Graham Norton is a staple on British television and has become a household name over the decades. From being the face of his own chat show to commentating on Eurovision since 2009, he’s done it all.
The chat show host turned 60 this year, but he has no plans to scale down his hosting of either Eurovision or his eponymous BBC chat show, The Graham Norton Show, to spend more time with his husband, Jonathan McLeod, as he never takes his showbiz achievements for granted. He previously spoke to OK! about the biggest singing competition heading to the UK shores.
“I am so looking forward to it,” Graham told OK!. “I don’t know what it’s going to be like – I still can’t quite get my head around that it’s going to be in the UK, and it’s going to be in Liverpool. It’s terrifying!”
Graham Norton’s real name
But did you know that Graham Norton isn’t actually his real name? Yes, we’ve all been fed a lie for all these years. His birth name is actually Graham William Walker. He moved to London to attend the Central School of Speech and Drama in the late 1980s.
But upon joining the actors’ union Equity, he chose the name Norton (his great-grandmother's maiden name) as his new surname as there was already an actor called Graham Walker represented by the union.
Graham Norton's near-death experience
Before he was famous, Graham had a close brush with death after being mugged, beaten up and stabbed by a group of attackers in 1989 whilst in London. During his time at university, Graham was assaulted on his walk home in the early hours of the morning in Kilburn.
Luckily he managed to survive but didn’t realise how close to death he was. Graham spoke about his terrifying experience on Elizabeth Day's How to Fail podcast about how he sought the comfort of a stranger to help him through the ordeal.
He said: “I'm on this mat and I didn't know I was dying, I didn't figure it out until later, and this is so not me but I remember saying to this little old lady 'will you hold my hand?' And it was a flicker on her face of 'oh do I want to hold his hand' but she did and she held out her hand.”
Graham recalled how he hadn’t even noticed he’d been stabbed during the altercation as his adrenaline was so high, reported The Mirror. Graham added: "I held her hand and I think that's something so deep within us and it motivates so much of our life that we don't want to die alone.
"I think so many decisions in our lives like having a partner and having children are about not being alone when you die. It's about having someone to hold your hand."
However, that wasn’t Graham’s only time coming face to face with a knife. Back in 2019, he revealed to The Mirror he had a knife pulled on him outside of a club just a few years after his stabbing.
Graham Norton’s husband
Graham is openly gay and he’s been in a number of relationships over the years. He tied the knot with his now-husband Jonothan McLeod, a Scottish filmmaker, back in July last year.
The pair married in a private ceremony attended by their closest family, friends and celebrity pals at Bantry House, West Cork. The Irish TV host had kept the identity of his mystery partner and details of their relationship under wraps even after marriage.
He spoke to OK! about married life, saying he hopes it’ll 'change' his life for the better. Graham said: “Hopefully getting married will change my life for the better. It’s that weird thing – when you’re not married, and married people talk about being married, they just sound so hideously smug. I am now that smug!
“Jonathan and I had been together for nearly six years and, at my age, to say ‘Til death do us part’ seems more achievable. When you’re in your twenties, that’s a big ask!”
It’s not known exactly how long the two were in a relationship before tying the knot. Back in 2021, Graham told The Times: “There’s a weird thing that happens in your life that the older you get the less right you have to be picky, but the pickier you become. And your dating pool becomes smaller and smaller — but that’s because you want it to be."
He also spoke about being spotted on dating app Tinder, saying: "I'm a single person, why wouldn't I go on Tinder?" He added that he had since deleted the app. "I was on Tinder a couple of years ago, but I'm not on it now. I felt like I'd done it," he said
Graham’s exes - from RuPaul’s Drag Race star to fashion consultant
Back in the day, before he was even a judge on BBC Three’s RuPaul’s Drag Race UK, he actually dated one of the US contestants. Graham dated Kristian Seeber, better known as Tina Burner, for five years before breaking up in 2006. The Mirror reported the TV host wrote about his relationship with the drag queen in his biography, The Lives And Loves of a He Devil.
Graham wrote: “The experiment lasted for about six months and it was a disaster. "I realise that even to a perfect stranger the outcome would have been glaringly obvious, but when you are in the middle of something and you are desperate for it to work, you'll try anything."
The TV host then dated fashion consultant Trevor Patterson from 2010 to 2013, before getting together with music marketing consultant Andrew Smith. He eventually parted ways with Smith in 2015.
He told The Independent back in 2015 that his ex-boyfriends often “resented” the role they had to play in the public eye as the presenter’s partner.
Eurovision is sold out but fans might be able to get resale tickets here. See more accommodation options for Liverpool on Booking.com. You can book UK trains on Trainline.
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