Blue Peter's Peter Purves regrets working on show as it ruined dream career

Veteran TV star Peter Purves claims his biggest regret is taking a job as a presenter on the children’s show Blue Peter.

His revelation will shock fans because for 11 years spanning the 1960s and 1970s he was one of telly’s most famous faces, fronting the tea-time series along with John Noakes, Valerie Singleton and Lesley Judd. Many regard this period as “a golden era” in the show’s long-running history.

Jobbing actor Purves joined Blue Peter in 1967 after he had been given the chop from Doctor Who, also a hit BBC show at the time. He had played TARDIS companion Steven Taylor for two years on the sci-fi series, alongside original Time Lord William Hartnell. Prior to that he had landed parts in Z Cars, The Saint, Dixon of Dock Green and The Villains.

READ MORE: Danny Dyer eyes Doctor Who job as he reveals plan for 'working class' Time Lord

But when the jobbing actor found himself out of work for a year after Doctor Who, and was offered the post as a Blue Peter presenter, he took it.

However, he now regrets that decision and wishes he hadn’t gone down that path, because he had always wanted to become a successful actor and blames it for taking his career in a different direction.

Purves, who is now 86, said: “Deep down I wish I’d not done Blue Peter. I wish I had been more successful as an actor. But I could not get the work.

“So I took the presenting jobs that came my way. I know it might sound silly but I fancied myself as a leading man. I hoped I was going to be a film star. That was my ambition.”

After he left Blue Peter in 1978, Peter went on to host TV shows such as Stopwatch and Kick Start and then Crufts. Although these jobs took him away from his acting dreams he tells Doctor Who Magazine about his lengthy TV career: “I’ve been lucky. I’ve had a full life.”

In 1962, Peter married actress and playwright Gilly Fraser with whom he has son Matthew and daughter Lisa. The couple divorced in 1982 and he now lives in Suffolk with his second wife Kathryn Evans. In 2008 his Blue Peter co-host Valerie revealed she’d enjoyed a "brief fling" with Peter when he was "between marriages”.

After leaving Blue Peter, where he was in charge of the programme’s dog, Petra, he went on to present Kick Start, Stopwatch, and the BBC's Crufts dog show, with which he had an association for 40 years.

He said their decision to axe him in 2020, because of his age, had felt like "a kick in the stomach”.

Like this story? For more of the latest showbiz news and gossip, follow Mirror Celebs on TikTok, Snapchat, Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, and Threads.