David Jacobs CBECBE and C.B.E. are abbreviations for Commander of the Order of the British Empire, a grade in the Order of the British Empire.Other uses include:*Calgary Board of Education, public school board for the city of Calgary, Alberta...
(born 19 May 1926) is a
BritishThe United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is a sovereign state located off the northwestern coast of continental Europe. It is an island country, spanning an archipelago including Great Britain, the northeastern part of Ireland, and many small islands...
actor and broadcaster who rose to prominence as presenter of the peak-time
BBC TelevisionBBC Television is a service of the British Broadcasting Corporation which began in 1932. The British Broadcasting Corporation has operated in the United Kingdom under the terms of a Royal Charter since 1927.-History of BBC Television:...
show
Juke Box JuryJuke Box Jury was a pop-themed panel show, originally produced by BBC television from 1959-1967, the first edition having been broadcast on 1 June 1959...
and of the
BBC Radio 4BBC Radio 4 is a domestic UK radio station that broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history. It replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967.-Outline:...
political forum,
Any Questions?Any Questions? is a topical debate radio programme in the United Kingdom.-Format:It is broadcast by BBC Radio 4 on Friday evenings and repeated on Saturday afternoons, when it is followed by a phone-in response programme, Any Answers?...
Jacobs was born in
London[]London is the capital of England and the United Kingdom. It has been a major settlement for two millennia, and the history of London goes back to its founding by the Romans, when it was named Londinium. London's core, the ancient City of London, the 'square mile', retains its medieval boundaries...
and educated at
Strand SchoolStrand School was a boys' grammar school in the Tulse Hill area of South London. It moved there in 1913 from its original location in the Strand...
. He served in the
Royal NavyThe Royal Navy of the United Kingdom is the oldest of HM Armed Forces . From the beginning of the 18th century until well into the 20th century, it was the most powerful navy in the world, playing a key part in establishing the British Empire as the dominant world power from 1815 until the early...
from 1944 to 1947, and first broadcast on
Navy Mixture in 1944. He became an announcer with the
British Forces Broadcasting ServiceThe British Forces Broadcasting Service was established by the British War Office in 1943. Today it provides radio and television programmes for HM Forces, and their dependents, in Afghanistan, Belize, Bosnia, Brunei, Canada, Cyprus, the Falkland Islands, Germany, Gibraltar, Kosovo, the Middle...
and was chief announcer on Radio SEAC in Ceylon (1945-47).
David Jacobs CBECBE and C.B.E. are abbreviations for Commander of the Order of the British Empire, a grade in the Order of the British Empire.Other uses include:*Calgary Board of Education, public school board for the city of Calgary, Alberta...
(born 19 May 1926) is a
BritishThe United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is a sovereign state located off the northwestern coast of continental Europe. It is an island country, spanning an archipelago including Great Britain, the northeastern part of Ireland, and many small islands...
actor and broadcaster who rose to prominence as presenter of the peak-time
BBC TelevisionBBC Television is a service of the British Broadcasting Corporation which began in 1932. The British Broadcasting Corporation has operated in the United Kingdom under the terms of a Royal Charter since 1927.-History of BBC Television:...
show
Juke Box JuryJuke Box Jury was a pop-themed panel show, originally produced by BBC television from 1959-1967, the first edition having been broadcast on 1 June 1959...
and of the
BBC Radio 4BBC Radio 4 is a domestic UK radio station that broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history. It replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967.-Outline:...
political forum,
Any Questions?Any Questions? is a topical debate radio programme in the United Kingdom.-Format:It is broadcast by BBC Radio 4 on Friday evenings and repeated on Saturday afternoons, when it is followed by a phone-in response programme, Any Answers?...
Early career
Jacobs was born in
London[]London is the capital of England and the United Kingdom. It has been a major settlement for two millennia, and the history of London goes back to its founding by the Romans, when it was named Londinium. London's core, the ancient City of London, the 'square mile', retains its medieval boundaries...
and educated at
Strand SchoolStrand School was a boys' grammar school in the Tulse Hill area of South London. It moved there in 1913 from its original location in the Strand...
. He served in the
Royal NavyThe Royal Navy of the United Kingdom is the oldest of HM Armed Forces . From the beginning of the 18th century until well into the 20th century, it was the most powerful navy in the world, playing a key part in establishing the British Empire as the dominant world power from 1815 until the early...
from 1944 to 1947, and first broadcast on
Navy Mixture in 1944. He became an announcer with the
British Forces Broadcasting ServiceThe British Forces Broadcasting Service was established by the British War Office in 1943. Today it provides radio and television programmes for HM Forces, and their dependents, in Afghanistan, Belize, Bosnia, Brunei, Canada, Cyprus, the Falkland Islands, Germany, Gibraltar, Kosovo, the Middle...
and was chief announcer on Radio SEAC in Ceylon (1945-47). He was later assistant-station director.
