Jo Brand, 64, claims she’s ‘not what men go for’ but insists she ‘doesn’t dislike’ the way she looks

Jo Brand spoke candidly about her experience with body image, admitting she doesn’t think she’s pretty.  

Appearing as the first guest of the new series of Angela Scanlon’s Thanks A Million podcast, the 64-year-old comedian said she isn’t ‘what men go for’ as she’s ‘not thin’ with ‘flowing locks’. 

Yet despite her comments, Jo insisted that she ‘doesn’t dislike’ the way she looks.   

She explained: ‘I think the thing is, it’s a very weird thing that if you’re absolutely gorgeous, then you don’t really get any sense of how it feels to be desperate. 

‘Obviously, I’m not saying that happens all the time, but I think also if you’re kind of like me, I don’t dislike the way that I look. But I know that I’m not pretty.

‘I know that I’m not what men go for because I’m not thin and I don’t have, like, long flowing locks and and lovely eyelashes and all that b******s.’

Speaking out: She said that it’s very hard, in her opinion, for attractive women to understand the mental state of ‘not so attractive’ women and vice-versa (pictured in 2019)

She continued: ‘And so, you know, it’s very hard for really attractive women to understand the mental state of not so attractive women and the other way round. 

‘So I would say as a teenager, I got quite a lot of knock backs, but also kind of like horrible ones, not them really meaning to be horrible, but just them being so dismissive. 

‘And when you’re really keen on someone to be dismissed as a teenage girl, it’s pretty hard work, emotionally.’ 

Jo said: ‘As a teenager, I got quite a lot of knock backs. And when you’re really keen on someone to be dismissed as a teenage girl, it’s pretty hard work, emotionally’ (pictured in the 1970s)

The Clapham-born actor also spoke out about her dry jokes, saying that many performers become exaggerated parts of themselves when they’re on stage.

She has been known to jokingly make comments like, ‘I hate men,’ or, ‘Let’s kill them all,’ in order to draw a reaction from the crowd.

However, her on-stage persona becomes an issue when the public begin to think that’s how she really is.

Jo married psychiatric nurse Bernie Bourke, 57, in 1997, and they share two children together, however he prefers to keep himself out of the spotlight.

‘I do jokes about my husband and I get people say to me, “Oh, why don’t you just divorce him then?”‘ Jo mused.  ‘That was a joke. You know, I don’t know.

‘I think one day I will just have to put a photo of me on Instagram, actually trying to kill him. So, yeah. To satisfy all those people that want me to do it.’

Listen to Thanks A Million with Angela Scanlon on Apple, Spotify and all podcast providers. 

Close bond: Jo married psychiatric nurse Bernie Bourke (pictured), 57, in 1997, and they share two children together, however he prefers to keep himself out of the spotlight