TICKETS for the live Any Questions to be broadcast from Teignmouth quickly sold out as word spread around the town.

Sue Blake, one of the directors of the Teignmouth Science Festival which is hosting the show at the Carlton Theatre, said they had been 'overwhelmed' by the interest shown.

She said:?'It has been very difficult having to turn people down – we could easily have filled the theatre three times over. The programme has caught the imagination of the town, especially with the star-studded line-up.'

Any Questions goes out on Friday, March 11, and is repeated on Radio 4 the next day.

On the panel are property expert Kirstie Allsop from the hit Location Location TV programme; Tory heavyweight Ken Clarke, the justice minister; Exeter MP and former Labour minister Ben Bradshaw; and columnist and Daily Mirror associate editor, Kevin Maguire. The chairman will be Jonathan Dimbleby.

The broadcast coincides with the second science festival, and Ms Blake hoped that people would be as interested in attending the many other events planned. Full details can be seen on the website teignmouthsciencefestival.com

Meanwhile Teignmouth councillor Sylvia Russell has dug out a newspaper cutting and photo from the last time Any Questions came to town, on April 20, 1984.

The chairman then was David Jacobs – pictured here with Cllr Russell – and the panel consisted of Dr David (now Lord) Owen; journalist and historian Max Hastings; Labour MP Gwynneth Dunwoody; and Dr Richard Clutterbuck of Exeter University.

Warm-up man was Roy Corlett, former head of BBC Radio Devon, who went on to become the Teignbridge correspondent for a local evening paper.

Cllr Russell was running the Venn Farm hotel and restaurant at the time, and recalls the team arriving to take tea on the terrace.

'Other guests in the bar were fascinated to see them there, and we served dinner in a private room so they could discuss the programme details beforehand,' she said.

'It went very well indeed. David Jacobs was the only one to stay overnight and it was quite funny next morning when he came down for breakfast. The repeat of Any Questions was on, as well as his recorded Music for You show – everybody did a double take when they saw him and heard him on the radio at the same time.

'He appreciated the joke, and was on good form the whole time – thoroughly charming and a real gentleman.'