Breaking Bread with Tom Papa - Episode 7 - Fortune Feimster

Episode Date: June 23, 2020

Today we break bread with Fortune Feimster. Not only is this southern belle one the funniest people alive she is also my co-host on What a Joke with Papa and Fortune on Netflix Is a Joke radio on SiriusXM Channel 93. Join us now for some good deep fried southern flavor.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Hey, don't you know, it's also a show. Hey. Hey, everybody, welcome back to Breaking Bread. I hope you're doing well. Thank you for joining me at the table. Once again, we've got a good one today. My good friend, Fortune Feimster, who's a hilarious comedian and actress, she's so, so damn funny and super talented, has become one of my closest friends recently because we'd host a show on Netflix called, on Netflix radio called What a Joke with Papa and Fortune. And for the last year, we have been welcoming all these great comedians and doing this great show every day. And when you're with someone that often, you really get to know them in a much deeper way. And look, she was always funny. I always friends with her,

always knew it was going to be a good time. But just to be with her and just see how off the cuff she is and how naturally funny she is. And more than that, just a really great person. Grew up outside of Charlotte, North Carolina and has some great, great stories about growing up in Southern food. We talk about food a lot on the radio show. We both enjoy food equally. It almost feels like we're doing a promo for all of these restaurant chains and and bakeries and stuff because we just really, really enjoy it so much. And look, this show is all about getting to know people through what they eat and how they celebrate. And there's no, no better person than Fortune Feemster to go down that road with. Enjoy the great Fortune Feemster.

Fortune. I was thinking today when we were, we, we wrapped up our radio show and then went about our day for a couple of hours before we meet up again and do this. And I was like, I probably talked to Fortune more than anybody. Yeah. Anybody else in the world. Yeah. Especially when our contact with the outside world is limited. Yeah. Yeah, that's a good point. We used to run out after the show, you run out and talk your head off. But now it's just, nope, just want. wait to talk to fortune again.

Yeah, the occasional Zoom meeting in between. But yeah. Thanks for doing this. Of course. Thanks for having me. I appreciate it. I can't wait to break bread. I know.

I know. I also have brought you more loaves than anybody. I think you've been the recipient of more bread than anybody. I have been. So I don't like to get stingy because I know that I'm blessed with the abundance of bread from you. I know, but I should have, I'll bring you more. I'll bring you more. You don't have.

There's one, there's a bread always attached to the podcast and that's, you deserve it. You give me plenty of red. You don't need to worry about me. I have whiskey. I have whiskey behind me because I know. Are you drinking? No, I just put it there for you. I have, because that's what I would.

I had to do a panel. I would probably give you. I was drinking box wine for an earlier panel. Box wine. I didn't even know they made box wine. wine anymore. Oh yeah. People, I don't really drink it, but people love it. This is a, do they really? Like legit. I mean, like probably, I don't know, maybe some, some Midwest mom right now is dipping into her box. Maybe a southern, some southern grandma. I like it. It just comes right out of the box.

Well, it's really funny that, you know, I love baking bread and we started this podcast. because I just love the thing of hosting everybody. And of course, we're not able to do that yet where we can actually sit down and share a meal and share drink and stuff. But I feel like we get very close to it doing our show, especially when we were in the studio, I mean, when we decided to do the show together,

it was really because we just are funny together and have a good time. And we quickly discovered that another giant love of ours is eating. We talk about snacks all the time. And we were worse about it in the studio because we would always try to somehow plant a seed to our producers that we were hungry, honestly hoping that one of them would pick up the queue and magically show up with treats. It's really, it really happened a lot. And it went from just, forget the clues.

We were just like blatantly like, we should have treats tomorrow. They've probably saved a lot of money now that we've been filming from home. Although we do get occasional treats sent. Yeah, which we've got to have to turn it up again because we, in the beginning of quarantine, we got that day when they brought all the pie to us. Oh, man, it was the, so we, our producer Joe, who's awesome, Joe Bolter, he was on, he was kind of ahead of the curve when it came to the, uh, down and he immediately planned for a home studio situation and so we I think everything shut down

like Friday or Saturday we were on Monday morning right back at it and yeah that first week everything was very dire and not to say that it's not now but it's there's some more hope now and it was scary that first week and I remember you didn't know if you could go out you know order things to go or take out or what delivery was like and someone showed up with pie and coffees and my head almost exploded with joy I know what place was that I forget what the name of the pie place was Republic of Pie it's in Republic of Pie oh man individual slices and there was like 10 of them well you got 10 of them because you have a family and I just had me and my lady So when you didn't mean to, you devulged how many pieces of pie you got.

And I went, what? So they ended up sending me a couple more pieces. I didn't mean for them to do that. But I ended up getting more pie. It's so funny. Yeah, we've given so much advertising out to restaurants, food makers, chains, small places, bakeries, alcohol. companies. We just talk about it all the time, especially during the quarantine because it's like,

I mean, we normally talked about it. And now it's like, well, we don't want to spend the whole time talking about awful news. So let's talk about Pringles. Yeah. And we, we don't advertise on our radio show. So people know we're not trying to get like advertisements out of it. How funny is it? I'm just thinking now, how funny is it that when we were in the studio, listeners from around the country were sending us treats. I know. Yeah, truck drivers calling tartine. Like, in what world is a truck driver like, hello, tartine?

I'd like a keesh and a scone. But that's the kind of nice listeners we have. Yeah, it's the best. Oh, my God. Now, pie is, when I think of pie, I think of it as a, where I grew up in the Northeast, as a in a diner late at night next to a police officer and a black cup of coffee. And, and, you know, there's pie at Thanksgiving and that kind of thing. But to the regular, you know, during the year thing, that's what I always pictured pie as.

