ALL ABOUT US
Anthony McPartlin and Declan Donnelly met at the age of 13 on the set of the hit BBC children’s drama, Byker Grove. Their characters, PJ and Duncan, were friends in the show and Ant & Dec soon became firm friends in real life.
In 1993, the boys signed a record contract and over the course of four years notched up 14 Top 20 hits including Let’s Get Ready To Rhumble, Stepping Stone and Shout, not to mention three multi-platinum albums and a shelf full of awards. British, European, and then World tours followed until they called time on their music career in 1997.
Alongside their music career the guys continued making TV shows including the BAFTA award winning Ant & Dec Show on BBC 1, before they moved to Channel 4 to make Ant & Dec Unzipped.
In Autumn 1998 their own company, Ant & Dec Productions, launched SM:TV Live and CD:UK, mixing music, comedy and cartoons, which were co-hosted by Cat Deeley. The show was a massive hit with audiences young and old, spawning the Friends parody Chums.
In 2002 the duo went on to present the first series of Pop Idol. They also returned to acting and filmed a special episode of one of Britain’s best loved sitcoms, A Tribute To The Likely Lads. In addition to this they re-wrote and recorded the official World Cup anthem for the England Football team, We’re On The Ball, which reached No. 3 in the UK single charts.
Later that year Ant & Dec returned to Saturday night TV when they launched a brand new prime-time ITV1 show – Ant & Dec’s Saturday Night Takeaway, where viewers were asked not to just watch the advert breaks, but also win them! Within a short space of time the boys were involved in the launch of yet another huge ITV programme I’m a Celebrity….Get Me Out Of Here.
Autumn 2005 saw the lads host Ant & Dec’s Gameshow Marathon as part of ITV1’s 50th birthday celebrations. They also formed a new production company, Gallowgate, which co-produced the hugely successful All-Star Cup for Sky One, a celebrity version of golf’s Ryder Cup, which featured among others, Catherine Zeta Jones and Michael Douglas.
Hollywood beckoned and Ant & Dec took time out from television to make their first feature film Alien Autopsy, which opened in April 2006. The film took well over £2 million at the box office and also hit No. 1 in the DVD/Video chart in its opening week.
Following the film Ant & Dec were asked to exclusively interview Princes Charles, William and Harry for the Anniversary celebrations of the Prince’s Trust. This interview went out in over 20 countries worldwide. May 2006 saw the boys present Soccer-Aid, where a celebrity and Legend England team (led by Robbie Williams) took on a Rest of the World Team (led by Gordon Ramsay) at a packed Old Trafford.
2006 saw Ant & Dec bring the All-Star Cup to ITV as well as devising and presenting the Saturday night smash Pokerface where the eventual winner took home £1 million!
June 2007 saw Ant and Dec reunite with Simon Cowell for the first time since Pop Idol with Britain’s Got Talent. The final episode attracted over 7 million viewers, all of whom tuned in to watch Ant & Dec declare amateur opera singer Paul Potts the undisputed winner of the series.
Britain’s Got Talent returned in April 2008, with Ant & Dec once again heading up the search for the weird and wonderful performers throughout the UK before crowning the winner George Sampson, a street dancer from Warrington. The final attracted a phenomenal 14.4 million viewers and remains one of the most watched shows of 2008.
Having established themselves as the undeniable champions of British Saturday night entertainment, Ant & Dec travelled to America to front the ABC produced reality game-show, Wanna Bet? The show features a celebrity panel that wager on contestants completing outlandish challenges. A typical event included a contestant attempting to ski over 2000 fresh eggs without breaking them.
Saturday Night Takeaway is in its ninth series, and will return to television screens in early 2010. In November ‘09 the boys head in the jungle for the ninth series of I’m a Celebrity…Get Me Out of Here! Over 7 million people tuned in last year, and Ant & Dec continue to host the show that has become a much-loved mainstay of the British television calendar.
The multitude of awards and nominations that continue to garner the programme is reflective of Ant & Dec’s own success as both producers and presenters.
