Female talent in the spotlight

Nineteen women have been spotlighted as ‘ones to watch’ in comedy as part of a project to promote female talent in the industry.

The Women in Comedy On The Rise list has been compiled from the Gobby Girls community of 2,500 women and non-binary people working in the business.

The group is run by the female-led production company of the same name, who compiled the list with the wider industry group Women In Film & Television UK.

Gobby Girl founder Gina Lyons said: ‘We’re tired of hearing there aren’t enough women in comedy. There bloody is. They’re writing, directing, performing and creating some of the most exciting comedy in the UK. 

‘The challenge isn’t finding the talent, it’s making sure the industry sees it.  It is about bringing those creators together with the people who can commission, finance and champion their work. We hope everyone leaves with a few new names on their radar. 

‘With only 11 per cent of sitcoms solely written by women and 12 per cent directed by women, we wanted to introduce more women to the industry.’

The 11 per cent figure originally came from a landmark 2018 report from the Writers’ Guild Of Great Britain – with follow-up research last year from the Female Pilots Club development group suggesting little had changed.

Here are the 18 Women in Comedy On The Rise:

Soph Galustian: A Mancunian comedy writer-performer of Armenian heritage, she played Suki in series two of Daddy Issues and Julia in Everyone Else Burns (Channel 4). She also appears in romcom Rye Lane, and wrote and starred in Peck 'Eds, a short-form comedy series created for the BBC Three Threesomes strand. Her debut book, No Worries If Not, was published in 2023.  She has more than 250,000 followers on social media.

Claire Rafferty is a Belfast-born actor, writer and comedian, best known for playing put-upon teacher Miss Mooney in Derry Girls. She is a member of the Gobby Girl sketch collective and has her first short sitcom commissioned with a major broadcaster to be announced soon.

Laura Evelyn is a queer, hard-of-hearing actor, writer and improviser. Her screen credits include Last Christmas, Black Mirror, Starstruck and Good Omens. She will next appear in Youth, the upcoming HBO drama created by Sharon Horgan. Laura’s pilot script Two By Two won the Female Pilot Club pilot script competition, earning an industry reading and mentorship. She is currently developing her short film Submerge, a romcom inspired by her experiences of hearing loss and tinnitus.

Libby Rodliffe's one woman play, Jobsworth, was published by Methuen of Bloomsbury before playing the Edinburgh Fringe and transferring to  The Park Theatre, London, late last year. It is now in development for a six-part TV comedy series with Playground Entertainment. She trained with improv school The Second City and Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, where she studied musical theatre.

Noor Sobka is a Libyan comedy writer and performer from the North of England. She has appeared in the women-led  sketch show Sketchy Muslims and the BFI-funded short film Mourning Period and written a number of plays, including Colonel Gadaddy, Nutella And Harissa and Brown Nose.

Alyssa Kyria has toured the UK with her one-woman stand-up show, The Funny Mummy,  and has amassed 50,000 followers for her online work, which was nominated for a Funny Women content creator award. She also founded Mums Night Out Comedy, stand-up nights for mothers.

Natalie Malla is a writer and director who has been selected for the BFI-backed Glasgow Funny Features programme with Kidding, Not Kidding, a feature film she co-wrote and will make her directorial debut with. She has also co-written the feature Rent-A-Friend, with Community’s Tristram Shapeero attached to direct and has another feature, Mistletoe Kiss, being developed with Netflix.

Mary Flanigan, a Belfast-born comedy writer, performer and stand-up nominated for the Leicester Mercury Comedian of the Year 2023 and the Birmingham Breaking Talent Award 2019. Flanigan has written and performed for Soft Border Patrol and Quick Comedy in Northern Ireland. This year, she makes her solo debut at the Edinburgh Fringe with Scream If You Want To Go Slower. 

Samantha Lyden and Teresa Burns, a comedy writing partnership specialising in female-led, working-class sitcoms and comedy for young audiences. They are also regular writers for Cartoon Network and have written for the upcoming kids’ animated series Foster’s Funtime for Imaginary Friends. Their adaptation of Nadia Shireen’s kids’ book, Barbara Throws A Wobbler, has recently been green-lit for a series. Their original projects include Curveball, The Bridesmaid's Diaries and the short film Neil's Yard, which won the 2019 Funny Women Award. 

Mari Izzard is a Welsh writer, performer and comedian recently commissioned by Beastly Media to write and star in her first short film. She appeared as Suki in David Earl and Chris Hayward’s film Brian and Charles and in Sitters for the BBC alongside her identical twin sister Lowri.

Kelly Condron is a Salford-born writer whose work has been selected for a number of script development programmes.  She previously played Zara Morgan in Hollyoaks for the best part of a decade, and is also a voiceover artist. 

Jessica Aytac is a British-French writer and performer whose comedy draws on her experience before and after becoming a wheelchair user. Her debut sitcom pilot, Damaged Goods, earned her a place on the prestigious BBC Comedy Collective. She was a lead writer on BBC Scotland's Breaking The News across multiple series and is currently writing for a new CBBC animated sketch show. She is also the co-founder of Cirque Du Lol-eil, an accessible comedy showcase championing disabled performers and audiences.

Ruth Pickett is a writer and director who won a Bafta for directing Luke Rollason’s BBC comedy short film Quiet Life. She directed sketches for Saturday Night Live UK, all of series 3 of Liam Williams’ Ladhood for BBC Three and Jordan Gray’s  Transaction, for Comedy Central. Of English and Turkish heritage, Pickett grew up in Yorkshire.

Hannah Berry George (HBG) is a director and writer who has recently wrapped production on her latest short, Folding In, starring Rosie Jones. She has also directed high-profile talent, including Cynthia Erivo, Katherine Ryan, Aisling Bea and Little Mix.

Ella Faye Donley is a director and writer from Teesside, who was last year also named as one of North East Screen's directors to watch 2025. She has made a number of shorts, shadowed the director on series 2 of the BBC comedy Smoggie Queens and co-founded the  Salty Pelican comedy improv theatre/

Anna Morris is a writer, comedian and actor who won a Scotsman Fringe First for her debut play Son Of A Bitch in 2024. She wrote and starred in ITV's Bad Bridesmaid and is the creator of viral lockdown comedy hits, including Back To Work and music parodies New (Tier) Rules and Vaccine!. Her Radio 4 comedy special Kid Life Crisis is available on BBC Sounds. A performer with single-sided deafness, Morris makes her directorial debut with Slay at this year's Edinburgh Fringe and is developing Son Of A Bitch for television with production company Big Beach.

Lily Portman is a writer, director and co-founder of Middling Women, a Midlands-based production company developing projects that champion underrepresented voices and regional stories.  Her comedy shows include Quiet, starring Philippa Dunne and Luke Rollason.

Josie Charles is a writer and director from Somerset, now based in London,  who has a TV series, Neighbourhood Watch, in development with Hartswood Films. Her short film Fishing won the grand jury prize for best narrative short at the 2024 Slamdance Film Festival. As a up-and-coming director she shadowed Simon Hynd on BBC’s Ghosts.

Published: 17 Jul 2026