Tomorrow - Episode 27: Sara Schaefer Mansplains Her Career

Episode Date: October 9, 2015

This week, comedian and writer Sara Schaefer sits down with Josh to discuss her incredibly varied resumé and struggle against a patriarchal society hellbent on keeping a good woman down. Intense internet harassment, sexual tension backstage at "Late Night with Jimmy Fallon," the stressful life of a "Who Wants to be a Millionaire?" writer, and getting tattooed for Jesus are just a few of the topics that Josh and Sara cover. Grab a cup of whatever it is you're drinking (we won't judge), and settle in for a stark look at world you can only begin to imagine. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

[♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ Hey, and welcome to Tomorrow. I'm your host, Josh with Topolsky. Today on the podcast, we discuss Mr. Pib, gun control, and lower back tattoos. But first, a word from our sponsor. This episode of Tomorrow is brought to you by Wealthfront. Wealthfront is a low-cost, automated investment service that makes it easy to invest your money the right way. It works 24-7 to manage your portfolio, keeping it diversified, customized to your risk profile, and optimizing its trading behavior to keep your tax bill low, all without ever charging commissions. Whether you've got millions or you're just starting out, Wealthfront is the most sophisticated way to invest your money.

To sign up and get your free personalized investment portfolio, go to Wealthfront.com slash tomorrow. Are you a tech professional searching for a new company to share your tech skills with? Then you should check out Hired. Hired connects town with top tech companies. On hired software engineers and designers get five plus interview requests in a week. Each offer has salary and equity upfront. They have full engineers and designers get 5 plus interview requests in a week. Each offer has salary and equity up front. They have full time and contract opportunities. Users can view offers and accept or reject them before talking to any company. And they're working with over 2,500 companies from startups to large public companies. They also have employers

from 12 major tech hubs in North America and Europe. And it's totally free for users. If you get a job through hired, they'll give you a $2,000 thank you bonus and there's a special if you use our link Hired.com slash tomorrow podcast to sign up they'll double that bonus when you accept a job so they'll double the $2,000 thank you bonus when you sign up at hired.com slash tomorrow podcast. If you're not looking for a job and know someone who is you can refer them to H hired and get $1337 in a bonus when they accept the job. So what are you waiting for? Check out hire.com slash tomorrow podcast right now.

My guest today is an old friend. Somebody I met in a very strange way and have followed since then. The comedian, the online personality, the dynamic entertainer known as Sarah Schaefer. Hi. Am I saying that right? Yes, you are. I used that joke earlier when you weren't recording and I thought I'm going to- It really killed. I'm going really kill it was an amazing. Yeah, so Sarah

I mean do you actually identify yourself as a comedian? Yeah, you do you say I mean first informus. Okay, and then what what after that you usually say writer Mm-hmm producer. Yeah, you've done it you've done a lot of things I met you in an environment which like You certainly were being funny But like it wasn't a comedian, a traditional comedian environment. We met when I was first on, was it the first show? I don't remember how early it was, but-

Very early. When I was first on late night, one of my first or second appearances or whatever, Jimmy Fallon's late night, you were like one of the bloggers. Yeah, I ran all the, I was head blogger. You were the head blogger. Yeah, right.

I ran the whole list of me. And like you would like come you would like be backstage And you had like a camera you would ask people questions. Yeah, do you remember the first thing that you asked me on camera? Do you remember our first conversation? No, because you would like basically you just like came into the Yeah, I would invade like huge celebrities privacy. Yeah, I'm like hi To me, I wasn't like how dare you because nobody ever yeah They were always pre-arranged. We always got permission ahead of time. It was I mean that was like the first late night show that really did stuff like that. So yeah, they were for the internet. Yeah, and and it was in the beginning in those days it was hard to convince even our own talent department to pitch these ideas to the bigger celebrities or even minor.

