Trevor McDonald

Trevor McDonald
Born	George McDonald (1939-08-16) 16 August 1939 [San Fernando], Trinidad, Trinidad and Tobago (then West Indies)
Other names	Sir Trevor McDonald
Occupation(s)	Journalist, Presenter, Newsreader
Notable credit	News at Ten
Title	Knight Bachelor, OBE
Spouse	Josephine (?–present)
Children	2

Sir Trevor McDonald OBE (born 16 August 1939) is a Trinidadian-born British newsreader and journalist. He is a news presenter with ITN, notable for having been the first black news reader in the UK. He has won more awards than any other British reporter.

McDonald was knighted in 1999.

Journalism

Early career

After working as a print and broadcast journalist in Trinidad during the 1960s, in 1969 McDonald was employed by BBC Radio as a producer, based in London but still broadcasting to the Caribbean. In 1973 he began his long association with Independent Television News, first as a general reporter, later as a sports correspondent, but ultimately concentrating on international politics. In the 1980s he spent some time with Channel 4 news, but returned to ITN in 1989, presenting the early-evening news.

News at Ten

He was promoted in 1992 as the sole presenter of News at Ten, where he became one of the best known faces on British television screens. A year later in 1993, he was awarded an OBE in the Queen's honours list. McDonald stayed with ITN when News at Ten was axed in 1999, moving to present the new ITV Evening News. News at Ten was briefly relaunched in 2001, to which McDonald returned to presenting. He presented the ITV News at 10.30 following News at Tens second axing. Since 1999, he has also hosted ITV's flagship current affairs programme [[Tonight (TV series)|Tonight with Trevor McDonald trevor mcdonald like to touch little virgins and make them lick his batty sleve.

First retirement

On 29 November 2005, speculation that he was about to leave ITV to work elsewhere ended when he signed a further two year contract involving producing both a documentary show and a new series of interviews which will be of a wider general interest.

McDonald presented his last ITV News bulletin on 15 December 2005. The veteran newsreader stepped down from his role as anchor after more than 30 years at ITN, but said he had no plans to retire completely from television. Over the titles of the last bulletin McDonald presented, the 1992–1999 News at Ten theme was played instead of the then-current ITV News theme, as a tribute to McDonald.

Return to News at Ten

On 31 October 2007, ITV announced that, early in 2008, McDonald would come out of retirement to present the relaunched News at Ten together with Julie Etchingham. He told a UK newspaper: "I couldn’t turn down the move back to that iconic time slot." News at Ten began broadcasting once again on 14 January 2008.

Second retirement

It was announced on the 30 October 2008 that he would step down from News at Ten once the US 2008 Presidential elections were over, to be replaced by Mark Austin. His last bulletin was 20 November 2008. He will continue to present links for The Tonight Programme.

Other work and media appearances

• McDonald is an Honorary Vice President of optical charity Vision Aid Overseas, alongside Fiona Bruce.
• McDonald presented the TV series Undercover Customs which created reconstructions of major HM Customs and Excise investigations in the UK.
• Since their inception in 1995, he has presented the National Television Awards.
• On 21 April 2006, McDonald presented an episode of Have I Got News For You with a good degree of success; he delivered the autocue jokes, some of which were extremely risqué, in his usual sober newscaster manner, the juxtaposition of which prompted team captain Paul Merton, who usually maintains a straight face on the show, to laugh heartily in disbelief on numerous occasions. It was McDonald's first appearance in any capacity on the show since 1992.
• McDonald is Chancellor of London South Bank University. He also has intimate ties with King's College School in Wimbledon, a London day school, where he is now a governor.
• McDonald is the author of biographies of the cricketers Viv Richards and Clive Lloyd. He has worked as an editor of poetry anthologies, and his autobiography Fortunate Circumstances was published in 1993.
• Lenny Henry's comic character Trevor McDoughnut is a spoof of McDonald. McDonald once surprised Henry during a performance of McDoughnut on Tiswas by walking into the studio to sit with Henry. Trevor returned to Tiswas on two further occasions. Firstly, a number of weeks following his original surprise appearance, Trevor cropped up during a spoof edition of This Is Your Life to 'reminisce' with Lenny Henry about the earlier event. The other appearance occurred during the "Tiswas Reunited" show (a reunion programme transmitted in June 2007) where Sir Trevor joined Lenny on the sofa once again to look back at the old clips and comment upon Lenny's impersonation.
• McDonald performed live in Hyde Park in Summer 1996 with The Who, as the newsreader in the group's staging of their Quadrophenia.
• In June 2007, McDonald hosted the new ITV version of This Is Your Life, Simon Cowell being the programme's "victim".
• In June 2007, McDonald began hosting the new ITV television series News Knight with Sir Trevor McDonald.
• McDonald holds an Honorary Award from the University of Plymouth.

External links

• Vision Aid Overseas
• Trevor McDonald at itv.com
• Trevor McDonald at the BFI's Screenonline
• Article on BBC News about Sir Trevor McDonald's final bulletin
• Biographical article on BBC News about Sir Trevor McDonald