Simon Dee: The Rise and Fall of a Television Star
Simon Dee (28 July 1935 – 29 August 2009) was a British television interviewer and radio disc jockey. He hosted the twice-weekly BBC TV chat show Dee Time in the late 1960s, which attracted up to 18 million viewers and made him one of the era’s most recognizable personalities.
Early Life and Education
Dee was born Cyril Nicholas Henty-Dodd on 28 July 1935 in Manchester, the only child of Cyril Edward Dodd and Doris Gwendoline Pilling. He was educated at Shrewsbury School, from which he was expelled, and later attended Brighton College. During his compulsory national service with the Royal Air Force, he served with a photo-reconnaissance unit and was stationed in Baghdad with RAF Intelligence, where he became involved with the domestic radio station at RAF Habbaniya and auditioned for British Forces Radio. He was wounded in the face by a sniper while in Cyprus.
Career and Achievements
After demobilisation in 1958, Dee worked various jobs including bouncer, actor, photographic assistant, builders’ labourer, leaf-sweeper in Hyde Park, and vacuum cleaner salesman. In 1964, he joined Radio Caroline, the pirate radio station broadcasting from a ship off the Essex coast. On 28 March 1964, his was the first live voice on the station, welcoming listeners and handing over to Chris Moore for the opening programme. He left Radio Caroline in 1965 after falling out with station directors over his refusal to play certain records and a dispute with the ship captain.
Dee joined the BBC Light Programme in 1965, introducing summer and late-night slots before joining the Top of the Pops team in 1966, replacing David Jacobs. He presented Radio 1 from September 1967 but quit in December that year to focus on television. He also worked on Radio Luxembourg during this period.
Dee’s television career peaked with Dee Time, which began in 1967 on BBC1. The show opened with sports announcer Len Martin announcing “It’s Siiiiimon Dee!” in a style imitating The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson, and closed with a sequence of Dee driving off in an E-type Jaguar with model Lorna McDonough. The opening became iconic of the 1960s, though it was also parodied by comedians including Benny Hill. In 1967, he hosted the Miss World contest from the Lyceum Ballroom, London. He also appeared in films including The Italian Job (1969) and Doctor in Trouble (1970).
In 1970, Dee moved to London Weekend Television on ITV after a contract dispute with the BBC over salary. He was offered £100,000 for a two-year contract and began The Simon Dee Show on Sunday evenings in January 1970. The programme was broadcast late in the evening after David Frost’s show and was only part-networked, with Granada Television screening editions a week later and Yorkshire Television not transmitting it at all. The show proved a ratings disaster, and after only a few months his contract was terminated following friction with station management and David Frost, who was part-owner of LWT.
Notable Events and Milestones
Dee’s first broadcast on Radio Caroline on 28 March 1964 marked the station’s launch as a pirate radio broadcaster. His move to the BBC Light Programme in 1965 established him as a mainstream broadcaster. The launch of Dee Time in 1967 became the defining moment of his career, establishing him as a major television personality with audiences reaching 18 million viewers. Only two complete editions of Dee Time survive in the BBC Archives, as programmes were transmitted live and the BBC seldom retained recordings at the time.
His departure from the BBC in 1969 and subsequent move to ITV in 1970 marked a turning point. The failure of The Simon Dee Show on LWT effectively ended his career as a major broadcaster, and he never recovered his former prominence.
Additional Resources
Dee’s life and career have been documented in various biographical works and television retrospectives. A Channel 4 revival of Dee Time was produced in 2003, and the 2004 Channel 4 programme Dee Construction featured recollections from contemporaries in broadcasting. More detailed information about his life and work is available through Wikipedia and other biographical archives.
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