{"id":168276,"date":"2025-11-30T22:40:12","date_gmt":"2025-11-30T22:40:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/168276\/"},"modified":"2025-11-30T22:40:12","modified_gmt":"2025-11-30T22:40:12","slug":"cariad-lloyd-and-rachel-parris-look-back-weve-been-through-a-lot-trying-for-children-losing-parents-but-our-friendship-is-constant-friendship","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/168276\/","title":{"rendered":"Cariad Lloyd and Rachel Parris look back: \u2018We\u2019ve been through a lot \u2013 trying for children, losing parents \u2026 but our friendship is constant\u2019 | Friendship"},"content":{"rendered":"

Rachel Parris (on left) and Cariad Lloyd in Jane Austen-style outfits, in 2011 and 2025<\/a>Rachel Parris (left) and Cariad Lloyd in 2011 and 2025. Later photograph: P\u00e5l Hansen\/The Guardian. Styling: Andie Redman<\/p>\n

Born in London in 1982, Cariad Lloyd<\/a> is a comedian, actor and podcaster. She met comedian and musician Rachel Parris<\/a>, born in Leicester in 1984, through improv comedy. Along with six other comedians, they formed Austentatious<\/a>. The show is an improvised Jane Austen novel, based on an audience\u2019s suggestion for a title, and is currently on at the Vaudeville theatre<\/a> in London. Beyond their stage work, Cariad hosts the podcast Griefcast<\/a> and is a co-host on Weirdos Book Club<\/a> and Rachel worked on The Mash Report<\/a> and publishes Introducing Mrs Collins: A Pride and Prejudice Novel<\/a> on 6 November.<\/p>\n

Cariad <\/p>\n

The photo was taken at Ham House in Richmond<\/a> on our first Austentatious photoshoot. Rachel was having a\u00a0proper picture taken and I jumped in. That\u2019s why she\u2019s laughing. It wasn\u2019t posed \u2013 it\u2019s a genuine moment.<\/p>\n

I met Rachel through the comedian Amy Cooke-Hodgson<\/a>, who one day said to me, \u201cRachel Parris is thinking of doing Jane Austen<\/a> improv, are you interested?\u201d I assumed it was a stage name. Rachel Parris? With two Rs? I\u00a0nearly didn\u2019t go, thinking it might all be bullshit. But as soon as I walked into the rehearsal room and watched the group improvising, I realised they were brilliant.<\/p>\n

Rachel and I gelled straight away. We were both obsessed with the 1995\u00a0BBC adaptation of Pride and Prejudice<\/a> and wanted to make our own version. She was happy to talk about ribbons, dresses and boys, and in many ways we formed a Lizzy<\/a> and Jane<\/a> dynamic. I\u2019m very mischievous, sometimes filthy, whereas she\u2019s beautiful and believes in magic. Jane is\u00a0boring sometimes \u2013 Rachel isn\u2019t, she\u2019s\u00a0very funny \u2013 but she\u2019s also taught\u00a0me how to be a bit classier with my comedic choices. If we\u2019re rehearsing, she might\u00a0say, \u201cYou could play it like it was a real romance\u201d and I\u00a0encourage her to be a bit cheekier. We\u00a0call each other the Bonnets, which I know is\u00a0so\u00a0cringey.<\/p>\n

Over the years, I have played Rachel\u2019s sister, mother, cousin, aunt and child. Out of all of them, I\u2019d say our bond is like cousins who really like\u00a0each other. I was surrounded by boys growing up, so to finally find someone that I could have a\u00a0conversation with about blusher with\u00a0nobody interjecting \u201cThis is pathetic\u201d was euphoric.<\/p>\n

As soon as I first saw her improvise, I was instantly struck by how fun she was to be around<\/p>\n

We started Austentatious in 2011. Our first show was in a room in a\u00a0pub and there were 12 people in the audience. The next week there were 20. Then we had to move the venue as we couldn\u2019t fit people in. The first year we went to Edinburgh, the queue was around the block. People were turning up hours before to get a space. We lived together in Edinburgh; she was in the room next to me. We\u2019d chat until 2am about what we\u2019d seen and done that day. She was clean and travelled light, yet still looked immaculate. She could have survived on a mangle and two dresses for a whole summer; very strong Austen vibes.<\/p>\n

