
Wincey Willis dead aged 76: ITV's first female weather presenter and GMB icon passes away after health battle
A GOOD Morning Britain legend has died aged 76 after a battle with dementia.
Wincey Willis, who etched her name in history as ITV's first female national weather presenter, sadly passed away following her health battle.
2
2
The TV icon died on December 18 last year but her death was only publicly announced this week.
Willis joined Good Morning Britain in 1983, thanks to TV titan Greg Dyke.
The trailblazing 34-year-old brought a fresh, animated take to the forecasts in a far more serious era.
At the peak of her career, during the mid-80s, she featured on the game show Treasure Hunt alongside Anneka Rice.
A contract dispute led Willis to resign from TV-am in 1987, after which her television career largely came to a halt.
In the following years, she dedicated her time as a conservation volunteer aiding endangered species globally.
Willis also hosted radio shows for BBC Coventry & Warwickshire and for BBC Hereford & Worcester.
Hashtags

Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles


South Wales Guardian
33 minutes ago
- South Wales Guardian
Gavin & Stacey star Ruth Jones to feature in new BBC series
Jones will play Mrs Bennet in an adaptation of Janice Hadlow's novel The Other Bennet Sister for BBC One and BBC iPlayer. She will be joined in the series by the likes of Richard E. Grant (Saltburn, Star Wars: Episode IX - The Rise of Skywalker, Loki), Indira Varma (Obi-Wan Kenobi, Luther, The Night Manager) and Ella Bruccoleri (Call the Midwife, Bridgerton). Filming for the 10-part series is already underway in Wales. A post shared by BBC Press Office (@bbcpressoffice) The Other Bennet Sister is an adaptation of the Janice Hadlow novel and explores and expands on the world of Pride and Prejudice through the often-overlooked perspective of Mary Bennet. The Gardiners (played by Varma and Richard Coyle) take Mary (Ella Bruccoleri) under their wing as governess to their three children - Marianne (Roisin Bhalla), George (Reggie Absolom), and Rebecca (Jasmine Sharp). This new role introduces her to an exciting new social world that includes the likes of Mr Hayward (Dónal Finn), Mr Ryder (Laurie Davidson) and Ann Baxter (Varada Sethu). The cast for The Other Bennet Sister includes: Viewers will return to Longbourn House during the BBC series where they will meet the iconic Bennet sisters: Other familiar Austen characters to feature in the series will include: The Other Bennet Sister is set to feature a "dream" cast including Varada Sethu, Richard E. Grant and Indira Varma. (Image: PA) Director of BBC Drama, Lindsay Salt, said: "It's a joy to see cameras rolling on our vibrant, witty and clever new take on Jane Austen's beloved world. "With a pitch perfect cast led by Ella, Ruth and Richard, The Other Bennet Sister will be an irresistible treat for viewers when it launches on the BBC next year." Jane Tranter says: 'We have been working behind the scenes on The Other Bennet Sister for many years now, and Janice's brilliantly observed characters have lived and grown in our imaginations throughout that time as Sarah (Quintrell - show writer) has been working on the scripts. "So, our actors had a lot to live up to - and I can honestly say that this is the ensemble cast of our dreams. "Each one brings something new and exciting to the world of Austen. And all of us at Bad Wolf are delighted to be making a drama that brings such joy." A release date for the new series is yet to be revealed by the BBC. Following the Gavin & Stacey Finale on Christmas Day (2024), Jones has taken on several different TV roles in 2025. She recently appeared in Ruth And Steve: From Merthyr With Love on BBC One Wales and iPlayer. RECOMMENDED READING: James Corden and Ruth Jones announce next project after Gavin & Stacey finale Gavin & Stacey star Ruth Jones hints at future projects with James Corden Gavin and Stacey's Ruth Jones to star in new Harlan Coben Netflix series Run Away She was also announced as part of the cast for the next Harlan Coben Netflix series - Run Away, alongside the likes of Jimmy Nesbitt, Alfred Enoch, Lucian Msamati and Minnie Driver. Jones and Gavin & Stacey co-writer James Corden are also set to release a new book in 2025 titled When Gavin Met Stacey And Everything In Between: A Story Of Love And Friendship. The book is set for release on October 16, 2025.


