I was recently asked to write about what I would do if I was given £10 to spend on anything I wanted. 
This was my reply...

I will be spending my £10 on tin peaches...

When I was a small child I was never allowed tin peaches. My mother’s penetratingly shrill response to my countless requests was always - “Tin peaches are special and for guests”.

Guests! Who invites people over to their home and serves them tin peaches? No one. That’s not normal. But I didn’t know that then. Subsequently the following 15 years of never being offered tin peaches when visiting friends felt like a perpetual personal rejection. It seemed I wasn’t a special enough guest to be offered tin peaches.

Days, months, years went by and still no one even discussed the possibility of popping a few tin peaches in a bowl for me. This offensive snubbing lay the foundations to my disproportionate lack in confidence, self-doubt and a shit load of stealing. Not one tinned peach had entered my mouth at home or away.

By the time I reached the crushing age of 14 my self-esteem was too low to make the right choices so when Michael Bell urged me to take off my top and show him my boobs, I did. There I sat, on my birthday, on my bed, wearing my half birthday suit, as topless as a page three girl but without the looks or the boobs, (size 26A, cotton wool buds would have sufficiently covered and supported those little grapes). To add to the humiliation he kind of tapped one boob a bit and then just stared at them in silence. For a while I think he expected them to speak to him. Well none of us had anything to say. It was a silent, haunting and chilly experience.

Now as a fully grown adult, I know that no one, thank god, will ever offer me tin peaches when I’m a guest in their home, because that’s not normal, and I can have tin peaches whenever I want because I’m normal. Neither do I take off my top and show my boobs to anyone, because… no one ever asks.

So spending £10 on tin peaches should keep me stocked up nicely for the time being. 

An article for the Jewish Chronicle...

Jews are funny. Without meaning to, we say and do the most ridiculous things. Added to this we have great warmth. I believe my comedy has inherited this and comes from a warm place. I try to make it affable and inviting. When I’m on stage it’s like I’m standing at my front door saying: “Come in, take your coat off, have a cup of tea, and tell me who died this week”.

I love being Jewish and knowing that most Jews around the world are getting together every Friday night for a good meal and a row. There’s so much rich and vacuous information flying around and always the big topic is “who died?” and “are you going to the funeral?” and “take the A41 it’s quicker than the A402”. I swear I know the fastest route to every Jewish cemetery.

When I was eight years old my parents took me to see Funny Girl, starring Barbra Streisand. This film had a huge impact on me. As well as the gut-wrenching singing, I saw how Babs was smothered by so much emotion from family and friends interfering in her life, coupled with her desire to do something out of the ordinary

I also recognised the chutzpah oozing out of her. I think it oozes from most Jews, even the grumpy, cantankerous and fractious. In fact, the more curmudgeonly, the funnier they are. There’s humour in the lack of humour.

When I was a 17-year-old my friend’s grandmother referred to me as the “witchy-looking girl”. I was mortified, but I saw the truth and humour in her comment — I had uncontrollable, wild hair, which must be blow-dried by several people on scaffolding.

(This was before the invention of Frizz Ease by the eminent Jew, John Frieda — God bless you John).

One very cold wintery morning recently I was visiting my parents and their dear friend Stanley (aged 75) popped in. Stanley has a wonderful hangdog face accompanied with a grouchy disposition. But behind that face is a kind, warm, humorous man.

He sauntered into the kitchen from the hall and while removing his hat and scarf, came to a halt, looked around and proclaimed: “This weather… it’s dangerous!” Heartbreaking. True. Funny.

When I write sitcoms, often many of the characters are Jews. Their qualities, habits and idiosyncrasies all come from the Jews I have met who say the most ridiculous, crazy, heartfelt, stupid things that are so often true. They’re not so much three dimensional as 10 dimensional.

While queuing to greet a widow sitting shivah, the woman in front of me threw herself at her and wailed: “What happened?” The widow replied: “He died!” Heartbreaking. True. Funny.

I have been surrounded by Jewish people all my life and their neuroses, morals, beliefs, sense of honour and, above all, sense of humour have shaped who I am and what I write — which, I like to think, is heartbreaking, true and funny.