Hedonism, addiction and 300 one nights stands - the confessions of Tony Blackburn

11 April 2012
The Weekender

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Although I could be irritating at times, I never really thought that my wife was serious when she talked about leaving me.

Then came the inevitable day of reckoning: on a Friday in October 1976, Tessa at last convinced me that she meant it.

I was distraught. Opening myself a bottle of wine, I swallowed several Valium and sat down to watch Fawlty Towers. The idea was that I'd die laughing - though in truth I knew I hadn't taken enough tablets to cause myself any lasting harm.

Tessa found me slumped on the sofa, slurring my words. Alarmed, she called the doctor, who came straight round and promptly packed me off to bed. The next morning, I turned up at Broadcasting House for what must rate as the strangest Radio One show I've ever presented in my life.

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Family bliss: Tony with wife Tessa and son Simon. But after four years the cracks were beginning to show

My head was spinning uncontrollably and my heart was heavy with pain. I was not only heartbroken but ashamed: our son, Simon, was just three and the marriage that I'd hoped would last forever had failed in little more than four years.

I'm glad I had no idea that day of how long I'd have to wait for my heartbreak to heal. God knows what I might have done if I had.

In a way, it was miserably appropriate that the Sex Pistols released their first single - Anarchy In The UK - that very month. I hated punk rock and everything it represented. But alone and in the grip of morbid despair, it was a fittingly angry and desperate soundtrack to the mess that was my personal life.

It only occurred to me much later that I started behaving then like a fifth Sex Pistol: numbing my pain with a series of one-night stands, allowing myself to get hooked on prescription drugs and indulging my petty whims on air.

Four different partners each week was my chief way of staving off the sadness. I'd go with a friend called Phil to a particular wine bar in Kensington, West London, had a bit of a reputation as a pick-up joint. Not every partner was a one-night stand - occasionally, the relationship went on for at least a couple of days.

I'm sure some "sexpert" would now class my womanising as a "compulsive sex disorder" and pack me off to an expensive corrective facility. But I refuse to feel guilty about my behaviour back then.

Why can't people accept that making love is simply one of life's most pleasurable pursuits? This country is still very uptight about sex - all the papers do is gossip about it, whereas I just got on with it.

I enjoyed every moment of it, too - and when you tot it up, having 250-300 lovers over the course of 20 years only works out at something like a different partner every couple of months. (A hit rate that my club- owning friend Peter Stringfellow would probably regard as a complete disgrace.)

If I couldn't have Tessa, I was definitely going to grow old disgracefully - or that's how it seemed at the time. And so I continued to drift through the Eighties, from one short-lived relationship to the next.

Photographs from the time suggest that, by my 40s, I'd turned into a caricature ladies' man, not dissimilar to that louche television sleuth from the early Seventies, Jason King. I seemed to have a permanent tan, though I had never used a sunbed in my life. I hung on desperately to the same mid-length hairstyle I'd sported, with little variation, since the mid-Sixties.

My shirt, usually silk, was invariably unbuttoned to the waist, revealing a luxuriant carpet of chest hair. I didn't skimp on the jewellery, either: an outsize medallion dangled from my neck, a heavy bracelet rattled on my wrist and one of those oh-so-classy sovereign rings flashed on my finger.

I lived alone, and for 17 1/2 years - from the time of my divorce until well into the Nineties - I survived on a daily diet of tinned lentil soup and processed peas (plus the occasional potato added as a treat).

Meanwhile, I was far from happy at work: after launching Radio One in 1967 and presenting the prestigious breakfast slot for a decade, I was moved from one show to another until I was no longer a weekday fixture on the radio.

There were "Bye-bye Blackburn" headlines, and my demotion hit me so hard that, once again, I briefly felt suicidal.

The truth is that my ego can be fragile. In spite of having had loving parents and a very happy childhood, I've always been a bit of a secret self-loather, lacking in confidence and security.

