Mental As Anyone

Interview with the delightful Gillian Cosgriff, who has been performing comedy for 10 years. Gill has recently been performing in Harry Potter and the Cursed Child at the Princess Theatre in Melbourne, although the show is currently on lockdown hiatus. Gill has a background in cabaret, comedy, and music theatre.   We discuss: writing songs on planes, the vacuum analogy of lockdown, the challenge of having big gaps in between work, tying her identity to her occupation, the philosophy of “a bad day is a good story”, reharnessing your own narrative through comedy, knowing the ingredients to the recipe for self-care in tough times but not doing them out of worry she will not feel better, lockdown affording her the time and space for self-care, the twilight zone of waiting for Covid test results, appreciating the slower pace of lockdown, the shock of the first 2 weeks of Melbourne lockdown in March 2020, the good fortune of being able to find work, being “show fit” and becoming a genuine fan of exercise, the rolle