Brian Dowling

Brian Dowling
Born Brian Patrick Robert Dowling
13 June 1978 (1978-06-13) (age 33)
Rathangan, County Kildare, Ireland
Occupation Television presenter
(previously flight attendant)
Years active 2001–present
Agent Debi Allen Associates
Website
Official website

Brian Patrick Robert Dowling (born 13 June 1978) is an Irish television presenter who rose to fame after being crowned the winner of the second series of UK reality television show Big Brother in 2001. He also won Ultimate Big Brother in 2010, making him the ultimate Big Brother housemate. In 2008, he was runner-up in the Irish reality television series Fáilte Towers.

Dowling guest-presented Live From Studio Five alongside Kate Walsh from 2010 until its cancellation in February 2011. On 21 July 2011, it was confirmed that he would host the UK edition of Big Brother upon its transfer to Channel 5 and has so far presented the 12th series of the original show and two series of the celebrity editions.

Dowling is often thought of as the first openly gay children's TV presenter. However, Philip Tyler preceded him when he presented Bosco, though Tyler's sexual orientation was not widely known during the 1980s.[1]

Contents

Early life

Before he entered the public eye, Dowling, from Rathangan, County Kildare, Ireland, trained as a holiday rep and air steward, working as a flight attendant for Ryanair. He came out as gay to his parents two weeks before appearing in Big Brother in 2001.

Big Brother

He was the eventual winner of the series, beating Helen Adams in the final and polling 4,231,660 votes (58%) out of a total 7,255,094.[2] He has been voted favourite ever Big Brother housemate in the UK on several occasions. In 2010 Brian returned to compete in the final Big Brother on channel 4 and he became the Ultimate Big Brother Housemate. Brian spent a total of 82 days in the Big Brother house, 64 for his original stay and later 18 days for Ultimate Big Brother. He also holds a record for never being placed up for eviction during his two stays in the Big Brother house.

Media career

Dowling followed his Big Brother success by presenting SMTV Live, becoming the first openly gay children's television presenter. He also presented his own show on ITV, Brian's Boyfriends, as well as narrating the Channel 4 reality show The Salon.

In 2002, Brian co-hosted the Elle Style Awards with BBC Radio 1 presenter Jo Whiley. In 2003 he joined Duncan James and Tara Palmer-Tomkinson in presenting the Now Magazine Style Awards, where he also won the award for Most Stylish UK TV Personality."

Dowling regularly stood in for Liz Bonnin on LivingTV's Celebrity Extra show in 2004. He has also voiced numerous adverts and TV series and has presented the companion show to I'm Famous and Frightened!.

In July 2005, Dowling fronted the Party in the Park concert in Leeds with Coronation Street's Nikki Sanderson. He then went on to front the Irish O2 in the Park concert, in Phoenix Park, Dublin, alongside Fran Cosgrave and Caroline Morahan in August 2005.

Dowling hosted a showbiz slot on Vernon Kay's BBC Radio 1 Saturday morning show from 9 October 2004 to September 2006.

In October 2005, Dowling presented a series of special Christmas features as part of Sky Digital's Interactive platform programming, titled Christmas Wrapped Up, in which he reviewed and helped to promote products that were available for purchase in the shopping areas of Sky Digital's Sky Active service.

Dowling was reintroduced as a presenter on ITV in March 2006 when the network launched its ITV Play subsidiary. Along with six others, Dowling was signed up as a presenter of the network's interactive gamble based telephone show, The Mint. The game show ran till 2007.

Dowling was a contestant in the ITV reality series Hell's Kitchen during September 2007, in which he competed against other celebrities to impress celebrity chef Marco Pierre White. Dowling finished in third place. Whilst participating, he had numerous clashes with fellow contestant Jim Davidson because of what Dowling interpreted as Davidson's homophobic slurs. Davidson was subsequently asked to leave the show as a contestant due to what ITV described as "unacceptable remarks" against Dowling.

His next job was as the presenter of a spin off show to Sky1's second series of Cirque de Celebrité entitled Backstage at the Big Top.

Following on from this, in August 2008, Dowling was a contestant in the Irish reality television show, Fáilte Towers, where he and 12 other celebrities had to take on the roles of hotel staff. He came second to John Creedon. He then went on to become a contestant on TV3's Celebrity Salon, in which he and several other Irish celebrities (Pippa O'Connor, Leigh Arnold, Virginia Macari, Celia Holman Lee and Breffny Morgan) learn the tools of the beauty trade. Celebrity Salon began airing on Monday 7 June 2010. Tasks included giving facials, waxing, performing cosmetic surgery, hairdressing and styling.

He also appeared in a special episode of Come Dine with Me, alongside three other previous winners of Big Brother and was declared winner.

Dowling was crowned Ultimate Big Brother Housemate on 10 September 2010 at the end of the Ultimate Big Brother series that saw the end of Big Brother UK's transmission on Channel Four.

Following this he has appeared as co-host alongside Katherine Lynch on the RTE2 series Wagons Den.

On 22 July 2011 it was confirmed that Dowling will be presenting the new series of Big Brother on Channel 5. [3]

Theatre

Dowling has appeared in popular Irish Christmas pantomimes, at Dublin's Tivoli Theatre. In December 2008-January 2009, he starred as the evil Captain Hook in Anthem Productions' presentation of Peter Pan. Since then, Dowling has had the new character "Bridie" created for him, appearing in 2009's Cinderella and 2010's Beauty and the Beast.

References

  1. ^ Bootboy (20 June 2007). "Reasons to be cheerful". Hot Press. http://hotpress.com/archive/2931306.html. Retrieved 20 June 2007. "Little Brian Dowling, the first openly gay children's TV show presenter. (Although, that’s not strictly true. The late Philip Tyler used to present Bosco. The parents of Ireland, however, may not have been aware that he was a regular presence on the gay scene in the early '80s..." 
  2. ^ "4.2m vote Brian winner of `Big Brother'", The Independent. URL last accessed on 2007-02-20.
  3. ^ www.dailystar.co.uk/news/view/202310/Brian-Dowling-I-m-new-Big-Brother-host

External links

Preceded by
Craig Phillips
Big Brother UK winner
Series 2 (2001)
Succeeded by
Kate Lawler
Preceded by
Davina McCall
Big Brother UK Presenter
2011-
Succeeded by
Current