The Chris Voss Show - The Chris Voss Show Podcast – Natasha Pearl Hansen, Professional Comedian and CEO/Founder of My Break-Up Registry

Episode Date: February 22, 2021

Natasha Pearl Hansen, Professional Comedian and CEO/Founder of My Break-Up Registry Mybreakupregistry.com Chris Voss 0:32...

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Starting point is 00:00:00 You wanted the best. You've got the best podcast, the hottest podcast in the world. The Chris Voss Show, the preeminent podcast with guests so smart you may experience serious brain bleed. Get ready, get ready, strap yourself in. Keep your hands, arms and legs inside the vehicle at all times. Because you're about to go on a monster education roller coaster with your brain now here's your host chris voss hi folks chris voss here from the chris voss show.com the chris voss show.com here we're coming with another great podcast we certainly appreciate you tuning in being a part of the. It's like you're part of a giant family that loves you, that hugs you. It doesn't judge you because I can't see you and I really don't know you.
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Starting point is 00:01:17 Go to LinkedIn forward slash the Chris Foss Show. Facebook, the Chris Foss Show. Goodreads.com forward slash Chris Foss. And, of course, Instagram, you can find us on both Chris Foss and the Chris Foss Show, Facebook, The Chris Voss Show, goodreads.com forward slash Chris Voss. And of course, Instagram, you can find us on both Chris Voss and The Chris Voss Show. I've been profiling a lot of different really cool and interesting people, and I've been meeting on the new Clubhouse app. In fact, many times we've been broadcasting live on the Clubhouse app. Follow me over there at Chris Voss, and I'm sure the Chris Voss Show will be on as soon
Starting point is 00:01:43 as well. But what I'd like you to do is check out some of the people that we've been interviewing and follow them as well today we have a professional comedian not an amateur comedian i'm kind of somewhere in like an amateur or below amateur level comedian uh but we have a professional comedian who's actually funny and probably fun much funnier than i am so i'm i'm building this up so i can give her a lot of pressure but i met her at clubhouse got to know her better she's really funny really interesting person i appeared on her podcast as well uh natasha pearl hansen welcome to the show natasha how are you thank you so much i'm good
Starting point is 00:02:22 i'm good just you know surviving this first winter in nine years uh hold up in wisconsin so yeah so i'm good though just you know waiting for the world to waken up just like everybody else there you go aren't we all kind of they're just kind of i feel like i'm actually hibernating like i'm in winter the last two weeks it's been like zero zero you guys don't even register a temperature it's that damn no temperature so i think we got up to one degree for a second and then the last two days it's been like i think yesterday it got up to like 35 and we were like we my boyfriend went ice skating it was my birthday yesterday okay the bikini's gotten oh happy birthday thank you yeah so um actually it's kind of funny how much you appreciate low level
Starting point is 00:03:13 temps when you've been in zero degrees for a long time like i've lived in la for the last nine years and people get such such pussies there like if it's 50 degrees everybody's like draped in 50 items and just like freezing everywhere and handle it and they need a heater and it's just like now i'm like shut up yeah i know how la just like shuts down if like one raindrop falls the whole city just comes just down oh my god there's rain yeah oh yeah rain or wind will completely take la out like people like on a rainy day i've been canceled on and for really big meetings where people like i'm just not going out of this i'm like it's rain like you're gonna be okay you're gonna be okay the uh that's funny in wisconsin they have zero degrees like the
Starting point is 00:04:04 weatherman just say, fuck it. I'm done. I'm not doing any degrees anymore. I'm out. It's too damn cold. Yeah, kind of. I mean, like everything just kind of gives up at that temperature. So, but then it's nice.
