Dawn French has opened up on what spelt the end of her then hugely successful comedy show French and Saunders, agonising: “The joke was on me.” The pair had performed alongside ‘I’m Outta Love’ songstress Anastacia and Dawn wore an identical outfit to her, before feeling so shamed by the episode that she decided the show couldn’t go on.
“I looked in the mirror and I thought: ‘This isn’t it, this isn’t what Anastacia looks like’, but instead of finding it funny, I just thought: ‘Oh I don’t like it,'” she recalled, cringing that she’d “never felt so ugly”. “It just felt like I wasn’t in control of the comedy. The joke was on me.”
Dawn’s mischievous routines would often see her parody big-name celebrities such as Madonna and Britney Spears – but it was the one with Anastacia that unexpectedly touched a nerve. After the sketch took place back in 2004, Dawn and Jennifer axed the BBC show, which had been on air for an impressive 17 years by that time.
In the years that followed, only compilation shows, recaps and one-off specials would be seen by the public. Yet the reason Dawn decided she couldn’t continue was completely unknown to pal Jennifer, with whom she’d kicked off her comedy career after meeting at the Central School of Speech and Drama in the late 1970s.
She unveiled the true root of her actions in a new BBC documentary, having confessed: “I got in my car and just wept all the way home. “I hated everything about the day and I’m never going to do it again. I’m never going to feel humiliated like that again.”
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A dismayed Jennifer explained that the emotions underpinning her withdrawal from the show were news to her.
“I didn’t know this was the reason… I didn’t realise it was so traumatic that you decided to end the whole act,” she exclaimed.
Dawn and Jennifer had been firm friends ever since hitting it off at college, and had even once lived together – but this was one secret Dawn had kept from her pal.
Despite the end of the French and Saunders sketch show, the pair went on to enjoy successful solo careers.
On their documentary, they reminisced about the beginnings of their hit show together, joking: “We’d dress up as punks and go on the tube and see if we could frighten anybody.”
Dawn also chuckled that the duo would mischievously “shout things to people on the street”.
Fast forward to the present day, and the star has been suffering physically after enduring major surgery on her knee – but she vowed on Instagram that now was the time to start “the healing”.
Imagine… French & Saunders: Pointed, Bitchy, Bitter airs tonight at 10.30pm on BBC One.