The broadcaster talks about his family
I grew up in all sorts of places because Hitler took against me during the second world war. He dropped a bomb in our back garden in Edgware in Middlesex and then we moved to Taunton and he promptly dropped a bomb just a few yards down from our house there, so then we went to Hassocks, in West Sussex, before ending up back in Edgware.The overall influence in my family as I was growing up was movies because my father worked at Ealing Studios [he produced My mother had been in the industry too, as an assistant editor, until she married and I came along. Dad wasn't an absentee father, but he was away a lot. When he was at home he was there for us all the time, but his job took him abroad for quite long periods.
My brother Richard is four and half years younger than I am, and my sister Valerie is 13 years younger. Richard is a chartered accountant. My sister lives in America and she recently retired from working in television, directing and script supervising. We're as close as you can be with a sister who lives about 7,000 miles away.
Becoming a father was a wonderful experience. Both my daughters were born in the house where I still live. I missed Samantha being delivered because the midwife felt that giving birth was women's business and men had no part in it. So when Emma was due and the same midwife asked me to fetch the water, I said, "No, you didn't really want water last time and you don't want water now, so I'm going to stay here." And I watched and Diana gripped me firmly by the hand and proceeded to curse me as the pains came.
One of the things I missed as a child was that because of Dad's work he was rarely around for big events in my life like when I first played for the school sports teams. It's nice to show off in front of your parents, so I made sure that I was always around for any big events in the girls' lives, like school choir singing and that sort of stuff.
I've always been close to Samantha and Emma but now that my wife, Diana, is gone the whole family is closer than ever. Emma lives 100 yards from my house in Hertfordshire with her son, Bertie, and Samantha lives in London with her two boys, Harry and Charlie, and we see a lot of each other. I love having the boys around. Charlie shares my passion for cricket, Bertie is a great movie buff and I've stood in the rain on many occasions up and down the country watching Harry play rugby.
Bertie's twin brother, Oliver, died before his first birthday and the impact on the family was pretty considerable as you can imagine. It was always on the cards as they were both very premature, but it was a huge shock when it happened. Oliver's death did worry Bertie for a long time but he's a pretty rounded kid now so I don't think it's adversely affected him.
Diana and I were married for 53 years before she died in January. The secret to our marriage was that we gave each other space. We knew it was unreasonable to expect to share every interest. For instance, she was very keen on sailing and was part owner of a yacht ? my idea of sailing was sitting on the deck of the QE2 with a gin and tonic. Equally she wasn't really interested in cricket, so she never came to Lord's for the big events and rarely came to movie events. But she was my best friend and I miss her terribly.
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