But how different everything had seemed back at the start of the Seventies, when I first set eyes on Tessa Wyatt.

At that point, I was probably at my professional peak: it's no exaggeration to say that I could often propel a single to the top of the charts by featuring it on my show. And as one of the country's top DJs, I also had the good fortune to rub shoulders - and much else besides - with some of the most gorgeous women in the land.

Then, one night, I was having dinner with a friend in a Kensington restaurant when I suddenly spotted a vision of perfection. She was in a class apart: almond-shaped eyes, blonde hair, a delicate face and a fun-loving smile. Utterly captivated before I'd even spoken to her, I instantly had marriage on my mind.

I asked a waiter to pass on the message that she was the most beautiful woman I'd ever seen.

When he returned, he had a piece of paper in his hand. I knew without looking at it that she had written down her phone number. But it took me two weeks to pluck up the courage to ring up and invite her out for an Italian meal at a nice little place near the Embankment.

My heart sank a little when Tessa told me she was an actress - a partner in showbusiness and a successful marriage were mutually exclusive in my book - but I proposed almost before she'd had time to look at the menu.

She turned me down. But nothing distracted me from my pursuit, not even the blazing rows we sometimes had during our first few months together in 1971.

Most of the time, we had great fun. I even broke one of my cardinal rules and threw in an occasional mention of "the mystery woman, Tessa" during my breakfast shows.

A few months into our relationship, she was offered a role in a big-screen version of a Graham Greene novel, England Made Me.

Peter Finch and Michael York were to star, and shooting was due to take place over several weeks in Yugoslavia.

My initial trepidation at losing her for such a long period eased when I began to sense that her loneliness made her increasingly receptive to my daily phone calls.

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Smooth: An early start for the morning voice of Radio One

It was during one of these long-distance conversations that, once again, I asked her to marry me. This time, she said yes - and just to make sure, I did it all over again in person when she returned home, after I'd compered Diana Ross and the Supremes in concert.

Six weeks and one £300 triple diamond engagement ring later, we were married at Caxton Hall in Westminster, where hundreds of confetti-throwing fans turned out to wish us well.

The bride wore a cream dress suit, with thigh-length black boots and a single orchid; the groom a fashionably slim-line maroon suit with a rounded-collar Brutus shirt. It was Thursday, March 2, 1973, and as I placed the ring on her finger, I knew that this was the happiest moment of my life.

But I hadn't reckoned on my old enemies - self-doubt and insecurity.

Looking back, I can see that something was already amiss that evening, when I found myself a stranger at my own wedding reception. Held in a function room at the Hyde Park Hotel, it was a costly affair - so, in order to keep Tessa's parents' expenses down, I'd decided not to invite any of my DJ friends.

I regretted it later, not least because halfway through the evening, I'd spotted that one of Tessa's exes had been invited, which choked me a bit. I also discovered that, although as the son of a GP I came from a perfectly respectable background, there was a significant cultural gulf between my family and Tessa's.

It didn't help that when I was first introduced to her parents, at the family home in the village of Mayfield, Sussex, I walked into an antique table and accidentally broke off one of its legs.

The Wyatts were very much part of the Barbour-wearing hunting, shooting and fishing brigade, with a fortune made in the City and an affluent lifestyle to match. I remember getting into an argument with one member of the family after he'd come back to the house bragging about all the game birds he'd just shot.

I thought he was a heathen, and I suspect the feeling was mutual. Tessa's golf-playing mother, in particular, didn't seem to regard DJ-ing as a profession befitting a future son-in-law. I suppose she was right.

On April 8, 1973, our son, Simon Anthony Blackburn, was born. He had next to no hair, and my first thought was: "My God, he looks like the comedian Charlie Drake!" Thankfully, he's changed a bit since then.

At last, I had everything I'd wished for: my own perfect little family, a gorgeous wife and son, and a beautiful house in North London, furnished in a classy, traditional style by Tessa.

