Jen’s our comedy sister
Filming with Jennifer Saunders on Unforgivable brought Mel’s TV career fullcircle, as it was another famous female comedy duo who helped to boost Mel and Sue’s early career.
“Jennifer Saunders gave us our first big break,” said Mel. “We were scrambling around doing bar jobs and waitressing, then writing gags on the side for our own show. Then Jennifer just called up, saying she’d seen us on some obscure TV show.
“We’d made her laugh, so she wanted us to come write for French & Saunders.”
Mel and Sue would also go on to star in several episodes of the series. “We started that in 1996 and it was brilliant. They’ve been like comedy big sisters to us,” said Mel.
On one episode of Unforgivable, Saunders’ daughter, Beattie Edmondson, revealed her mum would get her to help write Ab Fab scripts on the school run.
“She’d dictate parts of the script to her kids in the back of the car just before heading to a read-through in London. I relate to that because Sue and I are exactly the same,” laughed Mel, herself no stranger to winging it.
“We would turn up at the Edinburgh Festival with shows that weren’t fully written. We’d start with a 35-minute set that would gradually increase to 50 minutes over the course of festival. We’ve always been very last minute.”