But a southern thing, now you grew up in Charlotte, pie is a whole different meaning. Yeah, I mean, we, I think if you had like a mom or grandmother who baked, a lot, then pie was a pretty standard thing to see. So my grandmother baked fresh apple pies, and those were awesome. But my mom did not get the baking or the cooking skills. So any pie was usually a treat on Thanksgiving or Christmas. But it wasn't a mainstay in my house once my grandmother died. Did she live near you? Yeah, she lived like, two minutes for me just like at the end of the block around that corner so whenever my mom would get um like upset with me if i knew i was about to get in trouble i would run to the end of my road

and i would look down my grandmother's street and her house was just beyond the curb and uh i kept like willing her to like come out of her house because this is before cell phone so i just kept hoping she'd come because my grandmother was one that would be like oh do not she is fine do not get her in trouble and so she was my little protector from being grounded or spanked because in the 80s you got spanked yeah yeah for you were named after your grandmother weren't you it's uh fortune is her mom's main name your grandmother's main yeah so my great grandmother Oh, okay. But my grandmother

really loved the name Fortune and really, really wanted my mom to name me Fortune. But my mom thought it was too big of a name, so she named me Emily, and Fortune is a middle name. Got you. Now, why do you think your mom didn't pick it up from your grandmother? I think my mom always had this vision

know if I think what a girl having a girl would look like and she had always wanted a girl. I had two older brothers. I have them. And she was just like desperate to have a little girl because my mom's very prissy. My mom's very late like feminine. And I think Emily is such a quintessential girl's name, you know, and her. And she just always, she just loved that name. So I think she was said on like, I'm having a girl. She's going to wear lots of dresses. She's going to be named Emily. And my grandmother just had this very, like, she was very adamant, like about fortune.

And my mom was just like, no way. No. My mom even said that I would have to be Miss America to live up to a name like that. So I grew up as Emily. Wow. Why didn't she pick up the learning how to bake pies, though? Like, why? Because she was making them in the house, obviously, when she was a little girl.

I don't know why she, because my grandmother was an awesome cook. I don't know how, I think she just didn't pay attention. She was off meeting boys and driving around in a convertible. She didn't, she just was taking the food, but not participating in the making, which is part of my mom's personality. well. Yeah. Yeah. To give her food. Give her things. So if it was birthdays and stuff, like when you were little, would you, would your grandmother do the cooking? Like, would she host your birthday? Yeah. Yeah. She hosted a lot of family members' birthdays. They would have

some sort of big meal and she usually made a cake. Rare rarely did we have a store bought one until my grandmother that got older and then we started having our parties elsewhere. Right. But usually we had some sort of friend party somewhere out in the world and my grandmother that would have a thing at her house. Right, right. There was so much, my grandma, so much food at my grandmother's. Like, that's just a southern mom thing.

It's probably a lot of people's thing, but she was always putting food in front of your face, like always. So I developed my unhealthy upset. with food because that was how my grandmother expressed taking care of you, giving to you. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No, of course.

I mean, that I have the same problem that it was all the Italians. Yeah. They were just, food was how you communicated. Yeah. You know, food was how you showed someone that you loved them. Food was, that was it. And then you get cut off into the world and you're getting headshots done 20 years. later and you're like why do I have five chins? Yeah they're not they're not giving you salad there

no that doesn't say I love you if there is a salad involved in at least in the south it's just tons of thousand island or ranch just piled on top of an iceberg lettuce situation yeah man it is it's such a weird thing isn't it like it's not really great for you to have like fried chicken or you know big meatballs but that shows like that is like if your grandmother always gave you a salad I don't think that there would be that connection you wouldn't be telling stories of it. Our girl is so mean. Yeah North Carolina I think in particular is big into fried food. They fry everything. They're even frying green. beans now, ducking that in ranch.

Oh my God. It's like nothing's sacred. It's all fried. Yeah. Oh, man. What was the best? I was going to say, when I go home, I fall back into those habits where Jack's are like, we have to eat a vegetable.

We have to eat something green. And what are you eating when Jack's, you know, you're going to, well, they, even they're fish. Like you think of fish, you know, as being fairly healthy. They have something called fish camps in North Carolina, and it's just piles of fried fish, fried shrimp, fried oysters, crabs, like, clam strips, everything. It's just mounds of, you don't even taste the fish anymore.

It's just fried something and tartar sauce. It's the best, though. It is so good. Oh, oh, man, hush puppies. I really didn't even know what hush puppies were until after college. They're so good. You can't find them very many places outside of those, the southern areas. But, oh, I don't, whatever you make them, they're tasty.

Yeah. God. How long, when did your grandma pass? When I was 18. So. When you were 18. Yeah, just a few years ago. Were you a senior or had you gone?

Did you? were you still in school or had you left? I found out the beginning of my high school, senior year of high school that she had cancer and they gave her a year to live, but you know, you kind of think that that won't be the case. And then I graduated high school, they told us she had two weeks to live.

And she ended up telling, she and I always had a very special connection and she was kind of, she was always my cheerleader, always really believed in me. And, you know, when you're young, you haven't found that confidence yet. And she told my mom that they would see me off to college. And this is, you know, two weeks from past my high school graduation. And my mom's like, there's no way that she's going to make it. They're giving her two weeks to live.

And she died the morning after I left for college. No. Oh my God. That's amazing. Yeah, I, she was, we kept her, we were able to keep her at her home that summer. And, uh, that's, you know, it was really probably the most painful time of my life, but it was a very deep experience and very, because we had a hospice nurse. It was very spiritual who made you really like think about the journey of it and the connections of it and ask the questions you want to ask and say the things you want to say. And that last week before I went to college, I had gotten my wisdom teeth out.

So I was like kind of in and out of it. And I went to say goodbye. She was like, I don't even, you know, at the time you're like, I don't even know she can hear me. And I told her I was leaving for college. And I knew I wouldn't see her again, obviously. And the very next morning. Wow, that's amazing. Yeah, and she was mighty.

