Hattie Hayridge

Career

She was a major part of the late-1980s/early-'90s wave of alternative comedians of the British comedy circuit, appearing alongside Lee Evans, Jack Dee, Julian Clary, Paul Merton, amongst many others, including Mike Myers. Her distinctive style of gentle deadpan with a sharp edge attracted a great deal of attention straight away. Julian Hall of The Independent later commented on 10 August 2007, "Boom there it is, the deceptive and surprising edge for which she is renowned and applauded by so many of her fellow-comics."

Following a spontaneous five-minute spot in a London club, after "a bad day at the office", her first booked open spots were in a cabaret show (run by comics Cliff Parisi and Andy Lyndon) at the Edinburgh Festival in 1986, which quickly led to gigs on the London comedy circuit, and to an award for the Hackney Empire New Act of the Year (1987) .

In April 1988, she appeared on Friday Night Live hosted by Ben Elton, and was spotted by the producers of BBC's Red Dwarf for the episode Parallel Universe, (Series II) to play Hilly, the female equivalent of the male Computer, Holly (Norman Lovett). The same year, Hattie received rave reviews at the Montreal Comedy Festival, and appeared on the related televised Just For Laughs programme. In 1989, after the departure of Norman Lovett from Red Dwarf, to star in his own show, Hattie successfully auditioned for the part of Holly, appearing in Red Dwarf Series III, IV and V. She continues to be a sought after guest at Conventions and Comic Cons around the world.

Among the many television appearances as herself, include Have I Got News for You, Space Cadets with William Shatner, various other panel shows as well as a winning performance on Celebrity Mastermind (2010). As a guest on Robert Llewellyn's CarPool in March 2010, Hattie said that the previous year she was asked to tell a joke at U.S. Immigration in order to prove her occupation as 'comedian', she told the official: "The reason I'm here is I want to go to Disney Land. The nice bits obviously, not the touristy bits". That same year, 2010, Hattie appeared in an Awards Ceremony scene along with other notable comedians such as Eddie Izzard, Harry Hill and Kevin Bishop in Ben Miller's feature film, Huge starring Thandie Newton.

As an actress, she has performed in Jonathan Creek with Alan Davies in 2000 (Series 3 episode 6, The Three Gamblers) and the North American sci-fi series LEXX in 2001, where she played Sub-Warden Heidi in the third episode of the fourth season called "P4X" as well as various characters in sketch shows with Jon Culshaw Alter Ego. (1999) and Kevin Eldon, It's Kevin (2013). In 2015 Hayridge had a small appearance the film SuperBob. In 2009, she performed in the UK tour of the hit American show, Totally Looped, where performers including, Phill Jupitus, Humphrey Ker and Marcus Brigstocke Sanjeev Bhaskar, improvised live dialogue to film clips .

Her stand-up television appearances include Live At Jongleurs (1997), Rove (Australia ) 2002), and most notably The Late Late Show With Craig Ferguson CBS in 2009, and Stewart Lee's The Alternative Comedy Experience on Comedy Central in 2014.

Her autobiography, Random Abstract Memory is published by Penguin (1997) tells the story "from her birth as a suspected appendicitis to her spontaneous leap into comedy" RAM 1997, "Warm and witty, it's a gem" William Cook Guardian 2007)

Hayridge continues as a stand up comedian and has travelled the world including Festivals in Melbourne, Adelaide, Sydney, the first Latitude Festival and part of Best of Edinburgh Festival season in New York City (2007). In 2013, she supported Alexei Sayle on his comeback tour.

Books