Starting point is 00:04:16 Cause then when things actually, cause I, I lived in Chicago before LA, I grew up here in Wisconsin almost five years. I've been starting my career and, uh, the last winter in Chicago was snowmageddon. I think they're actually doing that right now again, where like all the cars are stuck under the snow. But it was like that the year I left. And so it makes you when you live in cold, like that's why people love the seasons because spring comes spring. Everybody's like, fuck fuck yeah yeah let's do everything even if it's like 20 degrees they're like super jazzed yeah it's kind of like my kids
Starting point is 00:04:50 that keep in the cages um you know when they get let out they're just so happy to be free at least the dogs you have to specify that those are dogs that you have not actual kids oh well the the dogs can't go in the cages because the kids are in them oh my god i'm just kidding people know i don't have kids but if i did anyway um so give people your plugs or people can look you up on the interwebs and find out more about you um so people can go to my website mphcomedy.com or natashapearlhansen.com they redirect to the same place. I also have my startup, which we'll talk about soon, which is mybreakupregistry.com right now. It's just an
Starting point is 00:05:31 email collection page, but I'm going to be starting to send out information on that regularly. So you can go to both, sign up for updates on both, get a handle on when I start actually touring again, which is still like giant looming question marks because everybody knows why that's an answer. Um, but yeah, so. Is there something going on right now that, uh, what's going on then? Yeah. If you haven't heard, I feel grateful to anybody who hasn't heard, like if you're on some Island or in space somewhere, they're like,
Starting point is 00:06:01 there's a bunch of people that are on a ship and they had it. They're like, what's this, what's going on? There was a whole um i believe it was the new york times it was something really reputable or time magazine or something you'll have to look it up but it was a there was a guy who went on like a personal sabbatical and went into some like cabin and was just on like a retreat off the grid no social media right when the pandemic first started and he didn't he came out of it didn't know about the riots the protests the pandemic like none of it and i was like what what almost like a beautiful thing yeah i think there was a guy in a boat too he he's like i, I'm going to go across the Atlantic. And I don't think he had radio.
Starting point is 00:06:46 Like when he landed, he's like, what the fuck is going on? Yeah. I thought about going full Ted Kaczynski doing the cabin thing, you know, just getting a typewriter somewhere and just disappearing for a year and writing.
Starting point is 00:06:58 You know what? I actually, maybe not a year, but since I have this startup that I'm trying to like focus on really heavily, like part of me actually thought about getting an airbnb for like an entire month somewhere and just like honing in on shit you know because sometimes i think it is nice to to kind of lock everything out but also we're doing that anyway so it's like you're kind of just locking it out no matter where
Starting point is 00:07:20 you go yeah my kids do that too i have them them, uh, they're, they're always, they're locked out right now. So there was a bang on the door, but it's warm in the garage. They're going to be fine. Always. So, uh, Natasha, as long as we're on the topic of your, uh, startup, let's, uh, let's hit that first. How's that sound? Sure. So, um, it kind of, it all started when I, I was in a long relationship that was coming to a close. It was like a slow close over a long time. I'm sure people have been there. It's like, it can be really tough to get out of something, you know? And so, um, a big reason why it took a long time, I gotta say it's because of tied personal finances.
Starting point is 00:08:08 It wasn't like we were completely tied up, but we, we had been together for almost a decade. And so like, you know, when you have two incomes or joint household income, um, it helps with a lot of things, you know, you have two creatives, it helps allow for flexibility for like travel and to work on projects or invest in projects. And so certain things like that really keep people stuck in situations that they need to be getting out of. So in late, late summer 2019, I was my it was supposed to be my wedding day and it was canceled. It was actually canceled for like the third time technically. So
Starting point is 00:08:48 I had postponed it twice. And then by the time it came around, we were trying to buy time to like work things out and it just didn't happen. And so then it finally was canceled. And I was like, well, I'm happy. I have this contract. So I decided to shoot my first comedy special at that stage. It's called I was supposed to get married today and it's going to be coming out soon.
Starting point is 00:09:16 We're going to we're going to be getting a launch date. Yeah. So it's were you in a bride's dress too? Will you shot it? Sorry to interrupt you. I actually was in a white jumpsuit that was i planned i'm very unconventional when it comes to stuff like even when i was planning the wedding i wanted to do everything unconventionally i didn't want to like you know i'm kind of like a bro when it comes to that stuff i wasn't like i'd get so
Starting point is 00:09:40 pissed when people would call me and be like we want to make you feel like a princess on this day and i was like i'm not a princess i'm not a pretty pretty princess i'm a little more rugged than that i have the same problem people call me all the time they go we want to make you a princess i'm like but i already am anyway well and i talk about that you know i touch on that in my special i i really wrote a lot of things specifically for that day. So it was really interesting because the special was done in one take. There was no obvious repeats or anything. It was my wedding, like guest list that was there. And then, um, yeah. And so I wrote a lot of things specifically for that day. So anyway, shot the special, um, and then a couple months later, me and my fiance officially broke up. And so had I been thinking about how challenging it is for people to leave situations because of finances.