Life at home was blissfully good. Some days, when I sat beside Tessa on our sofa, taking turns to bottle-feed Simon, I didn't give a damn about anything else.

One evening, after we'd driven out to see Terry and Helen Wogan at their home near Maidenhead for dinner, we talked about just how blissful life in the stockbroker belt might be. For the price of our home in St John's Wood, we could own a big place in the country.

As soon as we set eyes on Hollycroft, an ivy-clad, 100-year-old period house in Cookham Dean, Berkshire, we knew it was ours.

Set in one-and-a-half acres of magnificent, tree-lined grounds, with a gravel drive and gorgeous rosebushes, Hollycroft had four bedrooms, three bathrooms and plenty of period features. Later, we added a swimming pool and a small studio, where I would work on jingles for my radio show.

A gardener and a cleaner looked after the basics, while Josie, our Maltese nanny, tended to Simon. On the face of it, life at Hollycroft appeared to be idyllic: certainly, the tabloid photographers who regularly turned up would leave with a Hello!- style tableau of domestic delight.

However, cracks were beginning to appear behind the scenes.

Once Simon had begun to walk, Tessa was ready to get back to work again. I know it sounds terribly old-fashioned now, but I wasn't too happy with the idea. Besides, Tessa was a highly desirable woman. I didn't want her away filming for weeks on end, surrounded by men hitting on her all the time.

I knew how men behave. And like many men, I was extremely insecure and insanely possessive.

The things that bind a couple together during the early days of a relationship weren't happening either. While my desire for Tessa was still strong, I didn't feel the same sense of infatuation coming from her, and that upset me.

As a consequence, we became less tolerant of each other's tastes and habits. It always surprised me that she wanted to act in heavy dramas - depressing Chekhov plays that made even Tessa fall asleep when we watched them on television.

Increasingly anxious about life at home, I reacted by breaking out and giving my self-esteem a boost.

A perfect opportunity presented itself in spring 1974, when I found myself broadcasting a live show in Huddersfield. It was the night spent with an attractive, slightly older woman named Yvonne that remains my most vivid memory of that trip.

My insecure mind and straying ways meant that home was fast becoming a more complicated place. But the rot really set in after we fell in with a very nice couple, Margo and Roger Webb, who lived down the road.

He was a songwriter; she was a well-built, half-English, half-Chinese woman, and stunning with it. They were extremely social, often hosting showbusiness parties at weekends, attended by everyone from the broadcaster Michael Parkinson to the actress Beryl Reid.

Before we knew it, each weekend-would start on Fridays round at the Webbs for drinks, hit its partying peak there on Saturday night and end with a relaxing round of tennis with them on Sunday afternoons. We'd be virtually paralytic the whole time.

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The Ladies' Man: Tony became not dissimilar to that louche television sleuth from the early Seventies, Jason King

On one particularly hot and wild night, a couple of the more liberated guests peeled off and swam naked in the outdoor swimming pool. While all eyes were firmly trained on these poolside activities, I found myself drifting ever closer into the arms of Margo in a more secluded part of the garden. Before long, we were deeply embedded in an affair.

I was a young husband and a father, yet I was already living a double life. I'd look at my young family and I'd feel sad that all the aspirations I had were in tatters.

Then I'd fool around with Margo and feel overcome with a sense of relief, as if the act of infidelity would somehow make my doubts and insecurities go away.

The truth was that it made everything worse. My relationship with Tessa had drifted into an emotional no-man's-land, particularly after I took a room at the Royal Garden Hotel in Kensington so that Margo and I could continue our dangerous liaison without interruption.

Conveniently, I was appearing on a pop panel game for Radio Two once a week in the evenings, so after I finished my show at midday, Margo and I could shut ourselves away for a few hours. I knew the manager at the Royal Garden, and he gave me a reduced rate for the room, as well as access to the back entrance of the hotel. It was all very discreet.

Then, one day, Margo let slip that Tessa had been having an affair with her husband. With both of us looking for thrills elsewhere, it was obvious that my marriage was heading for total collapse.

