Eyes And Teeth

Welcome to Eyes & Teeth – That’s Showbiz the huge talents of actress Sian Reeves.

I have just completed a fantastic contract in the capital city of Wales and it was a star studded Pantomime with Sports Star Gareth Thomas, Award winning Pop Star Ian ‘H’ Watkins, Comedy and Vocal sensation Mike Doyle, Jazz performer Denquar Chupak amongst others and todays guest is just incredible to watch. Sian is constantly on television and if not in EastEnders, Coronation Street or Emmerdale, she is in the next drama Cutting It, Northern Lights, Hope Springs, Lunch Monkey and many many more.

She has appeared in movies her latest sharing the screen with Pauline Collins and Joan Collins but most recently she starred with me in Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs at the New Theatre Cardiff for the past 6 weeks.

To watch Sian work closely throughout rehearsals and the full 4 week run was truly a gift. I have worked with actresses in pantomime and great ones and Sian is up there as possibly my favourite. She is so down to earth, fun and honest off stage and delivers the ultimate professional performance from wings to centre stage giving 110% every time. There were no mistakes, no late entrances, even up to the last show she was in her space going over her lines to perform them to the max.

I loved watching her play Queen Lucretia even if every time she shouted for Muddles she was leaving as I was entering so we never really had dialogue until we chatted about crisps towards the end of the story but I clocked this ladies talent and respect her true honour to her art.

She is absolutely brilliant so please welcome to the show Sian Reeves.

Welcome to Eyes & Teeth – That’s Showbiz

Today I invite a cast member from my current Snow White pantomime in Cardiff to join me and share her journey and what a journey she is having. Not just the journey through the woods being chased by a Henchman who is also an icon of Rugby (Gareth Thomas) and a wicked Queen played by one of the UK’s greatest actresses Sian Reeves and saved by Muddles who walks about the palace grounds with his hand up an old man along the way bumping into 7 performers with 2 sets of legs each… btw the Way Mike Doyle had visitors to Snow White and the 7 Dwarves this week and they met him after to tell him they really loved the gnomes in the show!!!

Anyway this journey is about Denquars life in Hong Kong growing up transporting to Bristol and catapulting her into the World of Jazz and songwriting as well as starring in Qdos & Crossroads pantomimes. We talk about those shows which include Diversity, Count Arthur Strong, Mike Doyle and her all time favourite inspirations in music and her thoughts on working alongside a ventriloquist for 6 weeks in the Capitol of Wales…
Welcome Denquar Chupak

Welcome to Eyes & Teeth – That’s Showbiz season 14.

Today I talk with a fellow Water Rat and Big Band leader Mark Porter. 

Mark has been around this business from a very early age starting in Wales and taking an interest in Crooners and their music he sat back and learnt from the best by watching live on stage Andy Williams, Dean Martin, Frank Sinatra, Paul Anka, and what he must of learned at that time he soaked up and now delivers class throughout his touring with his own show as well as the Glenn Miller Orchestra and many more.

Mark has a wealth of humour and knowledge of music and showbusiness and has some great anecdotes about collecting autographs throughout his time on the road and I now know where the term “never meet your heroes” originated.

There are also little nuggets about Princess Diana and The Queen Mother

It’s a fascinating insight to another brother water rat and great entertainer.

Welcome Mark Porter

Welcome to Eyes & Teeth – That’s Showbiz Renato Pires 
Today a success story in the making from a young man from Portugal who has faced so many hurdles and heartbreaks along the way but it has never stopped him giving up his goals and dreams. He has such a positive outlook on life and business and wants the best for everyone he works with. He seems to use his sad past to make others lives better and at the end of the day just wants to entertain the public with his gift and he passes that gift onto so many to make their dreams comes true.

Renato and I hooked up about 10 years ago for a few projects including making a short film and we even drop off and pick up our kids at the same school gate.

It’s interesting when you get to know someone more by having a chat on a podcast and it proves that everyone has a story. Today’s episode shows this guy’s positivity and drive that started with him looking after his father suffering from cancer and then came the news that his mum had left him to it and left the family home.

The Circus has entered his life which to me seems to be a family created out of passion and misfortune, but I am so inspired our chat today that I would love nothing more than his Circus Story in Sussex to a massive success it deserves to be.

Welcome to Eyes & Teeth Renato Pires.

Pete Cutler

Welcome to Eyes & Teeth and today is Christmas Eve 2022 so Merry Christmas to all in these crazy times we’re experiencing. It started with Brexit, then Covid years and the crazy news just doesn’t stop which is why a little light relief in your ears is created through the medium of showbusiness as I continue my last few seasons of this podcast delving into the minds and careers of talented individuals and take little nuggets from their entertainment world so the future generation can look back and listen to how a comedian gets to the Comedy Store, or how that singer got the Royal Albert Hall or that comedy actor got to the sitcom or TV Presenter reached the heights of Television Success, it really is an insight and tuition for young budding performers in all genres so sit back and enjoy this next episode with an all round nice guy as well as an all round entertainer the unique talents of Pete Cutler.

