DOCSLIB.ORG

'Please Don't Call Me a Pensioner!' Says Sue Lawley

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
'Please Don't Call Me a Pensioner!' Says Sue Lawley 'Please don't call me a pensioner!' says Sue Lawley By Kathryn Knight Newsreader and broadcaster Sue Lawley, 62, presented Desert Island Discs on BBC Radio 4 for 18 years before resigning in 2006. Since then she has largely remained out of the public eye, but is back on our screens as a participant in Bridge: Celebrity Grand Slam on Sky TV, hosted by Clive Anderson. She has two grown-up children from her first marriage to solicitor David Ashby, but since 1987 has been married to TV producer Hugh Williams. The couple live in London and Devon. News reader and broadcaster Sue Lawley - presenter of Radio 4's Desert Island Discs for 18 years - says that at 62, she still feels like a 37 year old You seem to have been away for a long time… I still do my bit - I chair the Annual Reith Lectures for the BBC and I do quite a bit of travel journalism. But yes, by and large I stay out of the public eye. Producers ring up and say things like, 'We'd love to get the old Nationwide team back together', and I think, 'Actually, can we not?' I suppose, fundamentally, I don't really feel the need to do any more, so unless I really enjoy something, like the bridge programme I've just worked on, then there's no point. I like my privacy too much. I hate seeing interviews printed - there's always something in them you don't like. I've been happier since I haven't been putting myself about. You’re a bit of a dab hand at bridge, by all accounts? I’m an amateur, but I have played for years, on and off, and I do enjoy it. I tried for years to get the game on TV and never managed to, as it’s so complicated. Then this show came along and I thought, ‘Why not?’ It was a great experience – there were seven of us holed up in a country house hotel for two days, competing for a share of £20,000 in prize money that gets awarded to charity. We were a pretty motley crew, though, it must be said. [Model-turned-photographer] Pattie Boyd was my partner, and she was actually surprisingly good. There was a degree of humiliation to it all, of course. I was so nervous that I made a couple of fundamental errors – the people I play bridge with back in Devon will be stopping me in the Do you spend most of your time in Devon? Actually, we’re in London more as my husband still works in television, and I do a certain amount too – although not as much as I used to. So we move up and down as we feel like it. We do spend summers in the country, though, as well as family Christmases. We’ve owned our home in Budleigh Salterton, near Exeter, for 14 years. It’s wonderful, a proper house by the sea – we turn left out of our front gate and we’re on the beach, where we rent a hut from the council in summer. Hugh and I dreamed about living somewhere like this a long time ago, and when we started talking about actually doing it, I remembered that I’d been to Budleigh Salterton when I was working on Nationwide. I said, ‘There’s this lovely little place down in Devon, let’s go and take a look at it.’ It was just as charming as I remembered, and Hugh loved it, too. Eventually, this house came on the market. It’s smaller than the one we owned in Putney, southwest London, but the children were leaving home so we didn’t need so much space. We sold up and bought a smaller place in Chelsea. Sue Lawley, centre, with fellow Nationwide presenters Bob Wellings, left, and Hugh Scully, right. 'Producers ring up and say things like, 'We'd love to get the old Nationwide team back together', and I think, 'Actually, can we not?' Do you miss presenting Desert Island Discs? No, not at all. I’m not one for going back or revisiting things. I had been thinking about leaving for some time because it had dominated my life for so long, both in terms of the hours I put in working on it, and also as it was the only thing anyone would ever want to talk to me about. I just got bored with it. Do you still listen to the show? When I come across it by chance, which isn’t that often. I didn’t listen to myself presenting much, either. I did surprise myself by feeling nostalgic about it after I left and not, at first, wanting to hear Kirsty Young presenting it. I felt temporarily proprietorial, but that feeling soon slipped away. I think the baton has been passed on to a very worthy successor. You could go back to newsreading, of course… I don’t think so. Years ago, when I was reading the news, I used to say that I’d be interested to see if I would still be doing it when I was 56 or 60, when I had what I used to refer to as ‘luggage around the eyes’, which is what they used to say about the late newsreader Peter Woods