Surprise, Surprise (TV Series)
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''Surprise Surprise'' is a British
light entertainment Light entertainment encompasses a broad range of television and radio programming that includes comedies, variety shows, game shows, quiz shows and the like. In the UK In the early days of the BBC, virtually all broadcast entertainment would b ...
television programme that aired in two iterations on ITV. The series originally ran from 6 May 1984 to 26 December 2001 and was hosted by
Cilla Black Priscilla Maria Veronica White (27 May 1943 – 1 August 2015), better known as Cilla Black, was an English singer and television presenter. Championed by her friends the Beatles, Black began her career as a singer in 1963. Her singles "A ...
, while a revival of the show aired from 21 October 2012 to 26 July 2015 with Holly Willoughby as host.


Format

''Surprise Surprise'' was filmed in front of a studio audience. Its premise involved surprising members of the public with the fulfilment of long-held wishes, setting up tricks to fool members of the public, making
prank call A prank call (also known as a crank call, a hoax call, or a goof call) is a telephone call intended by the caller as a practical joke played on the person answering. It is often a type of nuisance call and can be illegal under certain circumsta ...
s to people, and reuniting guests with long-lost loved ones. Original host Cilla Black was initially assisted by Christopher Biggins, but more famously for eight series by Bob Carolgees, famous for his
glove puppetry Glove puppetry () is a type of opera using cloth puppets that originated during the 17th century in Quanzhou or Zhangzhou of China's Fujian province, and historically practised in the Min Nan-speaking areas such as Quanzhou, Zhangzhou, the Chaos ...
act ''Spit the Dog'' (who previously appeared in the first series with a puppet
ferret The ferret (''Mustela furo'') is a small, domesticated species belonging to the family Mustelidae. The ferret is most likely a domesticated form of the wild European polecat (''Mustela putorius''), as evidenced by the ferret's ability to inter ...
), with Gordon Burns and
Tessa Sanderson Theresa Ione Sanderson (born 14 March 1956) is a British former javelin thrower. She appeared in every Summer Olympic Games, Summer Olympics from 1976 to 1996, winning the gold medal in the Athletics at the 1984 Summer Olympics – Women's ja ...
as roving reporters. Other featured acts were "Cilla-grams," where Black would perform a song in a musical sketch relevant to the surprise a person was receiving (for example, a soldier was celebrating his 21st birthday, so the featuring song Black sang was " Celebration" by Kool & The Gang). The concept of the first series had been to film surprising and often unusual moments similar to those previously seen on '' Game for a Laugh''. This included a phone game that used viewers numbers and answering questions to try and form a winning line. Others included dancing and sporting events, and there were surprise reunions between family members. The popularity of this element of the show led executive producer Alan Boyd to change the format slightly so that all items in subsequent series involved surprises, rather than just being surprising. Although including many pre-filmed inserts, the first series and some early episodes of the second series were televised live in their entirety, but thereafter all episodes were pre-recorded. From 1984 to 1988, the show was broadcast on Sunday evenings. From 1989 to 1992, the show moved to Fridays, before returning to the Sunday evening timeslot from 1993 to 1996. The final series of the original run in 1997 was broadcast on Friday evenings. Between 1998 and 2001, a one-off special episode was produced per year which aired on Mother's Day from 1998 until 2000, and then at Christmas for 2001. Over the years, the show had many special guests, some of whom appeared live, including
Neil Diamond Neil Leslie Diamond (born January 24, 1941) is an American singer-songwriter. He has sold more than 130 million records worldwide, making him one of the List of best-selling music artists, best-selling musicians of all time. He has written and ...
. Many variety acts were also featured on the show. The
Spice Girls The Spice Girls are an English girl group formed in 1994, consisting of Mel B ("Scary Spice"), Melanie C ("Sporty Spice"), Emma Bunton ("Baby Spice"), Geri Halliwell ("Ginger Spice"), and Victoria Beckham ("Posh Spice"). They have sold over 10 ...
made their live debut on an episode in 1996.