Starting point is 00:10:33 And so I created my breakup registry.com. I started working on it over a year ago now, but it's a crowdfunding and registry platform for people going through breakups. And it also has a community element where people can help one another either share their breakup story or share advice or resources or whatever that may be. So it's been a lot of work to build. You know, I took most of the summer just like teaching myself how to build a company properly with like the right kind of morals and values and being mentored by certain people that I love and, um, and, uh, finalizing the LLC and setting up all the accounts and getting everything solidified, you know, legally. And then now it's getting ready to be launched. I'm just like finishing the product build. That's the biggest pain in the ass ever. If you're not a
Starting point is 00:11:23 technical person, like I don't code. So I have to have other people do that shit for me. No, I'm getting the product bill outsourced, but I'm still kind of on the hunt. I'm going to be doing this thing called building in public with it. So that's why I'm going to start email emails going out soon and like tweets and all that stuff. Cause I want to kind of pull my audience
Starting point is 00:11:45 for the proper person to be like either a technical co-founder or a CTO for my company, like somebody that would work really well hand in hand with me. So that's really what I think I'm looking for. But there's so many different ways to go about the tech side. So it's kind of hard to know what to do. You just, just like any entrepreneur I talked to or any founder, like nobody knows what the fuck they're doing until they made a mistake. And then they're able to be like, that was not what to do. But like nobody knows what they're doing. Like every,
Starting point is 00:12:18 every story is so different. So here's my story. That's awesome. So basically I think I heard you talk about this in Clubhouse now. This is coming back to me. And so basically, you know, when you break up, you know, you've got to maybe leave that toaster behind with XYZ. And so you need a toaster, right? And you need a bed. That's usually a good idea. You know, some silverware, some good idea you know some silverware some glasses you know and depend
Starting point is 00:12:46 upon how the breakup goes you know it one person might get the stuff i remember going through that where you're like fighting over the fucking um you know it's like that uh uh when hallie when harry met sally thing where they're fighting the fucking uh uh wheel table or whatever it was remember that scene yeah i remember when harry harry flips out and he's like someday you're gonna be fighting with that fucking piece of shit table and yeah so uh there's that that fun stuff but yeah i mean yeah i've been through that starting over phase and uh um yeah it's crazy and so you need stuff. Like usually when I just need gifted from a breakup is another girlfriend. Can I put up a thing? Yeah, right.
Starting point is 00:13:34 I mean, and that's also why I want to have partners like with dating apps and stuff. Good ones. Not like, you know, blah, blah, blah. But, you know, I have my eye on certain collaborations with other companies that I think are really doing things well. Um, because yeah, I mean, I think a lot of times people are just looking for a connection, even if it's not somebody that date after they get out of a situation, they even just want to go like have casual dinner and feel like nice for a couple hours. And like, that's the thing too. Um, you know, so there's a lot of ideas I have down the
Starting point is 00:14:05 road. But just like with anything, you have to start with a minimum viable product and then build out from there, you know, where I plan to have this in a couple of years is much different than where it's going to start. But really kind of like what I say it is, is the antithesis of like a honey fund or a Zola, which are like wedding registries um it'll be built a lot like really similarly but for the opposite thing yeah you got a marriage registry you got a breakup registry i love it exactly i love it maybe you can have the divorce court fund some of them or something i don't know yeah there there is one divorce registry but it's not very popular i'm i'm building this to be really fun and like have an attitude and like an air of positivity.
Starting point is 00:14:49 And so it's going to feel really shareable. You know, it's like the opposite of the pretty, pretty princess type of thing. Like the wedding registries are all like, look at us. We're so happy. Everything's sparkly. Fuck, fuck, fuck. And like, you know, this is going to be like more like, dude, doesn't this shit suck? You're going to be fine though.
Starting point is 00:15:07 You know, like. I like that, man. Yeah. Reality. I need a toaster. I need a new convention oven, you know, and there's always stuff you need when you break up because, you know, one person gets one thing. Sometimes, sometimes they fight over the dogs and cats.
