Chris Moyles facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Chris Moyles
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Moyles at a live karaoke event, 11 September 2009
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Christopher David Moyles
22 February 1974 Leeds, England
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| Education | Mount St Mary's Catholic High School |
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| Years active | 1990–present |
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Christopher David Moyles (born 22 February 1974) is an English radio and television presenter, author and presenter of The Chris Moyles Show on Radio X.
Previously he has presented The Chris Moyles Show on BBC Radio 1 from 2004 to 2012 and Chris Moyles' Quiz Night from 2009 to 2012 on Channel 4. Moyles has worked at various radio stations, including Radio Luxembourg (under the pseudonym Chris Holmes) and Capital FM. Moyles moved to BBC Radio 1 in July 1997 and left the station in September 2012. He has presented the early breakfast show, a Saturday morning show, and the drive time show (from September 1998 to December 2003), before presenting the breakfast show from 5 January 2004 to 14 September 2012. Moyles is BBC Radio 1's longest serving breakfast presenter.
He frequently made appearances on several television shows including Hotel Babylon, a celebrity version of Supermarket Sweep, Top Gear, The Charlotte Church Show, The F-Word, The Friday Night Project, The One Show, Friday Night with Jonathan Ross, Richard & Judy and The Paul O'Grady Show.
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Early life and career
Moyles was born in Leeds, West Riding of Yorkshire, to Christopher, a postman, and housewife Hannah Veronica "Vera" Moyles, (from Dublin) and he was educated at Mount St Mary's Catholic High School. While at school, he began his broadcasting career at WBHS (Wakefield's Broadcast to Hospitals Service), a voluntary staffed hospital radio station in the West Yorkshire city.
After WBHS, Moyles moved to local radio station Aire FM as an assistant for DJ Carl Kingston. During this time, he was also a presenter on Radio Top Shop in the Leeds Briggate branch. After hosting his own Saturday Evening Show on Aire FM (and occasionally serving as a stand-in presenter), he was then employed as a presenter at Radio Luxembourg in 1992, until the station closed.
In 1993, he gained a job at the Pulse of West Yorkshire, presenting the evening show from 7.00 pm–10.00 pm. He remained there until early 1994 when he was dismissed for comments made about the station's previous programme controller. Moyles subsequently joined Signal 1 in Stoke-on-Trent – again presenting The Evening Bit from 7.00 pm–10.00 pm. He remained there until he was dismissed by the station's programme controller. In 1995 Moyles was heard on the Chiltern Radio Network, presenting the evening show from 7.00 pm–10.00 pm, before taking on the late show from 10.00 pm–1.00 am. This show was simulcast on Horizon Radio, Chiltern Radio, Severn Sound and Northants 96.
In 1996, Moyles joined London station Capital FM, hosting his weekend show The Late Bit, which went out on Friday and Saturday evenings, and covering for other DJs. It was at Capital that Moyles fell out with fellow DJ Neil Fox. After declining the offer of presenting the breakfast show on rival station Kiss 100, Moyles joined Radio 1 in July 1997.
Radio 1
Moyles was voted one of the Faces for 97 by SKY magazine and presented his first show on Radio 1 on 28 July 1997, hosting the 4.00 am–7.00 am Early Breakfast show – soon called The Early Bit. In May 1998, his work was recognised with the award of the Silver Sony Awards DJ of the Year, and he was styling himself as 'The Saviour of Early Morning Radio'. Within the year Moyles was promoted to a Saturday breakfast, then Saturday mid-morning slot from 10.00 am–1.00 pm. At Radio 1, he presented most of his shows with David "Comedy Dave" Vitty, who worked behind the scenes at the station before Moyles' arrival.
After standing in regularly for Kevin Greening and Zoe Ball on the Radio 1 Breakfast Show, Moyles' next promotion came in October 1998 when he took control of the drivetime show from 4.00 pm–5:45 pm. The show was extended to 3.00 pm–5:45 pm in February 2001. Moyles has co-presented the show from 1998 with his sidekick.
On 5 January 2004, Moyles started presenting Radio 1's breakfast programme, named The Chris Moyles Show, switching places with Sara Cox. He had been appointed to increase the ratings for the show and did so, putting on an extra 1,000,000 listeners to the audience in the first quarter of 2004. After a successful first year, Moyles was awarded 'DJ of the Year' by readers of The Sun.
By 2005, Moyles and his team had succeeded in increasing the morning audience, with his programme's audience rising to 6.5 million. This was coupled with an increase in the overall Radio 1 audience share. With 895,000 listeners in London in the third quarter of 2005, he succeeded in overtaking Johnny Vaughan to take the position of the capital's most listened to youth breakfast show. Moyles' audience ratings continued to increase each week and led to him winning a gold Sony Radio Award in 2006 for best entertainment show.
