Tommy Boyd

Infobox_Celebrity


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name = Tommy Boyd
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birth_date = birth date|1952|12|14|mf=y
birth_place = Ealing
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occupation = Broadcaster
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Timothy Leslie Boyd (born December 14, 1952), better known as Tommy Boyd, is an English radio and television presenter, who now lives in Chichester, West Sussex.

Early career

Tommy Boyd was born in Feltham and grew up in Ashford in Middlesex before going to school at Tudor Grammar School, and later to the independent fee-paying Brighton College. His father, who was a weight trainer and later a bodybuilder, was from Newcastle upon Tyne. While at Tudor Grammar, he worked part-time at a Debenhams store in Staines. Aged 18 he went to New York to work at a Summer Camp. From there, Boyd went on to study at the University of Sussex. After his studies, Boyd became a dolphin trainer at The Brighton Dolphinarium, and later worked as a red coat entertainer at a Butlins holiday camp in Bognor Regis. In 1974 he joined start-up News Radio station LBC as a journalist, and in 1976 was made Editor of the rolling news breakfast show "AM".

Children's TV

From 1977 to 1980, he was co-presenter of the ITV children's magazine programme "Magpie" replacing Douglas Rae . In 1981, he devised, wrote, and presented, "What's Happening?", a news quiz. But he is perhaps better known for having presented the Saturday TV-am show "Wide Awake Club" (called "WAC '90" for the 1989 series), and its Sunday spin-off "WAC Extra", throughout the 1980s.

In the early 1980s, he could be heard as the voice of Biggum the giant (seen only as a large sandal and tartan-socked leg) on BBC television children's programme Jigsaw. Tommy was the presenter of Children's BBC progamme called " Puzzle trail".

Between 1982 and 1984, he also fronted Central Television's flagship Saturday morning kids TV show "The Saturday Show" alongside Isla St Clair and followed this with "Saturday Starship" in 1985 (co presented by Bonnie Langford). From 1991 - 2 he spent a period as anchorman for ITV's children's strand, "Children's ITV" (CITV). This was his 3rd and final time presenting CITV, as he had previously done it twice before, in July 1983 and December 1984. He left CITV in '92, after a disagreement with the then CITV controller, Dawn Airey. During his 3rd stint at CITV, he often revealed that he was a big fan of the CITV adventure gameshow, Knightmare and was also the second honorary member of the "Knightmare Adventurers' Club". (His fellow CITV presenter, Glenn Kinsey, was the first member, though!).

In 1993/4, Boyd served as a "Space Jock" on the "Ratkan", a space ship which beamed programming to viewers of The Children's Channel, a satellite television channel.

outhern Sound

During the late 1980s Boyd was a radio presenter on the ILR station Southern Sound on the late Sunday evening show along with Nicky Keig-Shevlin. The format of the show was phone-in/quiz style with the occasional record thrown in - 'Two Little Boys' by Rolf Harris and 'Narcissus' by Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band being two that featured regularly. Boyd signed off each show by playing "What a Wonderful World" by Louis Armstrong.

Talk Radio

He was a radio presenter on the British AM station Talk Radio (later talkSPORT) from its inception in February 1995 until November 1998, when he lost his job in a reshuffle at the station after it was taken over by a consortium led by former Sun editor Kelvin MacKenzie.

It was during this tenure that Boyd consolidated his reputation for being controversial. Broadcasting at first from 3pm to 7pm, transferring later to the 1pm to 4pm timeslot, the format of the show would involve Boyd making a proposition (e.g "Save a life ... Humiliate a sunbather" or "Who needs their legs?") and engaging in a frequently heated debate with the often ill-informed callers in which Boyd would always triumph.

Less argumentative strands of the show would also see the emergence of "The Angry Hour" and "The Wonderful Hour" the latter of which would always take place during the final hour of the Friday show.

During this period he presented the TV programme MLB on Five for its first few months in 1997. When he left, he was replaced by Johnny Gould.

Five Live & LBC

He subsequently worked for BBC Radio Five Live, before being sacked for his argumentative and controversial style of broadcasting. He also spent some time at the local station LBC in London, working on a Friday & Saturday evening "Nightline" phone-in programme during the early 80s remembered for it's 'Mystery Guest' feature, where a famous person would come in and not talk in their real voice and people would have to call in and guess who it was - Roy Castle once featured and 'talked' only by playing his trombone.

