31/01/2016 BBC Weekend News

Sir Terry Wogan, a giant of television and radio for decades,

Terry Wogan. Hello, and welcome to be the -- welcome to the beginning

of what I hope will be a long and happy relationship. How anyone can

get so much applause and still see as nice as me. -- still stay.

His family said he'd fought a short but brave battle against cancer.

His warmth and gentle style provided the bedrock

His warmth, his humour, and the fact that he did not take

himself seriously, and he was genuinely a really nice

man, and I think that is what we will remember about him,

he was part of our lives, a real radio legend,

he loved what he was doing, and he gave us an enormous

Sir Terry Wogan, one of Britain's best loved television and radio

stars, has died at the age of 77 after what his family described

as "a short but brave battle with cancer."

Sir Terry's warm and velvety voice, along with his dry wit,

defined his style for millions for decades.

He hosted a chat show, presented Children In Need,

the Eurovision Song Content and was a leading star

The BBC's Director General, Lord Hall, said,"Today we lost

a broadcasting legend, but also a dear friend."

Our first report is from our arts correspondent, David Sillito.

Please welcome our knight of the realm, Sir Terry Wogan!

Welcome to the beginning of what I hope will be a long

How anyone can get such applause and still stay as nice as me,

If being famous was there on offer, great!

Terry Wogan, warm, witty, never lost for a word.

A chapter of broadcasting history is over.

To command the affection of the public for such a period

of time is a feat that not too many broadcasters can do.

All sorts of different people found him and loved him,

loved his wit, loved his charm and felt that they knew him,

as all great broadcasters make people feel, that they actually

In the '80s, his chat show was on three nights a week.

He thought five would have been better.

A number of expensive and smart restaurants

He'd already experienced fame before he'd even arrived in Britain.

He'd been a newsreader and presenter on RTE in Ireland.

His humour, his love of language, he said, was a mixture of his home

town of Limerick and his love of British culture.

I suppose I was a bit of a West Brit.

When I was growing up in Limerick, I didn't listen to Irish radio,

the Goon Show, Take It From Here, all those things.

So I suppose in a way, I had more in common with British

radio and television than I had with Irish.

He was one of the original line-up of Radio 1, but his real home

All great radio is the friend behind the microphone and no-one

was a better friend than Terry Wogan.

I think that is why people feel upset and genuinely shocked today,

because they feel as though they have lost a friend.

There was also a hit single, a very Wogan hit single.

You were saying you find this kind of thing horrific.

He had an aura of good nature, an ease in front of the camera,

even when a chat show guest declined to chat.

Did you do any of this stuff in America?

Here's your host on Blankety Blank, Terry Wogan.

But it was on programmes with a bit more freedom that the Wogan wit

really blossomed, such as Blankety Blank.

I could've been a brain surgeon or anything.

And he was probably at his best in the place

It was certainly the hardest to say goodbye to.

Till we're together again in February.

Have a happy Christmas and thank you.

Sir Terry will be remembered for being the face of Children In Need,

which has raised many, many millions for children in the UK

And, of course, he presented for many years the Eurovision Song

18 million and then put thousands, ?199. Terry Wogan was as much a part

of Children In Need as Pudsey. For 35 years he was the genial and

tireless toast of the programme that every year raises millions for

charity. Taking nothing too seriously was his trademark, but

this was something his colleagues said came from the heart. He worked

as tirelessly on fund-raising behind-the-scenes as he did on

stage, in shooting Children In Need became part of Britain's national

conscience. He only missed the show once, last November, on the advice

of his doctors, and over the years he helped raise hundreds of millions

of pounds. We have helped literally millions and billions of

disadvantaged children right across the UK, and I think that is the

legacy that he would like to leave, as much as the fantastic impact he

made on broadcasting. New revision was another national event for which

Sir Terry Wogan was a perfect fit. Four brides of Frankenstein. With

his dry wit, he said what many viewers sometimes felt, but by the

time he gave up the role in 2008, some of the fun had clearly gone.

Some really ridiculous songs. You have to say that this is no longer a

music contest. He was sometimes mobbed by fans after the show,

attention that was not always welcome. He said, if I had known it

was going to be like this, I would never have started. I do not think

that was entirely true, but I think there were times when he felt that

the private person, and Terry was a private person in many ways, the

private person had given away too much to the public. For all the

affection for Terry Wogan, it maybe he was happiest when his fame was

helping others. Let's go live now to our arts

correspondent, David Sillito, The tributes have been pouring in

from everybody from David Cameron to the President of Ireland.