The dark, so there, so the cancer that she had was very, um, started a, I mean, she was 86, so it wasn't like she died young. Yeah. She had a skin cancer that ended up going and surrounding her spinal cord and her brain. It was very painful. And she never complained, never said ow. Wow. And a cancer doctor told us later that they studied her.

case and they were all going there's no reason that the how did this woman live for two and a half months with that kind of pain and that kind of pressure on her system her skull and brain like this doesn't make any sense science doesn't explain this yeah and my mom's friend told him what she had said and he goes yes she she willed herself to live. Man, isn't that powerful? Oh, it changed my life. God.

Yeah. Yeah. How so? What do you mean? Well, she and I had always been super close. And I'd always been a fairly responsible kid. Like, that's just kind of in my nature. But to see someone like that make that kind of sacrifice for you to be, to love you so much

that they want to see something significant like that for you. you go, I can never be a piece of shit. Right. You know what I'm not to say that I'm not, I'm not perfect. I'm such an idiot sometimes. But I just, I just knew that my life had to have some purpose because. Yeah. And so it just put me on this path of like, I got to make something good of my life

because this person loved me enough to do that for me. Right. Man, oh man, that is powerful. It's powerful in two regards. It's powerful that a person can do that, that she was able to, just out of pure love and willpower, that she was able to sustain it to when she did and live up to her promise. Yeah. You know, that that thing, that we, that we have that untapped ability. Yeah. That you can kind of tap into. And then that you then, with it being unexplained, that mental thing that you now are going to carry that and you're directing your mental well-being and your positive attitude throughout your life is it's just a it's like a profound thing because it's not something you can say oh she's doing that exercise now like there's no like you said like science doesn't explain it but then you wake up every day and be like you know want to be

better and do your thing and it's just i don't know it's because i believe it too i believe in you know Yeah. What you think is what happens. I feel very guided. And this is so hippie, I'm like such a crazy person. But I feel very guided. Even if it's, you know, if it's not her spirit by her energy,

whatever you believe in. I feel very guided by that. And it's a big driving force in my life and always has been. Maybe it's just like not even realizing it, this need or want to make her proud, you know. Yeah. So I try to. Yeah.

I remember when, I remember when Jamie Fox won the Oscar and he and the Golden Globe and he was thanking his grandmother for making it happen. She had passed and similar thing. And he was like, I want to thank her, you know, I believe that she's the one that made this happen. And I was at the laugh factory the next night. I was like, what's my grandmother doing?

Grandma, I want an Oscar. Yeah. I mean, come on, step it up. Yeah, your grandma. Who are you taking care of? Tired. She's like, I need a nap. I got to.

Yeah. I'm chilling right now. Oh, man. That's funny. It's amazing. Yeah. Yeah. But then to have like, it's so funny too.

If you, if you come back on it. And it's like, so you have this. positive attitude and you want to go out and do good stuff and you're also fueled by just smelling a like fried chicken or something and you're like that's the thing that reminds me of grandma any fatty food right exactly and she and she was so skinny that's what was not fair she was giving us all this like so bad for you food and she was tiny yeah that's so meanwhile we're just all like growing exponentially. Eat more.

I've had people be like, you're afraid, like you're, you know, they're trying to be nice or helpful. They're like, your frame is too small for your weight. And I'm like,

okay, whatever. I like food. Get out of here. Yeah, what is that? Basically, like,

usually they say the opposite. Yeah, usually they're like, you're just big boned. You can't help it. I used to say that. I was like, I just a big bone.

And then this one guy was like, no, your frame's actually not. I got you, shut up. Leave me alone. Oh, man. It's amazing. It's amazing that they could just have that effect on you. I mean, is it possible? Now, and then, of course, you know, you're running down the road from your mom because

she's going to discipline you. And, right? Yeah. Like she's, and I'm asking this because as a parent, I go back and forth on that. because my grandmother, of course, like all grandparents, like, no, as a grandchild, you could do no wrong. And it was just, it was just pure love. Yeah.

It's just, I just love you. I love you. And she doesn't even want to know what your troubles are. She doesn't want to know about your grades. And, oh, you'll do better next time. And I always think about that with my kids. I'm like, could I just love them that way? Like, as the grandma who just is just all in on love and forget.

get the disciplined part of it. I don't think parents can because kids crave structure. And so as much as hard as it is for the parents to be the bad guys, like at least one of you has to be or else your kids just running amuck, you know? And yeah, that's true. So you got to have, as much as kids say they hate it, they actually want. you to set boundaries. Yeah, that's true.

But then the grandparents get to come in and be, get all the love. But then when you become a granddad, you'll get to have that. So I think it comes around. That's true. You can't buck the system. It's all been figured out.

You can't just jump it and act like grandpa when you're dad. I mean, I'm not a parent, so I can act like I know. I don't really know. But it seems like. Yeah. You know, there's no real formula to it. Every, every kid comes out different for whatever reason.

Yeah. No, I know. Did she, did your grandmother identify with you more than your brothers? Were you the favorite? I mean, she loved us all very much. Of sure. Of course. But I know that she loved me more for sure.

Yeah. You could have just said yes. I got a video camera back in the day and I would always try to get her to admit on camera that I was her favorite and I would say, Nana, Nana, who's your favorite? She'd look around and she'd go, you. So I have it on tape.

Oh, that's great. But I think it's because I was with her all the time. I was like her little shadow. Right. Both my parents worked all the time, and my older brothers, one, once the oldest one, he was seven years older than me. So once he was able to drive, he was like out of there. And then my middle brother was always doing his own thing. So I was like always with my grandmother.

So I think we just had a bond. And again, as hippy-dippy as it sounds, I, there was definitely a soul connection because when she died, I knew. I called her house. And my dad was like, I gotta call you back because it literally like just happened. Oh, you called for that reason.

Yeah, I just felt it. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Yeah. I'm a cancer. We're very, we're empath. Yeah.

So I just feel energy. And I felt a shift. Right. Yeah. So when you and I are doing the radio show every day, what's the energy you feel for me most of the time? It's very positive. Yeah, it's all positive. I think that shows in our content too.

