Sofie Hagen


Sofie Hagen is a London-based Danish comedian and fat acceptance campaigner. She has toured with comedy shows and hosted a number of podcasts.

Biography

Sofie Hagen was born in Denmark on.
Hagen moved to London in September 2012 to perform regular comedy. In 2013, Time Out identified Hagen as "One to Watch". Hagen won the Laughing Horse New Act of the Year the same year; the first woman to win the award.
In August 2015, Hagen took her debut hour show, Bubblewrap, to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. The show was favourably received, with 5-star reviews from ThreeWeeks, The Skinny, and the Daily Mirror. Bubblewrap also received 4 star reviews from Chortle, Time Out, Beyond the Joke, The Herald, The Sunday Times and Fest Magazine. The show won the Fosters sponsored Edinburgh Comedy Awards for Best Newcomer. In November, Virago Press published her essay in the collection I Call Myself a Feminist.
In July 2016, Hagen appeared in the Channel 4 miniseries Outsiders. She took her second solo show, Shimmer Shatter to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in August. She attempted to make her next tour welcoming for fans with anxiety issues by allowing them to contact her before shows to let her know their needs. She also asked the majority of venues on the tour to provide gender neutral toilets for fans who do not identify as male or female.
The Guardian describes Hagen on stage as having "an easy charm... and an ability to combine delicate subject matter with big, accessible laughs."
Hagen espouses the fat acceptance movement. In January 2018, she wrote an article in The Guardian calling for people to stop dieting, labelling it as "boring", "triggering", and "neither feminist – nor healthy". In February 2018, Hagen gained attention for calling for Cancer Research UK to pull their campaign that highlights obesity as the second most common cause of cancer. After directing angry comments towards the cancer charity on Twitter, she described the campaign as "fat shaming" and said that there was proof that dieting is more dangerous than obesity. Cancer Research UK reiterated the scientific proof behind their statements.

Awards

Hagen hosted Comedians Telling Stuff, a podcast series where she asks six questions of six comedians. The show began in August 2013 and ran for nine seasons before ending in 2016. Guests have included Susan Calman, Nick Helm, Richard Herring, Michael Legge, Josie Long, Colin Mochrie, Pappy's, Katherine Ryan, and Arthur Smith, as well as younger comedians and comedians from Denmark.
From December 2015 to December 2016, Hagen co-hosted The Guilty Feminist podcast with Deborah Frances-White.
In 2016, Hagen created the Made of Human comedy podcast, in which she interviews various comedians. The New Statesman named Made of Human one of their top 10 podcasts in 2017. The Blurt Foundation named Made of Human one of their top 10 podcasts in 2018. Hannah Parkinson from The Guardian interviewed Hagen about Made of Human when she visited Edinburgh and named it a top podcast from the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. Hagen has interviewed many notable guests including Cameron Esposito, Aisling Bea, Mark Watson, Lolly Adefope, Hari Kondabolu, Nish Kumar, Katherine Ryan, and Sara Pascoe.
In 2018, Hagen created the Secret Dinosaur Cult podcast with fellow comedian Jodie Mitchell. They talk about dinosaurs and their daddy issues on their podcast. Their episodes are recorded in front of a live audience in London, at their so-called cult meetings. Each week they feature a new funny story about dinosaur porn that they find online.