Heights. For Children in Need, I had to abseil off the Orbit in the Olympic Park. It was the most terrifying thing I’ve done.
The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 22 October 2022 source ↗
The question
What do you fear most?Originally asked
Vanity Fair, to its interview subject, The Proust Questionnaire
The exact prompt is fixed in Vanity Fair's Proust Questionnaire and independently sustained in The Guardian's The Q&A over multiple decades.
You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.
Heights. For Children in Need, I had to abseil off the Orbit in the Olympic Park. It was the most terrifying thing I’ve done.
The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 22 October 2022 source ↗
To die before I know certain things.
The greatest fear I can remember is coming back from WW II and being amazed that I was more afraid to audition for a job than I was flying 52 missions.
Aggression without provocation or consequences.
Being onstage and forgetting why I’m there.
Katy Perry. I hired a Russell Brand lookalike as a joke for the radio, and she thought it was actually him. When she realised it wasn’t, she burst into tears. She was still married to him, but I didn’t take into account that there were things going on that we didn’t know.
When I left Radio 1: full snotty sobbing on air.
Now. I’ve moved to Hertfordshire after 25 years in London, got a fiancee and a dog, so everything has fallen into place.
I splash out on holidays and scented candles – I’ve got one that my fiancee won’t let me light, so it’s just for show.
Still biting my nails.
I went on a private jet with David Hasselhoff, and it was so turbulent between LA and Vegas I thought it was going down. I also thought: “The headline won’t be about me; it will be: David Hasselhoff and friend.”
Jimmy Kimmel, Helen George, Rita Wilson, Lauren Bacall, Tony Christie, Sarah Perry
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