BBC News
an hour ago
- BBC News
28 Years Later review: Zombie-apocalypse horror is a 'never-dull' monster mash-up
Alex Garland and Danny Boyle have reunited for a follow-up to their 2002 classic. It has visual flair, terrifying adversaries and a scene-stealing performance from Ralph Fiennes. 28 Years Later is part zombie-apocalypse horror, part medieval world-building, part sentimental family story and – most effectively – part Heart of Darkness in its journey toward a madman in the woods. That mashup is not necessarily a bad thing, since most of those parts work so well in this follow-up to the great 2002 film 28 Days Later, about a virus that decimates London. The new film is one of the year's most anticipated largely because it comes from the original's creators, director Danny Boyle and screenwriter Alex Garland. It glows with Boyle's visual flair, Garland's ambitious screenplay and a towering performance from Ralph Fiennes, whose character enters halfway through the film and unexpectedly becomes its fraught soul. But as with Frankenstein's monster, the seams are conspicuous, making for a patchwork that is never dull but not as fully engaging as it might have been. A lot has changed in the 23 years since the original, of course. Boyle, then known for smart indie films like Trainspotting, went on to win an Oscar for Slumdog Millionaire. Garland, then a novelist and screenwriter – 28 Days was his first – is now the director of politically pointed films including Civil War. In 28 Years Later, the central problem is that Garland's political bent and Boyle's commercial instincts don't entirely mesh. The world they have created is specific and impressive though, starting with an island where people have survived the decades since the outbreak by isolating themselves from the still-plague-ridden mainland of England, reached by a causeway that can only be walked across at low tide. It is a community that might have existed in the Middle Ages. Without 21st-Century resources, they make their own arrows for weapons and use wood for fuel. Aaron Taylor-Johnson is impressively solid as Jamie, a harried but responsible husband and father. Jodie Comer plays his wife, Isla, bedridden and occasionally delirious in this community which has no doctor to diagnose her. Mostly, Comer has to look woeful. Isla can barely remember why Jamie is about to take their son, Spike (Alfie Williams), on a ritualistic trip to the mainland. It is time for him to make his first kill of an infected creature, a survival tactic he will need to know. Boyle takes full advantage of his striking technical skills in the father-son hunting scenes, which are pure zombie action-horror, full of kinetic camera movements and quick cuts as Jamie and Spike race through the woods, shooting arrows and trying to outrun the infected. The creatures are officially not zombies, as much as they look and act that way, but victims of the same blood-borne virus that caused people to become full of rage in the original film, turning them into lumbering, mush-brained marauders. Decades later they have morphed. Some, called the Slow-Lows, look like hippos crawling on all fours. Others are faster and smarter than ever. All are naked, caked in dirt, and spout geysers of blood when an arrow hits them. The danger feels visceral. Some stylish flourishes briefly comment on this embattled world. A scratchy, ominous 1915 recording of the Rudyard Kipling poem Boots, about infantrymen, (the same used in the film's trailer) is heard over recurring images of war, from the Crusades to the 20th- Century World Wars. Text at the start of the film tells us that Europe managed to push the virus away, quarantining it in Britain, which has been abandoned by the rest of the world. French and Swedish boats patrol the waters to enforce the quarantine. But that politically acute theme, which might have been so resonant with the issue of isolationism today, goes nowhere. Spike, whose story is so central, is a bland character. A thread of the narrative about the boy and his mother strains for emotion and includes a twist about a pregnant infected woman that is ludicrous even for a horror film. And separated from the original in every way except its source story, for a long stretch the film lands as a more visually stunning, less emotionally rich variation on The Last of Us. But it takes on a quieter, more psychological tone and becomes infinitely better when Fiennes arrives. It's here that Boyle and Garland truly elevate and reimagine the genre. Fiennes's character, Kelton, lives on the mainland and was once a doctor. Spike believes he might be able to help his mother, although Jamie warns that everyone knows Kelton is insane. Fiennes plays him with a shaved head, a dash of wit, and skin that looks orange. "Excuse my appearance. I paint myself in iodine," he politely says when he first meets Spike and Isla. "The virus doesn't like iodine at all." (I did wonder how he got so much iodine after all those apocalyptic years, but let's not be pedantic about it.) And he shows them his lovingly designed temple, with tall columns made of bones elegantly laid out alongside a tower of skulls. It is, he explains, a Memento Mori, a reminder that we all die. Each skull reminds him that it was once part of a living person in the flesh, not a monster. Creepy, yes, but Fiennes also makes Kelton gentle, a man of deep compassion, who regrets that there are no longer hospitals where the sick like Isla can be treated. He is the most humane person on screen, which is largely down to Fiennes's vivid, layered performance. One of the film's strengths is that you can leave debating just how unhinged Kelton really is. 28 Years Later is the first in a projected new trilogy. The second part, written by Garland and directed by Nia DaCosta, has already been shot and is scheduled to be released in January. That one is called 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple, an excellent sign considering how Fiennes's character runs away with this imaginative but uneven film. ★★★★☆ 28 Years Later is released in cinemas in the UK and US on 20 June. -- If you liked this story sign up for The Essential List newsletter, a handpicked selection of features, videos and can't-miss news, delivered to your inbox twice a week. For more Culture stories from the BBC, follow us on Facebook, X, and Instagram.


