Claudia Winkleman

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Claudia Winkleman

Claudia Winkleman at the BAFTA Awards
Born January 15, 1972 (1972-01-15) (age 36)
Occupation Television presenter

Claudia Anne I. Winkleman [1] (born 15 January 1972) is a British TV presenter and journalist. She is the daughter of Eve Pollard, former editor of the Sunday Express and Barry Winkleman, a former publisher of The Times Atlas Of The World. Her stepfather is Sir Nicholas Lloyd, former editor of the Daily Express and her half sister, from her father's second marriage to children's author Cindy Black, is the actress Sophie Winkleman.

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[edit] Education

Brought up in the affluent Hampstead suburb of London, Winkleman attended the independent City of London School for Girls. From there she went on to the all-female New Hall College at Cambridge University, where she excelled, graduating with an MA in History of Art.

[edit] TV Career

Winkleman's first major Television job was in 1991 on the regional discussion programme Central Weekend. In 1992, she began to frequently appear in the long-running BBC series Holiday and continued to do so throughout the mid-1990s. This culminated in a special documentary in which she travelled around the world for 34 days reporting from Japan, India, Costa Rica and Dubai.

Through this period Winkleman also appeared as a reporter on several different shows, most notably This Morning, on which she would interview various celebrities, including Michelle Pfieffer and Harrison Ford (of whom she has often since referred to as "my least favourite interviewee... and only interested in carpentry").

In the late Nineties, Winkleman's career was given a platform to flourish with the arrival of Digital television in Britain. By definition, these smaller digital channels were receiving smaller, more niche audiences and Claudia reportedly felt that her unique presenting style lent itself to the less regulated medium. She had a stint on the now rather inauspicious cable channel L!VE TV, run by Kelvin MacKenzie and Janet Street-Porter but soon left to pursue other things. One project made at this period was a short series called Toilets which drew upon her supposedly extensive knowledge and experience of toilets and ironically attempted to examine the "...design, etiquette, psychology and hidden culture behind the humble loo". She also presented a number of fun and giddy Gameshows, including the dating show Three's A Crowd and Fanorama, which featured a young David Mitchell as a team captain, in his first television outing. She was also an occasional team captain herself on a gameshow called HeadJam, hosted by Vernon Kay - she lost every time.

Between 2002 and 2004 Winkleman began her first daily TV role when she hosted the BBC Three Entertainment update show Liquid News. The show, originally hosted by the late Christopher Price on the now defunct BBC Choice was shown live, six times a week - a routine Claudia was destined to become very accustomed to - and she shared the presenting duties with Colin Paterson and later Paddy O'Connell. The show was irreverent and playful, and often caused a stir, the largest of which occurred when Claudia interviewed S Club 7 in May 2003. She asked the band, who had just announced their split, about their financial situation. Despite the group themselves seeming happy to answer the question, a PR woman stormed onto the set to halt the interview. Although the altercation was not recorded live, the footage was still shown on that night's programme, typical of the show's cheeky nature.

In 2003, Fame Academy asked Winkleman to present a daily update show on BBC Three, in conjunction with its second series. It was a format that would prove to be hugely innovative. Reporting from behind the scenes of the show, Claudia would conduct daily interviews with contestants, experts and celebrity pundits. She repeated the show in 2005 for the much shorter celebrity version Comic Relief Does Fame Academy. By this stage, Winkleman had begun what has ultimately proven to be her most successful vehicle Strictly Come Dancing: It Takes Two, see It Takes Two for more details. She started the show in 2004 and it is still going today.

With her rising popularity, Winkleman was afforded the opportunity to demonstrate her intellectual side - rare amongst her peers - by presenting several more upmarket reality shows including End Of Story in 2004, a literature based show, and Art School in 2005, a programme which saw five unlikely celebrities go through a two-week art course at the Chelsea College of Art and Design. The latter was especially suited to Winkleman, given her Art History background.

By now Claudia had established herself as a genuine television presence, and though she always stated that she was much happier in the relative cosiness of early-evening BBC Two and BBC Three, she began taking on larger prime time presenting roles. In 2007 she took over from Cat Deeley as the main host for the third series of Comic Relief Does Fame Academy, co-hosting with Patrick Kielty. She also found an high-profile presenting job in Eurovision. She co-hosted coverage of the inaugural Eurovision Dance Contest 2007 alongside Graham Norton for BBC One in September of that year, and also co-presented the UK selection process for the Eurovision Song Contest 2008 called Eurovision: Your Decision, this time accompanied by Eurovision stalwart Sir Terry Wogan. In March 2008, Winkleman rekindled her partnership with Patrick Kielty when the pair hosted the final leg of Sport Relief 2008, announcing £19,640,321 as the final amount raised through viewer's donations. She has since spoken of how much she was moved by the experience.

