19 February 2025

Lissa Evans: “Being in the sea is like being cradled by a benign goddess”

The author, TV director and producer on Father Ted and fan-girling on suffragettes.

Lissa Evans was born in Surrey in 1960. She is a television director, producer and author. In her work for TV, Evans is best known for the comedy series Father Ted, and her writing includes the 2011 children’s book Small Change for Stuart.

What’s your earliest memory?

Going round the back garden collecting dandelion fluff in a bucket. This wasn’t for fun, you understand – it was part of my imaginary and very important job of making jumpers for policemen.

Who are your heroes?

As a child, my hero was Gerald Durrell, who provided me with my perfect comedy/nature fix. As an adult, I’d go for both Victoria Wood, who transformed the place of women in UK comedy, and Richard Mabey, author of Flora Britannica. It has been my bedside book for nearly 30 years.

What book last changed your thinking?

Until last year, when I read South Riding by Winifred Holtby, I wouldn’t have thought it possible to write an unputdownable, moving, witty and expansive novel about the politics of a provincial town council.

In which time and place, other than your own, would you like to live?

I wish I could see the English countryside as it was in the first half of the 19th century, when the poet John Clare was alive – every field and hedgerow dense with wildflowers, thrumming with insects, rich with birdsong. On the other hand, I’d probably be too busy trying to feed and clothe my 14 children to really appreciate it.

What political figure do you look up to?

Researching Old Baggage (a novel about former suffragettes) I ended up fan-girling over a cohort of brave and extraordinary women, including Flora Drummond, a working-class woman who was refused a job as a postmistress because she was too short. She went on to become one of the bravest, most daring (and most flamboyantly visible) of the militants.

What would be your Mastermind specialist subject?

I was rather lonely after we moved house when I was nine, and that loneliness developed into a desperate, unquenchable (sadly unfulfilled) desire for a dog. My in-depth research at the time means that I am still an expert on rare dog breeds.

What TV show could you not live without?

How could I not say Father Ted ? Even if I hadn’t produced it, I would still have loved it with a passion.

Who would paint your portrait?

I’m torn between John Singer Sargent, who would paint a gorgeously fictionalised version of me, or Gwen John, who would quietly reveal the truth.

What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever received?

“You can’t edit a blank page.” And no, it still hasn’t sunk in.

What’s currently bugging you?

There are no birds coming to the bird feeders in my garden. I slightly suspect that someone in the neighbourhood is using an ultrasonic scarer.

What single thing would make your life better?

Servants.

When were you happiest?

I’m not a keen cold-water swimmer, but whenever I conquer my feebleness and make it into the sea, it always fills me with absolute euphoria – that feeling of being gently cradled by a benign goddess…