Just it was like, there's this thing of the internet, it's very hot right now. Yeah, I mean, well, because they were like, we don't want to bother them, we don't want to bother them. Right, right. And luckily, Jimmy proved to everyone that this is important and it's content that people want. I mean, it's sort of the basis for,

I feel like that one of the biggest pieces of the success of everything that that show is doing and how the Night Show does is like playing to the internet. It's essentially thinking about the internet first as like the first place where something's gonna matter versus like on TV at 11.30 or in this case, 12.30. Yeah, we won Emmys for it. Yeah, that's a very exciting.

No, so yeah, and so you were leading this thing and you would come in and you would I'm trying to think of the conversation that we had. I don't remember. I don't I don't remember either. It was all it was just a sort of question. What kind of questions did you ask though? Like, can you think of questions you would ask people? Sometimes we would just do straight-up interview, but I think we had like we would get questions from Twitter and we would ask people like three questions from Twitter. I think we did some of those, but you got really bad questions from me.

Like you tweeted, days like Tech, Nerd, Josh, Pulsing me on the show, like what do you want to ask him? And like they were all like people who followed me. I see you guys like, what are these things? How much RAM do you think the next Samsung, whatever it will have?

It was like not good TV stuff. We would do, and we, I don't remember. It's such, it was such a blur. I mean, it really was a crazy story. How long were you there? A year and a half, but it felt like a decade. Yeah, I did just. It felt like it felt like longer to me too.

Maybe I was there two and a half years. No, I was there two and a half years. Yeah, okay, that sounds good. Yeah, it was like an intense time to work there. The first year, I mean everyone, if you have talked to anybody that worked a file and if work there. The first year, I mean, everyone, if you have talked to anybody that worked at Foulin, if you were there the first year, it was like magic. I mean, it was just summer camp, honeymoon.

I'm like, Summer camp honeymoon. Yeah, it was sexual and fun. Really? Wow. There was so much fun going on. I don't get the sexual aspect of it. I had to pin in who you were.

Some of the producers were grabbing in a way that I felt was where much fun. The sexual aspect of it. I had to pin in who you were. Some of the producers were grabbing in a way that they felt more there. I may have been one of those people. Really. Yeah, man. I was fresh off a divorce. I was like, throwing myself into this job. You do, you talk about this on your album,

even I'm called Chrysalis. Yes. Am I pronouncing that right? Yes. Which I just recently listened to. It's like a bunch of people were talking about when it came out, which was like six months, a year ago. This past March, yeah, six months. And I have not, I was like, then I was like,

well, I should listen to this picture. I plan to listen, I plan on it, but I was just listening to it. And you do talk about getting to, well, we'll talk about that in a second, but I don't know why I diverted the conversation to mention that later on we would get to a topic. It's a teaser.

Anyhow, so you were hooking up with a lot of people at the headlater. No, no, no. Do you name names? No, no. Anybody famous? No, I'm not, no comment. Is that a yes?

No comment. Too long, was it too long? It was, no, I wasn't hooking up with guests. Staff members. May love to Jude Law backstage during, I met Jude Law. It was one of my highlights of my life. He came into my dressing room and he was like, with his producer, and I forget who it was, might have been Jim Javon and maybe it had been somebody else. And he's like, we're going on a tour of the studio.

Do you want to go? Like, this is Jude Law talking to me. I was like, yeah, of course I do. And then we went on a tour of the backstage area of the show. Yeah, it's, it's, um, and it was great. In those days, it was, I mean, and I'm sure now too, but that's,

I can only speak to the beginning years. It's much more professional at this. Right, it's, it's toned down. Everybody has their job, everyone. It's very, it's very pro. Yeah, and I mean, when we, in the beginning, it was really wild. You know, like, everybody has their job, everyone. It's very pro. It's like, it was definitely crazy. In the beginning, it was really wild.

Every day was a new adventure. There were crazy things happening. Now I'm sure working there, it's like, oh, Mick Jagger's here, big whoop. But at the time, anytime anything exciting happened, Neil Young coming on, Jimmy doing some hilarious new impression that no one had seen before. It was just, every night was a discovery.

And so it was a really special time to be there. It's also weird because I think that it's easy to forget now, really easy to forget that like Jimmy, for a lot of people was not this like really well liked popular. No, it wasn't a Gary. I mean, this is like, a lot of people didn't like him in an unes and now. I mean, I remember a lot of my friends.

