43 Facts About David Frost

Sir David Paradine Frost was a British television host, journalist, comedian and writer.

David Frost rose to prominence during the satire boom in the United Kingdom when he was chosen to host the satirical programme That Was the Week That Was in 1962.

David Frost became known for his television interviews with senior political figures, among them the Nixon interviews with US president Richard Nixon in 1977 which were adapted into a stage play and film.

David Frost was the inaugural host of the US news magazine programme Inside Edition.

David Frost hosted the Sunday morning interview programme Breakfast with Frost for the BBC from 1993 to 2005, and spent two decades as host of Through the Keyhole.

David Frost received the BAFTA Fellowship from the British Academy of Film and Television Arts in 2005 and the Lifetime Achievement Award at the Emmy Awards in 2009.

David Frost studied at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, from 1958, graduating with a Third in English.

David Frost was editor of both the university's student paper, Varsity, and the literary magazine Granta.

David Frost was secretary of the Footlights Drama Society, which included actors such as Peter Cook and John Bird.

Christopher Booker, while asserting that David Frost's one defining characteristic was ambition, commented that he was impossible to dislike.

Meanwhile, having already gained an agent, David Frost performed in cabaret at the Blue Angel nightclub in Berkeley Square, London during the evenings.

David Frost was chosen by writer and producer Ned Sherrin to host the satirical programme That Was the Week That Was, or TW3, after David Frost's flatmate John Bird suggested Sherrin should see his act at The Blue Angel.

David Frost visited the US during the break between the two series of TW3 in the summer of 1963 and stayed with the producer of the New York City production of Beyond The Fringe.

David Frost was unable to swim, but still jumped into the pool, and nearly drowned until he was saved by Peter Cook.

At the memorial service for Cook in 1995, Alan Bennett recalled that rescuing David Frost was the one regret Cook frequently expressed.

David Frost took to reading synopses of the episodes at the end of the programme as a means of sabotage.

In 1985, David Frost produced and hosted a television special in the same format, That Was the Year That Was, on NBC.

David Frost signed for Rediffusion, the ITV weekday contractor in London, to produce a "heavier" interview-based show called The David Frost Programme.

David Frost was a member of a successful consortium, including former executives from the BBC, that bid for an ITV franchise in 1967.

David Frost was involved in the station's early years as a presenter.

Around this time David Frost interviewed Rupert Murdoch whose recently acquired Sunday newspaper, the News of the World, had just serialised the memoirs of Christine Keeler, a central figure in the Profumo scandal of 1963.

In 1976, David Frost was the executive producer of the British musical film The Slipper and the Rose, retelling the story of Cinderella.

David Frost was the subject of This Is Your Life in January 1972 when he was surprised by Eamonn Andrews at London's Quaglino's restaurant.

From 1969 to 1972, Frost kept his London shows and fronted The David Frost Show on the Group W television stations in the US His 1970 TV special, Frost on America, featured guests such as Jack Benny and Tennessee Williams.

David Frost interviewed heavyweight boxer Muhammad Ali in 1974 at his training camp in Deer Lake, Pennsylvania before "The Rumble in the Jungle" with George Foreman.

David Frost's company negotiated its own deals to syndicate the interviews with local stations across the US and internationally, creating what Ron Howard described as "the first fourth network".

David Frost taped around 29 hours of interviews with Nixon over four weeks.

David Frost asked Nixon whether the president could do something illegal in certain situations such as against antiwar groups and others if he decides "it's in the best interests of the nation or something".

David Frost was an organiser of the Music for UNICEF Concert at the United Nations General Assembly in 1979.

David Frost was dismissed after only three weeks because of poor ratings.

David Frost was one of the "Famous Five" who launched TV-am in February 1983; however, like LWT in the late 1960s, the station began with an unsustainable "highbrow" approach.

David Frost had been part of an unsuccessful consortium, CPV-TV, with Richard Branson and other interests, which had attempted to acquire three ITV contractor franchises prior to the changes made by the Independent Television Commission in 1991.

David Frost hosted Through the Keyhole, which ran on several UK channels from 1987 until 2008 and featured Loyd Grossman.

David Frost worked for Al Jazeera English, presenting a live weekly hour-long current affairs programme, David Frost Over The World, which started when the network launched in November 2006.

David Frost was one of the first to interview the man who authored the Fatwa on Terrorism, Muhammad Tahir-ul-Qadri.

In 2007, David Frost hosted a discussion with Libya's leader Muammar Gaddafi as part of the Monitor Group's involvement in the country.

In June 2010, David Frost presented David Frost on Satire, an hour-long BBC Four documentary looking at the history of television satire.

David Frost was a patron and former vice-president of the Motor Neurone Disease Association charity, as well as being a patron of the Alzheimer's Research Trust, Hearing Star Benevolent Fund, East Anglia's Children's Hospices, the Home Farm Trust and the Elton John AIDS Foundation.

David Frost was recognised for his contributions to the women's charity "Wellbeing for Women".

David Frost had an 18-year intermittent affair with American actress Carol Lynley.

On 19 March 1983, David Frost married Lady Carina Fitzalan-Howard, daughter of the 17th Duke of Norfolk.

On 13 March 2014, a memorial service was held at Westminster Abbey, at which David Frost was honoured with a memorial stone in Poets' Corner.

David Frost could turn over Richard Nixon or he could win the comedy prize at the Montreux Golden Rose festival.