In this age we live in of undeserved instant fame, it is inconceivable that a celebrity could fall off the radar in such a dramatic fashion. When there are only two television networks, and your belief in your own press cuttings makes you arrogant enough to piss them both off, you cannot go on television anymore.
Simon Dee came from a time when presenters were paid a wage, and the contracts and benefits were not as fruitful as they are now. As today’s television personalities own their own production company they are in a position
to be in charge. There are also whole rafts of different television channels to go and work for. If you storm out, then your talent can be appreciated elsewhere.Look at the behaviour displayed by Chris Evans; Radio One refused to let him have Friday off from the breakfast shows to concentrate on TFI Friday (in my opinion an iconic time capsule of the 1990s musical landscape), so he walked out in a huff. His television career did not flounder, and Virgin Radio was quick to invite him to do the breakfast show, which was identical to the old one. He then bought the station and became a prize dick! His refusal to turn up to work led to an acrimonious departure, which must have been a huge worry for him having to live on his last £75million! The BBC eventually gave him a second chance and now he has gone from the firebrand DJ rebel and Britpop champion to present a cosy couple of hours every weekday evening on Radio Two. A gesture of goodwill from the Beeb not afforded to Simon Dee all those years ago.
Even the media shitstorm created by Jonathon Ross and Russell Brand last year did little to temper the pay packets of the two culprits. After serving a suspension, Jonathon Ross is back to business as usual, (albeit a watered down shadow of his former self) on the same channel. Both Ross and Brand produced their own shows and moonlight as producers on other shows.
When Paul O’Grady had a contract dispute with ITV, he just upped sticks and moved to Channel Four. Or rather he did not do any actual moving, he carried on making his own show from the same studio (in the BBC oddly enough) with an identical format. Something that would not have been considered during the days of BBC or ITV or nothing.
Last year I did some research into the life and career of Simon Dee for a project that will now never happen. I caught some youtube clips of his old shows for a start, and read Whatever Happened to Simon Dee? The Story of a Sixties Star by Richard Wiseman. Looking at the footage of him in action on his top rated talk show Dee Time, I was taken aback by how amateurish he appeared. He was not a great interviewer; he looked ill at ease and very ‘Alan Partridge’ in places. However, he was also creating a new style of interview technique, years ahead of his time. Think about the chat shows of recent years, TFI Friday, The Word, The Big Breakfast, Loose Women, Richard and Judy, Des O’Conner Tonight and all the way back to Russell Harty and Terry Wogan. What do they all have in common? The answer is that none of them actually looked like they could carry an interview in a bucket, but at the same time made the audience feel at ease so they would warm to them. Television interviewers were very stiff before Simon Dee. He relaxed the etiquette of a chat show host and paved the way for all the imitators.
He is also alleged to be the main influence for the Austin Powers character, and it is easy to see why.
As is the case with many episodes of Top Of The Pops, Doctor Who and Not Only…But Also as the obvious examples, Dee Time fell victim to the BBC’s idiotic policy of wiping valuable tapes to use again.
The BBC’s money saving exercise in reusing tapes has left a hole in some rich television history, none more so than Simon Dee’s stint as a talk show host. In the BBC archive library at Windmill Road in London, you will find just one whole episode of Dee Time, along with several random clips of nine other shows.
This is in contravention of the BBC’s charter, drawn up in 1927 ‘to establish and maintain libraries and archives containing material relevant to the objects of the Corporation, and to make available to the public such libraries and archives with or without charge’.
After a drop in ratings, the show was moved around the schedules much to Dee’s chagrin. He left the BBC under a cloud and presented The Simon Dee Show for LWT.
Soon he fell out with them, and after a time hiding from and being caught by bailiffs, and claiming £6.90 a week dole money he set off to Australia to present a chat show for Channel 9. A dispute with management over money in which the network boss told him “We’ve been reading in the papers about you being short of money and signing on the dole, this is a hell of a lot more than the dole”.
Since that event, he went to prison for none payment of bills, made brief comebacks in radio, only to fall out with someone high up, marry four times, and become a subject of investigation due to his political beliefs. This led him to a paranoid period of writing letters to the press accusing ‘them’ of tapping his phone.
As I said before, such a fate would never had become of Simon Dee if he did it all in today’s media. Falling out of favour is good for business in some respects. Jade Goody went from national joke, to tolerated but not entirely disliked, to racist bully and national hate figure, to national treasure again.
Even if he did fall out of favour because he upset someone, a week or two in the jungle eating crocodile bollocks, or learning to ice skate or whatever would earn a few grand and hopefully lead to his second Warhol allocated fifteen minutes of fame.
Simon Dee will never know the legacy of celebrity he has bequeathed us. For better or for worse is a matter of debate when you look around a world of Heat magazine and game show contestants being turned into pop stars.
Nevertheless, is it better to be famous for being famous, or famous for having once been famous?
