This Is Your Life: Terry Wogan

Terry WOGAN (1938-2016)

The first time This Is Your Life opened live on radio

THIS IS YOUR LIFE - Terry Wogan, radio and television broadcaster, was surprised by Eamonn Andrews while presenting his BBC Radio 2 breakfast show live on air at BBC Broadcasting House. Terry then continued broadcasting his radio show while being driven, with Eamonn, to Thames Television's Euston Road Studios, where, for the first time in the programme's history, the opening few moments of This Is Your Life were broadcast live on radio.

Terry, who was born in Limerick, Ireland, and studied in Dublin, had a brief career in banking before joining RTÉ, the national broadcaster of Ireland, as a newsreader and announcer, later moving into light entertainment as a host of television quiz and variety shows, while also working as a disc jockey.

Having approached the BBC in London in 1966, he was offered work with BBC Radio. After standing in for Jimmy Young's mid-morning show, Terry was offered a weekday afternoon slot. In April 1972, he took over the breakfast show on BBC Radio 2 and, within a short time, was achieving record audiences of up to 7.9 million.

"I wish I'd shaved! Eamonn Andrews - I'll kill ya!"

programme details...

Edition No: 489
Subject No: 487
Broadcast date: Wed 19 Apr 1978
Broadcast time: 7.00-7.30pm
Recorded: Wed 19 Apr 1978 9.30am
Venue: Euston Road Studios
Series: 18
Edition: 22
Code name: Two

on the guest list...

Pete Murray
Tony Blackburn
Jimmy Young - live link
Alan - son
Mark - son
Katherine - daughter
Helen - wife
Michael - father
Rose - mother
Brian - brother
Pauline - sister-in-law
Frank Spencer
Peggy Spencer
Ray Carroll
James Sexton
Ken Daly
Noel Curran
Val Doonican
Mark White
Marion Montgomery
Laurie Holloway
Derek Broadbent
Michael Heary
Brighouse and Rastrick Brass Band

production team...

Researcher: John Viner
Writers: Tom Brennand, Roy Bottomley
Directors: Royston Mayoh, Terry Yarwood
Producer: Jack Crawshaw

names above in bold indicate subjects of This Is Your Life

related pages...

Radio Times

tuning in the broadcasters

Eamonn Andrews

a brief biography

A Life Remembered

tributes to the original presenter

Birth of Life

the genesis of the programme

Timeline

the show's fifty year history

Michael Aspel

a career review

The Story of This Is Your Life

a BBC Did You See...? special

This is his life...

Irish magazine RTE Guide reveals some behind-the-scenes secrets

Andrews's death casts doubt on his show

The Guardian reports the death of Eamonn Andrews

How they asked Aspel

TV Times interviews new presenter Michael Aspel

Life as seen by Aspel

Press speculation and announcements on new presenter Michael Aspel

Secrets Of The Big Red Book

TV Times launches another new series

Screenshots of Terry Wogan This Is Your Life

Terry Wogan recalls his experience of This Is Your Life in his autobiography, Is It Me? reproduced here with kind permission of the author...

Then one bright morning in 1978, Eamonn Andrews burst into my studio at nine o'clock with the Big Red Book, and I realised that Helen had been deceiving me for months, and I had never noticed a thing.

Up to that moment, I had thought of myself as sensitive, aware of nuance and any deviation in the pattern of behaviour of my nearest and dearest. This Is Your Life helped me realise that I had all the sensitivity of a lavatory seat.

They dragged me out of the studio, and I continued to speak to my radio audience from the BBC Radio cab, as Eamonn, myself and blessed Derek Mills, who had connived at it all behind my back, drove to the TV studios on Euston Road.

They were all there, of course – friends from Ireland, Laurie Holloway, Marion Montgomery, Val Doonican, Frank and Peggy Spencer from Come Dancing, Pete Murray, Tony Blackburn, an audience full of the friends we had made in Britain, and, most importantly, Helen, with Alan, Mark and Katherine. Brian and his wife, Pauline were there, too, and with them, Rose and Michael.

