Victoria Wood

DIRECTOR

Graduated from Birmingham University in 1974 with a degree so bad it had to be handed over with tongs. She then appeared on various upsetting television programmes. She sat around a lot. In 1978 she was involved in a slightly pretentious revue at the Bush Theatre in London called In At The Death and wrote a sketch for herself and Julie Walters which went down a bomb. She then wrote a stage play with songs Talent for the Crucible Theatre Studio, Sheffield (Evening Standard’s Most Promising Playwright, Plays and Players Award). Talent was then adapted for Television (Pye Television Award), and was followed by two more plays and a comedy series Wood and Walters. In 1984 she started touring as a stand up comic, promoted by Phil McIntyre, but unfortunately she didn’t really start to shift tickets until 1985.

For the last 20 years she has alternated stand up with work on television. Victoria Wood- As Seen on TV (BAFTA Awards for Best Light Entertainment Programme and Performance, BBC Personality of the year 1987), An Audience With Victoria Wood (BFTA Awards for Best Light Entertainment Programme and Performance), Victoria Wood’s All Day Breakfast (Writers Guild Award, Best Light Entertainment Programme), Pat and Margaret (Broadcasting Press Guild Award, Best Single Drama, Reims Television Festival Award Best Actress, Best Screenplay), Dinnerladies (British Comedy Awards Best New Comedy, Best Comedy for the Second Series, Writer of the Year, Press Prize at Montreux).

She has won many awards for her live work including Best Stand Up three times at the British Comedy Awards. Her shows have broken box office records all over the country, and she holds the record for number of consecutive sold out shows at the Royal Albert Hall. The day of her final performance there in 2002 she climbed the roof and made an entire circuit of the basement on an office chair, laughing. She has not been asked back.

Her two documentaries on the obesity crisis in the UK and the USA, Victoria Wood’s Big Fat Documentary were shown in 2004, followed by Moonwalking, an account of the midnight breast cancer charity walk. In 2005 she received a special award from BAFTA, and the following year, she and Julie Walters received an award from the British Comedy Awards for their outstanding contribution to comedy over the last twenty five years.

Victoria has just filmed a three part documentary series for the BBC on the remnants of the British Empire, and played the title role in Housewife, 49, an ITV film which she also wrote and executive produced.

She is the subject of a South Bank Show, one of the few artists to be featured twice, following the first programme in 1997.

Acorn Antiques the Musical! opened at the Theatre Royal, Haymarket in the West End in February 2005. It was directed by Trevor Nunn and featured some of the original cast. It received three Olivier nominations and Celia Imrie won the award for Best Supporting Role in a musical for her portrayal of Miss Babs.