Starting point is 00:15:24 Like I get the dog and you're like yeah no you don't uh so you know you can figure all that thing out um the uh i love this idea and what's what's do you have a name for this uh startup yet yeah it's my breakup registry.com okay so my breakup registry.com you own the thing that's awesome yeah and people can go there now i actually own a number of like other um it was gonna have like a different name before and it was a dumb name i'm glad i changed it that's what's nice about having time like you know like people have kids and they name them dumb things and nine months later they're like oh why did i name my kid that stupid i just put my kids
Starting point is 00:16:01 up for adoption because it was too much paperwork to to change their names it was like 10 right right and some paperwork and i'm just like you know i'm just gonna send you off the organ harvesting company that's what's nice about sitting on a company for a while to actually like think it through and be like is this what i want it to be called how's this gonna yeah it is gonna give all the information like i like things that i create to give people all the information that they need my podcast is called future role model there's not a lot of questions there right um the comedy special is called i was supposed to get married today like try to ask some questions about that yeah you know what do you do about people like me because this sounds like a great way to get a bunch of free shit from your friends and stuff and people on the registry like i might just get
Starting point is 00:16:51 in relationships and break up just to get some free shit and just keep doing it like man i might be using the system that's the beautiful thing that's the beautiful thing about this you can't really abuse a system that's created for your own personal community because your friends will start telling you to go fuck yourself yeah and i like that about it you know like like after round three break up your friends are just going to be like sorry you can't figure your shit out here's some therapy like maybe get better maybe that's what that's what you can put in the registry some therapy yeah yeah there's there is elements to that too and like you know um fitness and stuff like that so um that's the nice thing about something like this is like the same reason i did a lot of
Starting point is 00:17:33 research last year like a lot of research on relationships on the way that relationships and breakups are increasing or the breakups are increasing because of COVID because people are just like sick of being around each other. Yeah. The way people are looking at relationships and like Gen Z is just very different than the way that our parents did. And so people are sick of supporting people's weddings because people get married a lot of times too. There's people I know that have been married twice already and I'm,
Starting point is 00:18:04 you know, I'm in my mid thirties. And so it's like, you know, so people get sick of supporting the same people over and over again. And with weddings, you're just expected to, you obviously, um, people had thought about doing singles registries, but that's kind of stupid. Cause like some people are just perpetually single. And then with a breakup registry, your, your, your friends are going to regulate themselves. Like eventually, like if you go through that many breakups and you want to register for things that many times over and over again, you're going to need to keep getting new friends. And that's going to be exhausting. If I break up with my phone, my Samsung, I'm like, I'm getting a new phone. I got to break up with my relationship with my phone. Is that, is that. And the thing is, I hope people get creative with it.
Starting point is 00:18:47 Like, I hope people have other things that they're like breaking up with, like their job and then like can get support from their friends with that too. Like I hope people get creative with the registry and like want to use it for other things besides just relationships. So, yeah, I think it's a great it's perfect time because everyone keeps telling me like all my all my friends who have been married for a long time their wives are telling me there's going to be a lot of divorces when the shit gets over man
Starting point is 00:19:14 it's just like a landslide of people breaking up and they've had enough with each other it's kind of funny they've i guess they were always well many of them were always running on relationships that they just didn't ever spend enough time together to learn to hate that other person and now they have and they're like yeah wait i married you i've been with you for 10 years and i didn't realize you were a complete pain in the ass to live with there's a lot of things that people don't even know about themselves until they have to spend close quarter time with other people and that's something something I can stay. I can, I could talk about that for a while as well. Like, you know, me and my boyfriend, we started a relationship right before winter in the middle of COVID, like that's like double holdup. And I have learned quite a bit of things about myself
Starting point is 00:20:02 that aren't that pleasant, honestly, in that amount of time. I would have never, like all summer when I was just by myself in LA and this really beautiful home in the hills, like running every day. I was getting over the breakup every day, was doing really, really well, like being alone, but having to be with somebody else is a whole nother story. Like you don't learn about yourself insanely when you're just by yourself, you have to have like outer influences to realize like, am, am I like that? Do I think like that? What the fuck? You know? So it's like,
Starting point is 00:20:39 it's been this like chunks of eyeopening periods of time over the last year while i'm just living out of suitcases like starting this business it's been like damn what the fuck what the fuck you know that should be another app you should be working on what the fuck yeah damn what the fuck relationships what the fuck i think there is something like that out i feel like that's a podcast relationships what the fuck we should i should be doing that run podcast. Maybe I can sue because I say that all the time. What the fuck? Especially five years. I said that every morning when I wake up, I'm going to be like, what the fuck?
