Richard Madeley says comparisons to Alan Partridge don’t bother him and people can take the p*** if they want
IT takes something special to create more headlines than Piers Morgan while hosting Good Morning Britain.
But TV veteran Richard Madeley achieved just that when he filled in for the big-mouth host last month, thanks to some outrageous gaffes that drew comparisons to TV’s cheesy comic character Alan Partridge.
Indeed, cutting off a cabinet minister mid-flow, swearing live on air, telling a Britain’s Got Talent golden buzzer act consisting of schoolchildren that their performance “wasn’t perfect” and turning up for work looking like an Oompa-Loompa has all the hallmarks of a Steve Coogan script.
So what does Richard think about being compared to the calamitous Norfolk-based DJ?
He told The Sun: “If people want to take the p**s, that’s fine. It’s a harmless joke.
“I can take it. I don’t take myself even remotely seriously. I know some people do, and they get offended by being teased — but it’s only teasing.”
It’s a good job Richard’s skin, with its fluctuating shades, is so incredibly thick.
His fake tan disaster last month saw him get rinsed on social media, and the fallout continued in the next day’s papers, which he felt he had to mention on air.
I could tell he was keen to give his side of the story so I let him explain in full, while trying hard to keep a straight face.
Richard, 63, said: “I’m leaving the house at about ten to four in the morning in the semi-dark, with one light on.
“As I was going out the door I felt my face and thought, ‘I should have shaved. I will get a b*****king.’
“I went back into the kitchen, got a dry shaver and had a quick shave.
“It started to itch, so I thought, ‘I’ll put some aftershave balm on.’ Now I’m running late.
“I opened the kitchen cupboard, got what I thought was the shaving balm and put it on. I’m driving in to work and thought, ‘It smells a bit funny, this balm — it’s a bit woody. It must have gone off.’”
It wasn’t until 30 minutes before the end of GMB’s live broadcast that the full Tango effect was clear to viewers.
He adds: “People were laughing into my earpiece from the gallery. I asked to see myself on screen, and it was like I had just come back from a timeshare in Chernobyl. There was glowing radiation.”
Now back to a familiar mahogany brown, matching the leather sofa at central London’s exclusive 100 Wardour Street restaurant where we chatted, Richard also looks incredibly lean. But he does not put his slim frame down to hours in the gym or intense dieting.
No, Richard is a self- confessed “walking addict” who rewards his endless steps with a diet coke.
The broadcaster, who gave up alcohol in November, reveals that the decision was directly linked to a serious scare over his wife Judy Finnigan’s health last year, which also led her to quit booze.
Speaking for the first time about the incident, he said: “She’d been taking Ibuprofen for sore knees and she had no clue that taking them on an empty stomach could seriously affect the stomach lining.”
One morning Richard looked on in horror as Judy woke up and vomited a litre of blood.
He said: “I dialled 999 and the ambulance arrived in about four minutes.
“They had her on a drip and got her to the Royal Free in Hampstead and she had two blood transfusions.”
Judy, 71, had surgery to remove four ulcers above the stomach lining including one in an artery which caused her to bleed out.
He said: “It was touch and f***ing go. While she was coming round from that, the surgeon said, ‘She’s going to be fine. Did you call the ambulance immediately?’
“I said, ‘Yes,’ and he said, ‘Good, because if you’d waited another 20 minutes she probably would have bled out.’ Half an hour tops and she would have died.”
There’s no doubt the couple’s relationship is as strong now as it was 37 years ago when they first started working together on Granada TV.
They were both married at the time but later left their spouses and married in 1986, two years before they took up hosting jobs on This Morning.
Their on-air relationship has helped Richard avoid any allegations of sexual shenanigans in the #MeToo era.
He said: “When Judy and I were doing This Morning it was obvious that part of the appeal of the show was the fact we were happily married.
“Very early on I made the conscious decision that when I was in my dressing room, if anybody knocked on the door, I never let them in.
“I’d open the door and keep it open with my foot, and it became a complete habit. We’d have the conversation on the threshold and in full view of the office.
“It was my iron rule and it is one I still follow on GMB.”
While Richard continues to fill in on GMB and do the odd Radio 2 shift, he shows no sign of slowing down — vowing to “live until at least 100”, no doubt helped by the influence of his fitness trainer daughter Chloe. Judy, on the other hand, has left the spotlight completely.
Chloe, 31, told The Sun last May that her mum had retired from telly, and Richard confirmed it to me.
He said: “She’s completely backed away from TV. Given her success as a presenter and how good she was, she was the most reluctant TV presenter I’ve ever known.
“She didn’t enjoy it too much. She enjoyed the process of doing the programmes and she was incredibly good at it. But she really didn’t like the whole fame thing, because she’s very shy.”
Being shy is something that can’t be levelled at Richard.
I couldn’t help asking about Jeremy Kyle’s recent axing by ITV, and as Richard’s publicist tried to interrupt, he bit back and was intent on answering. It was a refreshing reaction in an age of micro-managed celebrities.
So I asked Richard if the recent suicide of Jeremy Kyle’s guest Steve Dymond after appearing on the show came as a shock to him.
He said: “First of all I can see why they kept the programme for so long. It was very popular, the most popular daytime show.
“They had limits and lines that the programme wasn’t meant to cross and I don’t think it did cross.
“But it was on-the-line television, no doubt about it, and if you walk a line every day, some day you’ll fall off it. That’s what happened.
“We don’t know the exact circumstances of the suicide but clearly there was a link. I don’t think ITV had any choice but to end the show.”
Such a brutal assessment was reminiscent of Richard’s bold decision to cut short an interview with then-Defence Secretary Gavin Williamson during his last GMB stint.
He admits that it sits among his proudest moments in a 30-year broadcast career.
Angry Richard ended the interview when Williamson repeatedly refused to discuss his previous flippant comment that the Russians ought to “shut up and go away” over the Salisbury poisonings. Richard said: “It wasn’t planned. It was completely instinctive and reactive.
“I gave him four chances to answer a fair question. I wasn’t aggressive, he wouldn’t answer it.
“I thought it was incredibly rude — not to me, but to the viewers.
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“As long as it’s my shift, I won’t allow it. It infuriates me when politicians deceive viewers, and I’ll hold them to account.”
With his youthful enthusiasm and determination to do a good job, the future still looks bright for Richard.
But hopefully not too orange.
Good Morning Britain is on ITV, weekdays from 6am.
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