Danny Baker admits to some 'appalling' TV shows

Danny Baker admits to some 'appalling' TV shows (Image credit: PA Archive/Press Association Ima)

DJ and presenter Danny Baker has admitted large chunks of his career were 'an appalling waste of time'. Danny, who recently returned to work after being treated for cancer, said he felt 'a distant shame' about his career in showbusiness. In an interview to be broadcast on Radio 4's Desert Island Discs, he said 'this nitwit culture we have' allowed him to use his 'gift for exploiting my personality. Danny made his name as a journalist on the punk fanzine Sniffin' Glue before going on to work at NME and launching a career in television and radio. He told Desert Island Discs presenter Kirsty Young: "I don't feel that's somehow lucky when you look around at some of the half-wits and boss-eyed bozos who people this business and they are running departments. "So all of this is an anthill that somebody has kicked over and I happen to be one of the more bumptious ants." He added: "Some of the television shows I've done have been an appalling waste of time... My mind is whizzing with them. A show called The Bottom Line that was no good, I've done a thing called Sitcom Showdown that was ridiculous. "But anything you do, especially in this game, you stand out there with half a chance but you don't think 'that represents me'." Danny described his illness as 'a rotten, disgusting time', but added it was a 'very small portion of a wider life'. He said: "You don't battle it. You are the battleground, you are Normandy beach, you are Hastings in 1066. It's science that's fighting it."

Patrick McLennan is a London-based journalist and documentary maker who has worked as a writer, sub-editor, digital editor and TV producer in the UK and New Zealand. His CV includes spells as a news producer at the BBC and TVNZ, as well as web editor for Time Inc UK. He has produced TV news and entertainment features on personalities as diverse as Nick Cave, Tom Hardy, Clive James, Jodie Marsh and Kevin Bacon and he co-produced and directed The Ponds, which has screened in UK cinemas, BBC Four and is currently available on Netflix.

An entertainment writer with a diverse taste in TV and film, he lists Seinfeld, The Sopranos, The Chase, The Thick of It and Detectorists among his favourite shows, but steers well clear of most sci-fi.