Comedian on Richard Osman’s House Of Games this week

Fern Brady is the only comedian on Richard Osman’s House Of Games this week.

From a working-class family from Bathgate, West Lothian, she originally wanted to be as a journalist, starting while an undergraduate in Edinburgh where she edited the newspaper The Student.  (She also worked as a stripper to put herself through uni, which she’s often discussed in her stand-up)

Brady took to stand-up after writing an article about trying comedy for Fringe publication Fest, and said it was ‘the push I needed to realise it was what I wanted to do’

In 2011, she reached the finals of So You Think You're Funny? new act competition at the Edinburgh Fringe and came third.

As she worked her way up the circuit she has also become a familiar face on TV with appearances on 8 Out Of 10 Cats, Seann Walsh's Late Night Comedy Spectacular, The Alternative Comedy Experience Frankie Boyle's New World Order and series 14 of Live at the Apollo. She has just presented the Dave travelogue British as Folk alongside fellow comedians Ivo Graham and Darren Harriott. Brady also has a BBC podcast with Irish comedian Alison Spittle  called Wheel of Misfortune.

As a teenager she spent time in a mental health unit and was diagnosed with obsessive–compulsive disorder at the age of 16. She revealed early this year that she has also been diagnosed autistic.

Her last stand-up special Power & Chaos aired on BBC One earlier this year and is still available on iPlayer. In January, she will begin a 25-date tour of her fifth stand-up show, Autistic Bikini Queen. Dates and tickets.

Brady is also writing a memoir called Strong Female Character, described as ‘about how being a woman gets in the way of people's expectation of what autism should look like and, equally, how being autistic gets in the way of people's expectations of what a woman should look like.’ It is due out in February 2023 and available to order here.

She has also spoken about being bisexual in her comedy shows.

• Richard Osman’s House Of Games is on BBC Two every night at 6pm this week The other competitors are The Repair Shop’s Will Kirk and presenters Edith Bowman and Martin Lewis 

Published: 15 Nov 2021