Absolutely, sometimes we say tributes are pouring in and it is a

trickle, but this has been a torrent. It is the number of years,

more than 50 years, Britain and Ireland, he has been famous,

generations of people. One of the tributes today stood out for me. It

was one little phrase, Paul O'Grady. He said there was no false it to

him. I said -- I thought, I have met him and did interviews with him once

or twice, and that is what struck you with him, the person you met in

private was almost exactly the person you heard on the radio. That

was reared gift. Most people in Broadcasting House broadcasting

personas, but you were seeing something of the real person, and

that is why he survived for such a long time, more than 40 years on

radio, it is a very sensitive time in the morning four-week up to

Wogan. When he left Radio 2, and we were outside waiting for him to come

out of the studio, some of his old geezers were waiting for him. I

thought, this is not just about a popular presenter, it felt like a

family that had developed over the years. Lots of people feel that

sense of warmth about him. If you want to understand and analyse it,

yet Israeli hard. It probably helps he had an Irish accent and was

classless. In the late making 60s, we did not really have DJ pole until

1968, they were announcers, I bit formal and stiff, and he was

something more intimate and friendly. That is the word that

stands out today. When I spoke to him, he would come up with these

amazing answers off the cuff. It would be the right tone, the right

feeling, the right words. He was a very clever man to do that again and

again, all for more than 40 years. David, thank you very much, David

Sillito. We will have more tributes

to Sir Terry Wogan in a moment, in a specially extended bulletin,

after the rest of the day's news. David Cameron will demand stronger

powers to curb immigration from the EU when he meets

the European Council President Donald Tusk in Downing

Street this evening. He'll insist that a proposed

"emergency brake" to deny benefit payments to working migrants should

be triggered immediately The Business Secretary,

Sajid Javid, has said that the controversial tax

settlement between Google and the government "wasn't

a glorious moment". Under the deal, the internet giant

has agreed to pay ?130 million in back taxes covering

the past decade. The Chancellor, George Osborne,

had called the agreement a "major Two bombs have killed and wounded

at least 30 people near Syria's most important Shia shrine

on the outskirts of Damascus. State television has shown burning

buildings and destroyed cars in the neighbourhood

of Sayida Zeinab. The shrine houses the grave

of the Prophet Mohammed's Andy Murray has been beaten

in the final of the Australian Open The Serb has now won six

Australian Open titles. The prize that has eluded

Andy Murray for so long was perched tantalisingly close,

but Novak Djokovic's grip on that trophy and Britain's number

one has been vice-like. The first set followed

a familiar pattern. Murray simply outclassed as the Serb

took the first set 6-1. Murray had been late to bed

the previous night after watching brother Jamie win the doubles

and in the second set he finally woke up, matching his nemesis,

until at 5-5, once again, he fell under Djokovic's spell,

another crucial break, 2-0. At least Murray had shown some fight

and that continued in the third where he managed to break

Djokovic and level at 3-3. Murray forced a tie-break

but during that the trophy looked Djokovic finished things

with an ace, one that seemed The Serb's six Australian Open

titles are matched only by the great Murray, once again, is left

dreaming of a first. Let's return now to the news

of the death of Sir Terry Wogan A master of live TV and radio,

with his easy broadcasting style and whimsical reflections on life,

Sir Terry built a devoted audience of millions over his 50 year career

and played a leading role in raising hundreds of millions

of pounds for Children in Need. We're going to take the next few

minutes to look back at his life with some of the people

who knew him well. With me in the studio

is his long time colleague from Radio 2 and BBC One,

Alan Dedicoat and the chairman Before we speak to you Alan,

lets hear a bit of Sir Terry For the first 12 years,

it was the plain old Terry Wogan Show, and you were all twits,

but Terry Wogan is top society. And when I returned to the bosom

of our family it became Wake Up To Wogan, and

you all became togs. It's always been a source

of a enormous pride to me that you've come together in my name

and you are proud to call yourselves my listeners,

and you think of me as a friend. He is the man who nicknamed you the

voice of the balls for your work on the lottery, was it fun? Laughter

from the beginning, from when he arrived to the minute he left, great

fun, we just laughed, not all of it could be broadcast but most of it

could, and he was very inclusive and shared his programme with people,

you were his friend. He did not pioneer but he perfected a business

of broadcasters talking to one person, one to one. Whether any

script involved at all, rehearsals? Rehearsal, what was that? He lived

on the edge and it shows. It was edgy stuff which made you listen

more and more. He turned up wearing his wife's cardigan. He dressed in