Starting point is 00:21:17 So you want to talk a little bit more about the special? I think the special is a brilliant idea. I mean, what a great backstory. You're supposed to, you know, have your wedding there saying your value. Yeah. Did you hold it as a stage? The special was an interesting thing because I had, like I said, we had a wedding day in place and then we waited. Like six months later to actually reschedule it with our close friends. And then when that was coming up, I rescheduled it a year later with the venue.
Starting point is 00:21:56 So there were three different dates we had to reschedule with like our people. Right. So by then, I think everybody was losing faith that it would ever happen, which is good. Cause I think they were loosely saving the date and that was absolutely the case. Um, but when, um, it was spring of 2019 that I knew that like, it wasn't, I knew in my heart that I was with somebody that like, not a really nice guy. We'd known each other forever. We'd met when we were 22, like, you know, but it wasn't the right fit for me for a long-term partner and what I, what I wanted and the way I like to live and, um, the way I like to create with somebody, there's a lot of things that I like to do. Like I'm a very collaborative person. And so I like that in a partnership in relationship to
Starting point is 00:22:46 whatever that means. Like, I want to feel like we're collaborating, whether it's on life or like ideas or just having good conversations. Like there were just things that were missing from my relationship. And so I started having the idea in the spring and in April of 2019, me and one of my girlfriends, Rachel O'Brien, she's an amazing comic as well. We produced our own co-headlining tour through Europe and went to six countries, uh, or maybe it was five. Um, but we, we crushed it. We did a really good job and we like sold pretty well. We picked small venues, you know, knowing that it would be tough to sell, but we like sold them well. So at least we picked like smart, you know, and it was just a relationship with somebody and they were going to be overseas for three and a half weeks, like I would make it a point to try and meet up with them on a part of that or something. You know what I mean? And I was having a lot of thoughts during that time.
Starting point is 00:23:58 It was just me and Rachel the whole time. And we were like, you know, I got out of that and was like, Hmm, it's now May, early May. Our wedding was scheduled for June, June 15th. When we got back from Europe on like May 3rd or 4th. And it was like the day I landed that I was like, well, I got to do something with this venue and I got to think of what to do fast because I'm going to owe them a bunch of money. Otherwise, I think it was like, like, it was either like nine grand or 15 grand or something that I owed remaining
Starting point is 00:24:34 depending on what the deposit was. And so actually this is what's kind of funny. So before that, like a couple of months before that, I remember, so my now boyfriend, he's a comedian, Jake Snell. And, uh, I had run into him in Madison at one of the big comedy clubs here and was like joking with him that like, Hey, I'm going to be getting married like in number of months or whatever. Like, I kind of want to do like a, a roast. You should come and roast people at my wedding. Yeah. I wanted to do that like regardless. And then, um, I,
Starting point is 00:25:15 and then lo and behold, he ends up hosting my comedy special on my canceled wedding day. So like nothing had transpired between us at that point, but like, you know, we had like a number of run-ins with each other. And, um, so yeah, from May four until June 15, like, I think it was by May 15, I had some press out and was selling tickets and I was selling like VIP tickets for the dinner. Like it was a tough day because I, I had to host, like we were filming. Right. So I was like co-executive producing with my director. I decorated the whole venue with my family, me, mom, dad, and grandma decorated the night before
Starting point is 00:25:57 I had to be there during the day to like prep for filming and get some like pickup shots and the pre-shots then I had a host of IP people started two hours without with them and out then like the when I went and hid for a bit and then I had to come down and perform for an hour in front of like my workers and my cousins and like and then through like an after party it was like an exhausting day both mentally and emotionally like it was it was tough um and then yeah i think we were shooting until like fucking midnight wow so it was all day and it was just one take so you can't like we had to do a couple resets but the crowd was really cool about it because you know obviously i had like cues i was watching from the director if something didn't get shot right I had to like address the crowd and
Starting point is 00:26:50 like take it back and like you know you just have to like handle that stuff so it was definitely a challenge like so on so many levels and um but yeah and also what was awesome that my boyfriend at that time, obviously we weren't dating, but he had worked with this venue a lot. So he gave me some pointers on how to renegotiate with the venue and do like a bar draw. So he ended up saving me thousands of dollars off of my bill for the space for the venue. So what's a bar jar jar is that where you pass around the thing or something draw draw so like okay so whatever i owed for the venue whatever the bar made they subtracted from that oh that's pretty smart and i wouldn't have even thought to do that and so he suggested i do that and like saved me I don't know probably somewhere between 25 and 2500 and
