This Is Your Life: The Beverley Sisters

The BEVERLEY Sisters - Joy (1924-2015) Teddie (1927-) Babs (1927-2018)

The first trio of subjects and the first set of twins to be featured on This Is Your Life

THIS IS YOUR LIFE - The Beverley Sisters, singing group, were surprised by Eamonn Andrews.

The sisters – Joy and twins Teddie and Babs – were born in London and began singing professionally in 1944 after auditioning for BBC Radio. Having made their debut on radio in programmes for the Allied Expeditionary Forces, they toured the UK on the cabaret circuit before starring in their own BBC television series, which ran for seven years.

They modelled their close harmony singing style on that of their American counterparts, The Andrews Sisters, and became known for their matching outfits, which they wore on and off stage. After signing a recording deal in 1951, the sisters had chart success with their versions of I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus and Little Drummer Boy, while their release of the Irving Berlin song Sisters became their signature tune.

programme details...

Edition No: 262
Subject Nos: 262-264
Broadcast live: Wed 31 Dec 1969
Broadcast time: 7.00-7.30pm
Venue: Euston Road Studios
Series: 10
Edition: 6

on the guest list...

Norman Newell
Geoff Love
Billy Wright - Joy's husband
Peter Felix - Teddie's husband
Dickie Henderson
Cecil Madden
Mrs Beverley
John Dankworth
Johnny Franz
John Dene
Rick Murran
Arthur Williams
Albert Ward
Les Ward
Vincent Wright
Sister Mary Fidelis
Jock Ware

production team...

Researcher: unknown
Writers: Tom Brennand, Roy Bottomley
Director: Margery Baker
Producer: Robert Tyrrell

names above in bold indicate subjects of This Is Your Life

related pages...

A Song For Life

it's the singer not the song

A Double Life

two's company

Family Life

keeping it in the family

The Night of 1000 Lives

a celebration of a thousand editions

Timeline

the show's fifty year history

Obituaries: Eamonn Andrews

Press coverage of the death and memorial service of Eamonn Andrews

The Beverley Sisters on This Is Your Life with Eamonn Andrews

The Times 1 January 1970

Backwards into the 1970s

By Leonard Buckley

Forward into 1970 with Bob Hope and Elvis Presley. Television yesterday made certain that while the New Year waited in the wings we should have an evening of nostalgia. But besides the transatlantic stars there was homespun talent, too.

Man Alive on BBC2 gave us a portrait of Bryan Forbes, actor turned film tycoon. This was a buttonholing programme but it attempted too much. It was best when it was looking back.

If, however, you want to dwell on the years that the locust hath eaten there is nothing quite like half an hour with Thames Television's This Is Your Life. Last night's subject was the Beverley Sisters and if one can say it in the nicest possible way these ladies go back a distance themselves. But I cannot report that the saga of their lives enthralled me. As we are dealing with what one gentleman called the best sister act in the business the half an hour was naturally rooted in the world of entertainment: it quickly became a cosy exercise in mutual admiration. I felt like a stranger at a party where everybody was kissing everybody else.

But what happened to the programme itself? It is not so much a shadow of its former self as a tatty imitation. This has nothing to do with the central figures, although one can remember when This Is Your Life could nobble a real live king and fly in participants from Fiji or Valparaiso at the drop of a hat.

One gentleman was indeed flown in last night from the United States, but his entrance was quite perfunctory. That clearly is the trouble. The element of surprise has dwindled. The sense of occasion is gone. In short the programme has lost its panache. Heigh ho for radio's Desert Island Discs which can still present Lord Montgomery.

Series 10 subjects