We're both pretty positive people, so we tend to see the brighter side of things. And that's, so we're coming at our conversation with each other. Usually, even though we tease each other, it's usually there's a positive feeling to it. And when we interview people, we're not trying to, like, get the hot goss. We're just talking to our friends. Do you think we should more? Like when Howard Stern, like, he had the reputation for like someone said something on the show or like on any show. It's like, oh, did you hear so-and-so celebrity dropped on the such-and-such show that someone was an ass.

Maybe we should trap people more with our, we'll use our good nature to trap them. Yeah, but that's just not us. That's not our thing. No, it's not. We'll even know hot topics, hot goss, about comics and be like, man, we don't need to talk about that, you know. I know. That's true. I think because our show is celebrating comedy, it's celebrating comics, our jobs. It's not really focused on the other, you know, more frivolous, like gossipy,

entertainment-y things. yeah who do you think is going to have the first scandal you or i oh god hopefully neither of us i don't think that we have the personality we're not the type that we're what is that saying all publicity is good publicity that is not you and me we're just like no right i just want to have a normal life yeah we're more likely to get fat shamed for eating donuts in the middle of our broadcast. Why are they chewing all the time? Can they stop talking about treats? No, we can't. It's so funny. So when you're when you, when you were a kid, you've kind of like hinted at it a couple of times. We're not hinted at it. You talked about it like that there was there was some lean years when you guys didn't have a lot of a lot of money and stuff.

were you aware of that when you were a kid or when you're a kid like my kids when we started in new york like lived their little room was like at the bottom of our little tiny new york apartment it was really in like a windowless basement under a staircase and they but for them it was like it was just yeah it was wonder yeah you know my family had a very interesting history because when my mom was growing up her family had tons of money they were very rich my grandmother was a I mean my grandfather was a very renowned architect and contractor and he built a lot of the houses in town on the middle school library you know lots of things and did so all over North Carolina and he died unexpectedly when my mom was 17 and through a series over the years of bad decisions and whatnot my family lost all their money So my mom had this upbringing of having a lot and then she married my dad and he grew up with nothing. He grew up in a trailer.

He hitchhiked to school. They could not have had opposite upbringes. Wow. And so we had a house that was like a big two-story house. So if you were to look up from the outside looking in, you go, this family is, they're good. you know so it's hard to compare being poor right with other people circumstances you're talking about people living on the street things like that so i had opportunities i had things but once my parents divorced uh yeah it just got very lean um my mom was a teacher and um where there were three of us

and my dad you know got a new job every couple years and so there it just became pretty normal that Like we'd be sitting there and the lights would get shut off. And you'd go, oh, the light bill to the electricity building isn't paid or there'd be no water. You know, and then other times I got IOUs a lot. So I had a roof over my head. Sure. And how old are you when you notice the lights? I mean, that was kind of throughout the, even when they were together, it was still financially hard.

Right, right. you know, you just kind of got used to it. I think that's probably where a lot of my work ethic comes from. I mean, our house was like falling down around us. Everything needed to be repaired. And at my last two years of high school, my mom came home one day with a bunch of boxes. She's like, we got to move. We're about to lose the house.

And I go, what? We got to pack up. but she somehow ended up coming up with the money to pay the what was due and we just had an empty house for the next two years we moved everything to my grandmother's base. Where was it? Yeah. Oh. Oh, so you had already moved to stuff.

I had like a couch and a TV and our bed and a bed and we didn't have curtains. We didn't have curtains. It was for two years. But, you know, my mom, to her credit, she when like in summers you know teachers don't have jobs and so she would go work at the but it's basically the equivalent of like a sizzler she would work in the quincy's in our hometown and i know that was pretty humiliating for her to like be waiting suddenly on friends and kids of friends and sure um but our whole family just we kind of knew you have to do what you got

you got to do what you got to do. And so we all started chipping in. Yeah, you got to hustle. It's interesting because I met your mom. She's great. And she does kind of carry herself as like a little more elegant. You know, she makes sense when you say like she kind of grew up with that. Because she does carry herself that way.

Yeah. Right? She's like a lady. I always said she was a rich woman living in a poor woman's world. Yeah. But yeah, I mean. Yeah, that makes sense. It was hard.

My brother had to leave college his sophomore year in the middle of it because we couldn't afford it anymore. And, you know, he had to come home and work and, you know, to see his friends getting to be carefree. And he's like, I hated that, things like that for him, you know. And, I mean, you know, it sounds a privilege. You're just like, I didn't get a car when I did. turn 16 but you know I still got to go to college and so it's hard to like it's hard to like say

I was poor because then there's oh other people's circumstances yeah yeah which is you know which on the one hand is understandable because uh everyone's experience is their own thing and if you're feeling that you know that's true and that is a real thing but also the perspective of oh don't cry about it like your grandmother being sick and never complaining. Yeah. That's an element too. It's like, yeah, just deal with it.

Yeah. We all just were like, okay, well, so you're going to work there. You're going to work there. I'll work to the recreation department. You know, you just kind of divide and conquer. Yeah. What was your first job as a kid? Well, it was babysitting was the unofficial under the table job.

I started that when I was like 12. Can you imagine hiring a 12-year-old to babysit? I think that. I'm like, what were they thinking? I babysit like all the kids in my neighborhood. That's how badly parents want to get out of the house. I was like, I need a babysitter. What is happening?

I was so scared. So that was my first official job, but then my real government job was working at the recreation apartment in town. Oh, really? Yeah, I worked there for the next four years. Oh, wow. I taught t-ball and I lined softball fields. I taught tennis.

I picked up trash. I answered phones. I swept floors. I was like a custodian and a maintenance worker. And I did daycare. I did it all. Jeez. We're the only,

it sounds like you were the only one working in town. Well, I think I got demoted. They didn't say it in that respect, but I had a very cushy air-conditioned job of answering the phones. That was the job you wanted because you could do your homework and just answer phones. And then one summer we got a new boss and she was like, you're basically now a maintenance worker. And I'm like, hmm, coming in. Who got your job?

