ABSOLUTELY Fabulous star Julia Sawalha has branded TV bosses sexist, saying that as an older woman she only gets cast as the “bitter, twisted old bi**h.”
The actress — who played teenager Saffy in the long running BBC1 sitcom — said TV bosses have old-fashioned views about women.
Julia, 55, who starred opposite Jennifer Saunders and Joanna Lumley, said: “They’re still writing for women like we’re in the 1940s. Younger actresses are always cast against older actors to play husband and wife, that still hasn’t changed.
“Actresses in their fifties, you get roles sent to you and you’re some bitter old, twisted old bi**h that the husband doesn’t want. You never get the glamorous.”
Julia voiced Ginger in the first Chicken Run movie in 2000. But she says she was not cast in the 2023 sequel because her voice sounded “too old.”
Talking on comedian Richard Herring’s podcast, Julia also said Ab Fab could be brought back to our screens, but it would have to fit in with our woke world.
She added: “Jennifer said ‘It wouldn’t be accepted in this day and age’. I think the opposite.
“It wasn’t what we called ‘politically correct’ then, and that’s why everyone was like ‘You’re saying everything we can’t.’
“Jennifer is intelligent enough to write it in a way where we can say things that need to be said, because of the cancel culture and the wokeness.”
Julia’s Ab Fab co-star Jane Horrocks, who played dopey assistant Bubbles, made similar comments about TV’s narrow view of women in 2022.
Jane, 60, said: “Producers are so short-sighted that they have to keep churning out the same people.”
