Cork man Graham Norton has revealed he had a brush with death before he found fame.
The award-winning comedian, broadcaster and actor, who provided the commentary for the Eurovision Song Contest on the BBC last night, was stabbed, mugged and left for dead on a London street in the 1980s.
He revealed during a podcast last year: "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. 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.It gave me a really good attitude to risk and to failure because if you think of the worst-case scenario, no failure compares to dying. I'm not recommending anyone do it but for me it was a very useful and powerful life lesson."
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Born in 1963 in Dublin under the real name of Graham William Walker, the 61-year-old always aspired to be an actor. Instead, he found his calling in stand-up comedy during the early 1990s, captivating audiences at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in 1992, dressed as none other than Mother Teresa, reports Wales Online. It's rumoured that he was so compelling, many actually believed they were witnessing a performance by the real Mother Teresa.
He featured in multiple TV shows throughout the 90s, including the much-loved Irish sitcom Father Ted and The Jack Docherty Show, a chat show. Thanks to his undeniable talent, Norton landed himself his own gig on Channel 4.
By 2007, he was offered the golden opportunity to host The Graham Norton Show. This turned into a significant success with millions tuning in over the past decade and a half. Interestingly, the show initially aired on BBC2 before transitioning to BBC1 in 2009.
Since 2008, Norton has been providing UK viewers with coverage of the Eurovision Song Contest, taking over from Sir Terry Wogan. Openly gay, Norton confessed to The Mirror in 2015 that balancing love and work was tricky since "work comes first". He also conceded that finding love would perhaps have been simpler had he been heterosexual.
The television presenter stated: "But because I've worked so hard to get where I am, I continue to prioritise my job over other bits of my life. That's probably very foolish, something I'll live to regret. When I look back at my romantic history, I have to say it's taken second place to my job. Perhaps I don't expect my love affairs to last. Or it could just be that I have a low attention span."
Norton speculated that his experiences with relationships might have been different were he not gay. He expressed: "I have a theory. I think there's something about having a male partner that makes it more difficult. This will sound sexist but that doesn't mean it's any less true. If I were a straight man, my female partner would have a role in the eyes of society.
"She would be the mother of my children, my hostess, the person on my arm at red carpet events. She would have a defined function. But that's not the case if your partner is male. Every man no matter how young or fey has something of the alpha in him. So all the things they thought they'd enjoy about going out with me become loathsome in the end because they haven't earned it for themselves. Increasingly, that puts a strain on the relationship."
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