I’VE just turned 57 and finished a run at the Edinburgh Fringe doing stand-up and I think I was the only grandmother performing at the Fringe.
I suddenly was very, very aware of the maleness of stand-up and the age difference as well.
The Fringe seems to be a boyfest, young boys stand-up and there seems to be no room for women’s voices. There are women coming through but my idea of hell would be sitting in the dressing room of the Stand comedy club or wherever it may be, in my 50s with all these young boys desperate for success.
I’m lucky I just want folk to enjoy themselves, I don’t have to prove myself to get a career. I’ve had a great 30-year career but I am very, very aware of the invisibility of women.
The series I’ve just finished filming, A Burdz Eye View, follows me taking my show round places Scots used to go on holiday, a simple idea, but I could not believe the audiences we got and that it was because I wanted to interview women, to do a programme that I would sit and watch and be interested in.
The experiences of older women such as Dorothy Paul and Una McLean were never that easy to break through and then at a certain age when you stop being beautiful, you are invisible.
I watch the media and I think who are my daughters and my granddaughter to look to? Is it Jackie Bird or Kirsty Wark, are they the only images we are seeing of women, or Lorraine Kelly in the morning, is that it?
It’s not that they are doing anything wrong, they are doing what is required and I think women are sitting there desperately trying to see themselves and beyond a certain age you are supposed to be quiet.
I had a big wobble before I opened at the Fringe but I am selling out everywhere. There is a long way to go in the media to accurately reflect women and particularly women of a certain age.
For me everything that is being done is tokenistic and I think the support really highlights that, actually, women in their late 40s and 50s – many of them have had their children already – are a vibrant, intelligent, experience, dedicated workforce.
What goes unnoticed for a lot of employers is that if you show your appreciation to your workforce they will stay with you forever. I’ve certainly experienced that in my own life because what I had to do was set up my own production company. There is an issue, not just with gender but with class as well because it seems to be alright to be a middle class woman and start your own company.
I’ve got a university degree, I’m a BA, I’ve a couple of honorary doctorates, all that sort of stuff. I am fortunate that I had a good education but because I played Mary Nesbitt, a working class woman in comedy, and then set up my own production company that was sort of frowned upon. There was a bit of a sneer about that but it was viewed differently when Kirsty Wark set up her company.
I welcome this report, it is not telling us something we didn’t know but it highlights the extent of the problem. I think men and men in power are possibly more ready to embrace and accept women in positions than they did before. There is still a long, long way to go but I think there is now a realisation that attitudes need to change.
I think a veil has been lifted from the eyes of women in Scotland since the referendum and I think the election of Nicola Sturgeon is a wonderful sign of hope,with Kezia Dugdale and Ruth Davidson as well in positions of power.
Scotland's invisible women: urgent action sought over gender gap in the workplace
The National View: Time for a change of mindset about older women working
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