Harriet Kemsley
Harriet Kemsley is an English stand-up comedian from Kent and studied English Literature at university. She began performing stand-up comedy in 2011 and immediately started winning competitions and awards. In 2012, she won the Bath Comedy Festival New Act of the Year and the Brighton Comedy Festival New Act of the Year.
Between 2018 and 2022, she co-hosted a podcast with Sunil Patel, and she has appeared on a number of comedy panel shows, including 8 Out of 10 Cats.
Why Harriet Kemsley is vegan
Harriet Kemsley is vegan for the animals.
Harriet became a vegetarian when she was eight years old, after her pet chicken died. She made the connection between meat and animals and didn’t want to be part of it. Unlike many, it wasn’t watching documentaries such as Cowspiracy or Earthlings that made Harriet go vegan. It was actually watching the 2024 blockbuster Wicked that made Harriet level up from veggie to vegan.1Smith, R. 2026. 21 vegan comedians who are rewriting the “humourless vegan” cliché. Vegan Food & Living. Available: https://www.veganfoodandliving.com/features/vegan-comedians/ [Accessed 4 August 2026]. She was moved by Peter Dinklage’s performance as Dr. Dillamond the goat and how the animals had had their voices suppressed due to the way in which humans had mistreated them.
References:
- Smith, R. 2026. 21 vegan comedians who are rewriting the “humourless vegan” cliché. Vegan Food & Living. Available: https://www.veganfoodandliving.com/features/vegan-comedians/ [Accessed 4 August 2026].