With the release of the RAJAR listening figures on 3 August 2006, Moyles had added a further 470,000 listeners to the Breakfast Show, taking the average listenership up to 6.79 million. On 10 May 2007, RAJAR figures confirmed that Moyles had increased his listening figures to 7.06 million, breaking the seven million barrier for the first time with the station having 10.55 million listeners overall. Moyles again increased his audience to 7.72 million as of 1 May 2008 slightly narrowing the gap between him and Terry Wogan, the highest-rated radio show in the UK at the time. The station's overall listener figure is now over 11 million.
On 12 May 2008 The Chris Moyles Show won its second Sony radio gold award for 'best breakfast show'. At this time he was given another half-hour on his show going from 7.00 am–10.00 am to 6.30 am–10.00 am.
On 7 September 2009 Moyles became the longest serving breakfast presenter on Radio 1, breaking the record previously set by Tony Blackburn.
In March 2011, Moyles and his colleague David Vitty beat the record for the longest continuous Radio 1 show, on Radio 1's Longest Show Ever with Chris Moyles and Comedy Dave for Comic Relief. Between 16 and 18 March they beat both Simon Mayo's 1999 record of 37 hours and the 'Radio DJ Endurance Marathon (Team)' Guinness World Record by broadcasting for 52 hours for Comic Relief initially raising £2.4 million, and with an audience of 2.84 million, it was the most popular live BBC Red Button radio feature ever. The event raised a final total of £2,821,831.
On 1 July 2011, it was announced that Moyles would remain within the BBC until at least 2014, ending speculation that he would move to a commercial rival. The deal was estimated to be worth £1 million. This would have allowed the presenter to reach his 10-year anniversary on The Chris Moyles Show. However, on 11 July 2012, Moyles announced that he would be leaving the breakfast show and the station on 14 September. It was announced later the same day that Nick Grimshaw would replace him.
Radio X
On 7 September 2015, it was announced Chris Moyles would return to radio on the newly re-branded Radio X (previously XFM) hosting the new Chris Moyles Show. The show began airing on 21 September 2015 from 6.30 am–10.00 am, returning to his former breakfast slot and was going head to head with his BBC Radio 1 breakfast show replacement, Nick Grimshaw. Chris Moyles stated Dominic Byrne, who read the news on his BBC Radio 1 show, would return with him, as would producer Pippa Taylor. On 19 April 2016 it was announced that there would be an additional pre-recorded show on Saturday mornings between 8 am-11.00 am featuring clips from the week, interviews with studio guests plus new content, which means that Chris is on air on Radio X 6 days a week.
Work outside radio
BT Red Nose Climb and Speaking Clock
Moyles was one of a team of celebrities who climbed Mount Kilimanjaro to raise money for Comic Relief, reaching the summit on 7 March 2009. He was joined by his show's producers, Rachel Mallender and Pippa Taylor, and BBC Radio 1 controller, Andy Parfitt. Also on the climb were Girls Aloud members Cheryl Cole and Kimberley Walsh, Fearne Cotton, Ben Shephard, Gary Barlow, Ronan Keating, Denise Van Outen and Alesha Dixon. He recorded a parody song around this time to promote the climb, mentioning all the names of the people that were also taking part – it was based on Lily Allen's "The Fear", and was called "(A month off of) The Beer".
From 3 February – 23 March 2009, Moyles was joined by Kimberley Walsh, Cheryl Cole, Gary Barlow, Ronan Keating, Ben Shephard and Fearne Cotton to help raise money for charity by reading the time on the Speaking Clock.
Film voice work
Moyles has provided his voice and/or likeness to a number of films and games. His face was used in 24: The Game, and his voice can be heard in the films Wimbledon, War of the Worlds and Robots. In some of these films, his voice was only used for the UK version.
Television presenting
Moyles has branched out his work into television. In 2002, his own Channel 5 show, Live with Chris Moyles, ran five shows a week for 13 weeks. Moyles was replaced by Christian O'Connell, before the programme was cancelled.
He and sidekick Dave Vitty had their own TV show, also entitled The Chris Moyles Show like their former Radio 1 show, which was aired from 1998–99 on the now-defunct UK satellite and cable channel UK Play.
Moyles voiced the fourth and final series of Sky1 show The Villa and has occasionally presented Top of the Pops. He has also worked for the Comic Relief and Children in Need charities on their telecasts.
Moyles has presented a number of episodes of Big Brother's Big Mouth. Daily Mirror journalist Rob Leigh once said of his Big Brother's Big Mouth presenting that "Chris Moyles may be Marmite for the ears on radio but never quite nails it on TV, even with his relative star power". He also presented The Big Breakfast on Channel 4 several times between 2000 and 2002.
In 2003, Moyles presented the launch of BBC Three. The launch night (not to be confused with the 2022 relaunch night) was simulcast on BBC Two.
Moyles launched a new show on Channel 4, called Chris Moyles' Quiz Night on 22 March 2009. The show consists of Moyles alongside three other celebrities partaking in a traditional pub-style quiz. The original series had the four competing to win an item that belonged to Moyles but this has since developed into a more traditional quiz with the loser singing karaoke-style at the end of the show. The opening show received poor viewing figures attracting just 6% of total audience for the timeslot. It was continued for a second series between 26 February and 11 April 2010, a third series following between 1 November and 22 December 2010 and fourth between 15 July and 2 September 2011. After 5 series, the show was shelved.