It was a wonderful, emotional day; Eamonn and his team treated everybody with typical kindness and professionalism, and we all ended up with a late lunch at a trat in Charlotte Street.

I sometimes regret that I was done by This Is Your Life so early in my career in British radio and television. Compared with what was to come, I had done very little. On the other hand, I am grateful that it happened while Rose and Michael were still alive. They were bemused, but, I think, proud, and Michael T. got to sing 'The Floral Dance' along with the Brighouse and Rastrick Brass Band.

Gus Smith recalls this edition of This Is Your Life in his book, Wogan...

It was inevitable that Eamonn Andrews would think of Terry in terms of This Is Your Life. Terry himself had sometimes wondered when Eamonn would get on his trail. When he eventually did, it was, as usual, an elaborate Life operation, involving Terry's family in Ireland, Mark and Stella White in the Isle of Man, Helen Wogan and the children. Terry had not the faintest idea of what was going on over his head. Eamonn eventually sprung the surprise on Terry when he interrupted him half-way through his breakfast programme on the morning of April 19, 1978. 'This is your life!' exclaimed Eamonn, thrusting a microphone at him.

'Eamonn, I'll kill you!' retorted Terry, for once almost lost for words.

Terry went on to introduce the next record, which started: 'I never thought you'd be here standing close to me.' The two then got into a BBC radio taxi, and Terry continued his show from there and later from the foyer of Thames Television. Since Life is shrouded in secrecy, Terry had no idea who was awaiting him. Helen had kept the secret from him, although she was terrified that the children might blurt it out.

Among the guests on Life were Mark and Stella White; they had been flown in from the Isle of Man. Stella recalls: 'Mark and I joined Terry's parents, Michael and Rose, at the same hotel. We were delighted to be asked on the show. I could see that Michael Wogan was thrilled; he was very proud of Terry. But we were all trying to conceal the Wogans' identity before the hotel staff in case they learned the truth. The Wogans were given a different name. However, once a round of drinks arrived, Michael, who was in a jolly mood, announced: "This is my party. No one must pay except me." He proceeded to sign on the room account, but unwittingly put down "Michael Wogan". We had to bribe the waitress not to tell anyone that the Wogans were in the hotel.

Val Doonican found the show 'moving and much fun', while Jimmy Young was 'delighted to be present'. Michael and Rose Wogan looked 'very proud of their Terry', but Stella White thought that Terry was embarrassed and speechless. James Sexton, who had travelled from Limerick, reckoned that Terry hadn't changed at all from the days when they played together at soldiers around Elm Park. When the show was over, Terry insisted on seeing his friends away. 'I remember,' says Jim Sexton, 'seeing him stand on the pavement saying goodbye until the time came when I was moving off, but there was no car around for him. It was the considerate Terry again. He hadn't changed. He was always thinking of someone else, never himself.'

Scriptwriter Roy Bottomley recalls this edition of This Is Your Life in his book, This Is Your Life: The Story of Television's Famous Big Red Book...

Terry Wogan was still a DJ when Eamonn Andrews gatecrashed his BBC radio studio while he was broadcasting live on 19 April 1978.

We had a radio car at the front door so he could continue broadcasting on the way to our studio.

Said the blarney to the blarney: 'If I'd known about this I'd have shaved.'

Gus Smith recalls this edition of This Is Your Life in his book, Eamonn Andrews His Life...

After Terry Wogan was surprised in the late seventies, during his morning radio programme in Broadcasting House, he told himself he was not nearly as perceptive as he'd reckoned he was.

'I mean my producer, my wife, relatives and friends - even my children - were all in on the plot and yet I never sensed a thing. It showed me that I was as sensitive as a toilet seat.'

To Terry, the only thing wrong with the show was that it was done five years too early. He hadn't presented Blankety Blank or the Wogan chat show; otherwise, he enjoyed the experience.

'I never considered it an intrusion. I now know that I reacted in startled fashion when confronted by Eamonn but I think that was understandable in the circumstances. I was glad in another way that it happened to me then, for my father was alive to enjoy it; that was an enormous advantage - he was thrilled.'

Series 18 subjects