Victoria Wood

Victoria Wood was the youngest child of Stanley Wood, an insurance salesman, who also wrote songs for his company's Christmas parties, was the author of the musical play "Clogs" based in a Lancashire village in 1887 and also wrote part time for Coronation Street, Northern Drift and others; and Ellen "Nellie" Wood (née Mape).

She had three siblings: a brother, Chris, and two sisters, Penny and Rosalind.

Wood was born in Prestwich and brought up in nearby Bury.

She was educated at Fairfield County Primary School and Bury Grammar School for Girls, where she immediately found herself out of her depth.

"I was always top of the class, and when I went to grammar school I could not deal with everyone being as clever... I went under. I was a mess, a bit of a misfit. I didn't have any friends, let alone try to be funny...I didn't do any work, didn't have clean clothes and didn't wash. If I didn't have any money I'd steal from people, and if I hadn't done my homework I'd steal someone else's. I was envious of all the groups: the horsey group, the girls who went out with boys, the clever ones. Looking back, I feel really sorry for that little girl."

Victoria Wood (19 May 1953 – 20 April 2016) was an English comedian, actress, lyricist, singer, composer, pianist, screenwriter, producer and director.

Wood wrote and starred in dozens of sketches, plays, musicals, films and sitcoms over several decades and her live comedy act was interspersed with her own compositions which she performed at the piano.

Much of her humour was grounded in everyday life and included references to activities, attitudes and products that are considered to exemplify Britain.

She was noted for her skills in observational comedy and in satirising aspects of social class.

Wood developed eating disorders, but in 1968, her father gave her a piano for her 15th birthday.

She later said of this unhappy time "The good thing about being isolated is you get a good look at what goes on. I was reading, writing and working at the piano all the time. I was doing a lot of other things that helped me to perform".

Later that year, she joined the Rochdale Youth Theatre Workshop, where she felt she was "in the right place and knew what I was doing" and she made an impression with her comic skill and skill in writing.

She went on to study in the Department of Drama and Theatre Arts at the University of Birmingham.

She had met long-term collaborator Julie Walters in 1971, when Wood applied to the Manchester School of Theatre, then part of Manchester Polytechnic.

Wood started her career in 1974 by appearing on, and winning, the ATV talent show New Faces.

Wood began her show business career while an undergraduate, appearing on the TV talent show New Faces in 1974.

It led to an appearance in a sketch show featuring the series' winners The Summer Show.

A further break came as a novelty act on the BBC's consumer affairs programme That's Life! in 1976.

Coincidentally the pair met again when they appeared in the same theatre revue In at the Death in 1978 (for which Wood wrote a brief sketch).

Its success led to the commissioning of Wood's first play Talent (in 1978), starring Hazel Clyne (in a role originally written for Walters), for which Wood won an award for the Most Promising New Writer.

Peter Eckersley, the head of drama at Granada Television, saw Talent and invited Wood to create a television adaptation.

This time, Julie Walters took the lead role, while Wood reprised her stage role.

The success of the television version of Talent led to Wood writing the follow-up Nearly a Happy Ending.

Shortly afterwards she wrote a third play for Granada, Happy Since I Met You, again with Walters alongside Duncan Preston as the male lead.

She established herself as a comedy star in the 1980s, winning a BAFTA TV Award in 1986 for the sketch series Victoria Wood: As Seen on TV (1985–87), and became one of Britain's most popular stand-up comics, winning a second BAFTA for An Audience with Victoria Wood (1988).

In 1980 she wrote and starred in the stage play Good Fun.

Recognising her talent, Eckersley offered Wood a sketch show, although Wood was unsure of the project: she agreed to go ahead only if Walters received equal billing.

Eckersley came up with an obvious title – Wood and Walters, and the pilot episode was recorded.

It led to a full series, featuring Duncan Preston and a supporting cast.

In the period between the completion of the pilot and the shooting of the series, Eckersley died.

Wood credited him with giving her her first big break, and felt that Wood and Walters suffered due to his death.

She was not impressed by Brian Armstrong, his fill-in, and was of the opinion that he hired unsuitable supporting actors.

Wood appeared alongside

In 1982 and 1983 she appeared as a panellist on BBC Radio 4's Just a Minute.

In October 1983 Wood performed her first solo stand-up show, Lucky Bag, in a five-week run at the King's Head Theatre in Islington.

Peter Llewellyn-Jones as an actor/presenter in Yorkshire Television's 1984 schools television programme for hearing-impaired children, Insight - a remake of the series originally presented by Derek Griffiths.

In the 1990s, she wrote and co-starred in the television film Pat and Margaret (1994), and the sitcom dinnerladies (1998–2000), which she also produced.

She won two more BAFTA TV Awards, including Best Actress, for her 2006 ITV1 television film, Housewife, 49.

Her frequent long-term collaborators included Julie Walters, Celia Imrie, Duncan Preston, and Anne Reid.

In 2006, Wood came tenth in ITV's poll of the British public's 50 Greatest TV Stars.