Popular TV presenter Paul O’Grady has revealed how he was badly affected by Covid-19 last year and how he thought he may never recover.
The 67-year-old was unable to work for two months as the virus took a tight hold of him. And because he’d suffered two heart attacks in the past, he feared his condition may get worse.
“I managed to escape Covid until last year and then I caught it,” he told the Mirror. “I didn’t half get it; I was really ill.
“It wiped me out, I was shocked at how bad I was. I was a good two months getting over it, my breath had gone.”
His heart doctor took an X-ray and diagnosed Paul as a recovering Covid victim. O’Grady then spent the summer recuperating at his Kent farm.
He recalled: “All I did was sleep. I’d wake up, go downstairs and sit on the couch and then pass out for another four hours.
“I’d get up, have a cup of tea and then go back to bed and sleep all night, it was very odd. I just felt terrible with it.
“I’ve never slept so much in my life. I’d had all the jabs, but it just finished me off.
“Thank God I’m over it now, but at one time I thought: ‘Is this ever going to go? Am I ever going to get my energy back and stop being tired?’ It wasn’t pleasant.”
O’Grady caught the virus in July while in Malta filming the second series of Sally Lindsay’s The Madame Blanc Mysteries. He said: “We got one day’s filming in the can and that night I felt a bit off and then the next day I felt like I was dying.
Subscribe here for the latest news where you live
“I had a vicious headache and a terrible cough. I spent nine days in a hotel room going slowly around the bend.
“It was a really lengthy script and I’d learnt it and then of course I didn’t get to do it. I eventually flew back home and I felt a lot better, but then after a couple of days I felt shocked and I was back in bed again, I just couldn’t shake it off.”
O’Grady eventually recovered and is this year back at work playing Miss Hannigan in a nationwide tour of the musical Annie. The infamous caretaker of a New York orphanage, Miss Hannigan despises children and much prefers a drink to childcare.
O’Grady, who also played the role in the West End 25 years ago, says: “You can play her two ways – really evil, with no redeeming features at all, or you can play her for laughs, which I tend to do. So, she’s either hungover or drunk.
“When she’s hungover, that’s when she’s evil, but I play her as a happy drunk. It’s a lovely show and a real hoot.”
Meanwhile, he is also still busy with For the Love of Dogs, his multi-award-winning ITV series. In it he helps re-home unwanted and abandoned animals at the famous Battersea Dogs & Cats Home.
And he reveals that this is the toughest time in the show’s 11-year history, as so many people are now having to give up their pets because of the cost of living crisis. He went on: “You wouldn’t believe the state of some of the dogs we get in, especially now, because people can’t afford to look after them any more.
“People are heartbroken – these are well cared for, well-loved dogs they’re bringing in. And they just say: ‘we can’t afford them; we can’t afford the vet’s bills’.
“Little vet’s practices have become huge corporations, so it’s nearly £100 before you put your foot in the door.”
O’Grady is married to ballet teacher and arts manager Andre Portasio, and they live with a collection of pigs, goats, chickens, sheep, dogs and owls. And even successful performer O’Grady feels the pinch from vet bills.
He said: “It costs almost as much to have a pig put to sleep as it did to have a stent put in my heart. Where’s the sense in that?
“It’s outrageous what they’re charging, so a lot of dogs just get dumped by the roadside or tied up in a wood.”
O’Grady is also a successful radio DJ. On Christmas Day he hosted a show on Boom Radio and for the previous 14 years, he had his own popular Radio 2 Sunday evening programme.
He quit last summer after being asked to share the time slot with comedian Rob Beckett, each doing 13 weeks before taking a break. Paul admits: “I was a bit narky when they asked me to share the slot. My hackles rose and then I thought, I’m going to honour my contract.
“I’m going to give my notice in properly and I’m going to go with no complaints, no bitching and no tears and just say ‘thank you very much for having me’ and then leave.
“Some of the listeners said to me they thought I was very dignified. They were expecting full guns blazing!
“It’s a shame because I always loved Radio 2. It seems to be that both telly and radio are terrified of an older audience, it makes me laugh.
“They assume that teenagers are going to be dancing to Radio 2 on a Friday night. Are you out of your mind?
“They don’t listen to the radio. They should have left Radio 2 alone for the older listener.”
For more stories from where you live, visit InYourArea.
