Gail Porter: Hung, Drawn and Portered

“Has anyone here been sectioned?” TV presenter Gail Porter jokily asks her audience. Famed for her vibrancy as well as mental health struggles, she has turned to comedy to take control of her own story.

Comedy is a new venture for Gail. She has just concluded a run of her one-woman show Hung, Drawn and Portered at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

The show documents her life experiences and appears to be liberating.

“If I’ve got a problem, I like to share it – whether it’s homelessness or losing my hair,” “I’ve been in a psychiatric unit and I just think ‘you know what? I’ll just tell you. What’s the worst that could happen?’”

She got the taste for comedy last year after she teamed up with stand-ups John Bishop and Tony Pitts for their Fringe show, Three Little Words.

“We just did not stop laughing,” she says. The duo made a throwaway comment that she should write her own show – so she did.

Gail’s career has been a rollercoaster and at the moment she’s enjoying a rising profile thanks to the comedy.