IN AUGUST, Dawn Bailey will be travelling to Edinburgh to participate in the biggest comedy festival, The Edinburgh Fringe, with her show Solo Show: As Told by Two People. She will be swapping the world of fiance for the stage, announcing that she will be retiring from finance to undertake a full-time career in comedy after the festival and has already secured tour dates with Frankie Boyle.
With over 21 years in the finance industry, Dawn has held a variety of roles within the bank transforming from cashire to head office. She will be leaving her finance role with a certain UK bank with international markets in September, where after Ed Fringe, she will be on tour sharing the stage with one of the UK’s biggest comedians such as Frankie Boyle, Wayne Beese, Scott Bennett, Danny Posthill, Alistair Williams, Steve N Allen, and others in validation of the alternative career she forged following her divorce, after the realisation that she is addicted to maknig people laugh.
“I went to study writing when I left school and had to stop the course when my dad died suddenly as my mum said that she couldn’t afford for me to keep going,” Dawn recalls. “I had to get a job, so off I went to be a trainee manager at a supermarket, then I got married, had kids and just never really had
a chance to get back to what I really wanted to do which was become the next Victoria Wood.
At 44 I was bored, my girls had grown up into young women and developed their own interests, so I started googling comedy courses and there happened to be one in Manchester, near my home. I signed up and as part of it you had to do a 5 minute set at the end as part of Women in Comedy Festival. My material was awful… but I thought it was the greatest thing ever! There was a promoter in the audience and after my set he told me: ‘you should do this’. So from there I did a few open mic nights and then started to get booked and that was how it all started really. I would agree to go to the opening of an envelope, do anything really.
In some ways it’s the most terrifying thing; standing up there, but every comedian will tell you about that first laugh, it’s like a drug. Once you get it you want it again and louder In those moments you
feel incredible. What I didn’t realise at the time was just how unhappy I was in my marriage.”