On 24 October 2011, The Metro announced that Moyles would co-present a new dating show, The Love Machine, alongside Stacey Solomon for Sky. Moyles confirmed this on his radio show that morning.
Other television appearances
Moyles appeared on the ITV show The X Factor: Battle of the Stars and had minor success. He was voted out of the show on 4 June 2006 in the semi-final. Following this appearance, stories in the New Statesman and The Sun both reported that Moyles was looking to relaunch his television career; rumours suggested that he had been offered his own show by ITV. Moyles has spoken of a desire to transfer the format of his radio show to the TV, but otherwise has thus far stayed clear of a conventional TV format.
Moyles regularly appears on This Morning and Celebrity Juice.
Moyles played himself in an episode of the drama Hotel Babylon which aired on 15 February 2007 and appeared on a celebrity version of Supermarket Sweep that broadcast on the same day. He has appeared as a guest on numerous British television shows, including the ninth series of Top Gear, Never Mind The Buzzcocks, which immortalised Moyles as an "oily pig in a dunce hat" The Charlotte Church Show, The F-Word, The Friday Night Project, Richard & Judy and The New Paul O'Grady Show.
In 2008, Moyles appeared on the Brit Awards to present the award for the best live act, and appeared in the BBC documentary series Comedy Map of Britain. He has appeared on Channel 4's Big Brother: Celebrity Hijack TV programme as well as an appearance as a team captain on the Channel 4 show Alan Carr's Celebrity Ding Dong and on 18 July 2008 he appeared on Jimmy Carr's show on Channel 4, 8 Out of 10 Cats.
On 23 February 2009, Moyles was the guest on BBC One's The One Show to promote the BT Red Nose climb of Mount Kilimanjaro. He appeared again on the show on 26 February 2010 to talk about and promote the second series of Chris Moyles' Quiz Night. In July 2009, he featured in an episode of the genealogy documentary series Who Do You Think You Are? on BBC One where he explored his Irish ancestry. He visited Ireland and Belgium, where his great-grandfather fought and died in the First World War. On the programme Moyles discovered that his surname means bald servant from the Irish "Ó Maolmanach". He also co-presented Children in Need Rocks Manchester in November 2011. Moyles appeared on the quiz show The Million Pound Drop along with Andi Peters in February 2012, they won £25,000 to divide between their chosen charities.
Moyles appeared on Children in Need on 16 November 2012, performing Bring Me Sunshine on stage with holograms of comedy duo Morecambe and Wise in an effort to raise money for the charity.
On 31 October 2022 Moyles was announced by ITV as a campmate of the 2022 series of I'm a Celebrity...Get Me Out of Here!. On the promo video Moyles says "It's only three weeks in the middle of a jungle; What could possibly go wrong?" He was voted out sixth on 24 November.
Autobiography
Moyles' autobiography, The Gospel according to Chris Moyles: The Story of One Man and His Mouth was released by Ebury Press on 5 October 2006.
On 4 October 2007 a follow-up book Chris Moyles: The Difficult Second Book, published by Ebury Press, was officially released. The Difficult Second Book was released in paperback on 1 May 2008. Stewart Lee, on his own programme Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle, commented that the title of the book suggests "a degree of irony and self-awareness largely absent from the text itself" and then went on to deconstruct and mock the book's contents.
Stage work
On 16 May 2012 it was announced that Chris Moyles had been cast to play the part of King Herod in an arena tour of Andrew Lloyd Webber's musical Jesus Christ Superstar. Moyles reprised his role as King Herod when Jesus Christ Superstar began another arena tour on 1 October 2013. Moyles also toured a solo stage show, "Chris Moyles Live".
Presenting style
Moyles uses a zoo format, and therefore relies on his team members and audience participation for his show's games and quizzes and for other sources of comedy. He is renowned for his boorish manner, quick temper, and put-downs. It is this approach which most commonly leads to criticism of Moyles.
Personal life
Moyles resides in Highgate, London with his girlfriend Tiffany Austin.
Moyles is a supporter of Leeds United F.C. and a critic of Boris Johnson and Matt Hancock.
Discography
Studio albums
- The Parody Album (2009) UK Chart No. 17
- The Difficult Second Album (2012) UK Chart No. 13
Awards and honours
Moyles has won several Sony Radio Awards: Silver in 1998; Gold in 2006; nominated in 2007: Gold in 2008; Bronze in 2009; and Silver in 2010.
He was voted "Best DJ" by readers of The Sun newspaper and readers of Loaded magazine.
In 2007 the rugby league team Featherstone Rovers named their ground after him. Historically known as Post Office Road, it was renamed via a sponsorship deal as the Chris Moyles Stadium. On 7 July 2007 Moyles appeared as a presenter at the UK leg of Live Earth in Wembley Stadium in London.