In another display of her contrasting abilities, Winkleman also became the face of Sky Movie Premiere's coverage of the 79th Academy Awards, repeating it for the 80th Academy Awards in 2008. The show is recorded live in conjunction to the ceremony itself, running right through the night into the early hours of the morning, and it affords Winkleman the opportunity to display both her knowledge of film and fashion.

Claudia has made many guest appearances on various panel and talk shows including: Never Mind the Buzzcocks, Would I Lie To You? (in which she appeared on David Mitchell's team, thus reprising their earlier gameshow collaboration), Have I Got News for You and Lily Allen and Friends. In February 2008, she appeared on the British version of the comedy improvisational show Thank God You're Here, hosted by Paul Merton. In it she had to improvise a scene in which she played a boarding school girl who had been called to the Headmistress's office. It signalled her first foray into televised acting.

Claudia also narrates the BBC 3 show Glamour Girls, a documentary series focusing on Britain's glamour industry[2].

It is reported that Winkleman is filming a new gameshow with Fiona Bruce rumoured to be entitled What Are You Like?[3]. It is due to be aired later in 2008.

[edit] It Takes Two

It is through her work on Strictly Come Dancing: It Takes Two that Claudia has gained most recognition as a highly entertaining and engaging television host. The programme - which started in 2004 - was devised as a companion show to run conjoined with the second series of Strictly Come Dancing, and has now finished its fourth series. It follows a similar format to the one Claudia made popular on Fame Academy and sees Claudia deliberating and dissecting the ins and outs of the main competition accompanied by an array of dance experts, celebrity pundits and the competitors themselves. The show is aired every weekday throughout the course of the series at six thirty on BBC Two. Despite its long run, the show maintains a freshness and zeal, always good-humoured and irreverent. The show's four judges - Bruno Tonioli, Arlene Phillips, Craig Revel Horwood and Len Goodman - almost always appear on her show once a week.

One of the show's highlights is Len's Masterclass, a segment in which Head Judge Len Goodman demonstrates with Claudia a dance move or two. Claudia's hapless attempts to follow the steps are accompanied by much girlish giggling and suggestive innuendo - mainly concerning the size of her "Chesticles".

The show receives some three million viewers on average.[citation needed] It will return for a new series in October 2008.[citation needed]

[edit] Writing

Winkleman started her written journalism as a travel writer, with informative and entertaining columns about her various worldwide excursions. She did so in The Sunday Times and The Independent but also contributed to the free daily London paper Metro in a similar capacity. As her Television career - and family - evolved, she travelled less and began to write more general work, opinion-led Lifestyle journalism about womanhood, sex and relationships. She wrote for Cosmopolitan and Tatler amongst others.

Since 2005 she has written a regular Wednesday column for The Independent called Take It From Me collating her various musings on the lighter sides of current affairs, celebrity news and anecdotes concerning her own life. These mostly comprise of tongue-in-cheek diatribes on the shortcomings of men and the pitfalls of juggling a professional life with that of being a mother. Her column often angles towards the more irritating aspects of life, with her husband regularly the subject of loving scorn. In 2007, this resulted in her husband writing her column instead, as something of a retaliation, though he has done this only the once.

On the 9th April 2008, Claudia wrote in The Independent about her having read this very entry on herself when scouring the internet looking for something to write about. In the column she denied recent speculation (mentioned on this site) that she was to have a third baby - she put her perceived new bulge down to the fact that she had not "...banned pasta from my world." She wrote of typing her name into Google and looking at this entry on Wikipedia. She then stated that this entry had read, "Since her recent appearance on Sport Relief it is obvious that Claudia is expecting her third baby. There has been no confirmation as yet". This is in fact untrue, as it actually read, "There are rumours, following her appearance presenting Sport Relief 2008, that she is expecting a third child, but this has yet to be confirmed." Either way, Claudia was immensely perturbed by the knowledge that there was any speculation that she was pregnant, when she wasn't, and - having rejected ideas from her friend Lucy that it was "...to do with the dress" or that "...they'd got her mixed up with Kate Thornton" - decided that the best course of action was to "have a slice of cake and a cup of tea"[4].

