Zoë Norton Lodge is a writer and television presenter who also works as an actress, director and MC. Her writing has been published in various anthologies including Best Australian Stories. Her own titles include an autobiographical book of short stories Almost Sincerely (Giramondo 2015); kids series Elizabella (Walker Books, 2020) and a new anthology Story Club (Harper Collins, 2018).
She has worked as a writer and performer with The Chaser on various shows including The Hamster Wheel, The Chaser’s Election Desk and The Chaser’s Media Circus. Zoe has appeared as herself on various other shows including Insiders (ABC), The Book Club (ABC) and SCREEN (Foxtel Arts), and as an actress on series including The Moodys (ABC) and The Letdown (ABC, Netflix).
As a screenwriter, Zoë has written for The Letdown (ABC, Netflix) and co-created the web series Ding Dong I’m Gay. Zoë is co-creator of Story Club, a live storytelling night that has been running in Sydney for more than a decade. Story Club was also adapted into a television series for the ABC (2014), as well as a podcast. Zoë is perhaps best known as a presenter on ABC’s long running consumer affairs comedy program The Checkout.
Most recently, Zoe has written on Queen of Oz, a Catherine Tate tv series spin-off for BBC One. She also wrote one episode of Year Of which began streaming on Stan in 2023.
Zoë has a number of projects in development.
For a full CV please contact info@rgm.com.au.
When Zoë Norton Lodge was growing up in Annandale in the eighties and nineties, the self-proclaimed Heartland of the Inner West was a heady brew of somewhat maladjusted and genuinely unsettling residents. But Annandale was changing. New words like ‘architect’ and ‘labradoodle’ drifted out of the overabundance of cafés – and eventually entire weeks would go by with no backyard bomb explosions.
These stories of neighbourhood warfare, unsound relations, quashed dreams and facial disfigurement are told with Norton Lodge’s characteristic comic verve and eye for absurdity: encounter Greek grandparents whose decades-long resentment turns a colander into a weapon; a petrol-sodden Mamma; children sent to school with cat-food sandwiches; ‘distressed’ furniture; flying babies and other suburban wonders.
Published by Giramondo [To purchase, go to Publisher]
Sometimes you’ve gotta bend the rules to straighten things out! The second book in the hilarious Elizabella series is middle-grade at its finest.
It’s the beginning of term for Elizabella and her gang, but instead of being a fresh start, it’s a rotten one. The school is falling apart and misery sets in when a big corporation takes over the tuckshop, leaving poor Miss Duck out of a job. Meanwhile, there’s a lice outbreak at Bilby Creek Primary and a competition to write the School Song. How will Elizabella deal with all of this? In true Elizabella style, of course!
Zoë Norton Lodge always wanted to write a book for children. And although her book Almost Sincerely and TV show The Checkout are geared towards adults, children are her biggest fans. A little bit naughty herself, Zoë is the perfect author to bring Elizabella to young readers everywhere.
Strong sisters with individual talents to share makes this series particularly life-affirming and family-focused.
School and family settings makes this series accessible to all readers and themes of friendship, family loss and healing, acceptance, writing and language tricks as therapy, judging what’s wrong, pets and pranks are appropriate for an 8 to 12 readership.
Published by Walker Books [To purchase, go to Publisher]
It’s hard to be good when your head is practically exploding with schemes! The hilarious Elizabella series is middle-grade at its finest.
Elizabella – ten and a quarter – is a Poet, Fixer of Fairytales and the biggest prankster in the history of Bilby Creek Primary. And when her plans involve making a swimming pool in the playground without consulting a single teacher, the students are behind her every step of the way. But what happens when Minnie, an even bigger prankster, shows up? Can Bilby Creek handle them both? And more importantly, can they handle each other?
Zoë Norton Lodge always wanted to write a book for children. And although her book Almost Sincerely and TV show The Checkout are geared towards adults, children are her biggest fans. A little bit naughty herself, Zoë is the perfect author to bring Elizabella to young readers everywhere.
Strong sisters with individual talents to share makes this series particularly life-affirming and family-focused.
School and family settings makes this series accessible to all readers and themes of friendship, family loss and healing, acceptance, writing and language tricks as therapy, judging what’s wrong, pets and pranks are appropriate for an 8 to 12 readership.
Published by Walker Books [To purchase, go to Publisher]
Excitement is in the air as Elizabella – poet, fixer of fairytales and the biggest prankster in the history of her school – heads off to camp with the rest of her class. But when Larry the Lizard learns she’s headed to Lizard Lake he stows away in her suitcase, dreaming of discovering the other sentient lizards rumoured to be living there. Soon, Elizabella begins having strange dreams and wonders if Lizard Lake is haunted.
Published by Walker Books [To purchase, go to Publisher]
A hilarious, no-holds-barred collection of true stories from Story Club, the legendary live show that spawned the hit podcast.
In this first collection from Story Club, the legendary live show that has become a hit podcast, Club founders and popular Checkout presenters Zoë Norton Lodge and Ben Jenkins have brought together 30 of the most candid true tales by some of Australia’s funniest oversharers.
The results are by turns hilarious, poignant, revealing and, sometimes, downright weird. Contributors include David Marr, Annabel Crabb, Richard Glover, Rob Carlton, Lewis Hobba, Cathy Wilcox, Susie Youssef, Kate Mulvaney (King Lear), Debra Oswald, and many more.
Published by Harper Collins [To purchase, go to Publisher]
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