This, then, was our own Home Counties version of Celebrity Wife Swap - except that the rules weren't fully explained to one of the couples. I had absolutely no idea that Tessa had been having an affair, and I don't think she ever knew about Margo and me - at least not until I went public about it in 1984, long after our divorce.

One of the regulars at Margo and Roger's soirÈes was an ITV television producer who was developing Robin's Nest, a new sitcom spin-off from the enormously popular Man About The House series. The star of that show, Richard O'Sullivan, was already on board for the title role, and he needed a co-star.

It was the right part for Tessa - but what no one bargained for was that she and Richard would take their on-screen chemistry into their private lives.

While they were falling in love, there was little likelihood of that happening between Margo and me. Our relationship was built purely on lust and mutual desire. She was magnificently attractive - so much so that I even put up with her awful smoking. But neither of us seriously imagined that we'd stay together.

Then, on that fateful Friday, Tessa made it plain that the marriage was over - she was leaving and she was taking our son, Simon, with her. I persuaded her to stay until Sunday night for a final supper, and put on a dinner jacket for the occasion.

"What on earth are you doing?" she asked, looking at me as if I were some kind of idiot. I told her that as I was about to eat the saddest meal of my life, the occasion required a certain formality.

On air the following Monday morning, I could barely hold myself together. The journey home from Broadcasting House was more awful still, because I knew that the only thing waiting for me at Hollycroft was the deafening silence of a failed marriage. I walked in and out of each room, staring at the empty spaces, barely able to think straight.

Despite all our problems, I'd wanted us to stay together for Simon's sake. And now all that was left was the lifeless shell of my son's empty bedroom. I broke down and wept like a child.

After one of my colleagues blew the whistle and told the tabloids about my marriage break-up, I decided to hold a press conference at the BBC. But I broke down after telling the assembled throng: "I still love her."

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You gotta have friends: Tony's time on the air proved that an invisible audience won't ever let you down

My grief also found its way on to the air. I introduced a song called (We've) Thrown It All Away, by R&J Stone, with the words: "In the unfortunate circumstances I find myself in at this moment, it's pretty appropriate." As the sad song began to fade, I returned to the theme: "This record is dedicated to the person who will always be very, very special to me."

It wasn't the last time I alluded to the breakdown of my marriage on the show, either. By a rather cruel twist of fate, the big Number One hit single at the time was a heartbreaker ballad by Chicago called If You Leave Me Now. I found it painful to listen to, and sometimes told my listeners why.

The mistake I made was not fully to understand that an audience does not really want to hear bad news. People have enough problems of their own without having to suffer through a DJ's tragic tales.

It was ironic, really. Just when I needed a strong producer to take me aside and tell me to go easy on the sad stuff, no one did. Over the days and weeks that followed, I was allowed to go on far too often about my marriage breakdown; bored the nation stupid with it, in fact. And no one told me.

In any case, I was too busy floating through life dosed up on Valium to take much notice of anything. There are times in life when resentment can get the better of us, and I had run straight to the medicine cupboard for comfort. I soon discovered that anti-depressants helped blot out the wilder emotional swings, enabling me to function without collapsing in a heap.

One thing that didn't change was that I still visited my parents as often as I could at the house where they'd always lived in Lilliput, near Poole on the South Coast. Now, though, there was an ulterior motive.

As a doctor, my father was able to prescribe more anti-depressants for me, knowing that they would help me to sleep. What he didn't know was that I soon started to take the pills at any time of the day.

I don't think he realised just how addicted I became. He certainly had no idea that I was raiding his handsome supply of the strong barbiturate, Tuinol, which he took to ease his back problems. I'd take packets of the stuff back home with me.

To be honest, my feet rarely touched the ground in the immediate years following the break-up of my marriage. I simply lost the plot after discovering that by misusing prescription drugs and washing them down with a few glasses of cheap wine, I could blot out reality.

