Dawn French on writing with Jennifer Saunders
When the great comedy duo of French and Saunders (Dawn French and Jennifer Saunders) went their separate ways back in 2010 following the end of Jam and Jerusalem, there was more than a bit of sadness in the air. Wanting a bit of time to focus on individual projects sounded great on paper, but there was no joy in Mudville with the thought of no more French and Saunders in the foreseeable future.
On the upside, there has been some brilliant work that has come out of these ‘individual projects’ with Dawn French’s recent series, Roger and Val Have Just Got In with Alfred Molina while Jennifer Saunders has had great success with the return of Absolutely Fabulous along with her upcoming PG Wodehouse adaptation of Blandings. Still, however, no French and Saunders.
That may change soon as it has been hinted in recent weeks that the band may be getting back together to work on projects when she commented about Dawn by saying, “There are moments when I really miss working with her and doing the sketches.“. According to Dawn French, they are both set to reunite this summer with the rest of The Comic Strip crew (Rik Mayall, Adrian Edmondson, Robbie Coltrane), the group in which they got their big comedy break some 30 years ago back in 1982.
During our 2010 interview with Dawn French for PBS’ Behind the Britcom: From Script to Screen, Dawn spoke on the general concept of writing comedy and how she and Jennifer worked and wrote together in the early days of French and Saunders. Seeing the twinkle in her eye when reliving her days of working with Jennifer, getting the band back together can’t come soon enough for me.