The Sun
an hour ago
- The Sun
Bay City Rollers star reveals ‘harrowing' sex abuse by band's ‘bully, predator' manager who ‘plied stars with drugs'
STUART 'Woody' Wood told how he hid the trauma of his abuse by paedo manager Tam Paton for 50 years, saying: 'I chose not to let it shape my life.' The Bay City Rollers icon, 68, said he was determined not to let the sicko 'win' as he opened up for the first time about how he too was a victim of the beast. 4 4 4 4 Burly Paton bossed the band during the height of their 70s fame, when they had No1 hits including Saturday Night, Bye Bye Baby and Shang-A-Lang. He was later fired by the group before being jailed for three years in 1982 for gross indecency with teenage boys. In his autobiography Mania, released on Thursday, former pop-pin up Stuart brands the late fiend a 'true monster' and explains why he kept his own suffering a secret for five decades. Stuart wrote: 'I met Tam when I was 16 years old. He was intimidating and a bully, and all the disgusting things said about him are accurate. 'He was a predator. He abused me as he did others. 'It was a horrific and harrowing time. The drugs he plied us with were part of that control. I met Tam when I was 16 years old. He was intimidating and a bully, and all the disgusting things said about him are accurate 'My take is that to have a healthy mind, you have to let some things go, as much as it might pain you to do so. 'So, when Tam's squalid little life came to an end in 2009, I stopped thinking about him. 'He was a terrible human being, but the way I see it, he doesn't get to define me. 'Tam f******g Paton doesn't get to win.' Original lead singer of The Bay City Rollers returns 50 years after fall out In 2003, Paton was accused of attempting to rape Rollers guitarist Pat McGlynn in a hotel room in 1977. Police investigated but concluded there was insufficient evidence to take it to court. Depraved Paton claimed he was being targeted because he was gay. After the flabby perv's death from a heart attack in 2019 singer Les McKeown claimed the former manager had also raped him while on tour in America after drugging him. Les — who died at 65 in 2021 — said: 'I was given Quaaludes, a drug for lowering your inhibitions and making you horny. 'Afterwards I felt really used and abused. I never told anybody about it, not even the other guys in the band, because I was ashamed.' Original Rollers singer Nobby Clarke has also claimed the boys were encouraged by Paton to sleep with radio DJ Chris Denning, who jailed for child sex abuse in 2016. Meanwhile, founder Alan Longmuir revealed in 2018 how Paton had 'friends in low places' and warned 'his depravity ran deeper than we know.' However, Stuart maintains he did not talk about Paton's abuse with either Les or Alan, even when they reformed the Rollers together 10 years ago. Speaking from his home in Edinburgh, the songwriter, guitarist and producer said: 'We never discussed it - any of us - it just happened. 'We were all survivors, but with Les it felt like it hit him harder. 'It's not like I locked all those experiences away, stuffed down the bad memories, pretending they didn't happen. BAND'S TROUBLED PAST 1974: Stuart 'Woody' Wood joins group to form classic line-up with Alan and Derek Longmuir, Eric Faulkner and Les McKeown. 1975: Bye, Bye, Baby reaches No1. 1978: Les quits soon after being booted off stage by Woody during a gig in Tokyo. 1979: Manager Tam Paton is fired before Rollers split. 1982: Paton is jailed for three years for sexually abusing ten boys over three years. 2003: Cops decide there is not enough evidence to prosecute Paton over accusations he tried to rape former Rollers guitarist Pat McGlynn. 2004: The sicko is fined £200,000 for drug dealing after cannabis stash find at home. 2007: Ex-band members sue Arista Records over claims they are owed millions of pounds in unpaid royalties. 2009: Paton dies after a heart attack on the same night £1.5million in drugs and cash are stolen from his Edinburgh pad. 2016: Les McKeown says he was raped by Paton. 2016: Woody sensationally quits the group after a bust-up at T in the Park. 2018: Alan Longmuir passes away aged 70. 2021: Les dies of heart attack at 65. 2023: TV documentary details how Paton controlled and abused band. 2025: Woody releases tell-all autobiography Mania. 'I just choose to not let them shape my life.' Stuart is now the last member of the 'classic' Rollers line-up still performing, with a new single Rollers Forever released next month. A musical of the same name opens at Glasgow's Pavilion Theatre in August. However, the star describes his relationship with Paton as 'complicated' as he even invited his abuser to his wedding to artist Denise in 1997. He added: 'There's an old expression, 'Keep your enemies close'. "I think that was the case with Tam. There was another side of Tam that was funny. 'He could be a lovable rogue.'