“The secret to a happy marriage is if you can be at peace with someone within four walls, if you are content because the one you love is near to you, either upstairs or downstairs, or in the same room, and you feel that warmth that you don’t find very often, then that is what love is all about.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“I met my darling wife Wilnelia in 1980 when we were on the judging panel for the Miss World contest at the Royal Albert Hall. With two ex-wives and five daughters, I thought I wouldn’t be involved with anyone for a long time – if ever. Winnie was so gorgeous, my jaw dropped – and it’s a big jaw to drop.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“It may be an old cliche, but I think true love will last; it has no end. But finding the right person is a very difficult thing.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“Puerto Rico is one of those places you can be as quiet or as crazy as you want, because there’s so much nightlife. I have to take the craziness carefully.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“It’s the combination of marrying a beautiful woman three decades younger and my iPad that keeps me young.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“I don’t want to grow old gracefully. I want to put up a bit of a fight.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“I hate the term ‘arm candy.’ But, look, a woman’s figure is a beautiful thing, and if she has shapely legs, then she should show them off, because men love to see that. Not just heterosexual men – gay men like to see a woman in her beauty and the shape of her.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“When you’ve been brought up in variety, I think timing is always important in your life. If I’m ever late for anything, whether it’s personal or business, I always apologise. ‘I’m sorry I’m late,’ and all that. And if somebody is late meeting me, I expect them to say ‘I’m sorry I’m late.’ It’s just, shall we say, showbiz etiquette of my day.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“I am not doddery… doddery I am not!”
― Bruce Forsyth
“When I was in the business as a young performer, it was a recognised fact that when you got to 60 you were out, because there’d be a new crop of comics coming up all the time, every 10 years or so.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“That Mick Jagger, I feel sorry for him. After all these years he still can’t get no satisfaction.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“I can tell by the way somebody walks if they can dance or not. Just by the rhythm.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“They do say, the smaller the feet, the better the dancer.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“I hate Mondays – I hate that feeling you’ve got to get yourself up.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“I’m not even really a joke-teller. I can do ad-lib and banter, but I don’t do jokes.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“People think I am the crazy person on stage, but I know how to relax.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“I do lead a careful diet, I don’t overeat, I have fruit and vegetables every day and I drink a lot of water. And my darling wife keeps me so young it is ridiculous. Being with her is an inspiration as well.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“When a performer doesn’t get nervous, that is when you have to give up.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“Not working is bad for you. It is my drug, it gives me a high; most performers will tell you that. And there is nothing like the high that an audience gives you.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“Just doing any kind of work – even an interview for breakfast television – makes me feel happy.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“On stage, I think I’m 35. Working takes over my whole body and I become a younger man – that’s why I won’t stop.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“In my mind, everything is too sanitised on television – what is wrong with things going wrong?”
― Bruce Forsyth
“Some people hate the sight of me as soon as they see me on television. They loathe the look of me, and I accept that from the days of variety. I would walk on and some people would open a newspaper and think, ‘He’s first on, so he can’t be any good.’ I accept that.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“I love getting on You Tube to look at the old comics. I am in my element seeing guys like Jack Benny and Phil Silvers give interviews.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“It gets harder every day to get out of bed. I don’t feel like it loads of the time. It is only my exercise routine which wakes me up.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“If I couldn’t move, I don’t know what I would do. That would be terrifying for me; I don’t know how I’d cope with that.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“Probably more than anybody else, I loved Nat ‘King’ Cole as a performer – not only his singing but his piano playing. Whenever he had a new record come out, I’d get it and try to learn how he was playing. And he was one of the nicest people I’d ever met.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“Little did I know that there’s nothing more competitive in the world than a professional ballroom dancer. They are as competitive as Olympic athletes.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“Ambition can take the place of everything – even sex.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“It’s frightening, the way life speeds up. When you’re at school, time can’t go fast enough.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“Although I’m predominantly known for game-shows, I do prefer to be known as a performer.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“It’s sad when you see most of your friends in the business gone, like Tommy Cooper, Frankie Howard, Eric Morecambe, Roy Castle, Les Dawson. They were very dear to me. You no longer have the chance to bump into them at a celebrity do.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“I’ve always been a family entertainer. Every show I have done has been suitable for any age – parents never need to worry that, if they pop out of the room, I’ll say anything untoward.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“You can only be as good as your audience. Sometimes you can be as bad as your audience, but you have to remember you can never be better than them.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“Golf is hugely important, as it keeps me going.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“I read a lot when I’m away. I love courtroom dramas and I’m always looking for new authors.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“My holidays are very important. Mind you, I take a very long one every year.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“It’s important for a dancer to wear very tight underpants. I used to feel a bit exposed if I wasn’t being held up in the right place.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“Goodness, that Simon Cowell is a sensitive soul.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“In the old days, variety turns like me learned how to cope with failure – we all had nights when we ‘died’ on stage – but today’s youngsters simply don’t have that experience. For them, it really is instant make or break time – hence, all the tears and, hence, all the potential emotional damage.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“No one – apart from my agent, perhaps – should leave one of my shows in tears.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“There are enough tears in any child’s life; we certainly don’t need to add to them in the name of entertainment.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“Once you’ve experienced the warmth of an audience, the achievement of getting your first laugh, and entertaining them, singing or playing piano, it just keeps it all going.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“I have no plans to rock myself to sleep in my bath chair yet.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“Television is great but for me, as a performer, nothing compares to a live theatre show.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“When I married Wilnelia, one of the first things I wanted to know about Puerto Rico was the quality of the golf courses.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“A round of golf is the ideal antidote to stress.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“If I go out one night, I must stay in the next. It’s the same with my golf. If I play one day, I don’t play the next. I try to pace myself.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“When I was a child, life felt so slow because all I wanted to do was get into show business. Each day seemed like a year, but when you get older, years pass like minutes. I wish there was a tape recorder where we could just slow our lives down.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“People think I rush around all day long like a raving lunatic. I’m much more relaxed than that.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“Lots of people come up to me and call me Sir Bruce now. Interviewers call me Sir with every question, but I never make a point of making people call me Sir. It doesn’t matter to me, though; it was a great honour to be knighted. I’m very proud of it.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“All kids love to get dirty, but if I wandered into the garage, my father would say: ‘Son, you’re not going to have filthy hands like mine. You’re going into show business.’”
― Bruce Forsyth
“My father earned every penny he had, and I would have loved to have bought him a Rolls-Royce because his whole life was cars. Sadly, he didn’t live to see the day when I could have done that for him, which still hurts.”
― Bruce Forsyth
“My biggest regret is that my mother didn’t see me walk on to that London Palladium stage, being the star she always wanted me to be. But I always say that when she reached Heaven, she had a word with a few agents.”
― Bruce Forsyth
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