The Stage

Simon Dee

Published Tuesday 20 October 2009 at 11:45 by Michael Quinn

In the second half of the sixties, Simon Dee was television’s equivalent of a Beatle and created - and shattered - the template for the smart-talking talk show host who was as famous (and more so in many cases) as his guests.

For three years from 1967, Dee was a television icon, his Saturday night show a ratings winner for the BBC. Both programme and presenter were kept in the headlines by Dee’s high-profile off-screen antics in which he flaunted his youth, fame and wealth with an almost naive disregard for the disapproving sniping it provoked.

Born Cyril Nicholas Henty-Dodd on July 28, 1935, in Manchester, he served in the RAF from 1953-58, rising to the rank of sergeant. A string of casual jobs - male model, photographer’s assistant and door to door vacuum cleaner salesman among them - ended with the offer of presenting on Radio Caroline, becoming the pirate radio station’s launch presenter in 1964. The following year, he joined the BBC’s Light Programme and soon found himself on Radio 1 and presenting the Corporation’s flagship pop music programme, Top of the Pops.

Dee Time, the early evening TV talk show that made him a star, launched in 1967 and was originally broadcast live twice a week from Manchester. When the programme switched to London and a prime-time slot on Saturdays, Dee’s ego seemed to dangerously inflate as his viewing figures steadily grew.

When Dee’s contract came up for renewal in 1969, the now A-list celebrity forced the hand of his BBC boss Billy Cotton, who had become increasingly sensitive to Dee’s behind the scenes tirades and tabloid-attracting behaviour, saying that LWT had offered him a salary four times larger than he was getting from the Corporation. Cotton promptly cancelled the show, consigning Dee to abrupt failure, despite a £100,000 fee, on the commercial channel.

Following cameo roles in The Italian Job and Doctor in Trouble, the seventies saw Dee becoming increasingly reclusive, except for spells in court for unpaid bills, assault, criminal damage and shoplifting. Potential comebacks in Australia, on Radio 2 and, in 2003, on Channel 4 were virtually stillborn. Few television personalities have risen so high or fallen so low as Dee.

Dying from bone cancer on August 29 at the age of 74, he is survived by three wives, four children and two complimentary claims to fame - that he was once seriously considered as Sean Connery’s successor as James Bond and that the character of super-suave, hyper-hip swinging sixties ladies’ man and spy Austin Powers was modelled on him.