Chris Evans' 'bad' £800,000 year

Chris Evans was paid more than £ 800,000 last year despite an embarrassing string of programme flops.

The multi-millionaire former DJ enjoyed a generous financial package from his production firm UMTV, it has emerged.

The details are revealed in UMTV's first set of accounts. They show that Evans - married to former pop singer Billie Piper - received £360,000 in dividends and charged £447,750 for "production services" in the nine months to the end of last March.

Evans, 37, recently sold his Surrey home, Hascombe Court, outside Godalming, for a £4 million profit. The sale triggered speculation that he has already spent much of his vast fortune, not least on his failed unfair dismissal case against Virgin Radio last year, which cost him about £18 million.

He has struggled to repeat the phenomenal success of his early career when he took the radio and television worlds by storm with shows such as Don't Forget Your Toothbrush, The Big Breakfast and TFI Friday.

Evans set up UMTV in 2002 as his vehicle for a much-heralded return to programme- making after an 18-month honeymoon. However, his formula of laddish, brash TV shows failed to work a second time.

UMTV's Channel 4 show Boys And Girls and a Five series, Live With ... were both quickly axed last year after they proved dismally unable to deliver audiences.

Boys And Girls, in which 100 boys and 100 girls competed for a £100,000 prize, was first dumped from its prime-time Saturday slot, then dropped altogether after ratings struggled to grow from

1.1 million.

The shows, which cost around £500,000 each to make, featured a slot called "Babes or Mingers", in which audience members had to guess which label they were given by the opposite sex.

Plans for a US version of the programme were also abandoned.

Live With ... was a lads' chat show set in a pub - and an even bigger disaster, with ratings as low as 200,000.

The show, presented in turn by DJs Chris Moyles and Christian O'Connell, was described by one critic as "the TV equivalent of a Burger King - distracting while you're consuming it but leaving no lasting impression."

Another UMTV production, Five's The Terry And Gaby Show, starring Terry Wogan and Gaby Roslin, still has very low ratings.

The UMTV accounts, filed at Companies House, show that it made a healthy profit in its first year, despite its lack of programming success.

Pre-tax profits were £777,281 on turnover of £6 million, largely made up of fees for UMTV's first wave of productions.

However, the failure of the shows means that the company may struggle to repeat the performance in its second year.

Evans made more than £60 million when he sold Ginger Media Group - including Virgin Radio - to Scottish Media Group in 2000.

Directors of UMTV, in which Evans is the controlling shareholder, said: "This was the first period of trading for the company and the directors are satisfied with the performance and hope to see continued success next year."

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