I got made fun of, by peers. Oh, I'm sure people are like He's so annoying. He's the guy who was breaks like oh, I hate that guy Yeah And then and then like he made two movies that weren't huge successes And people are like this guy and what's going on with him? And then they're like oh, he's gonna be the hostess And everyone's like yeah, right. I mean, there was a lot of that for sure Yeah, a lot of people had to eat crow on that one. I actually I actually, when I met him, which was not, which was in Las Vegas at the Consumer Electronics show, I had only my only knowledge of him

was like what he'd done on SNL and taxi. Yeah. So it was like, oh, this guy's actually kind of cool and smart and totally different and super like warm in a way that I was not expecting. Yeah. And I think that, like, obviously, tried to be real. obviously, he made it really, I mean, he really made everyone feel so included and it was interesting because he was already famous.

You know, so everybody was like scared in a way like, yeah, what's he gonna be like? And, you know, but he was just that, he is that person, you know, the nice, fun, um, and loves music, super talented, and it just it worked, you know, so you there for it, so you there for two and a half years, yeah, and then you left to do what? To write for who wants to be a millionaire. All right. Oh, some people were confused by that move for me, but I'm confused. I'm confused.

I really wanted to be a writer. Right. And thank you for staying. Let I'm confused. I really wanted to be a writer and let me tell you. Well, and this isn't a criticism of any particular thing there, but this just happens naturally in many jobs is once they see you in the position that you're in, they can't see you as anything else. And I really wanted to be a writer there, but it just never happened. And I got to have submit, but I always got beat out by the shiny new thing. They knew me. You're like, they're like, she's here.

They just saw me as the blogger. And meanwhile, I've been a standup for a long time. And that's okay. They didn't, I don't blame them for that at all. But I got an opportunity to submit to write for who wants to be a millionaire. And at first I was like, no, that's stupid. And then-

Is this with, wait, was Regis the host? No, Meredith was the host at the time. But Regis was at one point the host of the movie. Yes, he was the original American host. By now he was a little fuzzy. Yeah. He was the host in England as like Pierce Morgan or something. Yeah, it was the host in English like Pierce Morgan or something. Yeah. Probably. Um, I ended up getting the job and it was writer's guild and, um, it was great

hours and great money and, and it got me out of, cause, you know, late night was a, it became such a grind too because it was so much work. It was, I had so much on my plate. It was out of control. I was working 12 to 14 hours a day. We'll go do stand up at night, go home and do more work. Go to bed, get up, be it one of the first people at the office, and it was just really brutal. And I needed a change. And it's like, what's the, what's the, what's the, in that scenario, the reality is like, and this is not an awkward what you guys did, but like the stuff that was important for the people who really paid attention to was like the stuff that was made for TV that then went back to the web.

Yeah. And it was like, it's very hard to see how you, there's a progression of like being the blogger there and that being like equally important or like also focused on and invested in the beginning. They were really, they were really inclusive of us. And we were part of the writers' meetings and we were allowed to pitch ideas for the show. And we were doing creative projects on our own online.

And it was very creative. Yeah, but I think it just started to evolve into more of a utility for the show to promote. And the internet was changing. Gifts became like a thing towards the end of my time. Now it's like gifts are part of spreading your content. It's crazy how simplified it has become in some ways. And on my way out, it was becoming more like,

this is social media management job. Not creating new content. Right. And there's creativity that goes into that. And I've seen the stuff that they have done. And I'm like, I see what you're doing. I love that. They're pretty good Tumblr.

Yeah. And I'm glad at it. I remember when we started the Tumblr, there was like, whatever, just started. Like, we were like, and now. That's a problem. I think for a lot of people, that was the case of Tumblr. Yeah.

Like, you've got to have a Tumblr. Yeah. And so I think, you know, it's always evolving. And I think they know now to tell people who get hired for that job, like, you know, you're not gonna be a writer on the show. Right. Don't expect that. I think it could happen, but it's not like a natural progression.

