Des O'Connor: 'My son keeps me young'

Des O'Connor: 'My son keeps me young'
Des O'Connor: 'My son keeps me young' (Image credit: PA Archive/Press Association Ima)

Veteran entertainer Des O'Connor has denied he was "selfish" to become a father so late in life. The 80-year-old said his seven-year-old son Adam kept him young. He told Hello! Magazine: "I want to be with him for as long as I can, and that's another reason to keep myself in good shape. "I don't have a strict health regime but I do think you have to take care of yourself. "I've never drunk heavily but I drink even less now. I exercise but nothing too strenuous. I try to keep myself in good nick." He said he was not concerned about the criticism aimed at him when Adam was born and when he married his second wife, Jodie, who is 37 years his junior. He said: "I think I'm more concerned that Adam might be concerned one day that his dad is a bit older than everybody else's. "Happily, though, I'm not experiencing that at the moment. I had people saying I was selfish. But what's selfish about that? "How can you say to a woman you've been with for 15-odd years, 'No, I've got four and we're not having any more?' That would be selfish." Des said he was equally unconcerned about the age gap between himself and Jodie.

Patrick McLennan

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.