‘See that Ashley Jensen . . . she’d be nothing without her hair.” I like the way the woman sitting opposite me in a west London pub can laugh about a barb directed at her by a fellow student in Annan, Dumfriesshire, many years ago.
It upset the young Jensen a bit at the time, but she certainly proved that person wrong, deploying all her passion, talent and toughness to land an array of successful roles. These have included the kindly seamstress Christina in the hit American comedy Ugly Betty and Ricky Gervais’s dippy friend Maggie in his actor sitcom Extras. Jensen also beautifully humanised the self-centred Fran, best friend to Sharon Horgan and Rob Delaney’s central couple in the Channel 4 relationship comedy
