Background
NORMAN, Barry was born on August 21, 1933 in London. Son of Leslie Norman and Elizabeth Norman.
NORMAN, Barry was born on August 21, 1933 in London. Son of Leslie Norman and Elizabeth Norman.
He was educated at a state primary school and at Highgate School, then an all-boys independent school in North London.
He presented British Broadcasting Corporation Television"s Film 72 (and successive years) until 1998. He did not go to university, but instead began his career in journalism 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. He is the brother of script editor and director Valerie Norman.
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 has written several novels. Film critic
He presented BBC1"s Film programme from 1972, becoming the sole presenter the following year.
Norman"s involvement was broken in 1982 by a brief spell presenting Omnibus.
After having returned to the Film series in 1983, Norman became increasingly irritated by the British Broadcasting Corporation"s reluctance to screen the programme at a regular time, and in 1998 he finally accepted an offer to work for BSkyB, where he remained for three years. Jonathan Ross took his place as the British Broadcasting Corporation programme"s presenter. Norman has written and presented a number of documentary series for the British Broadcasting Corporation, including Hollywood Greats (1977-1979, 1983), British Greats (1980) and Talking Pictures (1987).
Radio
Barry Norman was for some years a regular radio broadcaster.
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. Satire
He is associated with the phrase "and why not?", which originated not as his catchphrase - though he did say it occasionally on his programmes - 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 Independent Television 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, which he doesn"t have), but later somewhat moderated his attitude and felt flattered that the series found him famous enough to include him in its sketches.
And Why Not?: of a Film Lover (2003)
See You in the Morning (2013).
Politically, Norman is a supporter of the Liberal Democrats.
Married Diana Narracott in 1957.