Paul James O'Grady (14 June 1955 – 28 March 2023) was an English drag queen, comedian, broadcaster, actor, and writer. He achieved notability in the London gay scene during the 1980s with his drag persona Lily Savage, through which he gained wider popularity in the 1990s. O'Grady subsequently dropped the character and in the 2000s became the presenter of various television and radio shows, including The Paul O'Grady Show.
Born to a working-class Irish migrant family in Tranmere, Cheshire, O'Grady moved to London in the late 1970s, initially working as a peripatetic care officer for Camden Council. He developed his drag act in 1978, basing the character of Lily Savage upon traits found among female relatives. Touring England as part of drag mime duo the Playgirls, O'Grady then went solo as a stand-up comedian in the early 1980s. Performing as Savage for eight years at a South London gay pub, the Royal Vauxhall Tavern (RVT), he gained a popular following among London's gay community and used his character to speak out for gay rights. After being nominated for a 1992 Perrier Comedy Award, O'Grady attracted mainstream attention and made various television, radio, and theatrical appearances. As Savage, he presented the television shows The Big Breakfast (1995–1996), Blankety Blank (1997–2002), and Lily Live! (2000–2001), earning various awards and becoming a well known public figure.
Wishing to diversify from Savage, O'Grady starred in the BBC One sitcom Eyes Down (2003–2004) and presented two travel documentaries for ITV. In 2004, he began presenting ITV's daytime chat show The Paul O'Grady Show. After the network refused to transfer creative control of the series to O'Grady's production company Olga TV, he moved to Channel 4 in 2006, where the show was rebranded as The New Paul O'Grady Show, airing until 2009. O'Grady presented the late night ITV show Paul O'Grady Live (2010–2011) and BBC Radio 2's Paul O'Grady on the Wireless (2009–2022). Additional television shows included Paul O'Grady: For the Love of Dogs (2012–2023), Paul O'Grady's Animal Orphans (2014–2016), Blind Date (2017–2019), and Paul O'Grady's Great British Escape (2020). He also published several books, including a four-volume memoir.
O'Grady was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) in the 2008 Birthday Honours for services to entertainment. In 2020 he became president of the British Music Hall Society, taking over the role from Roy Hudd. On 31 October 2022 he was appointed as a Deputy Lieutenant for the County of Kent, where he lived for many years.
O'Grady was born on 14 June 1955 at St. Catherine's Hospital in the Tranmere area of Birkenhead, Cheshire (now Merseyside). His father, Patrick "Paddy" Grady (1912–1973), was Irish and had grown up in Ballincurry, County Roscommon, before moving to England in 1936 and settling in the working-class area of Birkenhead. His name was changed from "Grady" to "O'Grady" in a paperwork mistake when he joined the Royal Air Force, and he kept the new name. Patrick married Mary "Molly" Savage (1916–1988), who was born in England to Irish immigrants from County Louth. Paul was their third child; his birth came over a decade after those of brother Brendan (born 1941) and sister Sheila (born 1944).
O'Grady spent his early life at the family's rented home at 23 Holly Grove in Higher Tranmere. He later said, "When I look back on my childhood I have no bad memories. Our family was loving and full of affection. I never knew what divorce was until I moved to London. I was an indulged child and completely protected from anything bad." Attending St. Joseph's Catholic Primary School, O'Grady excelled in all subjects except mathematics. Hoping that he had a good future ahead of him, his parents budgeted to send him to a private school, the Catholic-run Redcourt, but his grades dropped. Failing the eleven plus exam, he was unable to enter a grammar school so attended the Blessed Edward Campion R.C. Secondary Modern and the Corpus Christi High School. It was at the school that O'Grady experienced his first homosexual encounter, enjoying a brief romance with another boy, although he still assumed he was heterosexual.
A fan of television series The Avengers and Batman, O'Grady was enrolled in the Cub Scouts by his mother, but he hated it, leaving after a month. An altar boy at a local Catholic church, he was dismissed after laughing during a funeral service. He then joined the Marine Cadet Section of the Sea Cadet Corps, later commenting that he was following in the footsteps of his childhood hero, the cartoon character Popeye. He enjoyed the cadets, and at the advice of his captain joined the Boys' Amateur Boxing Club, developing a lifelong love of the sport. Playing truant from school, he got into trouble with his parents, and subsequently with the police after burgling a house with three friends. O'Grady's first job was a paper round that he kept for a week, and through this and other jobs, he saved up to afford Mod clothes, for a time becoming a suedehead.
Leaving school aged 16, O'Grady obtained a job in the civil service, working as a clerical assistant for the DHSS at their Liverpool office; he commuted in from his parents' Tranmere home. Supplementing this income, he worked part-time at the bar of the Royal Air Forces Association (RAFA) club in Oxton. Called for a disciplinary hearing at the DHSS and accused of incompetent behaviour and tardiness, he resigned. Obtaining a job at the Wheatsheaf Hotel in Virginia Water, Surrey, aged 17, O'Grady moved there; the management accused him of stealing, which he denied.
Promptly returning to Birkenhead, he increasingly socialised within the Liverpudlian gay scene, attending meetings of the Campaign for Homosexual Equality and working at a gay bar called the Bear's Paw; this was kept a secret from his parents, to whom he was not "out of the closet". He also had casual sex with a female friend, Diane Jansen, who became pregnant, news which O'Grady discovered in the same week that both his parents suffered heart attacks; his mother made a recovery, but his father died. Following the birth of his daughter, Sharon Lee Jansen, in May 1974, O'Grady agreed to pay towards her upkeep, but refused to marry Jansen, recognising his homosexuality.
Briefly working as an assistant clerk at Liverpool Magistrates' Court, O'Grady subsequently worked as a barman at Yates's Wine Lodge, supplementing the income with the occasional night at the Bear's Paw. Realising this wage was insufficient to support both himself and his daughter, he travelled to London, lodging in Westbourne Green, but found only poorly paid work as a barman. In London, he began associating with drag queens, particularly a couple who used the stage name of the Harlequeens. Although making friends in the city, O'Grady was homesick and returned to Birkenhead. Employed as an accountant in a FMC Meats Merseyside abattoir, he then worked for three years at the Children's Convalescent Home and School in West Kirby, a home for disabled and abused children.
Returning to London, he rented a flat in Crouch End and began busking with a friend in Camden Town before obtaining a job as a physiotherapist's assistant at the Royal Northern Hospital. Made redundant by public sector cuts, O'Grady took up a job at a gay club called the Showplace, befriending a Portuguese lesbian named Teresa Fernandes. In May 1977, they married to prevent her deportation; they lost contact and only legally divorced in 2005. Taking up jobs as a cleaner and a waiter at private functions, he began working for Camden Council as a peripatetic care officer. Living in with elderly people and dysfunctional families would have a lasting effect on him.
1978–1984: Lily Savage and the drag circuit
While working for Camden Social Services, O'Grady made his first attempt at putting together a drag act, creating the character of Lily Savage; he later said, "I wanted to get up there but be larger than life, a creature that was more cartoon than human." His debut was on the afternoon of 7 October 1978 at The Black Cap gay pub in Camden, where his act involved miming the words to Barbra Streisand's "Nobody Makes a Pass at Me" from the show Pins and Needles. Following a holiday to Poland, he visited an ex-boyfriend in Manila in the Philippines, there working briefly as a barman and waiter at a brothel.