Get all your news in one place.
100's of premium titles.
One app.
Start reading
Daily Mirror
Daily Mirror
Entertainment
Verity Sulway

Konnie Huq now - new career, famous husband and touching sacrifice for kids

Konnie Huq holds the record for the longest-serving female Blue Peter presenter.

She presented the show from 1997 to 2008 and was rarely off our screens in the 2000s, hosting The Xtra Factor, Hannah-Oke and The Tube as well as appearing as a guest on shows such as 8 Out of 10 Cats and Celebrity Fame Academy.

But now, the 46-year-old is rarely seen on television, having largely retired from showbiz and embarking on a totally new career path.

In 2010, Konnie married writer Charlie Brooker, who created the hugely popular Black Mirror series.

He has also hosted satirical shows including Screenwipe, Gameswipe, Newswipe, Weekly Wipe, and 10 O'Clock Live.

They had only known each other for nine months - but are still going strong 11 years later.

She has previously revealed that at first, Charlie insisted he didn't want children, until she gave him an ultimatum.

Get the news you want straight to your inbox. Sign up for a Mirror newsletter h er e .

Konnie Huq was the longest-serving female Blue Peter presenter (BBC)
Blue Peter presenters Konnie Huq, Richard Bacon, Katy Hill and Stuart Miles (PA)

Faced with the prospect of losing Konnie, Charlie changed his mind and they now have two sons - Covey, nine, and Huxley, seven.

Speaking on Rob Beckett and Josh Widdicombe's Parenting Hell podcast, Konnie explained: "He didn't want kids but he hadn't met the right person and all that changed. I said, 'I am not really interested unless I am going to have kids.

"And so... he obviously saw the gene pool that I possessed and thought 'it wouldn't be right!' I dunno, he just sort of changed his mind.

"I always wanted to be a mum. I always thought I'd have three. Two was just a nuclear family, so boring.

"Three is a dynasty, three is like a team and then I had two and I was like 'no way!' Two is company and three's a crowd."

Konnie said she and Charlie have a 'yin and yang' dynamic and that is what first attracted her to him.

Konnie met Black Mirror creator Charlie in 2009 and they got married just nine months later (EMPICS Entertainment)

And Konnie revealed she was also drawn to Charlie because he was good at having a phone conversation.

She said: "I don't have an Amazon account, an Uber, a Deliveroo... nothing. I am not even on Facebook, I am an old fashioned person.

"That was one thing that attracted me to Charlie, a bloke who is good at phone conversations is quite a rare thing, and Charlie is really good at having a telephone conversation.

"I am anti-consumerism. I buy nothing. Me and Charlie yin and yang well.

"I always say I am really analogue and Charlie is really digital. My oldest is digital and my youngest is analogue.

"The eldest is like his dad... he likes tinkering around with gadgets. The younger one loves getting out there and being sociable. He is a classic boy.

The pair have two kids - Covey, nine, and Huxley, seven (PA)

Speaking exclusively to Mirror Online, the mother-of-two admitted that she had a 'fundamental' and 'profound' overall feeling when thinking about her future with the TV writer, 50.

She said: "It was just a natural feeling that I had when I thought about our future together. I think that every single woman has the potential to just know.

"They always say that you 'just know', and to be honest, that's really how it was with me and Charlie. I just knew," she added.

Once she had welcomed her boys, Konnie decided to step back from television work to focus on raising them.

The star explained to the BBC about the moment she realised she needed to either prioritise her career or her children for a while.

She was hosting Sky show King of the Nerds shortly after welcoming her first baby, and was filming in Chelmsford and then coming back home to her baby instead of staying overnight, meaning she was picked up every morning at 5:30, before the tot woke up, having already expressed milk.

Konnie is a successful children's author (Birmingham Post)

Her desperation to miss the rush hour traffic meant she was willing the filming day to end.

"And I'd sometimes be sitting there exploding with milk, because you have to keep feeding the baby all day," she explained.

"I could get a nanny, but the time goes so fast, already both [my children] are in school and it feels like it was just yesterday they were born... these years, they don't come back.

"So I think after [King of the Nerds] I consciously took a step back, because I just thought, 'I'm doing everything badly'."

But it won't be forever - Konnie has taken on the odd TV gig, hosting This Morning in 2015 and playing Pam in Good Omens.

And she plans to return full-time one day - though she added the industry has completely changed since she's been away, with streaming taking over and viewers tending to watch box sets.

Konnie certainly hasn't stopped working, in fact she helped Charlie write Black Mirror episode Fifteen Million Merits.

She has also written three of her own children's books.

Cookie and the Most Annoying Boy in the World was published in 2019, and the follow-up, Cookie and the Most Annoying Girl in the World, came out the following year.

Also in 2020, Konnie wrote Fearless Fairy Tales: The Perfect Book for Homeschooling Fun and Inspiration.

"Children's has always been my bag really," she explained.

"Ever since coming out of university, I've worked in children's television, we had the Blue Peter Book Awards, I've done a lot of initiatives with children from deprived backgrounds and a lot of STEM learning initiatives, and so [writing a book] is sort of taking all that and putting it together."

Do you have a story to share? Email webfeatures@trinitymirror.com

Sign up to read this article
Read news from 100's of titles, curated specifically for you.
Already a member? Sign in here
Related Stories
Top stories on inkl right now
One subscription that gives you access to news from hundreds of sites
Already a member? Sign in here
Our Picks
Fourteen days free
Download the app
One app. One membership.
100+ trusted global sources.