in the 1970s. The fact is that the way women look on television is deemed far more important than the way men look – ’twas ever thus and it’s still the case. The other thing is that if a woman is a tenacious interviewer she’s criticised for being a bit of a headmistress, but if a man is like that, people just say he’s good at his job. It’s an ever-present bias. How have you found being in your 60s? I have to admit that I don’t like being over 60. I’d never been that bothered about age before, but, suddenly, you get the bus pass and the winter fuel allowance and it comes as quite a shock. I find myself reading newspaper articles where they describe a 60- year-old woman as a ‘pensioner’, which sounds so old, and then thinking, ‘I’m older than her.’ I like to think I don’t look my age – in my head I’m 37. I reckon this is the perfect age: old enough to know who you are and still young enough to exploit your potential. Have you ever been tempted by the surgeon’s knife? Whenever I meet someone who’s had a bit of Botox or a nip ’n’ tuck, I’m riveted – and, of course, one looks in the mirror and is tempted. But I don’t really think I could go through with it myself – in fact, I know I couldn’t. I shall stick with walking and playing golf, and hope the years are kind. .
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Children in Need Comprehension Rt/L1.1 Rt/L1.3
    November 2008. To print or download your own copies of this document visit http://www.skillsworkshop.org/ CHILDREN IN NEED Read the following text and then answer the questions. Where it all began The BBC's first broadcast appeal for children was a five-minute radio programme on Christmas Day in 1927. It raised £1,143 18s 3d and the proceeds were shared with four prominent children's charities. The first televised appeal was the 1955 'Children's Hour Christmas Appeal', presented by Sooty and Harry Corbett. The Christmas Day Appeals continued on TV and radio right up until 1979, raising a total of £625,836. The presenters included Terry Hall, Eamonn Andrews, Leslie Crowther, Michael Aspel and the rising star of the Radio 2 Breakfast Show - Terry Wogan - who made his debut appearance in 1978. In 1980 the appeal was broadcast on BBC One in a new telethon format, hosted by Terry with Sue Lawley and Esther Rantzen. The telethon was the brainchild of Mark Patterson, who went on to be the Executive Producer for nine years. It captured the public's imagination to such an extent that the donations increased dramatically and broke the million mark for the very first time. Pudsey made his television debut in 1985 when Terry introduced the new, brown cuddly mascot to the audience. He was designed by Joanna Ball, a BBC graphics designer, who named him after the West Yorkshire town where she was born. He proved very popular and returned as Children in Need's official logo the following year with his design amended to that of a yellow bear with a red spotted bandage.
    [Show full text]
  • Activity Orientation in the Talk of Politicians, News Journalists And
    Activity orientation in the talk of politicians, news journalists and audiences Paul Dickerson University College London Submitted for Doctorate of Philosophy 1999 1 Abstract The talk of politicians, news-joumalists and audiences has been relatively neglected in social psychology and media studies. Within these approaches talk has been ignored altogether, treated as a symptom of cognitive or ideological processes or employed simply as a tool to gain access to ‘inner’ ‘meaning making’ or ‘outer’ behaviour. This thesis explored a corpus of talk data from a discursive perspective in which the talk itself was the focus. It was argued that politicians and news-joumalists could in different ways be seen to orientate to the ‘truthfulness’ of what they say. Thus politicians’ were found to cite others to corroborate their claims, and new-joumalists through their exchange of utterances attended to the co-construction their ‘impartiality’ and ‘authoritativeness’. Politicians were also found to construct intent in terms of acting in ‘the national interest’ - this ‘repertoire’ could blame or exonerate self and others depending crucially on talk- context in which it was produced. Audiences’ talk about their identity and contrasts with others was also explored. Their talk was analysed not to uncover their ‘meaning- makings’ or behaviour but instead to discover the activity orientations of their talk and its sensitivity to the surrounding talk context. In this way the talk of politicians, news- joumalists and audiences was not seen as a symptom of some separate, ‘underlying’ phenomena of interest nor as a mere tool to access their ‘inner’ or ‘outer’ world - but rather it was the focus of study itself.
