Chris Evans

***Christopher James Evans*** (April 1, 1966, Warrington, England) is an English television presenter, radio DJ, businessman, voice actor and producer for radio and television. He started his broadcasting career working for Piccadilly Radio, Manchester, as a teenager, before moving to London as a presenter for the BBC's Greater London Radio and then Channel 4 television, where The Big Breakfast made him a star. Soon he was able to dictate highly favourable terms, allowing him to broadcast on competing radio and TV stations. Slots like the Radio 1 Breakfast Show and TFI Friday provided a mix of celebrity interviews, music and comic games, delivered in an irreverent style that attracted high ratings, though often also generated significant numbers of complaints. By 2000 he was the UK's highest paid entertainer, according to the Sunday Times Rich List. In the tax year to April 2017, he was the BBC's highest-paid presenter, earning between £2.2m and £2.25m annually.

In 2005, he started a new career on BBC Radio 2, hosting his long-running Drivetime programme, before moving in 2010 to host The Chris Evans Breakfast Show every weekday morning. He previously presented The One Show on Fridays between 2010 and 2015. Between 2011 and 2018, he co-hosted Radio 2 Live in Hyde Park.

In 2015, Evans signed a three-year deal to lead a new Top Gear line-up. and presented a revival series of TFI Friday. On 4 July 2016, he announced that he would be stepping down as presenter of Top Gear.

On 3 September 2018, he announced that he would be leaving his BBC Radio 2 Breakfast Show on Christmas Eve, and would be returning to Virgin Radio UK to present its breakfast show. He moved from BBC Radio 2 with most of his regular team.

Evans was born in Warrington, England, the youngest child of bookmaker and health authority wages clerk Martin Joseph Evans (12 November 1921–25 April 1979), and Minnie Beardsall (1926–2018), who managed a corner shop. His siblings are brother David (born 1953) and sister Diane (born 1963). He started his schooling at St Margaret's Church of England Infants and Junior School, and later the Junior School in Orford, Warrington.[citation needed] Evans' father died of colorectal cancer, and his mother was a breast cancer survivor.

Evans began his professional career at Piccadilly Radio, Manchester, in 1983, where he had previously had unpaid schoolboy work. Until 1984 Evans had three jobs: as an assistant to Timmy Mallett, and playing a character on his show called 'Nobby Nolevel' ('No 'O' Level'); acting as a disc jockey in the evenings at local pubs when he was not at Piccadilly Radio; and still working at the newsagents, opening up daily at 5 am to sort out the newspaper deliveries.

In addition to his Saturday morning show on GLR, in March 1992 Evans began presenting a Sunday afternoon show on BBC Radio 1, replacing Phillip Schofield. His show, Too Much Gravy, was broadcast from 14:30 to 16:00 and ended in September 1992. His move to Radio 1 was short-lived but seen as a huge success, with controller Johnny Beerling later admitting he wished he'd offered Evans a full-time show there and then. At the time, however, Evans objected that Radio 1 had attempted to constrain his style, preventing him from using the "zoo" format, allegedly because Steve Wright was already doing that on the station.

Evans' departure from radio was in part so he could devote his time to the new Channel 4 breakfast television show, The Big Breakfast, from 28 September 1992. He co-hosted the show with Gaby Roslin.

In April 1995, Evans returned to radio to host the flagship Radio 1 Breakfast Show. Evans negotiated into his contract with Radio 1 a clause allowing him to still make television programmes, and specifically an option to make a Friday night programme for Channel 4. A further clause required the Breakfast Show to be produced independently by Evans' Ginger company, rather than in-house by BBC Radio.

Evans began making editions of Channel 4's TFI Friday from 1996. The show – devised, produced and hosted by Evans through his Ginger Media company – combined celebrity interviews, musical guests and daft games and competitions. Largely based on the successful formula of his radio show, it was initially a big success. However, as the success of both shows peaked, combined with a string of celebrity relationships and highly publicised nights drinking with friends Danny Baker and Paul Gascoigne, the strain began to show, and a model emerged described as a "template for his approach to all his subsequent projects – an abundance of enthusiasm at the beginning which eventually falls prey to boredom and shiftlessness."

During a holiday in Killarney, he listened to the Irish broadcaster Gerry Ryan on the radio. Evans claims the variety on Ryan's show made him want to return to radio. Evans was then hired by Virgin Radio to host its breakfast show, prompting an immediate upsurge in station listening figures of 1.8 million to 2.6 million. His first show was on 13 October 1997, the same day as Kevin Greening and Zoë Ball on Radio 1. Starting at 7:00 am, Evans' crew presented the show from Monday to Friday, but without Evans participating on a Friday

Evans took over the Radio 2 breakfast show on 11 January 2010, succeeding Sir Terry Wogan. The show was originally 30 minutes longer than the Wogan incarnation and began at 07:00am, but following the departure of Sarah Kennedy from early breakfast, the show was extended by another 30 minutes and began at 06:30am. The show always ended with a handover to Ken Bruce at 09:30am. While Evans replaced Wogan owing to his long-planned retirement, supporters of Kennedy alleged there was a deliberate intention to force her out so that Evans' show could be lengthened. His first three songs were The Beatles' "All You Need Is Love" and "Got to Get You into My Life"; and Frank Sinatra's "Come Fly with Me". His co-presenters included ex-BBC TV newsreader Moira Stuart, sports presenter Jonny Saunders (who was replaced in June 2011 by Vassos Alexander), and travel reporter Lynn Bowles. Features included The Gobsmackers (two songs selected by a listener that sound good played back-to-back).