Sarah Kendall

Sarah Kendall (born 3 August 1976) is an Australian comedian from Newcastle, New South Wales. She won the Raw Comedy competition in 1998 and appeared regularly on Australian television. She moved to the United Kingdom in 2000 at the age of 24.

Early life Kendall grew up in Newcastle, New South Wales and attended Merewether High School. She moved on to Sydney University at the age of 18. She began her career in 1996 partaking in the annual 'Review' show. Of it she said: “It started at university where there was a stand-up competition which some of my friends said I should do but I was too scared to do it. I was a genuine coward about it all and that in itself started to bug me, so eventually I got up on stage. I hated every single minute of it and was sick beforehand. But that made me even more determined because I couldn't work out why my fear was so disproportionate to the thing I was doing. It was just me talking for five minutes and so what if I got booed off stage. After about seven or eight years I eventually got it under control.”

Career Stand-up comedy Kendall has performed solo shows at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe since 2003, with her 2004 show being nominated for the Perrier award. She has also performed in the Melbourne Comedy Festival since 2000.

In February 2003 she was in Greenwich, London, performing at Up The Creek comedy club, alongside Jimmy Carr.

In an article in The Guardian on 2 August 2014 Kendall talked about how she has reviewed her own comic response to a heckler who threatened her with sexual violence during a routine. She said, "I built a routine around it – but looking back, I betrayed the seriousness of the incident". Kendall remarked that she dropped the routine because it started to sit uncomfortably with her.

Television and radio Kendall has been a guest on the BBC Radio 2 comedy show Parsons and Naylor's Pull-Out Sections.

She was part of an all-female sketch comedy show called Beehive also starring Alice Lowe, Barunka O'Shaughnessy and Clare Thomson, which was aired on E4.

She was a guest stand up comic on BBC Three's Russell Howard's Good News.

From 2010, she took the role of Libby Prentice, an Australian character introduced in Series 6 of the BBC Radio 4 series Clare in the Community.

On 23 November 2012, Kendall appeared on BBC Radio 4's satirical news show The Now Show, and on 4 May 2015 appeared in The Vote Now Show, one of six election specials.

Kendall appeared on the Dave TV series Alan Davies: As Yet Untitled.

She was a guest on BBC Radio 4's Quote... Unquote on 21 September 2015.

In March 2017, her three-part series Sarah Kendall: Australian Trilogy was broadcast on BBC Radio 4. A second series was aired in August 2018.

She has also appeared in Richard Herring's Leicester Square Theatre Podcast in 2021, in which Herring took issue with an article that suggested she met her husband at the Edinburgh fringe, she revealed that they met at a Melbourne Comedy festival. She was also featured in a Georg Jensen commercial.

She appeared in the final episode of the first series of Motherland, originally aired on BBC Two, as a nanny.

In 2019, Kendall created, wrote and starred in the comedy TV series Frayed, renewed in 2021.

Kendall was the winner of Series 11 of the comedy game show Taskmaster.

In 2026, with Diane Morgan, she co-wrote and performed in the BBC One television sitcom Ann Droid.

Personal life Kendall is gay. She was married to Henry Naylor and has two children.

Filmography Acting Year Title Role Notes 2008 Beehive Various characters Sketch series; 5 episodes (also writer) 2010 BBC Nought Product Designer 1 episode 2017 Motherland Lindsey Season 1, Episode 6: "The Caretaker" 2019– Frayed Sammy Cooper Main role; 2 seasons (also writer and producer) 2020 The Other One Kelly Season 1, Episodes 2 & 7 (also script editor on 3 episodes) 2024– Things You Should Have Done Sarah Gilbeaux Season 1, Episodes 5 & 6 2026– Ann Droid Delivery Driver Season 1, Episodes 1, 5 and 6

Self appearances Year Title Notes 1997 Headliners Unknown episode(s) 2000 Russell Gilbert Live Season 1, Episode 9 2000–2012 Melbourne International Comedy Festival Gala 5 events 2001 Rove Season 2, Episode 1 2001 The World Comedy Tour: Melbourne 2001 TV special 2001–2003 The Glass House 3 episodes 2007 The If.comedy Awards: A Comedy Cuts Special Awards ceremony 2011 Comedy Summit: The World's Ultimate Prankster TV special 2011 So This Is Christmas! TV special 2012 The Unbelievable Truth 2 episodes 2013 Tractor Monkeys 2 episodes 2014 Cracker Night TV gala 2015 Alan Davies: As Yet Untitled 1 episode 2015–2021 Richard Herring's interview podcasts Leicester Square Theatre Podcast; 3 episodes 2020 Spicks and Specks 1 episode 2021 Taskmaster 10 episodes 2021 Taskmaster: The Podcasts 2 episodes 2021 Question Team 1 episode 2021 Between the Covers 1 episode 2022 Would I Lie to You? 1 episode 2022 Guessable 1 episode

Awards and nominations