Barry Norman

Barry Leslie Norman, CBE (born August 21, 1933 in London) is an English film critic and television presenter.

Early life

Norman, the son of film director Leslie Norman, was educated at a state primary school and at the Highgate School, a boys' independent school in north London. He did not go to university, but instead began his journalistic career at the "Kensington News", later spending a period in South Africa where he developed a hostility to the situation created there by the emergence of apartheid.

By the 1960s, Norman was a prominent journalist, and show business editor of the "Daily Mail" until 1971, when he was made redundant. Subsequently, he wrote a column each Wednesday for "The Guardian", also contributing leader columns to the newspaper.

He was one of the collaborators with Wally Fawkes on the long running cartoon strip "Flook". He has also contributed a column to the "Radio Times" for many years, and written a number of novels.

Film critic

He presented BBC1's "Film" programme from 1972, becoming the sole presenter the following year, although the programme was not transmitted outside of London and the south-east for the first few years.Norman's tenure was broken in 1982 by a brief unhappy spell presenting "Omnibus". After returning to the "Film" series, Norman became increasingly irritated by the BBC's reluctance to screen the programme at a regular time, and he accepted an offer in 1998 to work for BSkyB, where he remained for three years. [ [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/106832.stm BBC News: Barry Norman defects to Sky] ] Jonathan Ross took his place as the BBC programme's presenter.

Norman has written and presented a number of documentary series for the BBC, including "Hollywood Greats" (1977-79, 1983), "British Greats" (1980) and "Talking Pictures" (1987).

Radio

Barry Norman was once a regular radio broadcaster. He was the original presenter of the BBC Radio 4 transport and travel show "Going Places". He is a former chairman of "The News Quiz" on Radio 4 and also presented for the network, "The Chip Shop", an early 1980s series dedicated to the emerging home computer industry.

Personal life

Barry Norman has a family recipe for pickle that has been passed down through generations, and which was used as the recipe for his own brand of pickled onions, which went on sale in September 2007. [ [http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2007/09/26/cnonions126.xml Telegraph - Barry Norman moves into pickled onions] ] These onions are commonly regarded as the strongest pickled onions available in the UK, and have led to the product's "pickleodeon" branding being adopted as a synonym for "evil". [ [http://arblognot.blogspot.com/2007/11/pickleodeon.html Discussion on the potentially evil nature of Pickleodeon] ] The product has become quite a talking point in some UK universities in the form of the "PickleOrdeal" (alternatively known as "PickleOdyssey") challenge, whereby several contestants compete to consume an entire jar of onions in the shortest time, before drinking the pickling liquid and holding the empty jar inverted overhead to signify completion. [ [http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0635447/board/nest/86369969?p=1] ] Following the notoriety of this product, crisp manufacturer Walkers has announced plans to release a special 30th anniversary edition pack of its Monster Munch range called "Pickled Norman"Fact|date=March 2008.

Barry Norman's other passion is cricket; he is in the process of writing a book on the subject. He is a member of the MCC club and likes spending time at Lord’s watching cricket.

He is a supporter of the British Liberal Democrats. [http://www.politics.co.uk/features/opinion-former-index/legal-and-constitutional/feature-political-celebrities-$1238735.htm]

atire

He is associated with the phrase "and why not?", which originated not as his catchphrase but as that of his puppet likeness on the satirical show "Spitting Image". Norman has since adopted the phrase himself, and it is the title of his autobiography. In a recent ITV documentary on "Spitting Image", Norman admitted initially hating the way his puppet looked on the programme (mostly because it had a large inexplicable wart on its forehead), but later somewhat moderated his attitude and felt flattered that the series found him famous enough to include him in its sketches.

References

* [http://www.celebrityproductions.info/displayer_celebrities.php/82/Barry_Norman Clive Conway Celebrity Productions page on Barry Norman]
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