The Daily Show: Ears Edition - From the Archives: Yara Shahidi - January 2, 2018

Episode Date: May 21, 2018

Yara Shahidi discusses her "Black-ish" spinoff "Grownish" and explains how she's been politically active during the Trump administration, despite being too young to vote. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

You're listening to Comedy Central. John Stewart here. Unbelievably exciting news. My new podcast, The Weekly Show. We're going to be talking about the election, economics, ingredient to bread ratio, on sandwiches. Listen to the weekly show with John Stewart, wherever you get your podcast. My guest tonight is an actor who plays Zoe on Blackish

and is starring in the new spin-off series, Grownish. Please welcome, Yara Shahidi. I'm so glad. Thank you. Thank you for having me. I'm so glad to have you here. Uh, everyone from Blackish has been on the show. We've been fans of yours for a long time. Thank you for having me. I'm so glad to have you here. Everyone from Blackish has been on the show.

We've been fans of yours for a long time. And now you have gone from Blackish to your new show, Grownish, which in many ways parallels your real life. What is Grownish about? Grownish, I mean, is a very literal title in that it is a kid, Zoe Johnson, who thinks she has grown and soon realizes that she is not. And so it's her journey in this world of uncertainty. And it's really interesting because somebody pointed out that today was the day Kenya Barris, the creator of the show actually called me with the idea. So the show was being released basically a year from the day he actually called

me, and a year from the day I turned in my own college applications. There's many th th th th th th th is is th is th is th is th is th is many th is many th is many parallels in your story as well. Oh yeah. Right, so so you applied to college and your character Zoe is also going to college for the first time. You got accepted into Harvard, which is huge. And then you deferred it, you're like, I'm not going to go yet? Yes. I mean I'm I'm turning 18 next month, so I'm young for my grade. And I already knew that I planned on taking a gap year show or no show. The spin-off wasn't even an idea yet. And so it was the idea just that I wanted to be able to fully appreciate my college experience and be on campus and I already know what I want to to the the their their their their their their their to their to be to be to be to be to be to be to be to be to do to do the the to do to do the the to do to do to do to do their to do their their their their taken taken taken taken taken taken theirpape theirp. taken taken taken taken taken taken taken taken taken taken taken taken taken taken taken taken taken taken taken taken taken taken taken taken taken taken taken taken taken. taken. taken. taken. taken. to to ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta. ta. ta. ta. ta. ta. ta. ta ta ta ta ta and I want to take a moment in between working because I've been working my entire academic career.

So I wanted to be able to take a moment and then do a proper transition. That's like a pretty gangster thing to say to someone, oh I'd love to come to Harvard, but I have to finish acting. I have a spin-off series for my other successful series. And so it's a really exciting story in that's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, I, I, I's, I's, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I, I, I's, I'm, I'm, I'm, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I. And, I. And, I, I, I, I. And, I, I, I, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th th th th. to, you know, your character Zoe goes into this new environment and she realizes that she's not as grown as she thought. She realizes that there's different communities and different worlds that she has to experience. Were the experiences that you took from your life, that you applied to Zoe's? I mean, I think the one thing that Zoe is experiencing for the most part is that she's no longer experiencing thi things thi things thiiiiiiiiii, thi, thi, thi, thi, the reality, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, to, thi, tooiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii, thi, thi, thi, thi, thithat Zoe is experiencing for the most part is that she's no longer experiencing

things in theory. And so there is the reality of Zoe's situation in which she has socioeconomically privileged. A lot of what we talk about on the show doesn't directly affect her. And there's a certain semblance of, I have the luxury of living in the progressive blue bubble of California. And so a lot of the college experience is similar, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, and, and, the, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, the, and, and, and, so, and, so, so, so, so, so, and, so, so, so, so, so, souuuuuuuu. And, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is a the the the the they.e.e.e.e.e.e.e.a, somea, somea, somea, the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the college experiences, similar to any experience I've had in which that bubble is broken, and you realize that nobody, not everybody agrees with you, and you have to very much figure out your own opinion as well as why you believe in what you believe in, because it can no longer be like, this is just the way things are. You actually have to have that and have a line of reasoning, and so a lot of that comes with your personal development

and evolution along with a political development, which is expedited by our current administration. I was just appreciating that for a moment. That's something that I won't like, amaze me the first time I saw you not in your role on TV. I was, you flow, you lyrically flow through your ideas with a certain level of panash that most people do not possess, right? And you are, you, you're also engaged in politics in a way

that most young people aren't. As you said, you are turning 18 and because of that, you are really excited to become a part of the voting process, which is not normal for most the the th, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, the th... th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. thi. And, th. thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, th. And, th. And, th. And, th. And, th. And, th. And, th. And, th. And, th. And, the the the th. And, the the the the the the the the th.. th. And, the the th. And, th. And, th. And, th. And, th. And, the th. And, th. And, th. And, th th thri. And, thrown that that's, that's, that's, that's that's that's that's thrown that's thrown that's that that thrown th for most young people. Do you think that's a sign of the times we're living in? Yes, I mean it's always been who I am. I've always been excited to vote, and like when I was four, I had asked my grandfather if he'd be my roommate in college, because I was already looking forward to being in college. Yes. I'm always been one to plan ahead.