    [Show full text]
  • The Educational Backgrounds of Leading Journalists
    The Educational Backgrounds of Leading Journalists June 2006 NOT FOR PUBLICATION BEFORE 00.01 HOURS THURSDAY JUNE 15TH 2006 1 Foreword by Sir Peter Lampl In a number of recent studies the Sutton Trust has highlighted the predominance of those from private schools in the country’s leading and high profile professions1. In law, we found that almost 70% of barristers in the top chambers had attended fee-paying schools, and, more worryingly, that the young partners in so called ‘magic circle’ law firms were now more likely than their equivalents of 20 years ago to have been independently-educated. In politics, we showed that one third of MPs had attended independent schools, and this rose to 42% among those holding most power in the main political parties. Now, with this study, we have found that leading news and current affairs journalists – those figures who are so central in shaping public opinion and national debate – are more likely than not to have been to independent schools which educate just 7% of the population. Of the top 100 journalists in 2006, 54% were independently educated an increase from 49% in 1986. Not only does this say something about the state of our education system, but it also raises questions about the nature of the media’s relationship with society: is it healthy that those who are most influential in determining and interpreting the news agenda have educational backgrounds that are so different to the vast majority of the population? What is clear is that an independent school education offers a tremendous boost to the life chances of young people, making it more likely that they will attain highly in school exams, attend the country’s leading universities and gain access to the highest and most prestigious professions.
    [Show full text]
  • Professor Brian J Ford Looks Back Over Fifty Eventful Years As a Fellow of the Royal Microscopical Society
    half-century of Fellowship Professor Brian J Ford looks back over fifty eventful years as a Fellow of the royal microscopical society Brian J Ford n April 1962 I was recommended to become a fellow of the Royal Microscopical Society. The Fellowship was competitive in those days; Icandidates needed support from signatories who had to attest that they recommended your work. The microscopist Parry Morton, a kindly, sharp-eyed and distinguished man, kept some of my slides for study, many of them made when I was still a schoolboy. At the time I was studying trypanosome infections 50of fish, and he found my preparations fascinating. 4 Issue 25 march 2012 5 I had spent a year at the Medical Research Council contemporaries graduated I had research projects By the time my contemporaries graduated I had before going to University and, to bring in a regular coming to fruition. I was soon publishing on income, I was already writing a newspaper column microscopy and was engaged on my first academic research projects coming to fruition. on science. There were many talented people in that assignments. I was exhibiting micrographs as art could determine the likely cause of death and even social circle, all bubbling with enthusiasm and lively and studying microorganisms, snowflakes and cell offer a motive. The project featured in the press as crickets, including Michael Aspel, John Humphrys, specimens. Biology was turning to the electron and on TV and the new techniques we developed Sue Lawley, Martyn Lewis and Michael Buerk. I was microscope and views of dead matter, whereas I were published in a UNESCO textbook.
    [Show full text]
  • A Little Digging at the BBC
    A Little Digging at the BBC After almost a century of public radio broadcasting the BBC has built up an immense archive of past programmes, probably unequalled anywhere else in the world. There are fairly primitive recordings from the earliest days, but it was the introduction of tape recording after World War 2 which led to the massive increase which we take for granted today. The digital revolution makes the archiving process even easier. Aware of its responsibility to the licence payer, who after all is footing the bill, the BBC is using the internet to make as much of this historical material available to the general public as possible. (Its digital radio channel BBC 4 Extra also draws on this rich legacy). Accessing the material is straightforward. Just enter BBC Podcasts into Google and choose the radio channel that interests you, - BBC Radio 4 (the former Home Service), Radio 3 (the former Third programme) etc. The archive can also be reached via the iTunes App. The programmes can be heard “live” via the iPlayer App, or downloaded as a podcast to listen to at your convenience. The problem will be choosing from the huge range of programmes on offer. To give you a flavour here are just a few of the offerings: Virtually all “Letters from America” by Alistair Cooke from the 1940s onwards. All of “In Our Time” with Melvyn Bragg, (this series is still running.) All of the Reith Lectures from 1948. Front Row the long running arts and culture programme. To satisfy my own addiction and need for a steady flow of nostalgia I have been dipping into the longest running programme on the BBC, (and the second longest running radio programme in the world), Desert Island Discs.
