Jonathan Ross

It really wasn't, no one except someone extremely dodgy would have thought that was ok at the point that awards show happened

He’s been married for decades to an extremely good scriptwriter and has zero form for bad behaviour.

But a witch hunt is probably underway. His comments on that Andrew Sachs incident were beyond the pale but he got the sack. He now has a programme on Classic FM which is easy listening and perfectly acceptable.

They have a deeply alarming collection of friends though. I hadn't realised she was a screenwriter so I went on a quick Google and this Wikipedia entry is intriguing

Alongside her husband, broadcaster Jonathan Ross, Goldman appeared as a character in Neil Gaiman's short story "The Facts in the Case of the Departure of Miss Finch" in 1996. Gaiman is a personal friend of the couple.[37][38]

A little extract from Gaiman's Wikipedia ....

In July and August 2024, five women accused Gaiman of sexual assault and abuse. All five were interviewed on the Tortoise Media podcast Master: The Allegations Against Neil Gaiman. One, using the pseudonym "Claire", was also interviewed by The New York Times.[178] Claire described non-consensual kissing and groping by Gaiman after meeting him at a book tour event, as well as a $60,000 payment from Gaiman to her in August 2022.[178] A woman identified as "K", who also first met Gaiman at a book signing, said that during their relationship he subjected her to painful sex that she "neither wanted nor enjoyed".[21][179]

Scarlett Pavlovich, a former nanny for Gaiman and Amanda Palmer's child, alleges that Gaiman sexually assaulted her within hours of their first meeting in February 2022

They certainly seem to have desperately poor judgement when it comes to friendships

I’m going to defend Jonathan Ross on the basis that he’s always publicly paid homage to his wife and family, there has never been a whiff of scandal regarding infidelities or lechery. In fact he has always referenced and talked adoringly and lovingly of his wife since they were married.

Yes, he behaved laddishly and oafishly with fellow TV stars who were incredibly popular at the time. It was the kind of edgy stuff going on in a number of programmes - Chris Evans, Sacha Baron Cohen were doing similar stuff. National treasure Graham Norton started his career with a chat show populated with filthy innuendo and old ladies posing with sex toys….

JR didn’t write that line. Yes he could’ve refused to say it, but why would he have? He would’ve trusted the writers and producers in an industry he’s been successful in for decades.

I think YABU.

The problem isn't Ross reading out the joke about Walliams, the problem is he could publicly state in front of millions of viewers that Walliams was taking drunk 15-year-olds home and it didn't dent Walliams's public reputation in the slightest!

I don't think its ever been normal for a 26 year old man to have a relationship with a 16 year old.

What exactly would you have him report? If all he had to go on was rumour and gossip, what would be done about it? Police aren't going to investigate a man saying he thinks another man has been grooming 15 year olds.

Oh dear. She had a friend who dun something bad which she had nothing to do with. Presumably you want her cancelled too.

Exactly. Shows how ridiculous this is. It's beginning to turn into Salem style witch hunts.

I’m not defending Johnathan Ross by any means but apparently they rehearsed it before and it was planned for Aisling to respond with that (which is actually a bit from her stand up)

That is incredibly sad - sorry but your mother sounds awful

Maybe not to you but back in the day it was quite normal for 16,17.18 girls to marry older men because they had jobs and could take care of them. Back in my day, nearly everyone wanted to get away from their parents and strike out on their own. These days, they live with their parents until they're 30 or 40 and are vulnerable.

And very very common in the Victorian era too among the middle and upper classes.

Its completely reasonable to form a picture of people based on the company they keep and the jokes they tell.

Fully agree - a disgusting individual who I find it stretches credulity to imagine was unaware of Brand’s activities.

His horrible phone prank to Andrew Sachs and the revolting joke about the 15 year old indicate a man who is fundamentally not decent.

I don’t agree with the commenter who says he has a “wholesome family man” image - the two things above are incompatible with that, as is being slimy and appearing untrustworthy.

