Early years
Wood was educated at Bury Grammar Girls' School and began her showbusiness career while an undergraduate studying drama at the University of Birmingham, appearing on the TV talent show
New Faces. This led to her appearance in a sketch show featuring the winners of that series,
The Summer Show. Her first big break was as a novelty act on the BBC's consumer affairs programme
That's Life! in 1976. Wood had first met long-term collaborator Julie Walters in the early 1970s, when Wood applied for Manchester Polytechnic, and coincidentally met up once more when they appeared together in the same theatre revue,
In At The Death, in 1978 (for which Wood wrote a brief sketch). Its success led to the commissioning of Wood's first play,
Talent (also 1978), starring Hazel Clyne (in a role which had been written for Walters), and which won Wood an award for 'Most Promising New Writer'. Peter Eckersley, the then-head of drama at Granada Television, saw
Talent and immediately invited Wood to create a television adaptation. This time Julie Walters took the lead role which had been written for her, while Wood reprised her stage role.
1980—88
The success of the television version of
Talent led to Wood writing the "follow-up",
Nearly A Happy Ending. Shortly afterwards, a third play for Granada was written and made,
Happy Since I Met You, again with Walters alongside Duncan Preston as the male lead. During 1980 she also wrote and starred in the stage play
Good Fun.
Recognising her talent, Eckersley offered Wood a sketch show, though Wood was unsure of the project; she only agreed to go ahead with the programme if Walters received equal billing. Eckersley came up with the obvious title
Wood and Walters, and the dry run of the show (the pilot episode) was filmed. The programme was arranged to be made into a full series, and went on to co-star Duncan Preston and a cast of other supporting actors. However, in between the filming of the pilot and the series, Eckersley died. Wood cites Eckersley as giving her her first big break, and feels that
Wood and Walters suffered due to his death. She was not impressed by Brian Armstrong, the emergency fill-in for Eckersley, and was of the opinion that he hired unsuitable supporting actors.
Wood also appeared as a presenter in Yorkshire Television's schools television programme for hearing-impaired children,
Insight, alongside Derek Griffiths, between 1980 and 1983. In 1982 and 1983 she appeared in BBC Radio's
Just a Minute.
Wood left Granada in 1984 for the BBC, who promised Wood more creative control over projects. Later that year, Wood's sketch show
Victoria Wood As Seen On TV went into production. This time, Wood chose actors and actresses herself: her friend Julie Walters once again starred, as did Duncan Preston. Wood's friend Celia Imrie was also cast, as well as Susie Blake and Patricia Routledge.
As Seen On TV was notable for featuring classic sketches such as Acorn Antiques, a spoof of low-budget soap opera and rumoured to be named after an antiques shop in her birthplace. Acorn Antiques is remembered for characters such as "Mrs Overall" (played by Walters), the deliberately bad camera angles and wobbling sets, as well as Celia Imrie's sarcastic tone as "Miss Babs". The sketches were seen as satirising the production values of the ITV soap opera
Crossroads in the 1970s. Wood's most popular comic song, "The Ballad of Barry and Freda (Let's Do It)" originated in this show. It tells the story of Freda (a woman eager for sex) and Barry (an introverted man terrified of sex), makes clever use of allusions to a multitude of risqué activities while avoiding all taboo words.There was a second series of
Victoria Wood As Seen On TV in 1986, followed by a one-off 'special' in 1987.
In 1988, she appeared in the BAFTA-winning
An Audience With Victoria Wood for ITV. At the time of recording the show, Wood was six months pregnant.
1989—99
During this period Wood began to move away from the sketch show format and into more self-contained works, often with a more bittersweet flavour.
Victoria Wood (six parts, 1989)) featured Wood in several individual stories such as "We'd Quite Like To Apologise", set in an airport departure lounge, and "Over to Pam", set around a fictional talk show. There was a brief return to sketches with the 1992 Christmas Day special
Victoria Wood's All Day Breakfast. The television film,
Pat and Margaret (1994), starring Wood and Julie Walters as long-lost sisters with very different lifestyles, continued her return to stand-alone plays with a poignant undercurrent to the comedy. In 1998, she wrote her first sitcom,
dinnerladies, which continued her now established milieu of mostly female, mostly middle-aged characters depicted vividly and amusingly, but with a counterpoint of sadder themes.
In 1994 there was also the one off BBC 80 minute programme
Victoria Wood: Live in Your Own Home featuring Julie Walters and Duncan Preston.