    [Show full text]
  • Hybridity As Challenge in Televised Election Campaign Interviews
    Hybridity as challenge in televised election campaign interviews Argyro Kantara Center for Language and Communication Research, School of English, Communication and Philosophy Cardiff University Thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of PhD at Cardiff University September 2017 Abstract This thesis contributes to on-going discussions amongst academics on broadcast political disc ourse with respect to the multiplicity and transformation of institutional roles and relatio ns in p olitical news interviews. The thesis has as a startin g point the way hybridity in broadcast talk challenges “traditional” standa rds and participants’ identities in political news interviews. Adopting a conversation analytic perspective, it examines how these modified standards and identities shape political news interviews at a micro and a macro level. At a micro level, this thesis investigates episodes of adversarial talk in one -on -one 2012 Greek election c ampaign interviews, in terms of the turn -taking system and power relations between participants. Doing so, it points to changes in political news interviews (a sub -genre of which is the election campaign interview ). In particular, the thesis explores and discusses how, through their hybrid (antagonistic ) practices, Greek politicians and jou rnalists transfor m the televised election campaign news interview into an antagonistic arena where the winner is the one who shows that s/he plays the game of televised news interview in a fair way. At a macro level this thesis contributes with empirical , micro -analytic ev idence to wider debates related to politics and media communication by discussing the significance of both participants’ hybrid practices regarding: 1) how (mainstream) populism as political style, becomes manifest and 2) the epistemology of TV journalism in relation to its knowledge producing practices .
    [Show full text]
  • 12 Brown Desert Island Dislocation Bibliog Check FINAL With
    Chapter 12 Desert island dislocation: emotion, nostalgia, and the utility of music Julie Brown 1. Introduction Two and a half months after the first transmission of Desert Island Discs (DID) Assistant Director of Programme Planning in the BBC’s Gramophone Department Leslie A. Perowne wrote to the programme’s anchor Roy Plomley: I have given much thought to ‘D.I.D.’ recently, and take leave to suggest that you should impress upon your shipwreckees that they are not in fact spending a couple of nights on a sun-drenched island, but that they must sit down and consider very seriously what sort of moods they would be in after about six months entirely alone with their gramophone. They may be entirely gloomy, or if they feel they want gaiety it must be just the right kind. In other words the programme is not just ‘My favourite eight records’ but something much more significant.1 What interests me about this intervention is Perowne’s insistence on the utility of castaways’ chosen discs, their potential to help the shipwreckees to manage their moods while alone on the imaginary island. Ethnomusicologists have long studied music in its social situation, taking into account the way individuals and whole societies – typically traditional societies – utilise music as part of everyday life. Musicologists, however, have devoted less attention to how we in the West use it than to how Western art music works as an object of aesthetic 1 Letter from Leslie Perowne to Roy Plomley, 16 March 1942, in BBC WAC RCONT1, Roy Plomley, File 2a (1942).
