Michael Barrymore

British TV host and highest paid actor in British show business. His popular game show, "Strike It Lucky," that started in 1986 and later became "Strike It Rich," continues high ratings for his manic, hyper and physically exhausting entertainment.

His dad was a violent and chronic drinker and walked out on Michael and his mom when the boy was 11. Rail-thin, he is known to be hypersensitive and self-critical. He married on 10 June 1976 and his fiercely protective wife-manager has steered his career ever since. He had a nervous breakdown in 1990 but returned to a hard-drinking lifestyle until Spring 1993, when he sought help in an American rehab clinic.

Michael came out as a homosexual during a live radio show, London's Spectrum Radio, on 23 August 1995, 2:00 AM. He and his wife divorced in 1997.

From the summer of '95, the tabloids have been busy keeping up with his on-again, off-again marriage. Barrymore's ex-wife Cheryl died of lung cancer on 1 April 2005, age 56.