So you were in a couple of like sketches if I were like, like, yeah, that was like, you know, you'd be, I'd walk into work and they'd be like, Mike Schumacher would come up to me and be like, hey, do you are you busy today? And I'd be like, I would always say no, even though I was so busy. Right. Because I would knew that that meant it was something cool. Right. Coming. Yeah. Um, or something stupid. Like, you take pictures of the balloons we're gonna put in Jimmy's office. What? We were, we were,

they would just do stuff. Like, you know, we became the sort of historians of the show as well. They, you know, they get the bloggers down here to videotape this. Oh yeah. Well, you had a camera, anything. Yeah, yeah.

You were walking around with the flip camera. Yeah, the flip camera. Yeah, the WWE uses it. I think they went out of business actually. Yeah. I'm not kidding. I can't look. Yeah, it's so funny. They were like bought I think they went out of business actually. Yeah, I'm not kidding. I know, yeah, it's so funny. They were like by and then it killed the product altogether. So he came out to me, he's like,

we want you to be in the lonely island is gonna perform on the show tonight. We want you to be in a little lazy Sunday performance. And I was like, what? Yeah, well, were you in the lazy Sunday performance? I got Mr. Pib thrown in my face. That's so good. That's so good.

That's so good. That's so good. That's so good. And it was funny because we rehearsed it without the Mr. Pib, like actually going on. This is gonna happen. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So we didn't anticipate what was gonna happen, which was, and I didn't anticipate, like, they gave me an outfit to wear for it.

But I didn't think about my underwear but I didn't think about my underwear. I didn't think about my underwear getting soaked. Oh really, they really got you with the next one. I was like, I should have freezed it. How much mister, how much mister could have? It was probably a big gold floor. Like a two liter of tape. Yeah, it was a lot.

And it was, I didn't anticipate how cold it would be. And those floors are so shiny. And I almost fell. Yeah, you should have. That would have been it. Like, like trying to get off when they were like, okay, go, go, go. And I almost fell. You should have, you should have injured yourself just so you could have collected whatever NBC would have paid out

To make you to make that a problem go Probably $50 I'm super good for it like you know, I was a danger bit or something I gotta go back and look at that. Yeah, I gotta see because that's the moment where you realize you're extremely wet And now your next hyper hyper dangerous-gainterous situation. So you went to, who wants to be a millionaire? How long were you there? I was only there for one season.

So I'm just collecting information here. But so what was that, so do you remember anything that you had to write? Like you must have had to do a lot of research, right? Well, it was a really weird job that somehow I had a knack for. I wrote questions for the show. And the way they did it was, you can't ask a question that's already been asked and they have this massive database that they use. And I came in at a time when I think the show had been on for a really long time, maybe 10 years. And the database had like a daytime show at that point. Yeah, yeah every day. Yeah, so that's gracious

Crazy. So it's like a hundred thousand questions in this database already asked and even if they haven't been asked yet They're in there, you know like they've got it all organized and marked and whatever right. Um, it was very complex I was like whoever invented this software. I hope they got paid a lot of money right so I Would like come up with a question. I'm sorry. that software has like one use though. It's like I know questions database for who wants to Like have you ever used like I can't remember the name of it access or something like it's a database program and a window pops I probably should probably not a lot to tell you that's fine. We'll edit that out. We'll believe it. Um, it wasn't access But it was it's like a database entry program right and there's all these fields you had to fill in and you know, you had to like search though Like could you just search? Yeah, you could search keyword. You could search. It was very robust

So I would search and be like think I've come up with a question Yeah, and I would think there's no way this is already an error Can you give me an example of a question? I can't I'm actually not allowed Contractually say any of the questions because I don't know which one, I didn't follow like which ones have been asked yet. So if it's in there and it hasn't been asked on the show yet, I can't ask. So you can't talk about any of the questions. I wish I could because there's one that I'm so, I was good at the, the easy questions

and they're actually harder to write because it's, there's so few left to ask. And there's one that you were going to say there's one what? There's one I wrote a million dollar question that I was really proud of. What do you mean? It's like you think the value of it is a million dollars or they would only ask it for the million dollars. It's four million dollars, but the show is different now. I mean, I don't even show they scramble.