Yeah, that's way ahead. And so, I mean, I think being 18, it's like, okay, cool, I'm an adult and everything, but I can finally vote and I think what's really exciting is that I will be able to vote during midterms, and midterms determines how we redistrict and being able to vote while we figure out how we are redistricting means that in 2020, we're going to have a few things figured out hopefully. Do you think enough young people will come out and vote? I know you have an initiative that you're trying to inspire young people to come out. Yeah, so it is called 18 by 18 for obvious reasons, but I think a really big part of what

this election proved is just how young people vote. And also with everything happening in Virginia and Alabama, we see that people are not only willing to vote for first-time candidates, but there are first-time voters finally coming out. And a lot of the issue that I personally see with how we educate this generation is as though we don't have to have a political opinion until it's time to vote. And so we inherit this system that we have no idea about and we have no clue how it properly functions and so we theoretically vote based on ideology with no backup for why we support certain ideologies and really no

correlation between how our passions translate into policy change. Right. And so to be able to create a platform in which it can easily spell that out and for us to be able to truly take control of this political system, I feel like is really important. When you look at your personal life, you are someone who has been directly affected. You are someone who many people didn't know, you are half Iranian and half black. And that's an interesting combination of people

who are experiencing not the greatest time in America right now because of the current administration. You came out and you spoke about that. Why was it important for you to speak out? Was it scary? Was it something that you were proud of doing and would do again? I mean, quite honestly, I come from a family of humanitarians and so on my mother side, my papa's a Black Panther, and then on my Bubba's side, I have family in Masched

where actually rallies are happening right now. And they're all humanitarian as well. And so it's something that I feel like I've just been born and raised with and around the idea that you are socially conscious and take care of your global community. Now, I think this administration put a layer of emergency around the message just because I remember when the ban happened we were actually my my Junji and my grandmother was actually considering flying in for the first time in 13 years. Oh wow.

And so fortunately because she has her US citizenship she was able to do so but it was that scary moment of oh this affects my family and I have family in which you hear these things on the news and And when Donald Trump says all of these things about Iranians, about Muslims, I'm like, oh, but there are real people, and I know the people that he's talking about. And those are my choles, and those are my cousins. And so I feel like that's why it was important for me to speak out,

and just being half black and half Iranian. appreciation for what culture and the amalgamation of culture does. And so to be in a society that basically preaches Cold War isolationism as though that does anything or effectively helps our state progress is just surreal to experience. And so any message that I can spread that saying like my family is living proof of just the beauty of connectivity and interconnectedness, is something that I'm willing to talk about? If you look at the future, because I mean, you plan way, you plan, you, you, you, you the the the the the the the the, you, you, you, you, you, you, the, the, the, th, th, th, th, the, the, the, threat, the, the, the, the, the, the, threate, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, to, to, to, to, to, to, theat, theat, the, theat, the, the, the, the,, is it something that I'm willing to talk about? If you look at the future, because I mean, you plan way, way ahead. In a month's time, you turn 18, you then vote in the midterms. Do you see a future where you get involved in politics more directly? I describe my future as being policy adjacent, just in that I

would like to be next to Capitol Hill but not on it. And so the major that I'm doing at Harvard is actually called Social Studies. It's an interdisciplinary, sociology, economics, philosophy, and anthropology major and African-American studies is my second major. Wow. And and... Wow. Wow. But, with that, the goal is to either go into the nonprofit space or something along those lines that can help influence our political system without being in the political system. And when you got into that world, when you applied to go to Harvard, you had somebody really special who wrote a letter of recommendation

for you. My AP Calc teacher did indeed write one of my letters of recommendation. That was one letter and there was somebody else. First Lady Michelle Obama did write the second one. That's my thing. If Michelle Obama writes a letter of recommendation, I feel like you don't need to go to the school anymore. You just carry that with you and you're like, uh-huh, uh-huh. How do you stay humble?

How do you, how do you contextualize that in your life? Quite honestly, I've lived a very non-normal life, and so I feel like I attribute it to the fact that one of my cousins is an astronaut and one of them is the rapper Naz. And so there's high expectations in my family. Yeah, yeah. I can only imagine, yeah. And so I think with that being the context in which I was raised, there's a certain expectation that you achieve awesome things,

and then you just kind of to do it. Well, I th I I I I I I th I th I th I th I th I th I th I th I th I th I th I th I th I th I th I th I th th th thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thiolk thi thi thiolioliolk thia'er's thia'er's thi thi thi thi thi. thi. the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. theea. theaugh. thea. thea. thea. theaughea thea thea. thea. thea. th Well, I think you're going to do it. I think you're going to be the first astronaut slash rapper slash politician slash president of the United States at the same time. Thank you so much for being on the show. Amazing young women. Grownish to men is January 3 at 8 p.m. Show with Trevor No. The Daily Show, Weeknights at 11, 10 Central on Comedy Central and the Comedy Central app. Watch full episodes and videos at the Daily Show.

And follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram for exclusive content and more. This has been a Comedy Central podcast. This has been a Comedy Central podcast. Twitter and Instagram for exclusive content and more. This has been a comedy central podcast. John Stewart here, unbelievably exciting news. My new podcast, the weekly show. We're going to be talking about the election. Economics, ingredient to bread ratio on sandwiches. Listen to the weekly show with John Stewart wherever you get your podcast.