Katherine Parkinson

PERHAPS BEST KNOWN AS LOVABLE JEN FROM THE IT CROWD, KATHERINE PARKINSON IS AS HAPPY PLAYING COMIC ROLES AS SHE IS TAKING SERIOUS PARTS. AND SHE RECKONS SHE’S MARRIED TO A GAY MAN IN A STRAIGHT MAN’S BODY

{ BIG GAY FOLLOWING }

WORDS: TIM HEAP PHOTOGRAPH: HEATHCLIFF O’MALLEY/REX

WARM, SELF-DEPRECATING AND WITTY, Katherine Parkinson was a breath of fresh air on British television in the mid-noughties when she landed her big break in ITV’s comedy drama series Doc Martin. In 2006, a year after playing the medic’s receptionist Pauline, she was cast as Jen in Channel 4’s The IT Crowd — a career-defining role that stretched across four seasons. Playing the clumsy, technologically challenged Jen, she starred alongside Chris O’Dowd and Richard Ayoade’s socially inept boffins Roy and Maurice.

The star, now 39, studied classics at Oxford, but was more focused on acting opportunities than intellectual pursuits, working in the student theatre with the likes of The Missing writer Jack Williams (“all he did at university was write good jokes!”).

Her career choices since have showcased her skills in both comic and straight roles, the latter of which includes playing human-rights lawyer Laura in Channel 4’s popular sci-fidrama Humans.

She’s also appeared in The Honourable Woman and The Kennedys, and is a West End regular, currently treading the boards at the Vaudeville Theatre as unhappily married wife Eleanor in the revival of Terry Johnson’s Dead Funny. We catch her just before a performance…