Starting point is 00:27:47 four thousand dollars depending on what it came out to because everything was taxed you know so but it was um yeah so then that was in June of 2019 and then June of 2020 I was here in Wisconsin and him and I went for one drink and then kind of kept talking after that. And then when I got back here in November, we started dating. So it's kind of like a long drawn out, cool, like, you know, it's fun to actually think back on the trajectory of how you meet somebody special, you know? That's pretty awesome how things turn out. So when does this special come forth? Um, we should have an air date really soon. Like we solidified the deal with the distributor
Starting point is 00:28:25 in like right at the beginning of March of 2020. And then obviously everything hit kind of good in a way, because originally we would have been airing probably sometime in June and there's no fucking way in the world with everything that was happening in this country that I would have felt comfortable promoting my own shit and be like, Oh, my wedding day with like some real shit happening that needed attention. So, you know, in hindsight, sometimes you're grateful for things taking a lot longer than they were supposed to. Now it's just a much better time.
Starting point is 00:28:58 Um, but, uh, so we just finished like copyrights and all the legality paperwork. It's just endless paperwork in end of January. So everything should be, we should have an air date in the next couple of weeks. I would think. Nice. Is there a website you have set up for it yet? Or do they just want to go to your website?
Starting point is 00:29:21 No, no, no, because it's not going to be, it's going to be on an actual platform. Okay. We just don't know which one yet. So it's, it's not going to be it's going to be on an actual platform okay we just don't know which one yet so it's it's not going to be on my website it's going to be distributed on like some real shit cool so if they go to the website they can get news your website they can go to news updates and and be uh yeah oh for sure yeah yeah yeah and when that's ready to come out too there'll be tons of press because it's linked to the launch
Starting point is 00:29:44 of my startup as well so i want them to coincide since the stories are like so interconnected. So I'm getting like PR and stuff ready for as soon as I have the air date to work back. Yeah, that's where we're at. Just the waiting game. The good old, good old Hollywood waiting game that hurry up and wait shit that we've all dealt with our whole career. So there's been lots of great media that's sometimes better, you know, in the can. Let's it kind of, I don't know what you call it, ferment or, you know, just some things are better in the can. You know, I mean, right now it's such a crisis and ugly thing going on. You can't, you know, it's not the most funniest time right now but yeah so how what led you to become a professional comedian what what took you down that road well i mean it's actually funny because the other night with my family we had like pulled out all these like drawings and aspirational things i made in like first and second grade and I like wanted to go to Hollywood and be a director like I've always really liked telling stories I used to do it written you know I used to write as much as I possibly could I kind of became known in my high school um for what was called
Starting point is 00:30:58 Natasha's Books of Thoughts so it was like dumb kind of one-linery like not as good as Mitch Hedberg kind of jokes, but kind of stonery, almost like that, like quick, quippy things that you could read to friends. So I had all these notebooks I would carry around and I would read them at parties and like older kids liked me and invited me to parties because I like had these funny things. And so it was kind of a bug that was in me early on. I just hadn't, I just hadn't considered it as a real option for a job.
Starting point is 00:31:28 Yeah. Well, it's cool. You were kind of performing at a young age. Yeah. Writing at a young age, maybe. Exactly. And I was in college for pre-med, so I was taking a pretty heavy workload. But my minor was in theater, I was trying to like balance it
Starting point is 00:31:47 with something that I knew I just wanted to do I didn't really want to tell my friends that I was taking a minor in theater because I didn't I didn't want anybody like make fun of me or anything so I just kind of did it on my own um but one this was actually there was a lot of you know just like with anything there were a lot of different signs or a lot of different moments that kind of led me to like not going down this one path and to kind of feeling like the other path was going to be the choice. But so I think my answer to this varies depending on who I'm talking to and what seems more poignant. But my, there was one day in one of my Shakespeare classes, it was like Shakespearean literature 101 or something. And it was like this huge lecture hall. And I had done a piece on Midsummer Night's Dream, which I love because it's, you know, humorous. And we were supposed to write a speech about our take on our thesis. And they were doing sections in the lecture hall by last name. And the day I got there, it was the H's and I didn't, I didn't prepare mine. So I like ended up ad-libbing the entire thing. Luckily I had written a really good thesis. So my ad-lib was
Starting point is 00:33:02 like really good, but because I was not reading off of something, I performed it really nicely. And it was like maybe only eight minutes in front of the lecture hall. And my teacher came up to me after and was like, you didn't prepare anything. I was like, no. And she was like, that was really good. Like you should do improv. And I actually had never heard of improv. So I went back to my dorm room and typed in the Google task before it was even like called Googling something. And I would just look up improv and, um, started reading down this rabbit hole of second city, Chicago. So it was, it was that summer that I decided to check out Second City.