I don't know. one of those girls, one of the girl, other girls, and suddenly I was having to go around in the pickup truck with these burly dudes picking up trash in the parks and lining softball fields. I was like, what happened? It's hot. That's terrible. It's so funny. So when you're like that age, you're in high school and you're hustling and mom's hustling, everyone's hustling. And just the day to day in the house when your mom is not a cook, she is not, she hasn't picked up that gene.

What do you, what do you guys, what are you guys eating like day to day? Was it, was it fast food? Was it just fend for yourself? What was it? Yeah, it was a lot. I mean, she only knew how to make one meal and that was barbecue chicken and corn. and she made it so much that my brother was like, if I see one more piece of barbecue chicken, I will throw it across the wig. We were so sick of it. Oh, no.

Yeah, well, my grandmother, I basically ate at my grandmother's most nights. Oh, really? Yeah, she pretty much made most of the meals. Lunch was always at school. All right. But it was like cereal for dinner if I had to eat at home. Right.

Yeah, it was a lot of unhealthy, cheap stuff, fast food. Man, your grandmother must have been so happy that every day you come running up the drive to eat with it. She had me twice. That's how I can't say I was like totally poor because she still managed to feed me at like three o'clock and like seven o'clock. She doubled down like the after school snack. Yeah, but the after school snack would be like, let's go to Bojangles for fried chicken. And then she'd make dinner at like seven. Oh my God.

You've talked about Bojangles on the show so much that I haven't had it since we've talked about it. I think I had it probably once just in my life. And I literally, literally, without exaggeration, think about Bojangles. once a day. Well, people don't like it. It's like... Who aren't from the South, though. I wonder how you'd feel about it.

I would love it. I know I would love it. Why wouldn't I love it? I don't know. Because Bojangles hasn't been able to survive outside of the South because it's fried... It's very... Everything's very fried. Fried chicken.

Right. And chicken supprint, like chicken nuggets kind of thing. Not nuggets. The strips or whatever. They're known for... chicken fried chicken biscuits everything's fried and um but maybe you would be into it yeah i think i would there's nothing better in the world i think than fried chicken it's pretty tasty and they're yeah they have very buttery greasy biscuits and they have something called dirty rice

which is like so old school it's very old school it's the rice it's rice why would um that like the piece little pieces of of sausage in it. Oh boy. Yeah. I was talking with Duncan Trussell. Duncan Trussell grew up in South Carolina for a spell. And he talks about rice.

Was it North Carolina? I thought it was South. I don't know. One of those two. On the coast. On the coast, like towards the water. But he talks about rice like, like, you know, like it's sacred. The southern rice?

Yeah. Because usually it's some, some sort of chicken broth and other things that they put in it. It's, he couldn't really describe it. He was just like, he was like, when he went about his adult life and all of a sudden ran into someone who made it for him, it was like his head exploded because he'd traveled around so much and it like brought him back through the whole map back to where he was as a kid. And he's like, I can't tell you what there's just something about that.

Christ. Yeah, they have some things in that area, just so specific, you know, chicken and dumplings. We were like, what? What is that? Yeah. You know, it's just some very unique dishes. Cornbreads a staple. Oh, man.

They have this thing called Livermush. What's that? Liver mush. Only like your parent, only parents really eat. eat it, but it's a block. It's a block of liver, like a, it's like almost like a patte kind of thing, but it's been put into a block. And it is liver, liver.

And our people, my age, our parents like slice it, uh, and they fry it on it in a pan. And they, a lot of times either eat it with breakfast, like eggs or something, or they put it on a sandwich with like mustard. Uh-huh. They go nuts for it. It's disgusting. Livermush. They could have at least come up with a better name for it.

Oh, no. Even the name's horrible. It's terrible. My grandfather used to eat scrapple. Oh, I've heard of that. And it's similar. It comes in a block. And it's like weird parts.

It's like stuff left over after a hot dog. Like the stuff that didn't make it into the hot dog. And the hot dogs already. I mean, we both love hot dogs, but we never want to know what's in them. no not at all but man yeah scrapple and the same thing you would cut it and he put it in flour and then fry it and usually have it with eggs in the morning not for me no so when you when you bust out and go to college which must have been a weird time for you because your grandmother that just passes and then two months later you're you're walking into school uh not even two

was that was that a rough oh really was that she got the day i got to caught the day after i got oh the day you got in i'm sorry right right i went home for like four days while every during the time where everybody got to bond uh before classes started and then i showed up is that a hard year the beginning was really hard and i yeah called my mom being like i've made a terrible mistake. I've got to come home. I can't do it because everyone had bonded. Everyone was friends. And I didn't there. You know, normally you get to all be the new person together. And I was not there. So it was, I didn't have anybody to talk to. And I just wanted to be at home. And she, you know, she said, listen, you could come home, but you'll regret it. And don't do that. So it's just tough. out and I thankfully did not go home because eventually I loved it and college was a very positive happy experience for me. Yeah. Man that's a it's such a weird shift to have to make like

your grandmother wants it so badly and then but then you're in such a sad space. So sad. Yeah. And then I have to start off and be like that's a real test for your positive attitude. Well something a lot of people don't realize about me because I have a very silly personality and I put myself out there on videos and my characters are very bold. I can be pretty shy and so the beginning of high school, the beginning of college, the beginning of L.A. were very tough transitions for me to meet people. I get very internal and keep to myself and don't talk and don't put. myself out there. So it takes me a minute to be comfortable. Yeah. That does you do not portray that. Yeah. Well, because once I'm in my element, I'm good, you know. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So you didn't,

after school, you didn't, you went to Spain before you came into L.A. Mm-hmm. Yeah. I'm. That was for a year. For a year. Yeah. My senior. So, I mean, I grew up in a very small town, you know, 5,000 people. And I, I, um, I, um, I, um, I, um, I, um, um, I, um, um, I'm, I, I was. And I, I, I always had this internal feeling that there was more to the world. Yeah. And I didn't get to, I didn't get to grow up with a lot of diversity. I didn't get to grow up with a lot of worldly things. And when I got to college, it was still a very small college,

but I had a professor introduced me to like, I studied in Mexico two summers in a row. And I finally was like, oh my gosh, this whole other culture is so interesting. Yeah. And I've never, I'd never gotten to travel because I didn't have money and I didn't want money to stand in my way of learning more about the world. So I just made this decision I was going to move to Spain for a year. I don't know why. It's such a leap.

