From the Minds of Babes

The 37-year-old performer was raised in Bath and Somerset and studied drama in college, but it wasn’t until she tried her hand at making people laugh — she sent a tape of herself doing various characters to English comedy phenom Steve Coogan, who promptly hired her for his live tour — that she made her mark. In 2000, Davis impressed — and frightened — Brits with an acridly witty TV series called Human Remains, in which she and co-writer/friend Rob Brydon played six different creepy couples, each in various stages of delusional dysfunction. Nighty Night has since revealed to her countryfolk that Davis was the morbid half of that duo, and she admits that spending so much time writing alone only led her into more twisted recesses of her imagination. But she finds it particularly bizarre that strangers ask her if she’s Jill. “It’s weird. Obviously I’m not. Maybe I should say I am.”

When asked why such grave topics find their way into her humor, Davis alludes to a life of turmoil, including a close friend who committed suicide, which she won’t discuss. As for the character with MS, Davis explains, “There was a period where I was ill in my early 20s, and I was around a lot of people with MS, and I saw people being so patronizing [to them]. I found it unbearable, so I channeled all that rudeness into Jill. I suppose you’ve got to look at yourself and things that have happened to you and think, ‘Can I take it if jokes are made about it? And if so, maybe I’m allowed to do these other things.’”

Ultimately, the deliriously nasty high that Davis’ monstrous creation provides is in parodying the love-conquers-all scenario in which a girl is destined to be with a guy, decorum be damned. I mention this to Davis, and she acknowledges a connection between Jill’s bulldozer approach toward being loved and a self-help romance culture that odiously convinces women that manipulation is their salvation, citing the best-selling man-grab book The Rules. “It’s all stuff like not returning phone calls, essentially scheming and not being spontaneous or truthful, really, isn’t it?” says Davis, laughing. “I imagine Jill’s concocted her own set of rules.”