Because we have spent so many years improvising together, I can read Rachel pretty well. I have spidey sense \u2013 I know when she is upset before she tells me. If she\u2019s having a bad day, there\u2019s often no time before we go on stage to properly work through it but I\u00a0can tell her, \u201cI got you if you need me\u201d, and she\u2019ll know I can support her. It\u2019s a really deep connection.<\/p>\n

Improvisation requires being vulnerable and emotional with whoever you are with on the stage. That means you can\u2019t always be polite. You have to get under the skin of someone to get the magic alchemy going. Even though we occasionally wind each other up, Rachel never makes me feel as if I\u2019ve done something wrong. I corpse all the time and she never gets annoyed with me. Some other comedians might ask, \u201cWhy did you do that?\u201d, but she always makes me feel as if I am being funny. I never leave any social event with her worrying that I\u2019ve said something stupid or acted weird. We are truly ourselves around each other. She also likes being teased, which I find such a\u00a0charming quality, especially as I\u2019m not so good at laughing at myself.<\/p>\n

For a show that started in a pub, wearing costumes we found in charity\u00a0shops, it\u2019s staggering that we are now performing at the Vaudeville. The fact that we all still like each other 14 years later is even more amazing. It\u2019s an unusual setup for a creative venture. Normally the book, show or play ends and you move on. For me and Rachel, we choose to keep choosing each other.<\/p>\n

Rachel <\/p>\n

It was freezing cold and we were in a\u00a0draughty stately home wearing tiny old bridesmaids\u2019 dresses with no\u00a0insulation. But it was great fun. We\u00a0were at that age where we were trying to make things happen without\u00a0any money or contacts. I\u00a0don\u2019t\u00a0think we even got permission for the pictures. We just did it cheekily while National Trust members were milling around.<\/p>\n

In 2011, me and a few other comedians had got together to see if a Jane Austen<\/a> improv idea would work. I was excited that Cariad was interested. She had a reputation as an excellent improviser. There was an\u00a0element of intimidation there, but as soon as I first saw her improvise, I\u00a0was instantly struck by how fun she was to be around.<\/p>\n

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Cariad and I had a real honeymoon period when we first met. We were travelling a lot with Austentatious and\u00a0had one memorable trip to Lyme\u00a0Regis<\/a>, where we really delighted\u00a0in each other. We were giddy and giggly the whole time. There\u2019s a\u00a0great snap of us at the beach, quite pissed, really cuddling each other. I had assumed I had met all of my friends for life, so Cariad was an unexpected\u00a0discovery.<\/p>\n

Cariad is fierce in her friendships. She understands grief so well, and she wants to be there for you<\/p>\n

From the minute Cariad walks into a room, I can tell if she is anxious or excited. Doing our hair and makeup together before a show has become quite therapeutic. Maybe it\u2019s because we are not looking directly at each other, and we\u2019re partly preoccupied with what\u2019s happening in the mirror, but we do a lot of sharing.<\/p>\n

Cariad wears her heart on her sleeve. She is passionate and very in touch with her emotions. I can be more reserved and quiet \u2013 I hold back. Of course there are fallouts \u2013 we perform together and run a business, as well as maintaining a friendship. There have been times where I\u2019ve pissed Cariad off, and Cariad\u2019s pissed me off. But we are always going to make up. That picture was before we had ever pissed each other off. There is so much water under the bridge now that we are for\u00a0ever bonded together.<\/p>\n

We\u2019ve both been through a lot in the last 14 years. Trying for children, losing parents. She was the first of the\u00a0group to have a baby, and I often think how hard that must have been, as she would have experienced that massive impact alone. I had a baby loss\u00a0before I\u00a0had my first son. It was during Covid, so I was isolated in the hospital, but Cariad was amazing. A constant contact on the phone. She is fierce in her friendships. She understands grief\u00a0so well, and she wants to be there\u00a0for you.<\/p>\n

This photo has been on my mum\u2019s mantelpiece in a frame since it was taken. She must have recognised it was important. In the years since, boyfriends have come and gone but Cariad has stayed put. When I look at it, I think of the fun we had then \u2013 and the fun we still have now.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Rachel Parris (on left) and Cariad Lloyd in Jane Austen-style outfits, in 2011 and 2025Rachel Parris (left) and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":168277,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[321,93,61,60],"class_list":["post-168276","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-celebrities","tag-entertainment","tag-ie","tag-ireland"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/168276","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=168276"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/168276\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/168277"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=168276"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=168276"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=168276"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}