During the late 70's he hosted the Saturday morning show 'Jellybone' aimed at children. The show featured items such as a phone-in news quiz, and a segment where group or club members - such as bus spotters - were invited into the studio to discuss their hobby/interests, and to take part in the 'Jellybone Jury', reviewing and scoring the latest record releases. Previous hosts of the show include LBC stalwart Therese Birch, and the late Jeremy Beadle.

He also presented a three hour show on a Sunday afternoon between 2 and 5pm, the middle hour of which was called 'Cushion talk' because members of the public could come in to take part in a panel discussion style of programme, and you all sat on cushions that had been arranged on empty desks in the newsroom.

For his "Nightline" show he was awarded the Royal Variety Club Radio Personality of the Year and later co-presenting the Breakfast show with Anne Diamond leaving in 1999.

talkSPORT

In January 2000, Talk Radio was rebranded as talkSPORT, but with part of its schedules being retained for talk and non-sport phone in. After covering for absent presenters on several occasions, Boyd took up a permanent position in April 2000.

In May 2000, he began an experiment on his Sunday night slot whereby calls would go straight to air unscreened. This later evolved into "The Human Zoo". Boyd presented the show with Asher Gould. This style of programme came to light again in May 2006 when the LBC presenter Iain Lee (who openly cites Boyd as one of his broadcasting heroes) started a show called Triple M, expanded from a half-hour section of his regular show using such format.

Boyd would also go on to host a professional wrestling radio show on talkSPORT entitled 'Talk Wrestling'. Boyd was soon joined by professional wrestler Alex Shane who became a regular co host and with his knowledge of wrestling soon making the previously loosely based wrestling show the UK's first fully fledged national wrestling radio show which often saw Boyd introduce wrestling storylines into the actual radio show. This is common in US wrestling, and one storyline involved Shane attacking Boyd and being forcefully removed from the show. Following Boyd's departure from talkSPORT, the show was continued for few months and presented by Alex Shane.

Boyd also worked alongside Shane and the wrestling promotion Frontier Wrestling Alliance to help produce and promote one of its largest early shows, "Revival" at Crystal Palace in February 2002, which was broadcast on national TV and also made history by being the first ever (and only, to date) wrestling show to be broadcast live on national radio, when Dean Ayass and Mark Priest provided commentary on the TalkSPORT airwaves. Boyd was sacked from TalkSPORT in March 2002 after failing to use the profanity delay to 'dump' a caller's remarks that the Royal Family should be shot.

Current Work

In early 2004, Boyd joined BBC Southern Counties Radio, where he presented a Saturday Night show (with a live internet feed) from 9pm-1am with co-presenter Allison Ferns. It was here that the Human Zoo format was resurrected along with the more controversial aspects of the Talk Radio days. For the first few months in the slot, many (generally elderly) listeners would phone-in and express their dismay at this apparent departure from the output they had so far been accustomed to. Callers would often state their annoyance then quickly hang up, not wishing to cross swords with Boyd. Those who were brave enough be it to complain or to disagree with many of Boyd's proposals would frequently find themselves confronted with a strong argument. Boyd has stated that one of the things that annoys him is a person with a closed mind.

On the occasions when Allison Ferns was absent, cover would come in the guises of Lisa Francesca Nand, Alyson Mead, and on one show (New Year's Eve 2005), Boyd's wife, Jayne.

From April 2006 to December 2007 Boyd presented a daily afternoon show from 1pm to 4pm, Monday to Friday. Several popular elements from the past resurfaced, such as "The Angry Hour", "The Irritable Hour", and once again on the final hour of the Friday show "The Wonderful Hour".

From August 2007, Boyd was heard on Sunday nights on Play Radio UK, an internet radio station.

In January 2008 Boyd moved to Original 106 FM where he hosted the weekday Breakfast Show until September 2008 when Original changed it's format and he left to concentrate on broadcasting via the internet on Play Radio UK.

Personal life

He married his wife Jayne, a lecturer in Child Development, in December 1985 in Hove. They have two sons, Jack and Harry, born January 1987 and June 1990.Boyd ran an expedition to Scammon's Lagoon Mexico in 1986 to attempt to document the birth of a grey whale, but failed due to repeated attacks from attending bull whales.In 1992 he raced at Cheltenham against former champion jockeys Peter Scudamore and John Francombe. He didn't win. Between 1985 and 1987 Boyd studied Japanese swordsmanship Iado, Shinto.

External links

* [http://playradiouk.com/ Play Radio UK]
* [http://www.tommyboydshrine.co.uk The Tommy Boyd Shrine] - Fan site
* [http://www.geocities.com/thehotw/TommyBoydtracker.htm Biography] at Aircheck Tracker
* [http://www.original106.com Original 106]

References