Thomas Patrick O'Connor (31 October 1939 – 18 July 2021) was a British comedian, television presenter, and actor. Originally a comedian in

working men's club Working men's clubs are British private social clubs first created in the 19th century in industrial areas, particularly the North of England, Midlands, Scotland and South Wales Valleys, to provide recreation and education for working class m ...

s, he progressed to hosting TV game shows such as ''

Crosswits ''Crosswits'' was a British game show produced by Tyne Tees in association with Cove Productions and Action Time and filmed from their City Road studios in Newcastle upon Tyne. It was first shown on 3 September 1985 originally hosted by Barry C ...

'', ''

The Zodiac Game ''The Zodiac Game'' is a British game show that aired on ITV (TV network), ITV from 6 January 1984 to 27 August 1985 original format devised by Ron Bareham and is hosted by Tom O'Connor (comedian), Tom O'Connor with Bernard Fitzwalter as the f ...

'', '' Name That Tune'', ''

Password A password, sometimes called a passcode (for example in Apple devices), is secret data, typically a string of characters, usually used to confirm a user's identity. Traditionally, passwords were expected to be memorized, but the large number of ...

'' and '' Gambit''.

Early life

O'Connor was born in

Bootle Bootle (pronounced ) is a town in the Metropolitan Borough of Sefton, Merseyside, England, which had a population of 51,394 in 2011; the wider Parliamentary constituency had a population of 98,449. Historically part of Lancashire, Bootle ...

, and attended St Mary's College, Crosby, and Saint Mary's College,

Twickenham Twickenham is a suburban district in London, England. It is situated on the River Thames southwest of Charing Cross. Historically part of Middlesex, it has formed part of the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames since 1965, and the borou ...

. He became a mathematics and music teacher at the St Joan of Arc School, Bootle, and was also assistant headmaster. After work he appeared as a comedian in

Television career

His television break came when he appeared on '' The Comedians''. During the 1970s and 1980s, he was one of the most popular faces on British TV. He was a subject of the television programme ''

This Is Your Life This Is Your Life may refer to: Television * ''This Is Your Life'' (American franchise), an American radio and television documentary biography series hosted by Ralph Edwards * ''This Is Your Life'' (Australian TV series), the Australian versio ...

'' in 1977 when he was surprised by

Eamonn Andrews Eamonn Andrews, (19 December 1922 – 5 November 1987) was an Irish radio and television presenter, employed primarily in the United Kingdom from the 1950s to the 1980s. From 1960 to 1964 he chaired the Radio Éireann Authority (now the RTÉ A ...

. He continued to host many shows including ''Name that Tune'', ''Wednesday at 8'', ''The Tom O'Connor Show'', ''Gambit'', ''Crosswits'', and many more including ''The Tom O'Connor Road Show'' for the BBC. This show ran daily at lunch times and was watched by over 12 million viewers each day, but was an expensive show to mount as it came live from a different town each week, requiring the production team to move weekly. The show had several young producers who were overseen by executive producer Steve Weddel, and came out of the now defunct BBC

Pebble Mill Studios Pebble Mill Studios was the BBC's television studio complex located in Edgbaston, Birmingham, England, United Kingdom, which served as the headquarters for BBC Birmingham from 1971 until 2004. The nine-acre site was opened by Princess Anne on ...

. The script was written by O'Connor and writer Barry Faulkner, who had worked with O'Connor on his previous shows, with up-to-the-minute changes being made just before broadcast. In 2000, O'Connor made his television acting debut as Father Tom (a Catholic priest) in the BBC series '' Doctors''. On 24 February 2006, he was given an award for having appeared as a guest on the TV programme ''

Countdown A countdown is a sequence of backward counting to indicate the time remaining before an event is scheduled to occur. NASA commonly employs the terms "L-minus" and "T-minus" during the preparation for and anticipation of a rocket launch, and eve ...

