Jamie Theakston

Jamie Barker Theakston (born 21 December 1970) is an English television presenter, producer, and actor. He is best known for hosting Top of the Pops, co-hosting the breakfast show with Emma Bunton on Heart FM and also for narrating the BBC documentary series Traffic Cops and Motorway Cops. He has also hosted several television programmes for the BBC, ITV and Channel 4.

Born in Cuckfield, Sussex, Theakston was educated at two independent schools: the preparatory school of Hurstpierpoint College near the village of Hurstpierpoint in West Sussex, followed by Lancing College in the village of Lancing, and Brighton Hove & Sussex Sixth Form College in Hove. He joined the National Youth Theatre at the age of 13 where he appeared in plays including Murder in the Cathedral and Marat/Sade alongside contemporaries such as Daniel Craig, but was put off from pursuing a full-time acting career by the financial hardships that he encountered. After leaving college with nine O-Levels and one GCSE in Maths, he joined the North London Polytechnic, from which he graduated with a first class degree in business studies. Whilst at university, he read traffic bulletins on BBC GLR as he wanted to get into sports reporting.

Radio

Before embarking on a broadcasting career, he worked for auctioneers Christie's, and was going to study art history at the Courtauld Institute. After undertaking football and cricket reports for both GLR and Radio 5 Live, he was spotted by the BBC's head of sport and presented GLR's Saturday Sport Show at the age of 23. He then presented numerous shows for Radio 5 Live including Sportscall, The Jamie Theakston Cricket Show and Sport on Wednesday. Theakston joined Radio 1 in April 1999 to present the Sunday Lunch show. He fronted the 'One Big Sunday' events during 2000. He moved to a Saturday morning slot in 2001.

He left Radio 1 in 2002 to pursue an acting career, his last show being broadcast on 28 September. He joined Heart 106.2, a London radio station in May 2005, replacing Jonathan Coleman on Heart Breakfast with Harriet Scott, which won Gold for Best Music Personality Show at the New York Festivals, 2007 and the Silver Entertainment Award at the Sony Radio Academy Awards, 2007. In June 2009 he (along with Scott) won the Radio Presenter of the Year award at the Arqiva Commercial Radio Awards. In 2013 Harriet Scott Left Heart Breakfast and was replaced by Spice Girl Emma Bunton who already has a show on the Heart network.

Television

On television, after presenting The O Zone with Jayne Middlemiss, he has most notably hosted Top of the Pops (1998–2003), Live & Kicking (1996–1999) and The Priory. The latter two shows he co-presented alongside Zoë Ball. Other presenting work includes fronting the Glastonbury Festival coverage for the BBC, the Oscars, the Grammys, A Question of Pop, UK Music Hall of Fame and Guinness World Records.

He hosted the Channel 4 reality TV show The Games alongside Kirsty Gallacher. He was also the host of a 2004 game show, Beg Borrow or Steal. He presented the ITV Saturday night show With A Little Help From My Friends. He also appeared in a 2004 episode of the ITV series Agatha Christie's Marple.

Theakston also played himself in the mock-interview series Rock Profile in which he interviews "celebrities" impersonated by Matt Lucas and David Walliams. The programme was shown on the now defunct channel UK Play. He also appeared alongside Walliams in an episode of Little Britain.

The Priory was commissioned by Chris Evans's then production company Ginger Productions. Despite initially strong ratings, the show failed to capitalise on the demise of TFI Friday (also a Ginger production), and figures slowly dropped; a fourth series was never commissioned.

More recently Theakston has hosted the prime-time Saturday night show The People's Quiz and produced and presented on Channel 4's The Search, which was nominated for a Rose d'Or award at the International Television Festival.

He played himself in the episode "Video Killed the Radio Star" in the TV series FM in March 2009.

Theakston featured beside Zoë Ball once again in Channel 5's Britain's Best Brain series, which aired in October 2009.

Theakston has narrated all episodes of Traffic Cops and its spin-off show Motorway Cops.