Revival

In March 2012, it was announced that Holly Willoughby would host a revamped one-off episode of ''Surprise Surprise'' for ITV, although a full series was later announced. The series had six hour-long episodes, with episode 1 airing on 21 October 2012. A second series followed this in 2013, a third in 2014 and a fourth in 2015. In the show, Willoughby is joined by various locations reporters, these have included Marvin Humes, Mark Wright, Dave Berry,
Peter Andre Peter Andre (born Peter James Andrea; 27 February 1973) is a British-Australian singer, songwriter, and media personality. Born in England to Cypriot parents and raised in Australia, Andre achieved success in the mid-1990s as a singer, topping ...
and Matt Johnson. In one 2013 episode,
Cilla Black Priscilla Maria Veronica White (27 May 1943 – 1 August 2015), better known as Cilla Black, was an English singer and television presenter. Championed by her friends the Beatles, Black began her career as a singer in 1963. Her singles "A ...
made a surprise appearance on the show, singing a bit of the original theme as the show went to commercials (after Willoughby made the comment that producers refused to let her sing the song).


Final episodes

The last series hosted by Holly Willoughby aired on
ITV1 ITV1 (formerly known as ITV) is a British free-to-air Public service broadcasting in the United Kingdom, public broadcast television channel owned and operated by the British media company ITV plc. It provides the ITV (TV network), Channel 3 ...
between 21 June and 26 July 2015. On 17 June 2016, ITV announced that the show had been cancelled and would not return for 2017. Willoughby called for the show to return for another series, but this did not happen. A previously unbroadcast episode of the show, hosted by
Cilla Black Priscilla Maria Veronica White (27 May 1943 – 1 August 2015), better known as Cilla Black, was an English singer and television presenter. Championed by her friends the Beatles, Black began her career as a singer in 1963. Her singles "A ...
that featured appearances from Irish boyband
Westlife Westlife are an Irish pop group formed in Dublin in 1998. The group consists of members Nicky Byrne, Shane Filan, Kian Egan and Mark Feehily. Brian McFadden was a member before leaving in March 2004. The group disbanded in 2012 and later reun ...
and singer Gareth Gates, which was originally produced in 2003 as a one-off special to celebrate the series' 20th anniversary, was broadcast on
ITV3 ITV3 is a Television in the United Kingdom, British free-to-air television channel owned by ITV Digital Channels, a division of ITV plc. The channel was first launched on Monday 1 November 2004 at 9 pm, replacing Plus (British TV channel), Plus ...
on 27 December 2015, four months after Black's death. It wasn't originally broadcast at the time due to Black's departure from ITV earlier that year.


Theme songs

Cilla Black Priscilla Maria Veronica White (27 May 1943 – 1 August 2015), better known as Cilla Black, was an English singer and television presenter. Championed by her friends the Beatles, Black began her career as a singer in 1963. Her singles "A ...
introduced and closed each show by singing a theme song. The theme song from series one to eight was written by
Kate Robbins Kate Elizabeth Robbins (born 21 August 1958) is an English actress, singer, and songwriter. She came to prominence in the early 1980s when she scored a top ten single on the UK Official Charts with "More Than in Love", while she was appearing i ...
and was often imitated by Black impersonators, beginning ''"The more the world is changing, the more it stays the same..."''. The track was included on Black's 1985 album '' Surprisingly Cilla'', and as a single through Towerbell Records. A new song was written from series nine in 1992, until the show's conclusion in 2001, and the 2003 birthday special: ''"Reaching out, holding hands, reliving memories... Life is full, full of surprises...And the nicest surprise in my life is you!"'' Around 2022-23, the song enjoyed a resurgence on the social media app
TikTok TikTok, known in mainland China and Hong Kong as Douyin (), is a social media and Short-form content, short-form online video platform owned by Chinese Internet company ByteDance. It hosts user-submitted videos, which may range in duration f ...
. It then experienced another resurgence in 2025, when TikToker Dannie D used the song as part of his videos surrounding news of the administration of US president
Donald Trump Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who is the 47th president of the United States. A member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, he served as the 45 ...
. His signature move, lifting his leg up in time to the sound of the song in response to news of president Trump’s failures, went viral and became widely recognized throughout the platform. The revived series updated its theme for 2013. This theme uses a remixed instrumental version of the chorus from Black's original song "Surprise, Surprise".


Transmissions


Series

;Original ;Revival


Specials

;Original ;Revival


Awards


International versions


Notes


References


External links


Official Twitter page''Surprise Surprise'' at itv.com
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Surprise Surprise (Tv Series) 1984 British television series debuts 2015 British television series endings 1990s British television series 2000s British television series British reality television series British television shows featuring puppetry Cilla Black ITV (TV network) original programming London Weekend Television shows Television series by ITV Studios British television series revived after cancellation British English-language television shows