Comedy: Miranda’s happy to wear her heart on her sleeve

Published on 11/10/2012 14:40

EMBARRASSING moments are the story of Miranda Hart’s life. But, as she tells her former teenage self in her new book, Is It Just Me?, it’ll all be okay in the end.

Nevertheless, Hart sighs with mock horror as she recalls a particularly traumatic incident from her childhood.

“A pigeon once landed on my head, and that’s scarred me for life,” she explains.

“But now we’ve come full circle and the story makes good dinner party conversation.”

Indeed, Hart has made a bit of an art of revisiting mortifying moments. Embarrassment may have plagued her youth, but now provides endless comedy inspiration.

Her hit BBC sitcom, Miranda, in which she plays an exaggerated version of herself, a klutzy joke shop owner who is unlucky in love and life, has won a string of awards.

Although the show follows a storyline, the premise for the comedy is rooted in the same turf as Hart’s stand-up - taking the mickey of out herself and drawing on her wealthy supply of humiliating and awkward moments.

She makes the most of her 6ft 1in frame, which, rather than being imposing, only serves to make her more endearing to viewers, particularly on the many occasions she falls over on screen.

Explaining the idea behind the book, Hart says, “It’s the concept of talking to my younger self. Since my sitcom has done well, I’ve often thought, ‘Imagine what my 13-year-old self would think about what has happened to me’.”

The reason behind the title is, she says, “just to double-check”.

“It’s like when you are with your girlfriends and you say to them, ‘This could only have happened to me.’

“But it’s also inviting the sense that we have common ground. Like the sitcom character Miranda, I’m saying, ‘We’re all a bit like that, so don’t worry.’ It’s good for people to feel that they have something in common.”

• Is It Just Me? by Miranda Hart, published by hardback Hodder & Stoughton, £20