Yeah, it's such a leap. So I got like eight jobs. I graduated college and worked from like 6 a.m. to like midnight every day for three months. I graduated college with $50 in my bank account. And by the end of the August, I had $8,000, which was like a million to someone like me. Yeah, geez. I moved to Spain and taught. I tutored kids in English under the table.

And I lived off what I earned in that for a year. I had to actually come home a month early. I ran out of money. Oh, you did? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And then when did you come to LA?

So long story short, at my college graduation, the commencement speaker was an actress. She was from Raleigh, and we hit it off. And I ended up babysitting her friend as part of this earning money for Spain. And we would kind of talk, this is one you had to call house phones back in the day. I'd answer. I don't know why babysitters answered people's phones,

but I did. And we would chat and she ended up telling me if I ever wanted to move out there to be her assistant that she, I could. And I was like, okay, but I'm going to Spain for a year very naively. And somehow she hired me a year later

to come be her assistant. And at that time, are you thinking I want to be a performer or are you not there yet? I did some... You're not thinking that. I did some theater in college, but I had terrible state. right and probably from that shy part of myself and I didn't thrive in that

that program but I think there was a part of me just that thought oh this could be a really cool life experience but then in the backpack part of my head was a maybe there's a performer in me somewhere and so I'm so interesting because it's so interesting because you are such a natural. You're so naturally funny. It seems like this is you're one of those people that had to have thought, oh, I'm going to be on TV from the time they were five years old. No, I always loved comedy, though. I was, I was obsessed with Saturday Night Live my whole life. And I would consume all of the, I called them skits back then. And I would perform those for my friends.

So I always had that as part of my personality. sure but when I first I didn't do any performing my first two years in L.A. And I finally was like so desperate to make friends because I didn't have many friends my first two years out here that I joined the groundlings to take improv classes just to make friends. Wow. That's how it all started. That's so funny. Yeah.

That's so funny. So comedy was born out of loneliness. Yeah, well, that story's been told a bunch. And did it kind of click kind of early? I know it's a little bit of a grind there, but were you just like, huh? Oh, I knew like right away. I was like, this is, because I wanted to take improv in college. I went to a comedy sports show and they go, come to our free, you know, class.

And I went because I knew it. I was like, this is the greatest thing I've ever seen. And then they go, so glad you enjoy this. free class, if you want to take six weeks, it'll be $500. I was like, I don't have it. Or 300, I don't know what it was. I just, I was like, I don't have an extra cent. So I would have loved to, I wish I would have discovered it.

I mean, I discovered it. I wish I could have afforded it back then. But it happened when it happened. So once I finally got to take the classes, I was just like, this is it. This is for me. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Man, you know, you know,

you going through the improv and this happens a lot when we're doing the show and we have all these funny people come through. And there's like that stand-up track and then there's the improv track. Yeah. And I'm always envious of the relationship because it's, you guys all have this common path. And there's a, you could tell there's like a, the bond for.

from whatever you went through. And from the outside, I see it as this kind of free fall. It's improv. Our life is improv. Oh, yeah. We're making all this up at the same time together. Yeah, I was there for seven years. And you just are, it's like comedy boot camp, you know, where you live, eat and breathe,

sketch comedy and writing. And, but it's where all my training came from acting wise and writing sketches. It all's from there. But you look back. You're just like, we were just. these dumb 20-something-year-olds like dressing up in crazy costumes doing the most, the things that we thought were funny back then. You're just like, what?

Like, but you're just in this bubble and you're not even realizing how bonkers your stuff is. But I was able to hone my voice and my comedy. And once I found stand-up. Right. I found stand-up two years into doing improv, and then I teetered between the both worlds. Was it helpful, you think, that improv was the first stop?

Because I was very scared. Just the idea of stand-up was very scary to me. And I didn't grow up on stand-up. I feel like such a fraud sometimes when people were like, who'd you grow up listening to? I'm like, I didn't listen to stand-up. I didn't have access to it. Yeah.

So I don't have that as my repertoire in my... Yeah, that wasn't what you weren't digesting that. Yeah. So I finally, I always wanted to do stand-up and I finally got the courage to take... Oh, I did the nerdy route. I took a class, a six-week class, and you got to perform at the end of the other. Who's your teacher? Adam Barnhart, he's a comic that does a lot of shows at the comedy store.

and our show was at the comedy store and I just loved it and then I did, he ran a show in the belly room and I did the music for that show for a year and he would give me 10 minutes every week in exchange. And that for a brand new comic, 10 minutes was like invaluable.

Huge. So I rose through the comedy store ranks pretty quick. I became a paid regular in about three years. Wow. That is quick. Yeah. But the guys were so good to.

There weren't a lot of women there. There were some, but not a lot. But the guys were always really nice to me and really good to me and really like always they would speak. Because you always kind of needed somebody. It was a whole system back then where you had to get Tommy to let you showcase for Mitzie. All this these things. You had to have people vouching for you. And I was pretty new.

And these guys were really sticking their necks out for me. It was, I really am grateful for them. Yeah, that's amazing. It's amazing that it was, I mean, it's not, it's not a surprise, though. It's like, I mean, it's, it's more of a surprise that you weren't doing all of this stuff. Like I said since you were five years old. Like that part is like surprising. I really wish.

