Personal Life
On Australia Day, (26 January), 2007, Dickson became an Australian citizen. He has lived in Australia for over five years with his wife, Melanie Bell and two daughters Esme and Edie Perrygrove. He is good friends with his Pop Idol/American Idol counterpart Simon Cowell, going back to their days working together in the British music industry. It was Cowell who convinced Dickson to take the role as the "villain judge", despite Dickson's reservations given that he was relatively new to his adopted homeland and wanted to settle at a gradual pace. Cowell guaranteed immediate money and fame as incentives.
On an episode of the ABC Australian news program Four Corners broadcast on 19 February 2007, Dickson went public and discussed his problems with alcohol. The program followed how he attempted to give up alcohol altogether, however several weeks in Dickson broke from his attempt at abstinence. During the program he admitted that he was an alcoholic:
| “ | Am I an alcoholic or not? Yes, I think, I think I am an alcoholic. I think a lot more people are living under the cosh of booze than they are prepared to recognise. And it's actually quite liberating when you understand that, because you realise there's lots of people in the same boat. You don't have to be sitting on a street corner urinating in your trousers and shadow boxing to be a drunk. I'm living proof" | ” |
Read more about this topic: Ian Dickson (TV Personality)
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