A BBC staff announcer in the early 1950s, his voice eerily intoned the title for many of the 53 episodes of the popular space adventure series
Journey Into SpaceJourney Into Space was a BBC Radio science fiction programme, written by BBC producer Charles Chilton. In the UK it was the last radio programme to attract a bigger evening audience than television...
. He also played no fewer than 22 acting parts in the course of the series.
He also broadcast on
Radio LuxembourgRadio Luxembourg is a commercial broadcaster in many languages from the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg. It is nowadays known in most non-English languages as RTL ....
.
Later career
Jacobs became best known as presenter of
Juke Box JuryJuke Box Jury was a pop-themed panel show, originally produced by BBC television from 1959-1967, the first edition having been broadcast on 1 June 1959...
on
BBCThe British Broadcasting Corporation, usually referred to by its abbreviation as the "BBC", is the longest established and largest broadcaster in the world...
television between 1959 and 1967. He was one of the four original presenters of
Top of the PopsTop of the Pops, also known as TOTP, is a British music chart television programme, made by the BBC and originally broadcast weekly from 1 January 1964 to 30 July 2006. It was traditionally shown every Thursday evening on BBC1, before being moved to Fridays in 1996, and then moved to Sundays on BBC...
when it started in 1964. He had earlier, between 1957 and 1961, established the chart show format of the
Light ProgrammeThe Light Programme was a BBC radio station which broadcast mainstream light entertainment and music from 1945 until 1967. It opened on 29 July 1945, taking over the longwave frequency used before 1939 by the BBC National Programme....
's
Pick of the PopsPick of the Pops was a BBC radio programme based on the Top 20 UK singles chart first broadcast on the BBC Light Programme in 1955, transferring to BBC Radio 1 from 1967...
, to which he briefly returned in 1962.
Between 1957 and 1966 Jacobs was the presenter of
A Song for EuropeA Song for Europe may refer to:*A Song for Europe, former name of British pre-selection competition for the Eurovision Song Contest, now known as Eurovision: Your Country Needs You...
and did the UK commentary at several
Eurovision Song ContestThe Eurovision Song Contest is an annual competition held among active member countries of the European Broadcasting Union .Each member country submits a song to be performed on live television and then casts votes for the other countries' songs to determine the most popular song in the competition...
s.
He hosted the popular panel game
What's My Line? when it was revived on BBC2 from 1973 to 1974. In 1973 he hosted a short-lived version of the American game show
The Who, What, or Where GameThe Who, What, or Where Game was an American television game show, broadcast weekdays on NBC from December 29, 1969 to January 4, 1974. The host was Art James, and the announcer was Mike Darrow; Ron Greenberg packaged the show, which was recorded at the NBC studios 6A and 8H in Rockefeller Plaza in...
.
From December 1967 until July 1983 Jacobs chaired the influential Radio 4 live topical debate programme
Any Questions?Any Questions? is a topical debate radio programme in the United Kingdom.-Format:It is broadcast by BBC Radio 4 on Friday evenings and repeated on Saturday afternoons, when it is followed by a phone-in response programme, Any Answers?...
One episode notoriously descended into chaos when some of the audience heckled
Enoch PowellJohn Enoch Powell, MBE was a British politician, linguist, writer, academic, soldier and poet.He was a Conservative Party Member of Parliament between 1950 and February 1974, and an Ulster Unionist MP between October 1974 and 1987. He was controversial through most of his career, and his tenure...
: they were evicted, and a stone was thrown through the stained-glass window of the church from which the programme was being broadcast. Jacobs later for a time presented a similar series called
Questions for
TVSTelevision South was the broadcasting name associated with the ITV franchise holder in the south and south east of England between 1 January 1982 and 23:59 on 31 December 1992...
.
Jacobs appeared as himself in the 1974 film
StardustStardust is a 1974 British film directed by Michael Apted and starring David Essex and Adam Faith. The film is the sequel to the 1973 film That'll Be The Day...
, compéring a 1960s award ceremony. He also appeared as himself in an episode of the BBC sitcom
Some Mothers Do 'Ave 'EmSome Mothers Do 'Ave 'Em was a BBC situation comedy, written by Raymond Allen and starring Michael Crawford and Michele Dotrice....
, where he played the presenter of a fictional home improvement show.
