Kathy Clugston (born 22 August 1969) is a

Northern Irish Northern Irish people is a demonym for all people born in Northern Ireland or people who are entitled to reside in Northern Ireland without any restriction on their period of residence. Most Northern Irish people either identify as Northern ...

presenter, newsreader and

continuity announcer In broadcasting, continuity or presentation (or station break in the U.S. and Canada) is announcements, messages and graphics played by the broadcaster between specific programmes. It typically includes programme schedules, announcement of the ...

BBC Radio 4 BBC Radio 4 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC that replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967. It broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history from the BBC' ...

BBC Radio 4 Extra BBC Radio 4 Extra (formerly BBC Radio 7) is a British digital radio station from the BBC, broadcasting archived repeats of comedy, drama and documentary programmes nationally, 24 hours a day. It is the sister station of BBC Radio 4 and the p ...

and the

BBC World Service The BBC World Service is an international broadcasting, international broadcaster owned and operated by the BBC, with funding from the Government of the United Kingdom, British Government through the Foreign Secretary, Foreign Secretary's o ...

. Born in

Belfast Belfast ( , ; from ga, Béal Feirste , meaning 'mouth of the sand-bank ford') is the capital and largest city of Northern Ireland, standing on the banks of the River Lagan on the east coast. It is the 12th-largest city in the United Kingdo ...

, Clugston attended Methodist College and then studied French and Russian at

Queen's University Belfast , mottoeng = For so much, what shall we give back? , top_free_label = , top_free = , top_free_label1 = , top_free1 = , top_free_label2 = , top_free2 = , established = , closed = , type = Public research university , parent = ...

. The degree course entailed a period in France and a year in

Voronezh Voronezh ( rus, links=no, Воро́неж, p=vɐˈronʲɪʂ}) is a city and the administrative centre of Voronezh Oblast in southwestern Russia straddling the Voronezh River, located from where it flows into the Don River. The city sits on the ...

, Russia. While at university, she was very active in the drama society, playing leading roles in ''

A Midsummer Night's Dream ''A Midsummer Night's Dream'' is a comedy written by William Shakespeare 1595 or 1596. The play is set in Athens, and consists of several subplots that revolve around the marriage of Theseus and Hippolyta. One subplot involves a conflict amon ...

'', ''

Private Lives ''Private Lives'' is a 1930 comedy of manners in three acts by Noël Coward. It concerns a divorced couple who, while honeymooning with their new spouses, discover that they are staying in adjacent rooms at the same hotel. Despite a perpetuall ...

'' and ''

Buried Child ''Buried Child'' is a play written by Sam Shepard that was first presented in 1978. It won the 1979 Pulitzer Prize for Drama and launched Shepard to national fame as a playwright. The play depicts the fragmentation of the American nuclear family i ...

'', among many others, and directed the 1952 play about Joan of Arc ''L'Alouette'' (''The Lark'') by

Jean Anouilh Jean Marie Lucien Pierre Anouilh (; 23 June 1910 – 3 October 1987) was a French dramatist whose career spanned five decades. Though his work ranged from high drama to absurdist farce, Anouilh is best known for his 1944 play ''Antigone'', an ad ...

. Clugston worked as a continuity announcer and transmission director at

BBC Northern Ireland BBC Northern Ireland ( ga, BBC Thuaisceart Éireann; Ulster-Scots: ''BBC Norlin Airlan'') is a division of the BBC and the main public broadcaster in Northern Ireland. It is widely available across both Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ire ...

from 1996 to 2003, announcing for

BBC One Northern Ireland BBC One Northern Ireland is a Northern Irish television channel based on the UK-wide BBC One, owned and operated by BBC Northern Ireland. The service is broadcast from Broadcasting House in Belfast. In the rest of the UK, BBC One Northern Irelan ...

BBC Two Northern Ireland BBC Two Northern Ireland ( ga, BBC Thuaisceart Éireann a Dó) is the Northern Irish variation of BBC Two operated by BBC Northern Ireland. It is broadcast via digital terrestrial transmitters and from the SES Astra 2E satellite (transponder 48 ...

, and appearing as one of three in-vision announcers on

BBC Choice BBC Choice was a British digital television channel which was owned by the BBC and was launched on 23 September 1998. It was the first British TV channel to broadcast exclusively in digital format, as well as the BBC's second non-analogue-terres ...

Northern Ireland between 1999 and 2001. She also lent her voice to the BBC Northern Ireland animated comedy series ''The Folks on the Hill''. Clugston has also worked for a brief period for network

BBC One BBC One is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network owned and operated by the BBC. It is the corporation's flagship network and is known for broadcasting mainstream programming, which includes BBC News television bulletins, p ...

BBC Two BBC Two is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network owned and operated by the BBC. It covers a wide range of subject matter, with a remit "to broadcast programmes of depth and substance" in contrast to the more mainstream an ...

throughout early 2007 & mid-2017. Before starting at Radio 4, Clugston spent some years in

Amsterdam Amsterdam ( , , , lit. ''The Dam on the River Amstel'') is the Capital of the Netherlands, capital and Municipalities of the Netherlands, most populous city of the Netherlands, with The Hague being the seat of government. It has a population ...

