Wednesday, March 29, 2023

Paul O'Grady

I woke up to the news that Paul O'Grady has passed away at the age of sixty-seven.

Paul O'Grady

He first came to my attention when he would do comedy as the drag queen - Lily Savage. I particularly enjoyed Savage when they would host Blankety Blank (the British version of the US panel game show, Match Game).

As well as that, I'll always recall walking through an underground station in London, around late 1995ish, and seeing Lily Savage posters on the walls.

The advertisements were plugging the fact that Savage was appearing in the stage musical of Prisoner Cell Block H - yet another spinoff from a  TV programme I enjoyed watching back in the day.

Paul Grady as Lily Savage

In later years, O'Grady presented shows as himself. Channel 4's Paul O'Grady show would always be on in our living room back in the mid-to-late 2000s. Maybe more.

If you cannot write a tribute about Paul O'Grady without mentioning Lily Savage, you for sure cannot do so without mentioning his evident love of dogs.

He did. 

You could tell by his visual emotions whenever he had his own pets alongside him in his chat show career or - more specifically - when he would present For The Love of Dogs when he would visit dogs in care.

Lily Savage with Hulk Hogan and 'Macho Man' Randy Savage

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