian hotel and SINGING priest Father Ray
Kelly is dedicating his BGT performance tonight to the memory of his sister Regina, who died three years ago.
Ray, 64, said losing her at 59 to oesophageal cancer shaped his decision to go on the show.
He said: “I know she’s up there looking down on us and is on this journey with me. Two of her daughters will be with me.”
Fr Kelly, of Oldcastle, Co Meath, was a 2014 internet hit when a clip of him singing Hallelujah at a wedding got 36 million views on Youtube.
Simon Cowell praised his Everybody Hurts, by REM, as his “favourite audition ever”. STREET dance troupe DVJ clinched a final spot by winning last night’s semi, with son-anddad singing duo Jack and Tim Goodacre also going through.
Comedian Robert White won on Wednesday, and Welsh singer Gruffydd Wyn Roberts took the remaining place.
Singer Donchez Dacres won on Tuesday, with child star Calum Courtney also through.
Comic the Lost Voice Guy and singers The D-day Darlings made it on Monday’s contest. was a beautiful man in the front, an Adonis, all dark hair and green eyes.
“Part of my act involved fire, but then I accidentally set my hair alight.
“A waitress ran on with a tea towel to smother the flames, then I shot off, dunked my head under a tap, then ran on with hair soaked flat to my head.
“I got a standing ovation, but not a date with Adonis. So if the next BGT performance goes better than that, I’ll be one happy lady.”
Watch Mandy on tonight’s BGT live semi-final on ITV at 7.30pm. Also appearing are singer Fr Ray Kelly, Rat Pack singers Demille & Muoneke, dancers Lexie & Christopher, musical comic Micky P Kerr, eating opera singer Sarah Llewellyn, boy band Bring It North and acrobats the Giang Brothers.