What was key to give me the area of what's topic? I was good at they had me on art a lot because. What's that like modern art? I'm not, no, you're not. You're not gonna have to. Here's the thing, here's the thing. And this is, I think what got me hired is, they wanted questions that combined two areas of knowledge. So an example I give would be like,

if, and this is a very rudimentary version, but like if you mixed, what two colors would you have to mix together to get the color of Barney? So you knew so how that come, that you have to have no choice. I think I know the answer to this. Can I answer it? Yes. Brown?

Wait, no. Brown and like a dark gray. No. Barney's like, you're being stupid, right? No. Barney's like a drab. No, you're being stupid, right? Barney's like a drab. No, Barney's purple. He's like a washed out. He's purple.

I know, he's purple. Okay, I was like, I mean, that's Barney's purple. That was like, what color is red and blue? Red and blue, right? Yeah, so that's her color. I could have killed it. So that requires two pieces of knowledge.

They have to know what color Barney is and you have to know. So those types of barney. So like geography and history. Yeah, So my million dollar question combined pop culture and art and it was very proud of it. Was it about was it about was it Andy Warhol? No. That's the other thing about art is that when I learned what I learned is that the challenge of writing questions for that show was it's a TV show and it's all about the audience playing along in their mind. Right.

So you can't make the questions so too hard or too obscure. Right. And so everything has to be- Because nobody would be able to help. Right. Everything has to be in a lane of mainstream. So this sounds really exciting to me. Like to challenge-

It was a grind after a while. But it was a great- It was a grind on the days where you- Because we had a quota like 10 to 12 questions a day, which doesn't sound like much. But when you're faced with so many restrictions, it was very, there would be like four o'clock, and I'd only have written two questions,

and I would be like, fuck! Oh my God! Oh my God. That sounds intense, but also like mind numbing to it. And there were people there that had been there for like 10 years, who like, I'd come into work and they would be like with their like their feet up reading the newspaper They'd already written their questions because they were just so good at it. Oh my god So that sounds like when the job gets awesome. Yeah, maybe or it gets oriented

Right. I mean, you make great money and you get residuals and you know, but um, so do you get so wait? Do you get like do you have like? If they if you they replay the episode where a question of yours is asked you get something but um, yeah. So do you get, so wait, do you get like, do you have like, if they, if you, they replay the episode where a question of yours is asked, do you get something for that? Like, yeah, money off that. Yeah, really? Well, it's just any, any episode that I technically wrote on.

Oh, really? How many episodes is that? I think it was like five episodes a week for, and that was the show, the new episodes went air for a three month season. Okay. I mean, it was a lot of shows. But I, my residuals, I got residuals for two years. And then they, they haven't gotten anything, but I don't know why.

So you can't live off of your residuals from, but it was a good amount of money. Where I was like, I got home from a really long vacation. Christmas, like family vacation type situation last year. And I got this envelope. I had all this mail, I had been gone for a really long time and I was going through all the mail and I thought it was like, cause you get all this stuff from writer's guild,

like informational stuff. And it was this envelope that I thought was like the annual report or some crap and I just sort of put it to the end and I finally opened it. Like, I thought it was like, hey, we just want to be known. It was thick. It felt like an annual report or something like that. So, or your like health plan.

Yeah. I opened it and it was like literally like 200 checks. Oh my God. The tiny amounts, but when I, and I was like so excited adding, I was created a spreadsheet. It just happened to me once. My brother and I had a song that was licensed for a commercial and we got like six months after it aired or something, we got a package like that.

And it was like the craziest because there were so many little checks. Yeah. And you had to like compile them and we were sitting there like neither one of us would get a map. It was like counting change. Yeah. I'm like, I go to this number and then you have like pass them over and see if like your math checks out.

I guess now I think about it, you could have just handed those off to an accountant or something, but at the time, I wasn't that... Yeah, I just wanted to know how much it was gonna be. Yeah, sure. But that didn't, that is not carried, that's not just that you can't just live on that. No, I mean, I burned through money pretty good.