Fully agree. At age 15 at the beginning of the 90s I met a friend of a friend who was 19 and liked me. Once he found out how young I was he steered clear and we eventually went out when I was 19 and he was 23. Even that was enough of an age gap for people to remark on.

Don’t know if it is true or not @Undahpressurah but Jonathan Ross said he did not come up with that joke and it was just in the script he was given.

He still told the joke. He's very successful (successful enough to recover from Sachsgate). "Someone told me to say that" doesn't wash as an excuse.

An age gap of 10 years between 26 and 36 etc yes, fine. But not when one of the parties is only 16 and presumably needed parental permission to get married.

John Peel was another.

I didn’t say it does wash as an excuse @LastChristmasI but there are likely many other people in among the producers/crew etc who know exactly what was going on and who the dodgy people are …

NC for this.

As a child back in the 1980s I was living in NW London with my mum. We would often go up to Hampstead High street as that was the nearest place for shopping. My mum had a habit of talking to everyone and there was one woman she came to know reasonably well, to the point of going for coffee if they bumped into each other and putting the world to rights.

This woman, Kinny, was a nanny and had worked for families in that area for a while. She was basically retired when I remember her, but occasionally she would ‘help out’, sometimes just a bit of baby sitting, other times something more formal.

I don’t remember that much about Kinny, but I seem to recall that she had an accent and was Jewish. She may have been Israeli, but she had certainly been in the UK for many years. Kinny was, incidentally, absolutely lovely.

Kinny would occasionally work for Jonathan Ross and Jane Goldman, I believe she said she had been Jane’s nanny when she was young. Jane Goldman certainly had an unconventional childhood and I think Kinny was the most grounded influence in her life. According to her Wikipedia entry Jane left school early and went to the USA when she was 15 to follow Boy George on tour. Coincidentally, at the time he lived a 10 minute walk away from her in Hampstead!

Kinny was very fond on Jane Goldman, and I think this was mutual, the youngest Ross daughter is called Honey Kinny.

Now, this something I heard from my mum, so it may be that she mis-heard or that I mis-remember - and either way this is third-hand anecdote, but the tale she told of how Jonathan and Jane met is not quite the same as the one recorded in the press.

Google how did they meet and there are interviews with Jane Goldman saying she approached Jonathan Ross at an industry party when she was 16 and working for a music column in the Daily Star (?) possibly at Stringfellows. Apparently Jane pursued Jonathan.

But the story (possibly) from Kinny was that Jane Goldman had started work at Just Seventeen and was sent to interview Jonathan Ross as one of her first assignments. I got the impression this was alone, and near where he was living at the time, possibly at his home. That’s not uncommon for celebrity interviews, certainly wasn’t during the 80s and 90s.

And yes, you could leave school at 16 and go out to work then. But for an employer to send a young female reporter to interview a man ten years older than her - and on her own - at 16, seemed a bit off, even then.

I wasn’t privy to my mum’s conversations with Kinny, I only heard snippets, much edited for my young ears, but my mum wasn’t that impressed with Jonathan Ross, I guess based on what she’d heard. She definitely thought the age gap was a bit dodgy given he was already a known media personality (which gives a power imbalance as well) when they met.

The popular male entertainers of the 1990s and early 00s give me the creeps - Jonathan Ross, Russell Brand, Noel Fielding, Chris Evans, John Leslie, John Barrowman etc. Brand may be the only convicted rapist but the others all gave the impression of being rather unpleasant.

Gwyneth Paltrow interview. I'm not going to repeat what he said to her, but it was disgusting, sexually agressive and he managed to humilate Gwyneth and his wife in the same sentence.

I never watched his show again after that

Agree. That's why a spotlight needs to be shone on the whole sleazy industry.

Lovely that your mum met a nice friend but you do realise that there is absolutely nothing to your supposed story - just hints and whispers and misremembered comments. Not really worth a name change