Katherine Lynch reckons Marty Morrissey is bringing “sexy” back to Panto this Christmas.
The creator of Wagon’s Den is joining forces with the GAA commentator in Snow White and Sammy and Buffy at Dublin’s National Stadium.
Katherine plays the Wicked Witch opposite Marty as the Magic Mirror.
Leitrim native Katherine had been “underachieving” in peace, in her pad in Nice, France, and said she was ready for a change of pace.
The feisty telly favourite is gearing up to “fart rainbows” with the fondly dubbed “Marty Party”.
Katherine told Irish Sunday Mirror: “Marty Morrissey is too sexy for himself.
“Marty as the Magic mirror, when he asks who’s the fairest of them all, sure he is the fairest man of all in this country.”
She joked that she might need therapy after working with the RTE would-be lothario.
Katherine added: “I’m the Wicked Queen, I don’t know where I’m going to draw from.
“I’m going to have to actually talk to Marty every night, so I don’t know if I’m going to need therapy or if he will.
“He looks absolutely hilarious. My costume is amazing too, I’m seconds away from drag.
“I’m as camp as a row of tents.”
Katherine, famed for her madcap characters on RTE shows Wonderwomen, Working Girls and Single Ladies, said she might reinvent her controversial characters.
As to whether her satire would be more PC nowadays, she said: “No, the characters will have evolved, like we all have into different characters.
“I’d say Liz Hurley is on the back of a motor bike with Samantha Fox now.
“She’s out and proud and travelling the world.
“Singin’ Bernie is probably a senator in the Dail.
“Sheila Sheikh is definitely in prison, she’s still up to no good.”
The funnywoman said there’s no getting away from the characters that made her famous over a decade ago. She said: “Every single day I go out and people say to me, when are you coming back on the telly?
“Catherine Tate went back and did her characters again, so I might too.”
She concedes there’s an expectation to be funny, but she generally delivers.
She said: “Everyone still loves my characters.
“I came off the plane in Nice, I got a taxi driver and he goes, ‘Ah f**k off, I have to tell me wife I have Sheila Sheikh in the back of the car’.
“So I had to go on the phone and shout at her, ‘The hack of yeh’ to his wife.”
Katherine laughed: “I just wanted to go home to bed.”
Commenting on cancel culture, she said: “There are a lot of situations where people have more rights.
“We know how we can go back, we know how to deliver comedy again.
“Always tickle the underbelly of society but you don’t have to hurt anyone in the meantime.
“I don’t think I ever hurt anyone but if I unintentionally did it I’m sorry.”
Underneath her comedic facade lies a deep thinker, Katherine admitted.
Following in the footsteps of her great uncle Patrick Kavanagh, she’s about to launch her first book of poetry.
She said: “I’m sitting looking at a beautiful book with Patrick’s face looking down on me. He’s always nearby.
“I wrote an album called Settling Dust, I wrote seven originals and four covers, so that’s kind of poetry as well.
“I love reinventing myself, I think creativity is freedom.
“The money is not my motivation as such, it follows every so often but it doesn’t always.
“There’s definitely no money in my poetry or music side of things.
“I’m dealing with a foreword for a book of poetry now, that’s where I’m at.
“You have to do television quickly, [but] in theatre and writing you can take your own pace.
“A lot of my poetry is people based and how they’ve affected me, whether it’s the love or the loss and the worship of them.
“It’s all about people and places.”
She added: “Covid made us all slow down.
“It was lovely being down in Leitrim and marinating in my poetic past.
“I wrote ‘Settling Dust’ when my dad Tom was dying from Parkinson’s, when I certainly didn’t feel funny.
“During those times I went into melancholy, which is something we should also respect.
“We forget that melancholy can be a warm blanket.”
From appearing on TV alongside Twink to becoming a life coach, the talented Ms Lynch is unstoppable.
She revealed: “I’m a professional and executive coach, so I coach online a lot. I have gone into companies coaching them and it’s always through humour, through humour we can solve so much stuff.
“It’s always the person in the company who has a bit of charm who gets on well, humour is charm and charm is humour.
“I work on those levels.
“It sounds light but it’s quite deep, we all know the person who we work with who could do with laughing a bit more.”
She added: “I just found with comedy corporate gigs were changing in a way, people were asking me to do after dinner speeches instead of comedy.
“I was thinking what the hell would I be doing one of those for.
“I thought I was an imposter doing them.
“So then I became a life coach and started doing them.”
Taking part in the first series of Dancing With The Stars was a real joy.
Said Katherine: “I loved it, I had a major downer after it.
“It was like everything amalgamated, like the stars aligned. I was teamed with dance pro Kai Widdrington, who’s now a superhero on Strictly.
“He was the kindest man on the planet, I had a great time, it was so joyful.
“It was the first time it was on in Ireland, there was no competitiveness.
“There was none of this dancing for 10 hours a day, we did the four hours allocated.
“It wasn’t the pressure it has become.
“Now it’s really competitive, whereas I didn’t give a shit whether I won or not.
“I got to week 10, so it was great craic, the final was next so I could get out.
“To learn the Salsa, the Tango, the Cha Cha, it was just unbelievable.”
Katherine is convinced her love of trying new things is a sign of undiagnosed ADHD. She said: “We do need to reinvent ourselves in this industry.
“From sheer personality, I reckon I’m an undiagnosed ADHD.
Adding: “I think I’m a buzz junkie, I love doing different things and finding where the fun is.
“What are the choices, to do a fabulous panto for what’s going to be six weeks of creative fun with a new family for Christmas hanging out with all these great creative people, or work in an office.
“I definitely choose the panto where I can be farting rainbows for six weeks.”
- Snow White & Sammy and Buffy kicks off at the National Stadium on December 13 (www.panto.ie)
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