Do you? What do you spend money on? I'm a spender, like I, when I have it, I... Are you bad at, you're bad with money? Oh yeah, I was in horrible debt before I got my TV show. So I the TV show saved me. What a great segue. Actually let's take it let's take a quick break. Okay. And then we're gonna come back and we'll talk about your TV show and then we're gonna talk about other things darker darker things. Okay.

talk about other things. Darker things. Okay. Have you heard of Schoolhouse? Schoolhouse is a New York-based and globally-inspired brand design agency. When subjective experiences challenge you as an individual, dare you to take creative risks and ask individuals to define the collective versus the collective defining the individual, life and experience serve as your schoolhouse. This is why schoolhouse is about finding your brand truth

and not just your brand story. At schoolhouse, it's not only what they do, it's how they do it that makes the biggest impact. Authenticity, collaboration and expression keep schoolhouse sharp, excited, and honest about the work they do. They know the value of client relationships based on quality and trust. They're schoolhouse, the branding brand.

Learn more at www.weareschoolhouse.com and follow them daily through Instagram at at schoolhouse NYC. Again, to find out more, go to wearschoolhouse.com today. Look, you know you should be investing your money for the long term and you've probably wondered how you should do it. Maybe like me, you've even made some desperate, sad attempts to invest on your own. Perhaps you like me have driven your family into the poor house. Doing it yourself is not the way to do it. It's complex, it's time-consuming, and let's be honest, you really don't know how. Luckily, wealthfront makes it easy for anyone

to get access to world-class long-term investment management. It's an online automated service that invests your money for you. You can sign up for an account at Wealthfront.com in just a couple of minutes, and it goes right to work, monitoring your portfolios around the clock, and taking action as soon as an opportunity arises. With Wealthfront, you pay less than five bucks a month to invest a $30,000 account, and you don't have to have much to get started either. You can open an account with as little as $500.

Tens of thousands of people across the country have signed up already. In fact, wealthfront manages over $2.6 billion in client assets and it's grown over 20 times in the past two years. Go to wealthfront.com slash tomorrow to see your free personalized investment portfolio. You'll see the customized allocation they recommend for your profile. And just for tomorrow listeners, if you sign up to invest, wealthfront will manage your first 15 grand entirely free of charge for life. That means in addition to never paying commissions or any hidden fees, you also won't pay any management fees to have that first 15,000 invested.

Claim your offer today at Wealthfront.com slash tomorrow. For compliance purposes, I have to tell you the Wealthfront Inc. is an SEC registered investment advisor. Brokage services are offered through Wealthfront Brokage Corporation, member FINRA and SIPC. This is not a solicitation to buy yourself securities. Investing in security involves risks, and there is the possibility of losing money.

Pass performance is no guarantee of future results, which is at Wealthfront.com to read the full disclosure. So, you're back with Sarah Schaefer. So, then after he wants to be a millionaire, you had a, is this the next thing that happened? You did a show for MTV. Yeah, I, I, I, I, during the time I was working at it, who was a millionaire. And now, meanwhile, like over this time, I had started a podcast with a comedian named Nikki Glaser.

And we were getting a little bit of building an audience with that. And the podcast was called, you had to be there. You had to be there. And you got the story telling. Yeah, just talking about our lives, we didn't know each other.

We were getting to know each other on the podcast essentially. So now, okay, so I didn't know that. I thought you guys were like old friends. We had just met and we like drunkenly at a party. We're like, let's start a podcast. And we We actually did. Do you use that voice when you suggested? Yeah, I think we were it was a really loud. I remember it was a party that was like in an apartment in New York, like you know, there's party parties in New York and people's apartments

can be horrible if they invite too many people. Sure, because nobody has any role. Yeah. And it's too loud. And it's hot. It gets very gets very humid. It's hot. It's always very humid. That's my memory. Just a sweat box. But yeah, we started a podcast and I was at who wants to be a millionaire and I had started working on an idea for a talk show just knowing that it was probably impossible for someone like me at that time because I had had very little TV Experience as a comedian like I had never done a set on TV. I had never Been in a role in anything memorable on TV, but I had built a Bister Pib

And so but I won't I was putting it together just to kind of See if it could maybe come to fruition. See it. Be a thing. And I had it very well somewhat similar experience, but not as the same, but it's like you think it's a long shot and you're like, well, maybe I should just do it just to practice. Or you know, you think, why not just try? You know, that was sort of my attitude at the time.

