Don Maclean (born 11 March 1944, Birmingham) is an English actor and comedian, who hosted the BBC television series Crackerjack with Michael Aspel, Peter Glaze, and Jan Hunt in the 1970s.
As a child he had attended Clifton Road School, in Balsall Heath and St. Philip's Catholic Grammar School, Edgbaston. His first job was as a Civil Servant at the Inland Revenue.
Maclean usually performed a live routine or routines with Glaze in front of a studio audience of children and a filmed insert with Glaze, in the style of a silent comedy film. Live routines would almost always work in the 'joke' where an exasperated Glaze would exclaim 'Maclean!' to which Maclean would answer 'Yes, I had a macbath this morning!'. Also notable was that when responding to Glaze's exasperation, Maclean would regularly give an alliterative reply, such as "Don't get your knickers in a knot" or "Don't get your tights in a twist", the combination of which ("Don't get your knickers in a twist") has passed into popular vernacular.
Early in his career, Maclean was a comedy compere of the BBC Television Series The Black and White Minstrel Show. He also appeared in Crossroads and Carry On Columbus. From 1990 to 2006 he presented "Good Morning Sunday", a religious programme on BBC Radio 2 (he is a devout Roman Catholic), but he has now been replaced on that show by Aled Jones.
He hosted the panel games The Clever Dick-Athlon (1988-90), First Letter First (1993) and Are You Sitting Comfortably (1993-6), all for Radio 2. He also toured in the play There's No Place Like a Home with Gorden Kaye. In 2009, he claimed that the BBC is keen on programmes which attack Churches and that there is a wider secularist campaign to get rid of Christianity. [1]
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