Who is Helen Lederer? Celebrity Big Brother 2017 contestant profile

Twitter: @HelenLederer

Where have I seen Helen before? A former darling of the pioneering comedy movement of the 1980s, she appeared in a variety of sketches on the BBC2 comedy Naked Video and also had starring roles in shows like The Young Ones, Bottom alongside her friends Rik Mayall and Adrian Edmondson, and in Absolutely Fabulous where she played dippy Catriona.

She has also appeared in Big Brother companion show A Bit on the Side.

Bio: A versatile and long-standing performer she has used her quick wit and slightly unusual looks to good comic effect in a variety of roles.

Latterly she has been seen a lot around the Radio 4 comedy circuit, with an array of appearances on The News Quiz and Just a Minute. She’s been married twice and has a daughter, actress Hannah Lederer-Alton from her first marriage (to former Observer editor Roger Alton). She’s smart too – Helen has written a well-received comedy novel in 2015 called Losing It which was nominated for the P. G. Wodehouse Comedy Literary Award and the Edinburgh Book Festival First Book Award.

She also has a degree in applied social science and a doctorate – that's Doctor Lederer to you!

How will she cope in the house? She has mused in the past about being a BB contestant. "How do people wash with their swimming costumes on?" she said recently. “It’s disgusting. But I think in the Celebrity version at least you can close the door when you need a private moment.”

Here she is performing stand-up recently...

And here she is livening up the Sky News newspaper review...