Jason Donovan praises ‘brave’ Heart Radio station mate Jamie Theakston for being ‘open’ about cancer battle
Jason Donovan has applauded Heart Radio station mate Jamie Theakston for potentially saving lives by being “open and honest” about his cancer battle.
The Heart Breakfast host, 54, announced last September that he had been diagnosed with stage one laryngeal cancer.
Admitting that it had been an "enormous shock" after initially thinking it was just a "sore throat", the dad-of-two said he would be taking time out to focus on treatment, including undergoing three surgeries.
Despite being warned there was a one-in-six chance he might never talk again, Theakston made an emotional return to the station alongside co-host Amanda Holden earlier this week and revealed that he is now “cancer free”.
Donovan - who presents his 80s Rewind show every Sunday from 7pm - was delighted for Theakston, whom he hailed as “brave”.
The Australian singer said his actions highlighted how those with platforms like celebrities can use them to ‘shed light’ on topics previously viewed as taboo and start important conversations.
Speaking to The Standard, he said: “[Jamie] was brave the way he shared his diagnosis with the world.
“By being open and honest it sheds a light on cancer. I do think it’s one of the wonderful things about the world [and] the time we are living in, the ability to use our platforms to bring attention to make people get tests and do all that sort of stuff.
“[We can help] change the language around these things, not just sort of go inwards, go outwards advice.”
Of his own health, Donovan describes it as “reasonably good”, although he continues to be plagued by back pain following an injury that forced him to pull out of competing on ITV’s Dancing On Ice in 2021.
The Too Many Broken Hearts hit-maker is currently starring as Frank-N-Furter in a nation-wide tour of Richard O’Brien’s classic musical The Rocky Horror Show.
It comes 25 years after he last performed the role on these shores and requires him to step into the high heels of the cross-dressing antagonist upto eight times a week.
While he admits that “sometimes the back wins, unfortunately”, he says he finds the footwear can actually “help”, explaining they keep him “very vertical”.
“I don’t know, I’m still working it all out at 56,” he added with a laugh.
Either way, he will be giving his feet a rest from them when he heads off on his Doin' Fine 25 Tour next month.
The 30-date nationwide jaunt kicks off on Valentine’s Day in Cardiff and will include stops in cities including Glasgow, Liverpool, Canterbury and Birmingham.
For one night only on March 3, he will also be returning to the venue in which he made his original west end debut as Joseph in Lord Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat back in 1991.
The tour will serve as a celebration of everything Donovan has achieved to-date, including launching his pop career in the 90s off the back of his success on soap Neighbours.
Drawn on whether he would have chosen to do anything differently if he had the chance again, he became pensive.
“I probably could have had a film career if I’d chosen a couple of the films that were offered to me at the time,” he eventually replied. “I chose the path that I chose and I’m very grateful for that. You know it’s Sliding Doors, I don’t look in the mirror each day and get depressed about what could have been.
“I may look back in a nostalgic sort of way as we all do when we get older, but I tend to always look forward.
“There are things that I’d still like to do. I can’t change time or history. Had I not become a singer I might not have met my wife” - he is married to Angela Malloch, whom he met while doing Rocky Horror the first time around in 1998. “[And] then I might not have had my three beautiful children, so I think that’s very hypothetical”.
In other words, his tour title at this juncture of his life seems very apt - Jason Donovan is Doin’ Fine.
Tickets for Jason Donovan's Doin' Fine 25 Tour are on sale now.
