He had a little help from host Jeremy Clarkson
He had a little help from host Jeremy Clarkson
Sir Stephen Fry has spoken of his “delight” at winning £250,000 on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? after host Jeremy Clarkson helped him out on one question during a celebrity version of the series. The ITV show, which was originally hosted by Chris Tarrant, introduced a lifeline called “ask the host” when it was revived in 2018 with Clarkson as the presenter.
Former QI host, actor and comedian Sir Stephen also asked for help from Pointless star and author Richard Osman on the £500,000 question, by using his phone a friend lifeline. Clarkson called it the “biggest celebrity win since I started (on) this show”, and said it was a “whopping win” after Sir Stephen decided to walk way with £250,000.
For the half-a-million-pound question, Sir Stephen was asked what the longest gap was between the original version and the cover version of a song, but quiz host Richard didn’t know the answer.
The songs listed were ‘Tragedy’ by Steps, ‘Fast Car’ by Jonas Blue and Dakota, ‘Uptown Girl,’ by Westlife, and ‘Killing Me Softly’ by the Fugees. On the £500,000 question, Sir Stephen said Richard “naturally couldn’t” work out the long question in the five seconds he had left. “I am delighted and I am not complaining at all,” Sir Stephen said. “It was extremely good fun. The time goes so quickly.”
After Sir Stephen decided to walk away, Jeremy asked: ‘Which one would you have gone for?’ and Sir Stephen said, “B – Fast Car” – which turned out to be the correct answer. He later said the fact that he would have got it right if he’d gambled was “almost worse than getting it wrong”, adding: “You think ‘maybe I should have risked it’. But of course, you can’t risk it.”
Host Jeremy Clarkson helped him out on a question about European geography. He was asked which European city out of Brussels, Strasbourg, Munich and Luxembourg City would you come closest to if you walked a straight line from Paris to Berlin. Getting the answer correct took him up to a quarter of a million.
Sir Stephen said he will donate his prize money from tonight’s show to mental health charity Mind, which he has been the president of since 2011. “They have captured the attention of a whole new generation – either as something to support or indeed, to use its facilities and use its guidance on what it has to offer people who are in distress of mind,” Sir Stephen said.
“It is deeply worrying so many young people want to hurt themselves, this inner pain they are feeling. Mind is a wonderful resource.”
Sir Stephen is known as one half of a comedy double act along with House star Hugh Laurie, and their work on A Bit of Fry & Laurie and Jeeves And Wooster.
He was nominated for a Golden Globe for playing Irish writer Oscar Wilde in the 1997 film Wilde and has been open about his struggles with mental illness and his bipolar disorder diagnosis. He fronted the BBC programme Stephen Fry’s The Secret Life Of The Manic Depressive in 2006.
In the recent New Year Honours list, he was given a knighthood for his services to mental health awareness, the environment and to charity. Last time he was on the show, Sir Stephen won £125,000 for two charities when he appeared alongside TV cook Nigella Lawson in 2005.
Also in this series, TV presenter Steph McGovern, Strictly Come Dancing judge Anton Du Beke and former Coronation Street actress Julie Hesmondhalgh will join Clarkson in an effort to win a million pounds for charity.