Sometimes when I think that I even start comedy until I was 25, you go, oh, all those years I could have been doing it. I really wish. Yeah, I know. But I also didn't know myself. I was kind of as much as I like try to better myself and be an aware person, I was naive. Like I didn't come out of the closet until I was 25. And I feel like in some ways I was really mature. And in other ways I was just, it took me a little while to catch up.

And because I didn't grow up in a worldly sense and surrounded by. It took me a minute to really like come into my own and be the, be an adult and be the person that I am. Not that I'm not still evolving, but even before the age of, I think 30 for me was when I really was like, okay. Before that, I was just like, ah, I look back at some of my, I go, oh, I just grab my head and I go, oh, I just grab my head. Oh my God. Oh, my God. So it's really bad. The 20s are a mess. The 20s are a disaster. They really are. So I'm glad to be the person I am now. Yeah.

The 20s are a mess. It really is. Well, because too, when you're starting comedy, you just, you don't know what's funny. You don't know.

I mean, I told some jokes, like, that were, like, more graphic than anything. And I remember Paige Hurwitz me, like,

never, never tell that joke again. You're going, what, you know, you're just so, dumb. You're just so dumb. Like, she didn't say that.

I was, like, thinking, yeah. Do you remember what the joke was? I mean, it was something about a woman's cycle. Right. You know, talking about. Yeah. Which, like, who wants to hear about that? But when you're in your 20s, you're just like, for this will be funny.

You're like, it's all I got. Now I just freaking cringe. Like, oh. Yeah. Oh, God. we should do that. We should do that on the show. We should try and find the oldest set we have.

No, I just remember her. It would be so humiliating. I will never forget her just, me coming off stage, her going, don't ever tell that joke again. No discussion. Just don't do it. Yeah, okay, you're right. No one wants to hear about periods.

So was doing Chelsea lately, was that, like the place where you kind of felt like oh i'm on i'm solidly in now like i'm on firm ground or is it before that that was definitely my big break i yeah um i got last comic last comic standing was 2010 um mid mid mid 2010 that was my first tv gig and it was awesome it was what made people people in the lac scene knew i was because i was doing so many shows all the time i was everywhere every night. Yeah. But that was my first introduction to the, I remember meeting like Nikki Glazer and Rachel

Feinstein and all the, you know, these New York people had no idea who anyone was. And I think they probably thought I was a jerk at that point then too because I, again, my shy thing kicked in. I kind of kept to myself because I literally did not know anybody. I knew Taylor Williamson and that was it. And it was a bunch of New York comics that year. And then so that was kind of my intro into TV. And then I had tested twice for S&L, 2009 and 2010.

They had flown me out to New York both summers to audition for Lorne. And I just wasn't ready. If I had auditioned maybe two years later, it would have been a whole different ballgame. But it's just I wasn't ready. I had a raw. I had a raw talent. Like, I think they do that, but it just wasn't honed yet. Because, again, it was that late 20s.

I just wasn't, there's something shifting with me at 30, 30, 31, where I just, everything made more sense. Right, and that's when Chelsea shows up. 30, I was 31 when I got that. Yeah, yeah. That's all right. You didn't want to be on SNL during those years. It was terrible.

It's a hard job. from what I've heard from my friend. But yeah, the Chelsea show is the first, I mean, I, when I got her show, I ran out of money. I was an entertainment journalist for the seven years leading up to that. That's how I paid my bills. But it didn't pay very much. And in 2010, they had to let me go because all the newspapers were folding.

And I just said, okay, well, I'm going to take this year to not have a safety net and just do 100% comedy. And I was broke, broke. I made $18,000 that year. Wow. And my rent was like $11,000. Yeah. And then I got Chelsea the end of, in January, in December, I was like, I don't know how I'm

going to pay my rent in January. And I got Chelsea lately like the first week of January. January. Wow. It's saved my butt. Thank you. Thank you, Nana. Yeah, for sure. I was there for the I was a writer, a full-time writer there for three years. And the last year, I just did the panel. But I did the panel the whole four years. The whole way. Did you have to audition for it? I applied as a writer. I got hired as a writer first. So there wasn't even any guarantee I would get to do to be on the show but right i started being in sketches like week one yeah man there were a lot of comics passed through that show yeah they wouldn't put me on the um they wouldn't put me

on the panel uh we had tried for like two years to get me on the round table and i kept getting told no oh really it was just the sketch stuff they were saying that i was too low key to to to subdue And then they did a big search for a writer, a new writer. And I applied as a writer and had to go through a couple of auditions, interviews and somehow got hired. I go, you guys wouldn't even put me on your panel. Yeah. It's all timing.

It really is. It really comes down to that. It's like we always think like it should all happen when we want it to happen. and then it happens later to greater effect because you actually are better. You know, there's nothing wrong with waiting in a way. Yeah, it's frustrating when you're running out of money. And I mean, I'm so grateful that,

because I was going through a period of time, that period of time was a lot of people going, we really like you, we just don't know what to do with you. It was before being different was considered a good thing. It was not a good thing then. They were like, Oh, interesting. So I would constantly get very close to getting a break.

And they would be like, you know, these executives don't understand your comedy. They don't get your thing. God, that's so crazy. Okay. And then she was, Chelsea was the first one who was like, you're different. And I really like that. And she opened the door for everything. I've been working since.

It's so crazy to think that that was actually. a thing like that being different would have actually been a deterrent in comedy. Like that's so bizarre that that that within your career, which is, you know, a short amount of time really in the grand scheme of things, that that it could have that much of a shift. Yeah. I mean, that's the beauty of stand-up too is that it was so many people weren't getting me for so long that it helped define my voice eventually. And then you can just show people.

this is who I am. This is my comedy. Right, right. So when do you think you're going to make the next shift and come out as a straight woman? It's coming, baby. I do have a dainty side of me, though. Don't let these buttonups fool you. My partner, Jackson, is always like, I don't understand.