    [Show full text]
  • Broadcast Bulletin Issue Number 80
    Ofcom broadcast bulletin 12 March 2007 O fcom broadcast bulletin Issue number 80 12 March 2007 1 Ofcom broadcast bulletin 12 March 2007 Contents Introduction 3 Standards cases In Breach 4 Resolved 10 Not In Breach 14 Fairness & Privacy cases Upheld in part 16 Other programmes not in breach/outside remit 54 2 Ofcom broadcast bulletin 12 March 2007 Introduction Ofcom’s Broadcasting Code took effect on 25 July 2005 (with the exception of Rule 10.17 which came into effect on 1 July 2005). This Code is used to assess the compliance of all programmes broadcast on or after 25 July 2005. The Broadcasting Code can be found at http://www.ofcom.org.uk/tv/ifi/codes/bcode/ The Rules on the Amount and Distribution of Advertising (RADA) apply to advertising issues within Ofcom’s remit from 25 July 2005. The Rules can be found at http://www.ofcom.org.uk/tv/ifi/codes/advertising/#content The Communications Act 2003 allowed for the codes of the legacy regulators to remain in force until such time as Ofcom developed its own Code. While Ofcom has now published its Broadcasting Code, the following legacy Codes apply to content broadcast before 25 July 2005. • Advertising and Sponsorship Code (Radio Authority) • News & Current Affairs Code and Programme Code (Radio Authority) • Code on Standards (Broadcasting Standards Commission) • Code on Fairness and Privacy (Broadcasting Standards Commission) • Programme Code (Independent Television Commission) • Programme Sponsorship Code (Independent Television Commission) • Rules on the Amount and Distribution of Advertising From time to time adjudications relating to advertising content may appear in the bulletin in relation to areas of advertising regulation which remain with Ofcom (including the application of statutory sanctions by Ofcom).
    [Show full text]
  • Pati Marr: Freelance TV Director
    PATI MARR STUDIO, OB & TV DIRECTOR _______________________________________________________________________ Contact: Mobile: 07973 510330 Email: [email protected] Website: www.patimarr.tv _______________________________________________________________________ Awards/Courses: University of St Andrews: M.A. Hons French 2 x Bafta Awards: Director, Best Light Entertainment Series Director, Best Talk Show 1 x Bafta Scotland Award: Director, Best Children’s Programme, 2013 BBC Studio Directing Course ________________________________________________________________________ Current / Recent Projects: Yer Granny BBC Comedy Show Starring Rab C Nesbitt BBC Proms 2015 Albert Hall Concert With Nicola Benedetti / Bournemouth S.O. CBBC The Dog Ate My Homework (series 3) Bafta Nominated Entertainment Series Presented by Iain Sterling BBC Worldwide Showcase Live Event from Liverpool Echo Arena With Back Street Boys, Strictly Come Dancing Sir David Attenborough, Trevor Eve, Russell Tovey, Paulo Nutini, John Cleese, David Hasselhoff Mad Lab BBC Learning Drama for 7 year-old children Still Game BBC Live Comedy at Glasgow Hydro Arena _______________________________________________________________________ Comedy/L.E. Programmes: Ask Rhod Gilbert (BBC 1 Comedy Series) 2 Monumental BBC N.I. Comedy presented by Adam Hills I’ve Never Seen Star Wars (BBC4) Comedy series presented by Marcus Brigstocke Dead Ringers (Series 1, 2, 3, 4, 5) (BBC 2) The Frankie Boyle Show (BBC Scotland) The Royle Family (Pilot: Granada /BBC 1) with Caroline Aherne Distraction (Talkback/C
    [Show full text]
  • St Nicholas Parish Church, Prestwick the Thought for the Week Sunday 4Th October 2020 Someone Laughed the Other Day When I Said
    St Nicholas Parish Church, Prestwick The Thought for the Week Sunday 4th October 2020 Someone laughed the other day when I said that I had been listening to the wireless! “Gosh, Fraser!” she exclaimed, “that gives your age away!” And she is right! I have lived through history! We didn’t have a television set until I was five, so it was the radio that brought us the news and entertained us. I have vague memories of my Mother listening to “Mrs Dale’s Diary” and I can still vividly recall the dulcet tones of Alvar Lidell reading the News. To this day one, I still enjoy the radio, and thanks to Alexa, I can tune in immediately to a whole variety of stations. Apart from Classic FM, my favourite is Radio 4 - such programmes like The Archers, Poetry Please, Any Questions, Just A Minute and a programme that I have appreciated for a very long time is called “Desert Island Discs” – it is the second longest running programme on the radio, having been first broadcast away back in 1942, with its wonderfully atmospheric opening music of “By a Sleepy Lagoon” by Eric Coates. Now, believe it or not, despite appearances to the contrary, I have not been a listener since its inception, but only much later! Originally devised and presented by a man called Roy Plomley, who one night in November 1941 at his digs in Hertfordshire, his fire had gone out and he was in his pyjamas ready for bed, and the idea for the programme came into his head; he wrote to the BBC, got and favourable reply and the programme was born.