We had a few things in common working at the London Palladium back in the mid-nineties as Ushers, we knew the same people in that theatre and so we get to reminisce about those days as well as the days we cruised the seven seas on Cunard 
Welcome Pete Cutler

Dean Winters

Welcome to Eyes & Teeth, That’s Showbiz and where better to take you than Torquay and talk  about Babbacombe and its very successful summer season still going strong after many decades and one of the last surviving variety theatres running annual shows with casts of many talented folk which thanks to its Producer at Matpro Ltd Colin Matthews and his wonderful team have launched quite a few great names in variety and musicals in recent years.

Deano has been on the circuit for a few decades and knows his stuff, he has some great anecdotes and shares with us his heroes and stories of working hard in showbusiness, in pantomime, Benidorm, television, radio to co writing and starring in his own stage play with his pal the brilliant Steve Laister.

Dean is also a keen runner and talks about raising coins for many charities whilst travelling the world to complete marathons. Now thats dedication

Most of all he has the best laugh in the business since Barbara Windsor

Welcome to Eyes & Teeth Season 14 Dean Winters

Jon Udry

Welcome to Eyes & Teeth talking Variety and Showbusiness getting to know great performers behind the scenes.

We literally go behind the stage door today as I talk to the brilliant Jon Udry about his Lockdown shows, Cruise Ship Life, festivals and his brand new book in which he penned his experience performing in venues beginning with the letters of the alphabet across the UK.

Jon also tells me about juggling on the radio and his Variety Bungalow show recorded live in his home. Covid years created weird and strange gigs but then our business we have always had challenges.

Welcome to Eyes & teeth – that’s Showbiz Jon Udry

Helen Ward Jackson

Welcome to Eyes & Teeth – That’s Showbiz. Thank you for joining me and if its for the first time you have only missed 182 episodes of behind the scenes of Theatre, Comedy Clubs, Cruise Ships, Television and Radio Stars talking about their experiences which in turn could help along the next generation of performers by listening to our successes and mistakes along the way. Trust me we all make mistakes, some bigger than others but we all never stop learning.

In this business of ours we also bump into some great people, some you may never work with again but in todays story I am lucky to of worked alongside Helen countless times. Her talent is a force to be reckoned with. She has a huge voice and addictive personality you can’t help but fall for.

She is funny and extremely talented and in todays episode we chat about meeting in Sussex, working in theatres, variety and charity shows as well as her own Career which has flown beyond Eastbourne and now she enjoys the finest Theatres worldwide on the greatest Cruise Ships out there.

From appearing in Mamma Mia alongside a Broadway cast as well as playing Hattie Jacques for me in Re-Educating Archie a stage play about the famous Radio show starring a ventriloquist dummy. Google It!

There is also her incredible Adele Tribute Show which accompanies her own Diva Show as herself where she delights in singing her favourite songs linked together with her natural and hilarious personality.

Welcome Helen Ward Jackson

Tony Dowling… some of you will know his name and some may not. Tony was not only a successful Comedian and played dream venues along the way but he used his wisdom to start some businesses on the side. He is an inventor and that is I guess what has brought him most of his success, but he would never regret taking on one of the hardest jobs in showbusiness working the clubs and theatres across the UK & abroad. He’s been paid off AND been paid well. You can hear the experience and know how in his voice, he has been there and done it and he wants to talk about it. 

Tony is of the old school, he's now retired but when he was at the top of his game, he was topical, he was hip he just had to do what he needed to get that next job in the World of Comedy and he has some fascinating stories along the way on this episode of That’s Showbiz – on Eyes & Teeth with Tony Dowling.

Lloyd Hollett

Please welcome to Eyes & Teeth a unique entertainer who can have the audience in stitches one minute and in tears the next.

His style is so different to many, and I have always been flawed by his skills as a wordsmith. 

If you haven’t yet seen Llyod work, then you must go out of your way to do so. He will make you smile if not howl with laughter. He personifies what this Podcast is all about, In fact I was sad he never got back to me as I thought my listeners would love to hear his story and learn of his talent and I was going to have to resign to the fact that he wasn’t interested but I couldn’t be more wrong.

I never had a direct number for Lloyd, so I sent a Facebook message to invite him on in 2020 and never heard a thing back until our mutual friend Jimmy Tamley was working with him on a ship in the Autumn of 2022 and told me Lloyd was wondering why I hadn’t asked him on the show.

Well, that was solved pretty quickly and here we are talking about Pantomime, proposals, puns and poems, Jim Davidson, Dave Lee, Stanley Unwin, Gyles Brandreth and much more on Season 14 of Eyes & Teeth – Thats Showbiz!!!

Welcome Lloyd Hollett