Starting point is 00:33:46 And then I left school. And then I worked at an Applebee's in Madison. And I drove to Chicago every Sunday for class and drove back at night. Or as I made improv friends, sometimes I'd sleep on their couch if we were drinking after class. And I did that for four months or five months until i saved up enough applebee's money to move to chicago and then i moved and slept on an air mattress for a while and that wasn't that's what i did there you go so how long you've been doing a professional comedy comedy it's i mean it's been 15 years since i started the truck at second city
Starting point is 00:34:28 and i always remember one of my earlier directors he told me up front because i was like just turned 21 when i started um one of the bigger programs there and i was the youngest in my class and he was like you're really good like you're gonna really well, but just want you to know this career is going to take you 15 years. So grow a pair and buck up. Wow. anytime something good would happen in my career or something was giving me like some notoriety, I would be like, all right, this is just a piece of the stepping stone to this like larger story that you're creating. So this is year 15. So I was like, cool, this is the perfect year to be releasing my special. And maybe that actually means that like, cool, I'm exactly where I'm supposed to be, you know? there you go. There you go. Um,
Starting point is 00:35:25 so this is awesome. You've got the, uh, startup launching, you've got the, uh, and I love the premise of the startup. I also have the premise of the special. So you've got the special going on you're in your 15th year and, and, uh, hopefully, uh, they, they're been saying that we might have, uh, everyone inoculated or vaccinated or just uh whatever by july or june so you you probably could just come shooting right out of the gate there yeah that'll be awesome and that's the goal is that you know that's the hope is that since we've had like kind of a bummer of a year as far as live performance we've all had to get super creative so like now that
Starting point is 00:36:05 now that the special is going to be coming out at this time hopefully that'll be a nice like you said launching pad into like re-touring again i have a really good management team and um so they're working with me on like getting a right getting a plan in place and you know so we have a lot of cool goals for this year and next year so i think it's just the i think it's the right timing for things sometimes things just work out as they should it's kind of weird how life sometimes uh comes around that way um and and yeah i mean i i gotta tell you everyone's gonna be getting out of their house they're gonna be going to comedy clubs they're gonna be going to different events and stuff i i plan on when everything's over i'm leaving my house i'm not coming back for like i don't know half a year i'm just like
Starting point is 00:36:49 i'm just going to be out everywhere like just traveling now just be malls just go to the mall like all day just stupid shit you know just just being out i know i'm just going to go up to strange people rub my face up against them and just be like, God, we can't get to the COVID anymore. I'll just be like hugging people at malls and shit. That's such a thing. Like I'm, I'm not, I'm not like a touchy, like there, um, how do I word this? Like, I'm not a touchy person. Like there's touchy people.
Starting point is 00:37:20 And I think those people creep a lot of people out. I'm a very like naturally affectionate person though. So I love toy people. And I think those people creep a lot of people out. I'm a very like naturally affectionate person though. So I love to hug people without being able to hug people for the last year. Like it's really affect. It's really affecting me. Maybe, maybe there are people that hate being touched and they were like, yes.
