Viewers slam Dale Winton’s documentary for ‘ruining the story’ with ‘ridiculous’ editing: ‘I had to switch off!’

Viewers of the Dale Winton documentary have condemned the show for ‘ruining the story’ with ‘ridiculous’ editing.

The Dale Winton Story: One Of A Kind aired on Channel 5 on Saturday evening and was a festive tribute to the TV presenter’s life and career.

Radio DJ and television presenter Dale presented the shows Supermarket Sweep from 1993 to 2001 and again in 2007, the National Lottery game show In It to Win It between 2002 and 2016 and the 2008 series Hole in the Wall.

The beloved star of the TV screen and airwaves died on April 18, 2018 at the age of 62 from natural causes.

But viewers who watched the documentary were less than impressed with what they claimed was a “ridiculous edit” of the show.

One wrote on Twitter: ‘@channel5_tv congratulations on ruining the Dale Winton story… What about the stupid photo interference and zooming in on the photos, ridiculous, ruined a good show, I had to turn it off …Sorry Dal…!’

Another viewer complained that there were too many interviews of his friends and not enough content about Dale himself.

She wrote: ‘I think there are more Dale Winton traits in this book than in this show! Where are the features of his face on this show, instead of hearing from his friends doing ‘interviews’.”

Another said: ‘I feel like he should call this show ‘dale winton’s friends’ because I don’t see as much content from him as I would like!!! How dare they @channel5_tv #dalewinton.’

Someone else said: ‘They could have done Dale Winton better than this, instead of showing him as a murderer on a plate…’.

Dale used his final TV interview to admit that it was impossible for him to find love before he died because ‘nobody wants a camp, a man over 60’.

The star, who was found dead at home in 2018 aged just 62, also revealed he was unable to use internet dating because he feared it would make him look ‘desperate’ and ‘very unattractive’ to other gay men.

In his last TV interview in 2016, he revealed that he couldn’t meet anyone to spend his life with because he spent too much time chasing “mean and nasty” men.

He said: ‘No one wants a camp, man over 60. I can’t go on dating sites. I’m quite well known, so once you see the photo, it’s absolutely unattractive for another gay man to find someone there in show business.” He added: “It’s time for me to go from troubled boys to nice boys.”

In June 2016, two months before he was last seen in public, he said: ‘I wouldn’t leave the house for five years. I didn’t want to put one foot in front of the other outside the house. I had a bad breakup and I had health problems and I was like, ‘I want to retire’.”

A year earlier he failed to attend the funeral of his close friend Cilla Black, raising concerns about his health, and had undergone four operations in four years to correct crippling pain in his knees and shoulders.

In his 2002 autobiography, he came out as gay, but expressed regret for not telling his mother before her death, saying in 2008 that no one had ever asked him about his sexual orientation.

In 2018 he had revived his TV career with a new Channel 5 show Dale’s Florida Fly Drive, but he died before the series was fully screened.

Dale was a household name in the mid-1990s and early 2000s, fronting shows such as Supermarket Sweep and The National Lottery: In It To Win It.

He was born in Marylebone, London, in May 1955, the son of Gary and Sheree, an actress.

In his autobiography he writes: Dale Winton: My Storyin 2002, the beloved star movingly described his relationship with his beloved mother.

‘But to be honest, I always felt like my mother would forgive me for everything. She believed in boundaries and was strict, but her love for me was real and unconditional.”

His parents divorced when he was ten and his father died three years later on the day of Winton’s bar mitzvah.

Just days after turning 21, Winton discovered that his mother, whom he loved, had died after taking an overdose of prescription drugs.

Desperate, Winton never fully recovered from the loss of his beloved mother and asked for help from the Samaritans shortly after her death.

“I had some very desperate personal moments shortly after my mother died,” he said in his autobiography. ‘One time I called the Samaritans and visited one of their volunteers.

‘No matter what people say to comfort someone, suicide is largely seen as the ultimate rejection of loved ones, but also of life, and those left behind need time to move past these thoughts.

His career in show business began when he worked as a DJ in the London club scene before moving to radio and television.

His big break came with Supermarket Sweep, where participants ran through a supermarket to collect items.

He presented the show from 1993 to 2001 and was involved in a reboot in 2007.

From there Winton moved on to primetime shows, including the National Lottery’s In It To Win It, as well as hosting his own Christmas specials and celebrity guest shows.