the dark to be fair, he did not want to wake up, but he was a great

laugh. One of the causes closest

to his heart was - as we've been hearing -

Children in Need which he presented APPLAUSE

from Terry Wogan. You find me back in

the throbbing heart of what is going on

here, the ops room. Look busy, look busy,

lads, for goodness sake. the final total of this very night

for Children In Need 2011. He did help, literally, millions of

children. Literally millions. He was involved for all of the 35 years

since it started in 1980, he missed one show, last November, and he was

very much the heart and soul of the charity, not just the face of it,

and ?800 million has been raised in that time, and that has enabled us

to help literally millions of children. Only last year, we gave

out over 50 million of grants that help half a million disadvantaged

children that was close to his heart. He didn't actually like

scripts all rehearsals, was that a bit challenging sometimes? For

Children In Need, it was not, the script was irrelevant. He did it

from his heart. It was so close to what he believed in, that every

child in the UK should have the chance to reach their potential, and

when he looked in the camera it was not about the autocue, it was

generally about what he believed. He was a good director. You never knew

what he was going to do next, that was the fun of it. He was the best

at live TV and radio. And among it all, Terry found time

to have a hit record - # When stars in heaven

were shining bright, # Far away the full light

glare, # Into the sweet and scented

air, on a quaint old Cornish town. We can speak to Sir Terry's Radio 2

colleague Ken Bruce from his home That is, to me, sums him up in many

ways. Taking the job seriously but not himself being taken seriously

very much. He did not really take himself seriously at all. He enjoys

doing his work and wanted to do it well that he wanted to break the

boundaries and do things that people were not expecting, the mischievous,

it's naughty, and with that particular song, he broke several

boundaries, musical ones mainly! His father used to sing that song so

there was a family connection. It always comes back to family with

Terry. He was very keen to sing it on a record. The family was

everything to Terry. Intimacy is all on the radio, and his voice did

sounds like he was talking to you in your living room or having

breakfast. He did have that innate ability to speak directly to you,

and make you feel as if you and he had a special bond. It was not just

somebody on the radio talking to me. Ulysses and said, I get what you are

saying, that is subtle, it is money. -- you listened. It did not go over

the head of millions of his listeners. Almost everybody got it

but he made you feel special as a listener, as if you and he were the

two people who got this and it brought you closer than ever to him,

and that was his true gift, to make you feel like a true and close

friend. Whoever you were, you were his friend, and very few people have

got that. It is interesting that the listeners loved him but he also

loved his listeners. He had a loyal legion of fans. I took great

pleasure in joining him on trips to Leicester for those events. Did he

enjoy his fame? He was a very private man and his family was very

special to him. You could not do anything on a Sunday, that was

family day, and that was special stop every other day he would have a

slice of the Wogan action. When you were talking about him there, he did

not actually have do this, he did not have to work as hard as he did

on Children In Need. Yes, and people remember, of course, the one-day of

the year when he did seven hours of life were cast raise millions of

pounds but the rest of the year, 364 days, he would visit projects, he

was out, come to formal trustee meetings, he took it very seriously,

and he was always a joy to spend time with. One-on-one on the radio,

absolutely, but to see him in front of disadvantaged kids, they lit up

like Reagan's. Is a fellow broadcaster, when you get up in the

morning and do a job, its maze game glamorous, but it is a job, and he

got up in the dark, you were slightly later, was he ever grumpy

or fed up with Mark --? Like everybody, there were days when he

felt like getting up then other days. He lived in Buckinghamshire,

the south end of Buckinghamshire, and I don't get out of bed until

quarter past six and he was on air at 30 AM. A quick wash and brush, a

bit of breakfast, and he was in the studio by 7:20am. He did not believe

in being into early. Some days he was not in Intel's 730 but that is

another story! The idea was not to let the broadcast to get in the way

of his life stop did you ever wonder what was in store for you when he

turned up with Mark I was in slightly earlier, an hour or so, and

you never knew what he was going to throw at you. That was the joy and

he responded to it but he was generous, you would let you say

various things and get away with murder. A joy, and absolute boy.

Thank you very much. -- joy. Tomorrow evening the One Show

will present a special programme looking back on Sir

Terry Wogan's life. You can watch "A Tribute

to Sir Terry" at 7 o'clock And now, to end the programme,

lets give the last word I've just loved the nature of it,

the show is my creation,