Rhona Cameron

For a long time I felt – like Maxine Peake’s character – that life was easier on stage than off. Funny Cow left me pissed off because I wanted to write that film! But I was moved, too, because so much of its emotional core resonated with me. I couldn’t leave my seat for a while because I was so upset. I felt relieved that someone was finally talking about the seriousness of comedy, through the journey of a working-class female standup.

I don’t identify as a “woman comic” or indeed a “woman”. I am Rhona. I’ve always been very non-binary gender in my thinking, feeling and actions. But I did notice, as a younger comic, that an unknown male could go on stage and he’d be given a chance. He was allowed to take his time, to indulge, even. But if you were a woman, you had to be “bang, bang, bang, bang” right away, no breaths. So I thought the scene in the club where she demolishes a fat, drunken, thick guy was very powerful.

There’s one line that will stay with me: “It’s fuck all to do with being funny, it’s to do with surviving.” That is so true. A comedian is part-gladiator, part-psychologist, part-preacher, part-actor, part-self-harmer, part-poet, part-clown. If you’re screwed up from life and go out on to this risky tightrope of adulation or hatred – running this extreme gauntlet every night – and then go back to this desolation of self, it takes its toll. That’s what makes comedy the mothership of the arts. It’s so fucking dangerous.

Rachel Fairburn

It’s every northern cliche rolled into one. The performances are brilliant, but I felt that a lot of the film was stereotypical. You have a female character from the north of England, and it’s like: “Of course she’s northern, she’s beaten by her husband. Of course she’s northern, her dad was an alcoholic.” I’ve never written a film, and I hate slating other people’s work, but I just found it a bit empty.

You don’t really see any of the reasons why Peake’s character would want to become a standup. She makes two funny comments as a child – using humour as a defence – but doesn’t come across as particularly witty. I suppose, as a kid, she was an outsider and a bit of a showoff. That was relatable: when I was a kid, I was either showing off or I was really quiet, and I always had a side of me that wanted to perform. But it wasn’t clear why she would have wanted to be a standup, other than suddenly going to a comedy night and enjoying one person’s set.

I get fed up of the idea that people do standup because they’ve had a hard time when they were young or that they must be sad really, which the film suggests. It’s not true. There are lots of different reasons why people start performing comedy. This could have been an opportunity to have a female standup character who wrote her own material and was different, and that’s why she is funny. But she just goes on stage and does the exact same jokes that a bloke had done. The older comic, Lenny (played by Alun Armstrong), says to her: “It’s not a job for women; women aren’t funny.” She sort of proves his point by then doing his jokes.

Shappi Khorsandi

In one scene, Peake goes on stage and can’t speak, and the audience starts heckling. I’ve never frozen like that, but what made it powerful to watch, as a comic, was knowing how badly she wants it, and then seeing her sabotaged by her own nerves. It’s the personification of every bad gig, every bad feeling that you have when you die on stage. They got that bit beautifully, and that made me feel so proud of all that I’ve been through as a professional comic. I thought: “Yes, babe – being a female comic, I get that.”

But Funny Cow is not a film about standup comedy. It’s not a film about a woman making her way in the comedy world. It’s a film about child abuse. In the first few minutes, a child gets brutally, viciously attacked with a chain belt. It wrecked my head, to the point where I got into a fight with a man in the audience who was being rude to some women. It’s not a subtle film about the delicate soul of a standup; it’s about a spirited child being broken by her parents. She could have decided that, in order to get out of her head, she wanted to be a cartoonist or a landscape gardener.

It doesn’t get into the nitty-gritty of being a comedian. I didn’t find anything nuanced about it. There’s a scene where Paddy Considine’s character, a bookshop owner, takes her out to dinner. They do this whole Educating Rita thing, and he says to her: “Who took away your self-esteem?” It’s like: “I see, what happens is comedians don’t have self-esteem – got it!” It didn’t leave much to the imagination.

But what made the film, for me, were the spectacular performances. Kevin Eldon’s brilliant turn, John Bishop’s gorgeous cameo. And I could not take my eyes off Peake. She’s an utter superstar, and I now want to see everything she does.

• Funny Cow, written by Tony Pitts and directed by Adrian Shergold, is out now. Rhona Cameron is currently developing the screenplay of her first book, 1979. Shappi Khorsandi is touring the UK until June 2018, including London’s Soho theatre, 15-19 May. Rachel Fairburn is at the Edinburgh fringe, 1-27 August. Her All Killa No Filla podcast is available to download.