Starting point is 00:37:38 But for me, I'm like, God, I just missed just fucking hugging people. Yeah. Shaking hands. Yeah. i just miss just fucking hugging people dude shaking hands yeah like greeting people or making them feel like embraced you know yeah i saw those people on the internet where they make like a plastic sheet and they have like the holes that go through so you can hug your grandpa and stuff
Starting point is 00:37:59 and not give them but yeah after when when all this is over man i'm just gonna be running around just being like hey do you want to make out i i don't i'm not attracted to you but i just we can do that now i'll look your face or something i'll go to the mall glass stuff like that more than anything i want to go back to europe like oh it's already been almost two years since i was there and like i I love incorporating comedy into everything I do. It's usually been a good catalyst to be able to travel all the places I want to, like in 2019, I was really lucky to perform in Spain, France, Italy, the UK, you know, like London, Edinburgh, all that stuff. Um, Prague, Germany, like I got to hit a lot of really cool places. Thank God before the world shut down.
Starting point is 00:38:46 Cause it at least felt like I bought myself some time, but like, I really want to go spend some time in like some of the overseas markets and like perform in like Paris again. And like just places that challenge you as a writer and as a comedian, like I, I would love to do that. Like, you know, Just when it comes to markets stay out of the wuhan wet market the uh i'm gonna throw a chinese joke in there just for the chinese segment of my audience
Starting point is 00:39:15 um no this is this is awesome i mean it's gonna be fun like i'm just gonna be like uh i want to just eat at restaurants and just sit there in the restaurant like for hours and just like i don't have to worry about covid and you're just you know what's nice too is it'll probably take me a while but you know anytime these days anytime you're in the store or something somebody starts coughing you're like you're like holy crap get me out of here and um yeah not have to be throw a fit every time someone someone uh coughs near you and stuff yeah and hopefully people just learn to be less gross like yeah that's probably true too if anything has taught us about the math thing you know people have people are much grosser than like than we realized until the math thing came into play like you know now that people have to sneeze
Starting point is 00:40:06 into their own faces they're starting to become a little bit more aware of how like vile that can be like just keep wearing the mask you kind of like right yeah hopefully we'll just end up in a like a more you know conscientious society as far as not spreading our shit to people because you know that's the thing i might just keep wearing the mask because people think i still have something they'll be like what's going on with you man i'm like just don't get fucking near me just stay away the mask has been handy for winter here it actually has like been great to wear one it keeps your face warm we were ice skating yesterday and like my face was sweating and I was like
Starting point is 00:40:47 this thing actually does something there you go the you know the one thing is I had a joke queued and it lost it just went the nice thing about the mask the queue won't come anyway
Starting point is 00:41:03 it was wonderful to have you on natasha uh yeah thank you so much things give us your plugs so people can uh go google you on the interwebs and find out more about you yeah so website is nphcomedy.com it stands for natasha pearl hansen but you'll remember that easily by neil patrick harris i share his um share his, um, share his, uh, same initials. Um, so NPH comedy on all socials. That's on Twitter, Instagram, fucking Pinterest. I don't know what you guys do, but, um, TikTok, my TikTok is terrible. Please don't go, just go and judge me on it. It's bad. I need to redo it. Um, and then obviously on clubhouse, I'm also NPH comedy. I need to go on there more, but it's just like so flooded right now that I just get overwhelmed a little bit.
Starting point is 00:41:53 And then my startup is mybreakupregistry.com. So you can go there and just subscribe to the movement as I call it, which is the breakup breakup movement and you can start getting updates as soon as I start putting them out and follow the entire journey of me creating this startup in public because that's what I'm going to be doing there you go I had a breakup movement it was leaving my shit behind oh anyway uh the um I did remember the joke though the joke was the problem with the coronavirus thing is is no one's going to have excuses for anything anymore. Like, you know, if somebody calls you and like, hey, you want to come over for that barbecue and you don't want to come over, you can't be like, I got the corona right now, I can't.
Starting point is 00:42:36 Or, you know, your boss calls you and like, why don't you show up for work? You're like, I got the corona. You know, your wife calls you and like, why are there panties in her bed from some other woman and you're like i got the corona you know that's it you're gonna lose that excuse so exactly all right well this was so much fun thank you for having me thank you for coming thanks natasha thanks for tuning in be sure to check natasha out in our future special and everything she's been working on go to youtube..com. Fortuna's Chris Voss hit the bell notification, go to your goodreads.com for Chris Voss. You of course find the Chris Voss show on Facebook,
Starting point is 00:43:10 LinkedIn, Instagram, and all that good stuff. And of course, follow us on clubhouse. Thanks for tuning in. Stay safe, wear your mask and we'll see you next time.
Starting point is 00:43:19 Thank you so much.

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