P
peter hayes
Guest
Great news for all of us: Bill Oddie has been awarded an OBE. The announcement will be made in tomorrow's UK newspapers.
May I may be the first to offer The Great Man my congratulations. For those of you who don't know much about Our Bill, he is Britain's most famous birder. Here is a background piece:
Peter
GOODIE WITH A PASSION FOR WILDLIFE
Bill Oddie was one of the three offbeat brains behind madcap 1970s comedy The Goodies - but he is rewarded for his services to conservation.
The 61-year-old has become one of Britain's best loved wildlife
broadcasters, stemming from his hobby of birdwatching.
Just last month Oddie fronted an ambitious week-long broadcast called Wild In Your Garden for the BBC.
The bearded funnyman was born in Sparth Bottoms Road, Rochdale, and was brought up largely by his father after his mother left. They moved later to the West Midlands.
As a child he would collect birds' eggs but corrected the error of
his ways to develop a huge love of birds, writing about his finds for local clubs.
He was a contemporary of fellow Goodie Tim Brooke-Taylor and Monty Python star John Cleese at Cambridge University where he became a member of the world-famous Footlights comedy group.
Oddie's musical abilities helped him to lampoon pop songs and after touring the US he was signed up as a scriptwriter for That Was The Week That Was.
He went on to work on BBC radio's I'm Sorry I'll Read That Again and TV satire BBC 3, before eventually teaming up with Brooke-Taylor and Graeme Garden for a series called Broaden Your Mind, which became The Goodies.
The surreal series - in which the trio rode a three seater bike -
was once described by Oddie as Buster Keaton meets Tom and Jerry .
Notable moments from the show included a cat scaling the Post Office Tower and the bun fight at the OK tearooms.
A rumoured movie failed to come to fruition and budget constraints on the series meant The Goodies headed to ITV, but the show was dropped after one series.
He has lamented: The Goodies was great fun, but people have had a preconceived idea about what I can do ever since. I've been regarded as almost a cartoon figure because of it.
Oddie went on to develop his work with wildlife shows, spending the honeymoon to his second marriage in Papua New Guinea with a BBC film crew for the documentary Oddie In Paradise.
May I may be the first to offer The Great Man my congratulations. For those of you who don't know much about Our Bill, he is Britain's most famous birder. Here is a background piece:
Peter
GOODIE WITH A PASSION FOR WILDLIFE
Bill Oddie was one of the three offbeat brains behind madcap 1970s comedy The Goodies - but he is rewarded for his services to conservation.
The 61-year-old has become one of Britain's best loved wildlife
broadcasters, stemming from his hobby of birdwatching.
Just last month Oddie fronted an ambitious week-long broadcast called Wild In Your Garden for the BBC.
The bearded funnyman was born in Sparth Bottoms Road, Rochdale, and was brought up largely by his father after his mother left. They moved later to the West Midlands.
As a child he would collect birds' eggs but corrected the error of
his ways to develop a huge love of birds, writing about his finds for local clubs.
He was a contemporary of fellow Goodie Tim Brooke-Taylor and Monty Python star John Cleese at Cambridge University where he became a member of the world-famous Footlights comedy group.
Oddie's musical abilities helped him to lampoon pop songs and after touring the US he was signed up as a scriptwriter for That Was The Week That Was.
He went on to work on BBC radio's I'm Sorry I'll Read That Again and TV satire BBC 3, before eventually teaming up with Brooke-Taylor and Graeme Garden for a series called Broaden Your Mind, which became The Goodies.
The surreal series - in which the trio rode a three seater bike -
was once described by Oddie as Buster Keaton meets Tom and Jerry .
Notable moments from the show included a cat scaling the Post Office Tower and the bun fight at the OK tearooms.
A rumoured movie failed to come to fruition and budget constraints on the series meant The Goodies headed to ITV, but the show was dropped after one series.
He has lamented: The Goodies was great fun, but people have had a preconceived idea about what I can do ever since. I've been regarded as almost a cartoon figure because of it.
Oddie went on to develop his work with wildlife shows, spending the honeymoon to his second marriage in Papua New Guinea with a BBC film crew for the documentary Oddie In Paradise.
