Sally Phillips

Sally Phillips is an English actor, writer, comedian, producer and director. She is an executive producer at Captain Dolly. We are delighted that Sally will be joining us at Cadogan Hall for a very special celebration of British Film and Television at 4.15pm on Saturday 20th September.

Sally is best known for her work in tv sitcoms such as I’m Alan Partridge, Jam and Jerusalem, Miranda and Veep, films such as Bridget Jones and tv comedy shows like Taskmaster and QI.

She started her comedy career in the Oxford Revue and with comedians Simon Munnery, Stewart Lee and Arthur Smith over 9 Edinburgh Fringe runs in shows like Ra-Ra-Rasputin, a comedy biography of Rasputin the monk set to the words and lyrics of Boney M, Cluub Zarathustra and playing Ophelia in Arthur Smith’s Hamlet alongside writing and performing comedy for BBC Radio. Her first comedy drama ‘Protesting Too Much’ starred John Fortune and Eleanor Bron and aired on BBC Radio 4 in 1994.

Smack the Pony was a ground-breaking female-led sketch show that Sally developed and co-wrote with Doon Mackichan, Fiona Allen, Sarah Alexander and Darren Boyd, produced by Caroline Leddy and Victoria Pile. It aired between 1998 and 2002 and won many awards, among them two international Emmys.

Sally television roles since then include Rescue Me, Tourist Trap and Parents, in which she played the leads; Green Wing, Galavant, Vanity Fair, Year of the Rabbit, Zapped, Henry IX (Golden Rose of Montreux); Friday Night Dinner, Breeders, Jerk and Pennyworth. Her most recent television credits include Channel 4’s Big Mood, Disney/Hulu’s Queenie and BBC’s We Might Regret This all of which drop this year.

Sally loves movies and has a long list of credits. Notable roles include Shazzer in the four Bridget Jones movies Gina in How to Please a Woman, Liz in Off The Rails, Mrs Bennett in Pride Prejudice and Zombies, Marie in The More You Ignore Me, Tessa Jones in Love At First Sight as well as parts in Blinded by the Light, The Fence, You, Me and Him, Burn, Burn, Burn, Off the Rails and Birthday Girl. She also provided voices for the animated film Ferdinand (1998).

Sally enjoys her ongoing relationship with the QI family of programmes. She is a regular guest on QI on and its little sister podcast No Such Thing As a Fish and in 2017 she became one of BBC Radio 4’s ‘Museum of Curiosity’s’ curators. She is an occasional presenter, hosting The One Show from time to time, and My Life At Christmas for the BBC in 2023. During Lockdown she co-presented BBC One’s Sunday Morning Live with Sean Fletcher.