Anthea Turner

Anthea Turner
Born	Anthea Millicent Turner (1960-05-25) 25 May 1960 Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire, England
Occupation	Journalist, television presenter and media personality
Notable credit(s)	Presenting: Blue Peter (BBC) Top of the Pops (BBC) GMTV (ITV) Anthea Turner: Perfect Housewife (BBC) Dinner Party Wars (Food Network Canada)
Spouse(s)	Peter Powell (1990–98) (divorced) Grant Bovey (2000–present)

Anthea Millicent Turner (born 25 May 1960) is an English television presenter and media personality.

Education

Turner was born in Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire and educated there at the independent catholic St. Dominic's Priory School (Stone).

Career

Turner joined BBC Radio Stoke as a runner, eventually joining breakfast show presenter Bruno Brookes as part of his rap crew. The couple became romantically involved and employed Peter Powell as an agent through his management company.

Move to television

Turner moved into television through Sky Channel and Music Box presenting live music programmes from July 1986 to 1989. Her debut on national television was with the BBC on But First This, which led to her fronting two series for the BBC on the Saturday morning show Up2U.

The short-lived Saturday morning children's show UP2U was a flop, and is chiefly remembered for a motorcycle stunt that went wrong. Turner suffered burns and temporary hearing loss, which led to her successful lawsuit against the BBC.

She was the only non-Radio One DJ to regularly present Top of the Pops, remaining with the programme for three years.

Blue Peter, Dancing On Ice and GMTV

Turner presented the children's television show Blue Peter from 27 June 1992 to 29 June 1994, and around this time, was also associated with publicising 'The Y Plan', a system of exercise developed by the London YMCA. She moved on to presenting on Totally Live on pan-European music channel Music Box and the ITV morning television station GMTV, which she presented from July 1994 to 24 December 1996. She was also a host on the first National Lottery draw on BBC1 on 19 November 1994 with Noel Edmonds and Gordon Kennedy. She remained as sole host of The National Lottery Live until 20 April 1996, when she defected to ITV and the travel show Wish You Were Here...?, becoming the second highest paid female television presenter in Great Britain, after Cilla Black. She released two work-out videos: Anthea Turner Body Basics (1996) and Anthea Turner: Tone, Lift And Condition: The Inch Buster (1999), both produced and distributed by Grant Bovey.

The relationship between Turner and her GMTV co-presenter Eamonn Holmes was frosty, with Holmes issuing an ultimatum to the GMTV management that he would leave if they did not sack his colleague; Turner lost her job. After Bovey left his wife Della for Turner, the ensuing tabloid interest, and then the "Flakegate" scandal (see below), Turner's career went into a decline.

Attempting to revive her career, Turner presented BBC1's short-lived Saturday evening programme Your Kids Are In Charge in 2000 with Wendy Turner Webster, her sister. The following year, she participated in Celebrity Big Brother, and was the third contestant to be evicted, after Chris Eubank and Vanessa Feltz. But nothing seemed to work to erase the fallout from the media reaction to Flakegate, and in 2003 she came 15th in a Channel 4 poll of 100 Worst Britons. Turner's most recent career exploit was on Dancing On Ice, where she came 9th out of 12 celebrities with pro-skater Andrew Buchanan. In week 1, she performed Adele's Skyfall, scoring a mediocre 18. Despite being in the bottom two, against TOWIE star Lauren Goodger, in which she advanced to week 2. She got through in the battle rounds over X Factor singer Shayne Ward, getting immunity from the public vote. In week 3, she performed Donny Osmond's Puppy Love, getting eliminated in a bottom two with Keith Chegwin

Career revival

In February 2006, Turner made a television comeback on BBC Three in Anthea Turner: Perfect Housewife, where she taught disorganised housewomen and men how to clean and run their houses. This period was widely referred to in the television industry as the "Turner Renaissance". The series was accompanied by three related books. Later in 2006, she appeared as a guest on BBC Two's music-based panel show Never Mind the Buzzcocks. In April 2009 Turner appeared on the ITV reality show Hell's Kitchen with Marco Pierre White, alongside her husband Grant Bovey. Anthea also presented the show Help Me Anthea, I'm Infested for BBC Three, as she advises people whose homes have been overrun by pests. Since then she has appeared on Big Brother serving breakfast in bed to the finalists.

In 2010 Anthea has been starring in a new show Dinner Party Wars for Food Network Canada, where, together with chef Corbin Tomaszeski, they judge and rate couples putting on a dinner party.

Personal life

Turner's private life has led the tabloids to take a continual interest in her. After her long relationship with fellow Stoke resident and one-time DJ co-worker Bruno Brookes, she married her manager, former DJ Peter Powell; the couple divorced in 1998. That year, Turner's present husband, Grant Bovey, left his wife Della for her; he then reconciled with Della, before leaving her again. Bovey and Turner eventually married on 23 August 2000. On 23 February 2009, the Daily Mail reported that their Surrey mansion had been put up for sale owing to catastrophic failures in Bovey's buy-to-let property business, Imagine Homes. The newspaper reported Turner is making television commercials for household detergents to alleviate financial difficulties.

Turner is keen to start her own family with Bovey. She is stepmother to Bovey's three daughters Lily, Amelia and Claudia, from his previous marriage.

Controversies

In 2000, Turner received negative ad publicity from the tabloids when photographs of her wedding reception, published in the magazine OK! in an exclusive deal worth £450,000, showed the couple (apparently) using their wedding to publicise a new Cadbury chocolate bar, Snowflake. OK! issued the photo to the media with the caption "Anthea Turner and Grant Bovey: exclusive OK! wedding photograph, enjoying Cadbury's new Snowflake. For the complete wedding coverage and a free Cadburys Snowflake, buy OK! magazine this weekend. OK! First for celebrity news." The Sun described it as "the most sickening wedding photo ever", and the event is now referred to as "Flakegate". Turner, Bovey, Cadbury's and OK! all denied that the chocolate was part of a sponsorship deal. The wedding was rumoured to have cost in excess of £150,000 which was paid for by OK! magazine. Pictures of their wedding and their subsequent honeymoon were in the magazine for the next two weeks. Turner and Bovey insist that someone had stuck the chocolate bar in her hand and snapped a picture before she knew what was happening. Richard Desmond the proprietor of OK! and his wife were sitting next to the newly married Boveys at the time. The pair briefly split up, due to Grant Bovey's extramaritial affair, however they reconciled late 2012. Speaking to the Sunday People, then 52 year-old Turner said: 'Last year was awful, horrible, one of the worst. But at the end of the day Grant is my future, my soulmate.'

References

Preceded by Yvette Fielding

Blue Peter Presenter No. 20 1992–94

Succeeded by Stuart Miles