Tuesday 13 April 2010
Jo Brand- 'Look Back In Hunger'
I've just read and thoroughly enjoyed Jo Brand's autobiography 'Look Back In Hunger'. I first properly took notice of Jo Brand when she started appearing on Friday Night Live in the late eighties. It was still unusual for a woman to have ventured into stand up comedy, even in the alternative comedy world. She had her own highly distinctive style- unkempt, scruffy, unrepentant. This wasn't how a woman who was appearing on TV should look- or rather thats what the advertisers in 1986 would have you believe.
Her routine tackled issues that were taboo or personal to herself. She spoke about her weight and clearly didn't give a fuck what people thought. She didn't want to diet and was very happy as she was. The opening credits to her show years later satirised the popular Sainsbury's ads (you hear a famous voice and a pair of hands preparing a meal using nutritious and fresh ingredients. The camera pans up to reveal a celebrity such as Felicity Kendal or Denis Healey smiling sweetly into the camera). The ingredients in Brand's version are extremely fattening and in the quantites used in her recipe, very bad for you (the end result is a multi-layed sponge cake full of cream and topped with various Cardury's Flakes and a family size pork pie!). The camera pans up to reveal Brand sneering at the audience with a fag in her hand. The name of the show was 'Jo Brand- Through The Cakehole'.
Her autobiography is highly recommended and deals with events in her life up until her first appearance on TV. It covers in depth her first career as a psychiatric nurse after witnessing her father's manic depression first-hand. She also revels that, shock horror, she isn't a lesbian. In fact she has received numerous petitions from lesbians over the years asking her to give up her career in comedy. They thinks shes giving them a bad name.
She also discusses when she suddenly piled on so much weight. It was when she went on the Pill and concludes that this made it 'a very effective contraceptive indeed'.
Brand's style of writing is very conversational which makes for a very quick read indeed. Its almost like Brand is in the room telling you a concise story of her very interesting life- the mark of a great autobiography. Highly recommended.
Her routine tackled issues that were taboo or personal to herself. She spoke about her weight and clearly didn't give a fuck what people thought. She didn't want to diet and was very happy as she was. The opening credits to her show years later satirised the popular Sainsbury's ads (you hear a famous voice and a pair of hands preparing a meal using nutritious and fresh ingredients. The camera pans up to reveal a celebrity such as Felicity Kendal or Denis Healey smiling sweetly into the camera). The ingredients in Brand's version are extremely fattening and in the quantites used in her recipe, very bad for you (the end result is a multi-layed sponge cake full of cream and topped with various Cardury's Flakes and a family size pork pie!). The camera pans up to reveal Brand sneering at the audience with a fag in her hand. The name of the show was 'Jo Brand- Through The Cakehole'.
Her autobiography is highly recommended and deals with events in her life up until her first appearance on TV. It covers in depth her first career as a psychiatric nurse after witnessing her father's manic depression first-hand. She also revels that, shock horror, she isn't a lesbian. In fact she has received numerous petitions from lesbians over the years asking her to give up her career in comedy. They thinks shes giving them a bad name.
She also discusses when she suddenly piled on so much weight. It was when she went on the Pill and concludes that this made it 'a very effective contraceptive indeed'.
Brand's style of writing is very conversational which makes for a very quick read indeed. Its almost like Brand is in the room telling you a concise story of her very interesting life- the mark of a great autobiography. Highly recommended.
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