In July and August 2013, Theakston along with Emma Bunton presented ITV's This Morning Summer on Friday mornings. Since 2015, he has narrated episodes of Caught on Camera for ITV. In 2016, he presented Dogs Might Fly for Sky1.

Acting

Theakston has acted with Amanda Holden in Mad About Alice (2004) and worked with Adam Faith on the series Murder in Mind in 2003, shortly before Faith's death. He has also starred in the West End in the plays 'Art' and Home and Beauty at the Lyric Theatre, Shaftesbury Avenue.

In 2004 he appeared in Agatha Christie's Miss Marple: Body in the Library.

Theakston lived for about ten years in Wings Place, a Tudor mansion in Ditchling, East Sussex. Theakston married Sophie Siegle in Ditchling on 15 September 2007, and they live in west London. The couple have two sons – Sidney, born 11 April 2008, and Kit, born 29 September 2009.

He is a keen fencer and competed for Sussex in 1985.

As captain of Ditchling Cricket Club, Theakston was a member of the first cricket team from England to play the Afghan cricket team in Kabul.

Theakston is a member of Mensa and a supporter of Brighton & Hove Albion.

In 2002, Theakston was the subject of a Daily Mail article titled "The shaming of Jamie" which detailed his admission to visiting a brothel where he was allegedly blackmailed by a sex worker.

Charity

In 2003 he took a break to travel to Uganda to meet with former child soldiers. Theakston is a patron for CANCERVIVE – a charity established to address the needs of anyone whose family or friends are cancer sufferers.

He played in his fifth successive Soccer Aid match at Old Trafford in June 2014. Having, in 2010, saved four penalties for England against the Rest of the World in a penalty shoot-out, before missing a penalty himself in a defeat, he was later named man of the match for his performance in goal.

Television

Television presenting

• The O-Zone – BBC Two
• Live & Kicking – BBC One
• Holiday – BBC One
• The Priory – Channel 4
• Holiday – You Call the Shots – BBC One
• Sport Relief – BBC One
• Top of the Pops – BBC One
• Wish You Were Here – ITV
• Glastonbury – BBC One & BBC Two
• The Eclipse – BBC One
• Queen's Jubilee Concert – BBC One
• Natural Born Losers – BBC One
• A Question of Pop – BBC One
• The Millennium – BBC One
• Pick n Mix – UK Play
• The Games – Channel 4
• Comic Relief – BBC One
• Landmarks – BBC Two
• Aqua – BBC Two
• Not a Lot of People Know That – BBC One
• Children in Need – BBC One
• The Brits – ITV
• 100 Greatest Kids Shows – Channel 4
• Behind the Music – VH1
• Traffic Cops – BBC One and Channel 5
• Car Wars – BBC One
• Richest Kids – ITV
• Bitesize – BBC Two
• The Grammys – BBC Two
• Beg Borrow or Steal – BBC Two
• With a Little Help from My Friends – ITV
• The Simpsons Quiz – Channel 4
• The UK Music Hall of Fame – Channel 4
• 50 Years, 50 Records – ITV
• The Oscars: Live – SKY 1/Sky Movies
• Top of the Pops Awards – BBC One
• All*Star Cup – Sky1
• The Search – Channel 4
• The National Lottery People's Quiz – BBC One
• Concert for Diana – BBC One
• Sky Cops – BBC One
• Forbidden History – Yesterday – UKTV

Radio

• Saturday Sports Show – GLR
• Sportscall – BBC Radio 5
• Friday Night on 5 – BBC Radio 5
• Jamie Theakston's Cricket Show – BBC Radio 5
• Radio 5 Sport – BBC Radio 5
• The Sunday Lunch – BBC Radio 1
• The Jamie Theakston Show – BBC Radio 1
• The Griff Rhys Jones Show – BBC Radio 2
• One Big Sunday – BBC Radio 1
• Heart Breakfast with Jamie Theakston and Harriet Scott – Heart FM
• Heart Breakfast with Jamie and Emma – Heart FM