Morwenna Banks: tragic tales of loss that gave voice to quiet woman of British TV

When Hollywood hosts the American premiere next month of this autumn’s hit weepie, Miss You Already, its stars Drew Barrymore, Toni Collette and Jacqueline Bisset will be at the centre of the usual whirlwind of flashing cameras and TV microphones.

But behind the film, and now with a fresh career as a Hollywood screenwriter, is a Cornish woman who has already created a series of hit comedy characters in Britain, is the partner of a well-known writer and comedian, has written an award-winning radio play, and also plays the mother of the most famous cartoon pig in Britain, Peppa. Yet somehow Morwenna Banks has carefully kept her private self out of the limelight during a long and successful career in the entertainment industry.

The film is directed by Catherine Hardwicke, of Twilight fame, and was shot in London and Yorkshire. Released recently in Britain, it attracted a bigger audience than any other new release and is set to become a word-of-mouth success this autumn.

It tells the emotional story of a female friendship that is tested by illness, and is based on Banks’s highly-praised 2013 radio play, Goodbye. Banks was inspired to write the play by the experience of losing three friends to breast cancer over a short period, and she dedicated Goodbye to these three women – Deborah, Victoria and Bethany. The idea, she has explained, was to bring humour into the story as a truer reflection of the way women face adversity.

“All three were diagnosed in their 30s, and when I talked to Deborah she said she had an idea for a funny novel about it. We worked on it together and when she became too ill and too tired, she entrusted the writing to me and asked me to do something with it. But that was a complicated request. I felt protective,” she said.

Literary agents told her there was not enough there, so Banks wondered if she could turn it into a drama.

“I was nervous of their families. I try not to plunder in my writing. But when I talked to Deborah’s husband he gave his blessing,” recalled Banks, 54. “I felt it was a big thing to take these families on this journey and not to deliver. In the end I sent the script to each family and they gave their approval.”

Banks won the annual Tinniswood award for radio drama for the play, and when accepting the prize she thanked those who had taken a chance on a “cancer drama with laughs”, adding that Goodbye was her attempt “to make sense of the death of three friends”.

Banks lives in London with David Baddiel and their two children, Dolly and Ezra, and has skilfully avoided much of the personal publicity that could have come with her job. But her gentle voice is certainly recognisable to many parents of young children. She has played the part of Mummy Pig in Peppa Pig since the hugely popular show began on CBeebies in 2004.

Her children are too old now to watch the show but originally took her double identity in their stride. “They thought everyone’s mum was Mummy Pig, and that was what all mum’s do as their day job.”

Banks is also an admired television actor, appearing in shows such as Skins, Catterick, with Vic Reeves and Bob Mortimer, and Saxondale, with Steve Coogan and Ruth Jones. In the early 90s she was one of the key members of the cult radio and television comedy sketch series Absolutely. Her repertoire of regular comic characters included dentally and intellectually challenged Welsh woman Gwynedd, who appeared opposite John Sparkes’s Denzil, and loquacious schoolgirl “Little Girl”, who pontificates on the world while swinging her legs from a chair, always signing off with the catchphrase, “It is, it’s true!”

The radio play was broadcast two years ago this month on BBC Radio 4 and starred Natascha McElhone and Olivia Colman. At the time, Banks spoke of her astonishment that two such high-profile actors wanted to be involved. “It makes me want to cry when I hear those names,” she said. She had the same surprise when Collette and Barrymore took the film roles.

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Collette, best known for Muriel’s Wedding, Little Miss Sunshine and About a Boy, shaved her head for her role in Miss You Already. She was, she has said, happy to do it for her character, Milly. “It was something Milly went through, and it was the least I could do really – I would have done anything for this film,” she said. “It’s very special and realistic and relatable, and I didn’t want to fake any of it.”

Collette and Barrymore became close friends during the shoot, with Barrymore describing her delight at finding such a strong bond with her co-star. “Our kids became friends and they’re still best friends, and we’ve travelled together. We had this electric connection and we got lucky,” she said.

In the film version, Collette’s character is a woman who has everything: a successful career, a devoted husband and two gorgeous children. Barrymore plays Jess, who lives in a boathouse with her boyfriend Jago and desperately wants a baby. The tensions between two childhood friends, one struggling against the end of life and one attempting to create a life, are at the centre of the story.

Banks grew up in Cornwall and went to Truro High School for Girls before going up to Cambridge. She appeared in straight drama with the Marlowe Society, but Footlights, the feted proving ground for student comic talent, also immediately appealed to her, and she was an active member from 1981 to 1983. She arrived in the wake of Emma Thompson, Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie, but Banks found her own brand of comedy, appearing in well-received shows at the Edinburgh fringe, such as The Preventers, a camp send-up of the popular 1970s crime shows.

Among her contemporaries were comics Neil Mullarkey and Nick Hancock, and fellow student actors included her friends Tilda Swinton, and Joanna Scanlon, now known for starring in No Offence, The Thick of It and Getting On.

In 2001 Banks wrote, produced and appeared in the British ensemble film The Announcement, and in 2009 she made a series of web videos for BBC Comedy called Celebrities STFU, each video featuring her in costume impersonating Lady Gaga, Noel Gallagher, Susan Boyle, Pixie Lott, Jools Holland and Duffy.

Miss You Already was first shown in London this August at a “Pink Picnic” in aid of Breast Cancer Now, from which all proceeds went to the charity. Banks was probably happier moving through the picnic, unrecognised, than she will be on the red carpet outside premieres this autumn. But she does hope the film will encourage women to take symptoms seriously. “Checking out your own health is often low on the list,” she has said. “Women tend to think it is probably fine – and it often is. I don’t want to be alarmist and scare-mongering. I just think women should not worry that they are making a fuss.”

Morwenna’s milestones

Born Flushing, Cornwall; attended Truro High School for Girls

Cambridge Footlights, then star of Edinburgh fringe shows including The Preventers, which became a TV film in 1996.

Absolutely Appeared alongside Moray Hunter, John Doherty, Pete Baikie, John Sparkes and Gordon Kennedy in cult 90s Channel 4 sketch show, revived last month with four new episodes for Radio 4.

Mummy Pig The voice of Mummy Pig in children’s animation Peppa Pig from 2004.

Catterick appeared in 2004 BBC3 series with Vic Reeves and Bob Mortimer.

Saxondale Played Vicky in Steve Coogan’s 2006-07 BBC2 comedy-drama.

Skins Played Anthea Stonem from 2007-10 in the Channel 4 teen drama.

Goodbye Award-winning radio 2013 play, now remade by Twilight director Catherine Hardwicke as Miss You Already, with a screenplay by Banks.

Lives in London with David Baddiel; mother to Dolly and Ezra.