2000—05
December 2000 saw the Christmas sketch show special
Victoria Wood with All The Trimmings, starring her traditional troupe of actors and actresses as well as a string of special guest stars. However, it was during this period that Wood tended to move away from comedy, focusing on drama instead. She did continue to produce one-off specials, though, including
Victoria Wood's Sketch Show Story (2002) and
Victoria Wood's Big Fat Documentary (2005).
Wood wrote her first musical,
The Musical!, which opened in 2005 at the Theatre Royal, Haymarket, London, for a limited period, directed by Trevor Nunn. It starred most of the original cast, with Sally Ann Triplett playing Miss Berta (played in the series by Wood). Wood played Julie Walters' character Mrs. Overall for matinee performances.
2006—present
Wood wrote the 2006 one-off ITV serious drama
Housewife, 49, an adaptation of the real diaries of Nella Last, and played the eponymous role of an introverted middle-aged character who discovers new confidence and friendships in Lancashire during World War II.
Housewife, 49 was critically praised, and Wood won BAFTA for both her acting and writing for this drama ... a rare double.
In November 2006, Wood directed a revival production of
Acorn Antiques: The Musical! with a brand new cast. The musical opened at The Lowry in Salford in December and toured the United Kingdom from January to July 2007.
In January 2007, she appeared as herself in a series of new adverts featuring famous people working for supermarket chain Asda. The adverts featured Wood working in the ASDA bakery and introduced a new catchphrase for the supermarket - "there's no place like ASDA". Wood was also the subject of an episode of
The South Bank Show in March 2007 and is the only woman to be the subject of two
South Bank programmes (the previous occasion was in September 1996).
Wood appeared in her own travel documentary show on BBC One called
Victoria's Empire, in which she travelled around the world in search of the history, cultural impact and customs which the British Empire placed on the parts of the world it ruled. She departed Victoria Station, London for:
- Programme One: Calcutta (India), Hong Kong and Borneo
- Programme Two: Ghana, Jamaica and Newfoundland, Canada
- Programme Three: New Zealand, Australia and Zambia, finishing at the Victoria Falls.
In a tribute to Wood, the British television station UKTV Gold celebrated her works with a weekend marathon of programmes between 3 November and 4 November 2007. The weekend focused on programmes such as
Victoria Wood Live and
dinnerladies in addition to
Victoria Wood As Seen On TV - this marked the first time it has been shown on British television since its last rerun in 1995.
Wood returned to stand-up comedy with a special performance written for the celebratory show
Happy Birthday BAFTA on 28 October 2007, alongside other household names. The programme was transmitted on ITV1 on Wednesday 7 November 2007. On Boxing Day 2007 she appeared as "Nana" in the Granada dramatisation of Noel Streatfeild's novel
Ballet Shoes.
In December 2007, while guesting on the radio programme
Desert Island Discs, Wood said that she was about to begin writing a movie, described as a contemporary comedy about a middle-aged person, marking her first foray into film. On Thursday 12 June 2008, Wood was part of the celebrity guest panel on the series
You're Fired! on BBC Two.
In June 2009, Wood appeared as a panelist on the first 2 episodes of the new series of
I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue.
Wood returned to television comedy for a one-off Christmas comedy sketch-show special, her first in 9 years, titled
Victoria Wood's Mid Life Christmas, transmitted on BBC One at 21:00 on Christmas Eve 2009. The special, which reunited Wood with long-time collaborator Julie Walters, included a spoof of BBC period drama (
Lark Rise to Candleford,
Little Dorrit and
Cranford) entitled
Lark Pies to Cranchesterford, a spoof documentary following
Acorn Antiques star Bo Beaumont (Walters) titled
Beyond The Marigolds, highlights from the
Mid Life Olympics 2009 (with Wood as the commentator), parodies of personal injury advertisements and a reprise of Wood's most famous song "The Ballad of Barry and Freda" ("Let's Do It").
Seen On TV, a 90-minute documentary looking back on Wood's career, was broadcast on BBC Two at 20:30 on December 21, whilst a behind-the-scenes special programme about
Midlife Christmas,
What Larks!, was broadcast on BBC One at 23:00 on December 30.
Associated actors
Wood is notable for frequently including the same actors in her shows. These actors have appeared in most of her work in the 1980s, 1990s and 2000s and include ... most notably ... Julie Walters, Celia Imrie and Duncan Preston. To a lesser extent, other associate actors include: Lill Roughley, Anne Reid, Susie Blake, Richard Lintern, Sylvestra Le Touzel, Lorraine Ashbourne, Marcia Warren, Wendy Nottingham, Dorothy Atkinson, Sally Bankes and Jason Watkins.
