A THEATRE magazine has been forced to apologise for describing the Derry Girls actress Nicola Coughlan as overweight.

Critic Philip Fisher called her character an “overweight little girl” in a review of the acclaimed production of The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie at London’s Donmar Warehouse.

Coughlan, 31, said that the remark, made in The British Theatre Guide, was “cruel” and pointed out that there is no reference to the character’s weight in the text for the production, which is based on Muriel Spark’s 1961 novel. The character, Joyce Emily Hammond, 16, is introduced as a rich “delinquent” who wants to be part of Miss Brodie’s “set” of schoolgirls.