'' 100 times. O'Connor won '' Celebrity Come Dine with Me'', scoring a record-breaking 29/30, on 14 March 2010. In 2011, O'Connor appeared on '' Pointless Celebrities'', a celebrity edition of the

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 (broadcasting), flagship network and is known for broadcasting mainstream programming, which includes BBC News ...

gameshow with his daughter-in-law

Denise Lewis Denise Lewis (born 27 August 1972) is a British sports presenter and former track and field athlete, who specialised in the heptathlon. She won the gold medal in the heptathlon at the 2000 Sydney Olympics, was twice Commonwealth Games champion, ...

(the gold medal winning Olympic heptathlete). They reached the final, eventually winning £500 for charity.

Stage career

His stage acting debut was as Pike in ''The Perils of the Pond'' at the

Playhouse ''Playhouse'' (german: Schauspielhaus) is a common term for a theatre. Specifically it may refer to: Venues Australia * Dunstan Playhouse, at the Adelaide Festival Centre, Adelaide, South Australia * The Playhouse, at the Arts Centre Melbourn ...

Weston-super-Mare Weston-super-Mare, also known simply as Weston, is a seaside town in North Somerset, England. It lies by the Bristol Channel south-west of Bristol between Worlebury Hill and Bleadon Hill. It includes the suburbs of Mead Vale, Milton, Oldmi ...

, in 1991. O'Connor also appeared in

summer stock theatre In American theater, summer-stock theater is a theater that presents stage productions only in the summer. The name combines the season with the tradition of staging shows by a resident company, reusing stock scenery and costumes. Summer stock th ...

cabaret Cabaret is a form of theatrical entertainment featuring music, song, dance, recitation, or drama. The performance venue might be a pub, a casino, a hotel, a restaurant, or a nightclub with a stage for performances. The audience, often dinin ...

tours and

pantomime Pantomime (; informally panto) is a type of musical comedy stage production designed for family entertainment. It was developed in England and is performed throughout the United Kingdom, Ireland and (to a lesser extent) in other English-speakin ...

Death

O'Connor, who had been diagnosed with

Parkinson's disease Parkinson's disease (PD), or simply Parkinson's, is a long-term degenerative disorder of the central nervous system that mainly affects the motor system. The symptoms usually emerge slowly, and as the disease worsens, non-motor symptoms becom ...

in 2007, died in hospital on 18 July 2021, aged 81.

Bibliography

* ''Tom O'Connor's Book of Liverpool Humour'' (1987) * ''Tom O'Connor's Book of the World's Worst Jokes'' (Pestalozzi Children's Village Trust, 1991) * ''From the Wood to the Tees: An Amusing Golf Companion'' (Robson, 1992) * ''One Flew Over the Clubhouse'' (Robson, 1993) * ''Take a Funny Turn'' (Robson, 1994) * ''Follow Me, I'm Right Behind You!'' (Robson, 1995) * ''Eat Like a Horse, Drink Like a Fish'' (Robson, 1996). * ''Fit to Travel'' (Acer Designs, 2004) * ''Golf...is Where You Find It'' (Acer Designs, 2005) * ''Is There Anything in that Empty Box?'' (Acer Designs, 2005) * ''I Remember: the Collected Thoughts of Tom O’Connor'' (Acer Designs, 2008)

References

* "Tom O'Connor." ''People of Today.'' Debrett's Ltd., 2007. Biography in Context. Web. Retrieved 2014-5-22

External links

*
Tom O'Connor Official Website
*

{{DEFAULTSORT:Oconnor, Tom English game show hosts English male soap opera actors English stand-up comedians People from Bootle 1939 births 2021 deaths Schoolteachers from Merseyside Comedians from Liverpool People educated at St Mary's College, Crosby English people of Irish descent Alumni of St Mary's University, Twickenham Neurological disease deaths in England Deaths from Parkinson's disease 20th-century English comedians 21st-century English comedians