[edit] Radio Work

From the 19th April 2008, Claudia began hosting the first in a six part comedy quiz series taking a humorous look into the week's celebrity gossip, called, aptly enough, Hot Gossip. The show takes place on a Saturday afternoon on BBC Radio 2 and sees Claudia dishing out points for those who dish out dirt[5]. The show has featured many famous pundits, including Will Smith, Phil Nichol, Jo Caulfield, Rufus Hound and Jonathan Ross' brother, Paul.

[edit] Charity And Other Work

Claudia uses her influence to participate in a lot of charity work. In 2007, she travelled to Uganda for Comic Relief where the harsh realities of the AIDS situation there affected her greatly (she made a video diary which can be viewed here: Claudia's Ugandan Video Diary). Following this she manned the phones at the BT Tower for the Disasters Emergency Committee in response to the problems in Darfur[6]. She also relaunched The National Missing Person's Campaign and supported Refuge charity's Raise Your Hand Christmas Campaign for women and children against domestic violence.

In April 2008, she became a guest photographer for Barnardo's children's hospice, photographing the plight of homeless children in the London borough of Camden for an exhibition to be held at The Getty Images Gallery in Mayfair, London. She is also an outspoken advocate for The White Ribbon Campaign, as well as many other charities.

Claudia has also presented several Award Ceremonies including the Purple Heart Awards, The HSBC Awards and The Campaign Digital Awards. In addition she has hosted promotional videos for companies such as John Lewis Partnership, C&J Clark and the British airport consortium BAA Limited.

[edit] Personal life

Winkleman is married to Kris Thykier[7] - once a partner of the infamous PR firm Freud Communications with Matthew Freud, he has since joined forces with film director Matthew Vaughn in setting up a film production company. They live in the Hyde Park area of London where she is a neighbour of Tony Blair. They have two children: Jake, born in March 2003, and Matilda, born in June 2006. In April 2008, Claudia denied speculation that she was due to have a third baby, see Writing for details.

[edit] Image

Claudia has become famed for her very definite sense of style, initially made notable by her thick straight fringe or bangs. So prescient was her hairstyle, she could arguably be deemed responsible for the its proliferation in Britain towards the end of 2007/8, though Kate Moss is usually accredited. Ironically, it was as the style became truly fashionable that Claudia ditched her trademark fringe for a central parting. She wrote with extensive irony about the emotional trials involved in finally cutting off her fringe, in her weekly newspaper column. She went as far as to refer to herself simply as "the girl with the fringe".

She is rarely seen without lashings of eye liner and eye shadow which give her a vampish, retro style, often teamed up with floaty designs by designers such as Chloé and Chanel.

Winkleman also has a much-vaunted penchant for Christian Louboutin.

[edit] Fan Base

With her distinctive looks, quirky sense of humour and innate charm, Claudia has become one of the most popular personalities on British TV. It has been said that her education and wit make her "The Thinking Man's Davina McCall" and that her burgeoning success is due to her popularity amongst women and men alike.

Claudia is a popular figure in Blogs and on Message Boards. There is even a group, on the the social networking site Facebook, called It May Take Two To Tango But There's Only One Claudia Winkleman, in which members divulge any dreams they may have had in which she features. Fans refer to such dreams as "Winklewinks".

[edit] Other Miscellanea

  • In 2003, Claudia raised £7000 for Comic Relief by getting people to sponsor her for every hour she was in labour with her first son Jake. His birthday coincided with Red Nose Day.
  • Claudia has a crush on the sixty year old British newsreader Jon Snow. She has said of him, "I fantasise about having sex with him. He is my dream boy, because he's fiercely intelligent and wears a jaunty tie."[8]

[edit] References

  1. ^ Birth Index, General Register Office
  2. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1219967/
  3. ^ http://www.ukgameshows.com/page/index.php?title=What_Are_You_Like%3F What Are You like
  4. ^ Take It From Me, The Independent, 09/04/2008
  5. ^ http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio2/comedy/ BBC Radio 2
  6. ^ DEC work, 24/05/2007
  7. ^ Interview In The Telegraph, 2005
  8. ^ http://arts.guardian.co.uk/art/visualart/story/0,,2274351,00.html The Guardian, April 20th, 2008

[edit] External links