Eddie Izzard

Eddie Izzard (born Edward John Izzard; 7 February 1962), also known as Suzy Izzard, is a British stand-up comedian, actor, and activist.

Her comedic style takes the form of what appears to the audience as rambling whimsical monologues and self-referential pantomime.

Edward John Izzard was born in Aden (then in Aden Colony and now in Yemen) on 7 February 1962, to English parents Dorothy Ella Izzard (1927–1968) and Harold John Michael Izzard (1928–2018).

Their surname is of French Huguenot origin.

Dorothy was a midwife and nurse, while Harold was an accountant who was working in Aden for British Petroleum at the time of Edward's birth.

A brother, Mark, was born two years earlier.

When Izzard was a year old, the family moved to Northern Ireland and settled in Bangor, where they lived until Eddie was five.

The family then moved to Wales, where they lived in Skewen.

Eddie was six when her mother died of cancer.

After splitting with Ballard, Izzard spent a great deal of the early 1980s working as a street performer in Europe and the United States.

She says that she developed her comedic voice by talking to the audience while doing solo escape acts.

She then moved her act to the stand-up comedy venues of Britain, performing her routine for the first time at the Banana Cabaret in London's Balham area.

She refined her comedy material throughout the 1980s and began earning recognition through improvisation in the early 1990s, in part at her own club, Raging Bull in Soho.

In 1987, Izzard's first stage appearance was at the Comedy Store in London.

Her breakthrough came in 1991 after she performed her "raised by wolves" routine on the televised Hysteria 3 AIDS benefit.

Izzard's stand-up comedy tours have included Live at the Ambassadors (1993), Definite Article (1996), Glorious (1997), Dress to Kill (1998), Circle (2000), Stripped (2009), Force Majeure (2013) and Wunderbar (2022).

In 1994, Izzard's West End drama debut as the lead in the world premiere of David Mamet's The Cryptogram with Lindsay Duncan, in the production at London's Comedy Theatre.

The success of that role led to a second starring role, in David Beaird's black comedy 900 Oneonta.

In 1995, she portrayed the title character in Christopher Marlowe's Edward II.

In 1998, Izzard appeared briefly on stage with Monty Python in The American Film Institute's Tribute to Monty Python (also referred to as Monty Python Live at Aspen).

As part of an inside joke, she walked on stage with the five surviving Pythons and was summarily escorted off by Eric Idle and Michael Palin when attempting to participate in a discussion about how the group got together.

Izzard portrayed comedian Lenny Bruce in the 1999 production of Julian Barry's 1971 play Lenny.

In 2000, for the comedy special Dress to Kill, Izzard won two Primetime Emmy Awards: Outstanding Individual Performance in a Variety or Music Program and Outstanding Writing for a Variety or Music Program, while the special was nominated for Outstanding Variety, Music, or Comedy Special.

Izzard has also worked as a voice actor on films such as Five Children and It (2004), The Wild (2006), The Lego Batman Movie (2017) and the Netflix original series Green Eggs and Ham (2019).

Among various accolades, she won two Primetime Emmys for Dress to Kill and was nominated for a Tony Award for her Broadway performance in A Day in the Death of Joe Egg.

She starred in the television series The Riches (2007–2008), and has appeared in numerous films, including Ocean's Twelve (2004), Ocean's Thirteen (2007), Valkyrie (2008), Absolutely Anything (2015) and Six Minutes to Midnight (2020).

In 2009, Izzard completed 43 marathons in 51 days for Sport Relief, despite having no history of long-distance running.

Izzard is fluent in French and has performed stand-up shows in the language; since 2014, she has also started to perform in Arabic, German, Russian, and Spanish, languages that she did not previously speak.

In July 2014, she appeared on stage with Monty Python during their live show Monty Python Live (Mostly) as the special guest in their "Blackmail" sketch.

In 2016, she ran 27 marathons in 27 days in South Africa in honour of Nelson Mandela, raising £1.35 million.

In addition to her native English, she regularly performs stand-up in Arabic, French, German, Russian, and Spanish, and is an active supporter of Europeanism and the European Union.

The siblings built a model railway to occupy their time while their mother was ill, which was later donated to Bexhill Museum in 2016.

Following the death, Izzard attended the private St John's School in Newton, St Bede's Prep School in Eastbourne, and Eastbourne College.

She has said that she knew she was transgender at the age of four, after watching a boy being forced to wear a dress by his sisters, and knew she wanted to be an actor at the age of seven.

She studied drama at the University of Sheffield.

Izzard began to toy with comedy while at university with her friend Rob Ballard.

The two took their act to the streets, often in the Covent Garden district of London.

A dedicated Labour Party activist, Izzard twice ran unsuccessfully for the party's National Executive Committee and then joined as the most successful initially non-elected person after Christine Shawcroft resigned in March 2018.

In 2022, Izzard attempted to become the party's prospective parliamentary candidate for Sheffield Central but was not selected in the members' ballot.

In 2023, Izzard attempted to become the party's prospective parliamentary candidate for Brighton Pavilion but was not selected in the members' ballot.