Good Morning Britain’s Richard Madeley in hospital dash after a ‘freak accident’
RICHARD Madeley revealed the reason for his mystery absence from Good Morning Britain on today’s show.
Viewers have been wondering where Richard has been of late with Ed Balls filling in for him alongside Susanna Reid.
However, he was back on screens today and revealed it was a ‘freak accident’ that was behind his disappearance.
The broadcaster told viewers how he needed stitches in hospital after a car door slammed into his face.
He explained: “I was crouching down on a slope between my open car door… and I turned round as the car door decided to close itself. Gravity pulled it shut. It’s a big heavy door and it hit me on the chin, and I really bit my tongue to the extent I needed an op. i had to have some stitches in it.”
The gory details left Susanna covering her face, while Richard explained he has a temporary lisp from the accident.
Elsewhere on today’s show, Richard tore into comedian Chris Rock as the “rudest” celebrity he’s ever interviewed.
He recalled meeting Chris and Ben Stiller, whom he praised, with his wife Judi while the US stars were on the promo trail for animated film Madagascar.
Richard said the pre-recorded interview was heavily edited to cut out Chris’s “nonsense” and his “excruciatingly rude” behaviour that saw him effectively blank the hosts.
Meanwhile during Richard’s absence, GMB suffered a series of embarrassing on-air blunders that left Susanna fuming.
The Sun revealed how the presenter was “tearing her hair out” after production staff clangers.
Most recently, the voice-over announcement said: “You’re watching Good Morning Britain on Friday the third of February.”
Unfortunately, it was Monday the sixth.
A bemused Susanna, 52, and co-host Ben Shephard, 48, were able to laugh off the calendar cock-up.
But the blunder has added to fears among executives that humiliating mistakes will keep on happening.
A show insider said: “Susanna and Ben were stunned, especially after last week’s mishaps.
“To get the date of the show wrong is pretty poor by anybody’s standards — it was the worst possible start to the week.
“She’s let this one go, with a few eye rolls, but they keep happening.”
Another said: “It’s actually really sad — the production team seem totally incapable.
“They just seem overwhelmed.”
The Sun told how Susanna had raised frustrations with bosses over the basic errors, telling executives the on-screen mistakes “make us look stupid”.
One of the gaffes was the word “remembering” being spelt incorrectly in a particularly sensitive item about a death.
Susanna’s frustration prompted several emails from bosses to staff — urging them to take more care over details.