Janice Connolly

## Introduction

**Janice Connolly** is a British actress, comedian and artistic director. She runs the Birmingham-based group Women and Theatre, and performs stand-up comedy as her character "Mrs Barbara Nice". Connolly has also appeared in Coronation Street, That Peter Kay Thing, Phoenix Nights, Max and Paddy's Road To Nowhere, Thin Ice and Dead Man Weds. She has also worked at the Birmingham Rep with Roxanna Silbert as Artistic Director. In 2017 Connolly was awarded a British Empire Medal in the New Years Honours list for services to community arts in the West Midlands.

## Early life

Connolly was born in Stockport in 1954. She left to study drama at Birmingham Polytechnic (later renamed Birmingham City University). After graduating she became a drama teacher and a social worker for Barnardos.

## Roles

Connolly is best known for her character **Barbara Nice** - a caricature of a middle aged housewife and mother of five from Kings Heath, Birmingham. However, she has had other roles too. In the early 1970s Janice performed at Birmingham Arts Lab off Summer Row Birmingham in *Dogman* in with the cartoonist Hunt Emerson who also drew the set. Children's playwright Mike Kenny, Chris George and Paul Fisher who wrote the piece. The performance was directed by John Dowie with costumes by cartoonist Suzy Varty.

Janice Connolly was part of the Birmingham independent music scene in the late 1970s and early 1980s. She performed with "The Surprises" and "The Evereadies" playing regularly in Moseley at the Fighting Cocks. Singles championed by John Peel included "Jeremy Thorpe is Innocent" and "Martian Girlfriend". Other local bands active at the time included UB40 who played as support band for the Evereadies at one point.

Connolly was performing as Barbara Nice at the Palace nightclub in Levenshulme in 1997 when spotted by Peter Kay at the finals of the *Manchester Evening News* New Act of the Year and went on to appear in several of his television shows. She played Holy Mary in *Phoenix Nights*, a part Dave Spikey claimed he wrote with her in mind and which was reprised in *Max and Paddy's Road to Nowhere* written by Kay and Paddy McGuinness. She also played Mrs Bamforth in *That Peter Kay Thing*.

Her other television work includes playing Carole in Dave Spikey's *Dead Man Weds* and appearing twice in *Coronation Street* as Dolly Gartside and Sheila Wheeler. Radio work includes an appearance in the second series of *Arthur Smith's Balham Bash* where her character Barbara Nice played the resident housekeeper and mistress of the house. The Radio 4 show is recorded in Arthur's flat where guests are invited to join Arthur at home and to become a live audience for bands, poetry and comedy. The show was first broadcast in 2009, with a second series in 2010.[*citation needed*]

Janice is the artistic director and founder member of Birmingham-based Women and Theatre. The company is committed to social change through new theatre and drama and in its mission statement states that it aims to make heard the voices of those who are not usually listened to. The company performs in a variety of settings including schools, arts centres, health centres and conference halls. She ran the 'Laughing for a Change' project, funded by Time to Change, which encouraged comedians and audiences to talk about mental health; this culminated in a stand-up tour in 2014 featuring Seymour Mace, Rob Deering and others.

In October 2015, Connolly appeared in the stage adaptation of Meera Syal's novel *Anita and Me* at the Birmingham Rep, for which she was acclaimed for her "comic talent". Further stage appearances have included Birmingham Comedy Festival's *Lost Hancocks: Vacant Lot* (2017-2018). and *Prime Time* (2019).

## Personal life

Connolly is married with two children and lives in Kings Heath, Birmingham.

In 2017 she appeared in the New Years Honours list in recognition of her contribution to community arts through her work with Women and Theatre. She was awarded a British Empire Medal.