    [Show full text]
  • The Nationwide Television Studies
    THE NATIONWIDE TELEVISION STUDIES The ‘Nationwide’ Television Studies brings together for the first time David Morley and Charlotte Brunsdon’s classic texts Everyday Television: ‘Nationwide’ and The ‘Nationwide’ Audience. Originally published in 1978 and 1980 these two research projects combine innovative textual readings and audience analysis of the BBC’s current affairs news magazine Nationwide. In a specially written introduction, Brunsdon and Morley clarify the origins of the two books and trace the history of the original Nationwide project. Detailing research carried out at the Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies at the University of Birmingham, Brunsdon and Morley recount the internal and external histories of the project and the development of media research and audience analysis theories. In a final section The ‘Nationwide’ Television Studies reprints reviews and responses to Everyday Television and The ‘Nationwide’ Audience including comments by Michael Barratt, the main presenter of Nationwide. David Morley is Professor of Communications at Goldsmiths College, London. Charlotte Brunsdon teaches film and television at the University of Warwick. ROUTLEDGE RESEARCH IN CULTURAL AND MEDIA STUDIES Series Advisers: David Morley and James Curran 1 VIDEO, WAR AND THE DIASPORIC IMAGINATION Dona Kolar-Panov 2 REPORTING THE ISRAELI-ARAB CONFLICT How hegemony works Tamar Liebes 3 KARAOKE AROUND THE WORLD Global technology, local singing Edited by Tōru Mitsui and ShūheiHosokawa 4 NEWS OF THE WORLD World cultures look at television news Edited by Klaus Bruhn Jensen 5 FROM SATELLITE TO SINGLE MARKET New communication technology and European public service Richard Collins 6 THE NATIONWIDE TELEVISION STUDIES David Morley and Charlotte Brunsdon THE NATIONWIDE TELEVISION STUDIES David Morley and Charlotte Brunsdon London and New York First published 1999 by Routledge 11 New Fetter Lane, London EC4P 4EE This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2005.
    [Show full text]
  • 9 December 2011 Page 1 of 16
    Radio 4 Listings for 3 – 9 December 2011 Page 1 of 16 SATURDAY 03 DECEMBER 2011 SAT 06:30 Farming Today (b017vbbh) Steve Richards of The Independent looks behind the scenes at Farming Today This Week Westminster. SAT 00:00 Midnight News (b017mxdm) The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4. Charlotte discovers some of the hidden complexities of the soil Who's ahead in the long bout between George Osborne and Ed Followed by Weather. and finds out how growing food can put it under pressure, at the Balls ? The clashes between the Chancellor and his Labour National Soil Resources Institute in Bedfordshire. Professor shadow are perhaps the most riveting at Westminster. Here, Jane Rickson, from the Institute, discusses how tilling soils can reflecting from the political ringside after the Autumn SAT 00:30 Book of the Week (b017mwz2) lead to erosion and compaction, and we hear how some farmers Statement, are Janan Ganesh of The Economist, and William Charles Dickens: A Life, by Claire Tomalin are moving away from traditional ploughing to avoid these Keegan of The Observer. problems. Professor Rickson also explains that the Institute is Episode 5 searching for new fertilisers to replace those made using finite How reliable are economic predictions? Andrew Dilnot, former resources like minerals and natural gas. And, she reveals why director of the Institute of Fiscal Studies. explains the art of Claire Tomalin's acclaimed biography of one of Britain's best she gets excited about earthworms. economic forecasting on which politicians rely. loved novelists paints a portrait of a brilliant writer and a complex man.
    [Show full text]