You're not butch, but you're not feminine. I do have a little daintiness in me. Yeah, well, I've seen those pictures of you as a little girl. You were a little fashion plate. Well, she says I get too excited when I dress up. I have very feminine female characters that I play where I'm on Chelsea. They did it all the time. They love to doll me up.

I would have long wigs and full makeup. And I'd be prancing around in high heels. And I love, I don't. want to dress like that in life because I like to be comfortable, but I kind of love doing that stuff. Yeah, yeah. It's yeah, who cares? I mean, it's really, but I have to say, just knowing you as being your friend, when you, when you do show up that way in pictures or whatever, it looks like a totally different person. Yeah. It looks like, yeah, you just, you transform into some other character. It's fun. It's full bore. It's fun to show people because,

I think because of my accent and because of my big hair, people just kind of assume I can only do one thing. And so it's kind of nice when you go, do you know who this is? And they're like, huh? It's cool to transform a little bit, you know? It is. I know.

I want to come up with some characters. I always play the same guy. I mean, a lot of my characters are a different version of another character, you know? Yeah, yeah. Well, man, I don't think we're going to, I don't think we're going to get back in the studio really soon. But we should definitely keep, keep hounding them to send us treats. Tom, truer words have never been spoken. I really, I'm so craving, like, just going to, into restaurants and stuff.

I really, and you must be too, because you don't really cook at home. So there's, I, I mean, in so many levels. Yeah. Are you getting good? no jacks is uh jacks jacks

jacks this company that it's sort of like blue apron but it's a different company where they send you the you order like

we order like three meals and they send you all the ingredients and how to make it so we've been doing that where it's like I guess cooking for dummies kind of thing

are they good they're not bad I mean we do them because it forces us to eat vegetables you know it's like a well balanced meal.

Otherwise, we're like eating tortilla chips for dinner. I know. I know, but there's in so many of those moments where you're just like, how many, I can't cook the same thing again. Just give me some can of Pringles and just leave me alone. I think we're ordering food out to go tonight and that makes me very excited. Because we haven't, we don't do it. I mean, we've been doing it a little bit more the last few weeks.

weeks, but it's more of a treat for sure. Yeah, I know. We have friends coming over tonight and they want pizza and they want to drink and it's like, I was good all week and all right. I guess I'm not going to sleep tonight. You're going to order the pizza from somewhere? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'm not making it. You have places in LA you like. I feel like people complain about the pizza out here. No, not for where we live. Like there's other spots around town, but they don't deliver to where I live. And I know it's going to be like, mediocre pizza. It's not going to be great.

Do you have a good one? I made them. I like those. I'm like so bougie now in L.A. I like those like artisan pizzas, you know. Why don't I keep saying you know all of a sudden? Pizana is really good. And there's a place on.

Melrose, it starts with an R. That sounds far, though. No, it's right beside their groundlings. They're not going to deliver to me. No, they won't deliver to you. There's a Lucifer's pizza now in the valley, right? I think people like that place. I don't know.

What's that? What's Lucifer's? It's a pizza place. It's a pizza place. Pizza place. I wish I could think of that place. Too funny. So we're going to keep going with this radio show?

I think so. It seems like it. Are we not? Yeah, it sounds like it. It's been fun. It's been a fun year. It has been. I mean,

that it's all comedians and that we're always doing, that it's always you and I doing some version of comedy every day. Like I couldn't do, I couldn't do a straight show. radio show that was about other things and talking to other kinds of celebrities and stuff. I mean, once in a while we'll get like an actor, but they're always like involved in something comedically. Right.

I feel like, right? You know what I mean? I feel like that's like the comfort zone that makes me want to continue. Yeah. I mean, I never really saw radio as part of my career. Yeah. But I really enjoy it. And it's a nice addition to the other things we do.

yeah yeah no it's it's been i enjoy it i really i sincerely uh love doing it with you i think if we if we if i was if i was put with somebody else it just wouldn't because it's always you know because it's a friendship that's also developing so like you know it's like it's like it's not like oh i've just known this person for 20 years and we're just cranking out this show together it's like you know yeah it's it's uh i feel like we're still growing into it in into it like personally and professionally. I mean, the only time when it was, it was hard at times was when we were both prepping our specials.

So we had, we were on the road all the time doing local shows all the time. And we were waking up at 5.30 in the morning for the show. It got a little like, whoof for a bit there. I know. And, well, we did it. Yeah. So I felt bad because sometimes when I'm really tired, I get quiet, which is, you know, Not helpful for radio.

But, no, I didn't notice that. The only time I would notice you running out of energy is when we did get treats early. And someone would give us like something really amazing sugar-wise. And I'd look over it. And you were kind of like one of my kids, like at a birthday party at the end of the night. Just your head would start going. I was like, she's not an out. I haven't better.

I used to eat on the show all the time. and I don't eat on the show. I've not eaten on the show. Well, here and there. There's been a couple of times, but I've been better. I'm more focused the last since we'd been doing it in quarantine because we've been able, we've had the luxury of not waking up a 530. So my eyes aren't shutting.

No. It was crazy. And we couldn't even get good guests, really. We had okay guess, but we're getting such great. because they don't have to hustle in at 7 o'clock in the morning. It's like when now we're getting like all of the best people are willing to do it because it's at a normal time. Show business people, especially comedians, do not do well early in the morning.

It doesn't work. Before our show and people would say, do you want to come on our radio show at 730? I was like, no, I do not. I got nothing I want to promote that badly. Yeah, no, no one does. It's much better. The shows are much better. Oh, all right.

I'm going to go order some pizza. Do it. Thank you so much for doing this. You're the best. Oh, thanks for having me. I love doing these kind of things. And I like doing yours also because you get to ask questions that you don't normally ask when you're just hanging out. Yeah, it's great.

But thanks for sharing all that stuff about your grandma, especially. It was really. Thanks for listening. I wish I could have met her. Yeah, she was pretty rad. Pretty rad. Fortune rocks. You rock.

All right. Take care. Bye. I'll talk to you later. Bye.