, working as a reporter and presenter for

Radio Netherlands Worldwide Radio Netherlands (RNW; nl, Radio Nederland Wereldomroep) was a public radio and television network based in Hilversum, producing and transmitting programmes for international audiences outside the Netherlands from 1947 to 2012. Its services i ...

. She began working on Radio 4 in 2006, and first read evening news bulletins in 2007. In April 2008, she began newsreading duties on the ''

Today Today (archaically to-day) may refer to: * Day of the present, the time that is perceived directly, often called ''now'' * Current era, present * The current calendar date Arts, entertainment, and media Films * ''Today'' (1930 film), a 1930 A ...

'' programme. Alongside her newsreading and announcing duties, Clugston is known as "The Posh Radio 4 Lady", or "The PR4L", on

Scott Mills Scott Robert Mills (born 28 March 1973) is an English radio DJ, television presenter and occasional actor. He is best known for presenting the '' Scott Mills'' show on BBC Radio 1 from 2004 to 2022 and since then, on BBC Radio 2. Mills has also ...

's afternoon radio show on

BBC Radio 1 BBC Radio 1 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC. It specialises in modern popular music and current chart hits throughout the day. The station provides alternative genres at night, including electronica, dance, ...

, reading out emails from listeners. More recently she took part in ''Scott Mills The Musical'' in her role of "Posh Radio 4 Lady". As well as being a

ukulele The ukulele ( ; from haw, ukulele , approximately ), also called Uke, is a member of the lute family of instruments of Portuguese origin and popularized in Hawaii. It generally employs four nylon strings. The tone and volume of the instrumen ...

player who made a documentary for Radio 4 in 2009 she came up with the idea for "Radio4minus1letter", taking a radio programme title and dropping a single letter to create a new title, while using

Twitter Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...

. The idea led to a book, ''A Brief History of Tim: The World Minus One Letter'': Clugston reads the latest creations on ''

Broadcasting House Broadcasting House is the headquarters of the BBC, in Portland Place and Langham Place, London. The first radio broadcast from the building was made on 15 March 1932, and the building was officially opened two months later, on 15 May. The main ...

''. In the autumn of 2014, the

Watermill Theatre The Watermill Theatre is a repertory theatre in Bagnor, Berkshire. It opened in 1967 in Bagnor Mill, a converted watermill on the River Lambourn. As a producing house, the theatre has produced works that have subsequently moved on to the We ...

, Newbury, Berkshire, staged the premier production of her musical comedy ''But First This: A Musical Homage to Radio 4'' starring

Michael Fenton Stevens Michael Fenton Stevens (born 12 February 1958) is an English actor and comedian. He is best known for being a founder member of The Hee Bee Gee Bees and the voice behind the ''Spitting Image'' 1986 number 1 hit "The Chicken Song". He also starred ...

John Humphrys Desmond John Humphrys (born 17 August 1943) is a Welsh broadcaster. From 1981 to 1987 he was the main presenter for the '' Nine O'Clock News'', the flagship BBC News television programme, and from 1987 until 2019 he presented on the BBC Radio 4 ...

. Clugston is the female voice on the Tom Tom traffic, navigation and mapping product. She reads articles for the audio edition of ''

The Economist ''The Economist'' is a British weekly newspaper printed in demitab format and published digitally. It focuses on current affairs, international business, politics, technology, and culture. Based in London, the newspaper is owned by The Econo ...

''. In late 2015, she began presentin
The Radio 4 in Four Podcast
a weekly podcast for the channel. In April 2016, in an article in ''

The Daily Telegraph ''The Daily Telegraph'', known online and elsewhere as ''The Telegraph'', is a national British daily broadsheet newspaper published in London by Telegraph Media Group and distributed across the United Kingdom and internationally. It was fo ...

'' and a programme "The Neglected Sense" on Radio Four, Clugston revealed that she has suffered since childhood from

anosmia Anosmia, also known as smell blindness, is the loss of the ability to detect one or more smells. Anosmia may be temporary or permanent. It differs from hyposmia, which is a decreased sensitivity to some or all smells. Anosmia can be due to a num ...

, the lack of a sense of smell. In March 2019

confirmed that in May 2019, Clugston would replace the retiring

Eric Robson Eric Bell Robson (born 31 December 1946) is a television broadcaster, author and documentary film maker who has lived for most of his life in Cumbria, where he has a sheep farm. For many years he was the main presenter of ''Brass Tacks''. Earl ...

as chair of the popular Radio 4 series ''

Gardeners' Question Time ''Gardeners' Question Time'' is a long-running BBC Radio 4 programme in which amateur gardeners can put questions to a panel of experts. History The first programme was broadcast in the North and Northern Ireland Home Service of the BBC at 22 ...

''. This became effective on May 3.

References

External links

Kathy Clugston
at

Kathy Clugston
at voiceover.co.uk
Kathy Clugston
reading the Shipping Forecast on 7 June 2017 {{DEFAULTSORT:Clugston, Kathy Mass media people from Belfast BBC newsreaders and journalists BBC Radio 4 BBC World Service people Living people Radio and television announcers 1969 births People educated at Methodist College Belfast