SHE'S been voicing the thoughts of grumpy old women for a decade, both on screen and on stage, but now Jenny Eclair is turning her attention to a subject close to her heart – middle age.
For her new live show, How To Be A Middle Aged Woman (Without Going Insane), Eclair (55) is pictured on the flyer in an unflattering bra and knickers.
"It's about the fury of middle age and what you can do about it," she says.
"I had to go on HRT because my anger issues became insane. I was dangerous. I was very close to killing something. It was HRT or Holloway prison for me. I was angry about everything.
"I also get cross about the underestimation and the patronising of middle-aged women. When Kate Bush came back and did those gigs, everybody was very excited, but underneath it all they were thinking, 'She's going to make a complete t**t of herself, run up that hill, fall over, cry and run off stage'.
"And the fact that they're going to have a woman of 50 bedding James Bond has caused a big furore – it's Monica Bellucci, it's not like it's a dinner lady with a bandage around her ankle."
In the last decade Eclair – who lives in London with daughter Pheobe (26) and partner of 33 years Geof Powell – has guested on Countdown, QI and Loose Women and done the reality show circuit, from I'm A Celebrity... to Celebrity MasterChef and Splash!
"They're like panto. It's an opportunity to make a chunk of money – more than I get for writing a book," she explains.
"But TV is not something I rely on. If I'd been a successful TV presenter, I probably wouldn't write books."
The comedienne has now written four novels. Her latest, Moving, centres on a woman selling her house and the memories it stirs as she goes through each room with the estate agent, taking her back to her old life as a young mother.
Some of the flashbacks in the novel take place in Manchester, a throwback to Eclair's early years there as a student.
She says: "My memories of Manchester are very much in terms of payphones on the stairs and that tide of post that nobody will claim that builds up behind the front door, light fittings that are broken and nobody fixes, the filthiness of communal stairs and the grottiness of shared bathrooms."
Eclair was one of the first stand-up females and, like the drama student in her latest novel, she's suffered stage fright.
"I only got stage fright later on in my career, which came with anxiety. It happened a couple of times.
"I had a wave of it once at the Edinburgh Festival in 2000, and once in Australia when I was on stage in Sydney in Grumpy Old Women. It was a massive theatre and I didn't think the audience got it in the same way that British audience did.
"I got this absolutely huge wave of fear. I thought I was going to be sick, I thought I was going to faint, I had to hold on to furniture.
"It was paranoia, symptoms of anxiety. Anybody who has a panic attack can tell you that you just feel light-headed and that you're going to be sick and faint.
"I always had to use valium. I'd do half a tab - I love a bit of valium - but I don't do it now. I literally manage to get five valium to last about five years.
"I have high expectations of myself, not wanting to drop the ball, not wanting to fail. I think most performers have an anxiety button they can press now and again."
- Moving by Jenny Eclair is published by Sphere on July 23, priced £13.99. For details of her solo tour, visit www.jennyeclair.com
