Comedy and drama writer Tiwa Lade has been announced as the fourth-ever recipient of the Felix Dexter bursary. Run by the BBC in honour of the late comedian and Absolutely Fabulous star Felix Dexter, the bursary aims to help black, Asian and ethnic minority talent thrive.
Lade has her writing staged as rehearsed readings in New York, Lagos and London, Lade said: “I am so happy and excited to start working as a writer with the BBC on other projects, it’s a dream come true! Someone, anyone pinch me.”
Head of BBC comedy Tanya Qureshi said: “We are delighted to be welcoming Tiwa into the BBC Comedy team and working with her towards the next step in her career.
“The Felix Dexter bursary remains incredibly important and precious to BBC Comedy. We are so pleased to be able to fund a placement which affords new comedy writers from minority backgrounds the time out to fully focus on further developing their craft. Finding and nurturing new talent, on and off screen, is a vital part of what we do.”
The bursary gives trainee writers the chance to focus on comedy, writing full time over six months, while immersed in comedy production. They hone their skills while gaining experience on a range of BBC comedies across radio, TV and online, on panel shows, shorts, sitcoms or comedy entertainment shows – building the confidence needed to take the next step in their career.
Previous Felix Dexter Bursary recipients include Leah Chillery, whose placements took them behind the scenes on a range of shows from BBC Three’s Famalam and This Country to BBC One’s Mrs Brown’s Boys and Radio 4’s Newsjack and Athena Kugblenu, who said that the dedicated time to work on her pilot with the assistance from comedy commissioning, and introductions to contacts across the industry, have helped to develop her craft to a professional standard that has allowed her to work on a whole range of shows post-bursary.
