Michael Parkinson’s biggest impact on British television was to stretch the schedules at each end of the day. The broadcaster, who has died at the age of 88, was instrumental in introducing late-night talkshows and breakfast TV to the UK. Although he had starkly different levels of personal success with these previously American formats.
His chatshow – which he hosted in various iterations on BBC and ITV from 1971 to 2007 – saw him create the all-time standout hours of television interviewing: four encounters with boxer Muhammad Ali. It was television so great, its only possible rival was David Frost’s 1977 programmes with the disgraced former US president Richard Nixon. And, coincidentally, the two presenters were also associated during the low point of both their careers: as shareholders in a consortium called TV-am that won the right to launch, from 1983, Britain’s first breakfast television programme: ITV’s Good Morning Britain. It would prove a disaster.
