Tracey Ullman, actor and comedian

Desert Island Discs

BBC

Society & Culture, Music Commentary, Music, Personal Journals

4.4 • 13.7K Ratings

🗓️ 26 September 2021

⏱️ 34 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Tracey Ullman was the first woman to be offered her own television sketch show – both in Britain and America – and has starred in film and television dramas alongside Meryl Streep, Cate Blanchett and Hugh Grant. The Emmy-winning Tracey Ullman Show ran for four seasons in the US and provided the launch pad for the Simpsons. Tracey was born in Slough and as a child she would impersonate people and put on shows for the amusement of her mother after the death of her father. At 12 she won a scholarship to the Italia Conti Academy of Theatre Arts in London and worked in repertory theatre and the West End in London before her television career took off. She was one of the stars of the BBC’s primetime sketch show Three of a Kind alongside David Copperfield and a young Lenny Henry. In 1985 she moved to Los Angeles with her husband, the producer Allan McKeown, where her uncanny impressions of Americans from all walks of life won her acclaim and awards in equal measure. After the death of her husband Tracey returned to the UK in 2016 and was soon back on our screens in a new sketch series, Tracey Ullman’s Show, which showcased her enduring talent for sending up the powerful and the famous, including Dame Judi Dench, Angela Merkel and Theresa May. DISC ONE: American Girl by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers DISC TWO: You Won't See Me by The Beatles DISC THREE: Nichols and May At Work by Mike Nichols And Elaine May DISC FOUR: That's The Way Of The World by Earth, Wind & Fire DISC FIVE: Everyday I Write the Book by Elvis Costello And The Attractions DISC SIX: They Don’t Know by Kirsty MacColl DISC SEVEN: You and I by Stevie Wonder DISC EIGHT: This Is the Sea by The Waterboys BOOK CHOICE: The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole, Aged 13¾ by Sue Townsend LUXURY ITEM: Nuts CASTAWAY'S FAVOURITE: You and I by Stevie Wonder Presenter Lauren Laverne Producer Paula McGinley

Transcript

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0:00.0	BBC Sounds Music Radio Podcasts
0:04.8	Hello, I'm Lauren LeVern and this is the Desert Island Disks Podcast.
0:08.4	Every week I ask my guests to choose the eight tracks, book and luxury they'd want to take
0:13.2	with them if they were cast away to a desert island.
0:16.4	And for right reasons, the music is shorter than the original broadcast.
0:21.1	I hope you enjoy listening.
0:43.5	My cast away this week is the actor and comedian Tracey Olman.
0:47.5	She's arguably the most successful British woman on comedy's international stage
0:52.6	and her creative adventures encompass two continents and many disciplines.
0:57.3	She was the first woman to be offered her own television sketch show, both in Britain and America,
1:02.7	where she became the first non-American female comedian to make it big.
1:07.2	She enjoyed a spell as a pop star and has shared the big screen with Merrill Streep, Kevin Klein and Hugh Grant.
1:14.0	Her many accolades include a dozen American comedy awards, seven Emmys, two BAFTAs and a golden globe.
1:21.6	30 years after relocating to America, life brought her back to the UK and to the BBC,
1:27.2	where she introduced us to a kleptomaniac Dame Judy Dench and a sex-bomb Angola Merkel.
1:33.0	And although her inspiration moves with the Times, she is, she says, still putting on the show she
1:38.0	would act out as a little girl to entertain her mother after her father's death.
1:42.5	She says, I realised I used to do this in my mother's bedroom when I was six.
1:47.1	I used to be everyone in my village, everyone at school and everyone in the news.
1:51.0	And I'm still doing that same show.
1:53.0	I think I'll be doing it in my 80s.
1:54.8	I'll just impersonate everyone around me in the nursing home.
	...

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