I actually enjoyed the woozy effects of the drink and drug concoction, which was not unlike the sensation of a pre-med in hospital.

It put up a protection, gave me a space in which I could lose myself. After four of those high-strength blue Valiums, the room certainly span around quite nicely.

Although I made sure not to take them during weekdays (I still had my weekday radio slot then), the effects stayed with me. I remember almost getting run over outside Broadcasting House one day because I was so relaxed that I'd become almost comatose.

Nobody else had a clue what I was up to. I lived in isolation at the house that had once been such an oasis of love and joy. I'd often spend entire weekends there, stumbling around in a drug-induced daze and eating cold food from tins. On a good night, I'd just about stagger up to bed.

I didn't even tell my mother the truth about my life. I wanted to grieve alone and saw no benefit in discussing my situation with anyone - either friends or family. I had hit the lowest point in my life.

In fact, I had no idea just how dependent I'd become on the heady cocktail of drink and drugs until I had a terrible case of the shakes while in bed with a lovely Chinese girl. "It's a heart attack!" I said, and immediately phoned my father.

"Have you taken your Valium?" he said. He clearly thought a tablet might calm me down - but I realised then that the sheer number I'd been knocking back most days was actually the source of the problem. I was a slave to the stuff.

So I decided there and then: no more drugs. Checking into a costly rehab centre or seeking out any other complicated methods of withdrawal didn't occur to me - I simply weaned myself off the habit and have never, ever been troubled by the blotto urge since.

On November 7, 1977, I was granted a quickie postal divorce from Tessa on account of her adultery with Richard O'Sullivan. "I shall never again marry anyone in showbusiness," I loudly declared. I meant it, too - though many years later, I married another actress and have been happy ever since.

Two things kept me going throughout this personal nightmare. One was my radio show, which proved that an invisible audience won't ever let you down, even if the real people in your life do.

The other was my son, Simon. Throughout the divorce negotiations, I'd made it very clear that I didn't want any other man being referred to as my son's "daddy". I was Simon's father, as I probably reminded my listeners a little too often during those difficult days.

Now, when I turn the pages of an old photo album and see Simon's smiling face staring out between those of his proud parents, it makes me sad to think that Tessa and I messed things up for him.

Then I reflect on how he's turned out - a magnificent young man who's making a success of his career in the advertising world and who is always kind and considerate to others - and I stop beating myself up about it. Apart from the very worst moments of my descent into a private hell, I made sure that I was always there for my son.

When you're a weekend father, there's a tendency to overcompensate and shower the child with armfuls of gifts - and, at first, I was no exception.

Before we'd go off to see a film, I'd often take him to Bill Wyman's Sticky Fingers restaurant, just off Kensington High Street, which was very close to where I was living. Simon knew there was a toyshop round the corner, and we'd always make our way there afterwards so I could buy him something.

One day, I explained to him that he probably had enough cars, and that no one should expect presents every week. Since that day, he's never asked me for anything.

I have to confess that, in the early days after the divorce, I struggled to come to terms with seeing my son only once a week. After several lovely hours together, I'd drive him back to Tessa's place, have a strained but always polite conversation with her, then say goodbye and walk back to my car alone. On many occasions, I'd pull the car over to the side of the road and cry my eyes out.

I'll always regret the break-up with Tessa because I hate failure of any sort. But when I think back to those times now, I realise that neither of us had really been prepared for marriage. Nor did we know enough about each other - or even life itself - to give the union much of a chance.

Looking at what happened dispassionately, I think I fell in love with an image. And, of course, it takes far more than that for a relationship to work. But, as I'll explain on Monday, that wasn't the only reason that my romances seldom ended happily...

AN ABRIDGED extract from POPTASTIC! MY LIFE IN RADIO by Tony Blackburn, published by Cassell Illustrated at £18.99 ° Tony Blackburn 2007

To order a copy at £17.10 (p&p free), call 0845 606 4213.

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