S3 Special Episode Helen Lederer

Helen Margaret Lederer (born 24 September 1954 is a British comedian, writer and actress who emerged as part of the alternative comedy boom at the beginning of the 1980s. Among her television credits are the BBC2 sketch series Naked Video and BBC One's Absolutely Fabulous, in which she played the role of Catriona.

In 2015, her comedy novel Losing It was published by Pan Macmillan It was nominated for the P.G. Wodehouse Comedy Literary Award and the Edinburgh Book Festival First Book Award.

She recently released a biography,  " Not That I'm Bitter" she wanted people to connect with her experiences in a humourous way. At the time of writing she is in a run starring in the stage version of Fawlty Towers.

In 2018, Lederer launched a new literary prize for comic fiction written by women. The 2019 published winner of the CWIP award was The Exact Opposite of Okay by Lauren Steven- Kirsty Eyre was the inaugural winner of the unpublished prize with her comic novel, Cow Girl, which was published in 2020. The 2020 awards added a humorous graphic novel prize.

The award was created because of dissatisfaction with the Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize , which was not awarded in 2018 and had up to that point only been won by a woman three times.

Key points of this episode:

• How writing her book gave her a second confidence,,
• How people were not mean about woman in comedy back then as such, but it was simply a different time.
• How she "accidentally" stole someones comedy partner for a year!
• Her thoughts on comedy, connection with an audience and performance.
• What can make an audiance angry.
• Her book - "Not that I'm bitter"
• Her run being on the stage version of Fawlty Towers.
• Her appearance on "The Pilgrimage"

You can see more about this talented lady here:

@helenlederer on X and Instagram