His daughter, Emma Jacobs, was an actress best known for her role as Alex Khaled, daughter of Fontaine Khaled (
Joan CollinsJoan Henrietta Collins OBE is an English actress, author, and columnist.-Early life:Collins was born in Paddington, London, the daughter of Elsa , a dance teacher and nightclub hostess, and Joseph William Collins, an agent whose clients would later include Shirley Bassey, The Beatles and Tom Jones...
) in the 1978 film
The StudThe Stud is a 1978 film starring Joan Collins and Oliver Tobias. It was based on the novel by Jackie Collins.-Plot:Fontaine Khaled is the London wife of a wealthy but boring businessman. She spends his money on her nightclub, Hobo, and partying...
.
Most of Jacobs' career since the advent of psychedelia and
flower powerFlower power was a slogan used by the American counterculture movement during the late 1960s and early 1970s as a symbol of passive resistance and non-violence ideology. It is rooted in the opposition movement to the Vietnam War. The expression was coined by the American Beat poet Allen Ginsberg in...
has been at
BBC Radio 2BBC Radio 2 is one of the BBC's national radio stations and the most popular station in the UK. Much of its daytime playlist-based programming is best described as Adult Contemporary or AOR, although the station is also noted for its specialist broadcasting of other musical genres...
. Between January 1985 and December 1991 he presented a daily lunchtime programme of what he characterised as "our kind of music", much of it popular tunes from
musical theatreMusical theatre is a form of theatre combining music, songs, spoken dialogue and dance. The emotional content of the piece – humor, pathos, love, anger – as well as the story itself, is communicated through the words, music, movement and technical aspects of the entertainment as an...
. Now one of the station's old guard, his Sunday late-night
easy listeningEasy listening music is a style of popular music and radio format that emerged in the mid-20th century, evolving out of swing and big band music, and related to Beautiful music and Light music. Easy listening music features simple, catchy melodies, soft, laid-back songs and occasionally rhythms...
show,
The David Jacobs Collection, often features the likes of
Frank SinatraFrancis Albert "Frank" Sinatra was an American singer and actor.Beginning his musical career in the swing era with Harry James and Tommy Dorsey, Sinatra became a successful solo artist in the early to mid-1940s, being the idol of the "bobby soxers." His professional career had stalled by the...
,
Judy GarlandJudy Garland was an American actress and singer. Through a career that spanned 45 of her 47 years, Garland attained international stardom as an actress in musical and dramatic roles, as a recording artist, and on the concert stage. Respected for her versatility, she received a Juvenile Academy...
and Sammy Davis Jr. (Its signature tune,
I Love You, Samantha"I Love You, Samantha" is a song written by Cole Porter for the 1956 film High Society, where it was introduced by Bing Crosby.In the United Kingdom, an instrumental version of the song recorded by the Pete Moore Orchestra has been used as a theme tune by BBC Radio 2 presenter David Jacobs for many...
, by the Pete Moore orchestra, is available on the album
My Fair Ladies.)
Much younger DJs
Stuart MaconieStuart John Maconie is an English radio DJ and television presenter, writer, journalist, critic and champion of pop music and popular culture. He is currently active on BBC Radio 2, co-hosting with Mark Radcliffe the Radcliffe and Maconie Show from 8-10 pm Monday to Thursday...
and
Mark RadcliffeMark Radcliffe is an English broadcaster who has worked in various roles for the BBC since the 1980s and remains one of Britain's most recognised DJs...
recruited Jacobs in 2008 to introduce album tracks from
CreamCream is a dairy product that is composed of the higher-butterfat layer skimmed from the top of milk before homogenization. In un-homogenized milk, over time, the lighter fat rises to the top. In the industrial production of cream this process is accelerated by using centrifuges called "separators"...
on their weekday evening Radio 2 show under the rubric 'Jacobs' Cream Crackers', an allusion in to a well-known
brand of biscuitJacob's is a brand name for several lines of biscuits and crackers. The brand name in the United Kingdom is owned by United Biscuits, while the brand name in Ireland is owned by the Jacob Fruitfield Food Group.-History:...
.
Jacobs holds the honorary office of high steward of the
Royal Borough of KingstonThe Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames is a borough in south-west London, England. The main area in the borough is Kingston upon Thames, but it covers a wider area also including places such as Surbiton, Chessington, New Malden and Tolworth...
. He has been involved since its inception in the development of the Kingston's
Rose TheatreThe Rose Theatre, Kingston is a theatre on Kingston High Street in the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames. The theatre is also known as the Rose of Kingston Theatre and seats 1,000 around a wide, lozenge shaped stage ....
, of which he is life president. He is vice-patron of the charity Advance Centres of The Scotson Technique, the restorative science for brain-injured children,
and patron of the Disabled Photographers' Society.
External links