And I started kind of putting together the idea, and Nikki at the time was getting very close to booking a gig as a co-host of a talk show. That would be like a syndicated thing. Right. And it was a was a pretty high profile, and like she really thought she was going to get it. And she found out at my apartment that she didn't get it. We were about to record an episode of our podcast and she got the call and I could see her in my back,

I had a little garden apartment and I could see her in the backyard like her body language. She really thought she had gotten the job. She was like, oh God, they're calling. I was like, like, this is it. Oh my God. I could see her like slow. That's the fucking worst. It's not just like, this is it. Oh my God. I can see her like slow, but I was like, oh no.

It's not just that, it's not just like, like, oh, it started the trend down or whatever. Yeah, no. It's like, oh, this is the call where they're gonna confirm. Yeah. Oh, and she was really sad obviously, and we had this very emotional moment in my kitchen. And I said, you know what?

Like, this is somehow gonna be good, you know, and you'll look back and be like, thank God I didn't get that job. And she kind of was like, we should pitch a show. Like it was just this angry reaction. And I was like, oh, wait, what have I been doing this whole time working on a show idea that doesn't include her?

We have such great chemistry. Right, and you're doing a show. Yeah. You already have a show. Yeah, you're like, hey, wait a second. A foundation that we've got pressed for it, we've got, I was like like what am I thinking and so My managers had just told me that every network executive will go why you

Right, maybe not something I love the shit I love the shit that people say that people say to you when you're doing anything. They're like not that familiar with Yeah, I mean in the sense of like they're I'm sure they were thinking the same thing. Like, why you and not these 10 other clients. Right. Or this more famous person or whatever. Yes, of course. And then I thought, I know why. I know how to answer that question now because it's us. And they have a track record.

It's like, it's like, and I, by the way, I'm at various intervals of my life, have dealt with these exact same questions. And like whenever you're doing something new, and if it's something that people are somewhat familiar with, but like they can't understand why you do it. We don't fit them all to it's like it's like the same argument it's like it's like why make another pop song or something it's like well like somebody's gonna make a pop song you haven't heard before you can be like well that's a really catchy song and like it's not always gonna be the same person. Like some DJ snake is gonna do you turn down for what and you're gonna be like oh my god Well that happens in TV all the time like anytime you come up with an idea someone goes well

Like imagine if when they came up with breaking bad they had been told well weeds right they already did a show like that It's really does both things where it's like we'll do the thing where it's like oh you did this nobody else can do this now This has already been taking care of but then on on the flip side, they'll also be like, are you doing like a Truman Capote movie? We are also doing a Truman Capote movie. It's like us too. Oh, I was already working on that. Yeah, yeah.

No, I've had some experience with that. Anyhow, go ahead on it. But yeah, so we started working on the idea together and we got a couple of pitch meetings. And we thought, I think everybody like, this is just practice. No one's actually gonna give us this opportunity. Because Nikki and I mean, Nikki. To get attitude.

It was very, very up and coming in the standup world and we were both at a place where we weren't a shoe in for something like this. Like it wasn't like an obvious, like, there's so many, like, if you're, and this is too inside, but like in comedy, like you know where everyone is at, and they're in their career.

It's like, oh, they're about to hit, you know? Or, oh, of course they gave it to that person, because she's so hot right now. You could tell me, so you could tell me right now who's the next comedian that's gonna be the breakout. No. The next Amy Schumer. Unfortunately, with female comics, it's like this idea of one of the time of course

which is incredibly frustrating people can't they're like I don't know the lot ladies well look the same to me the new queen comedy why is there one I'm sorry but you know what's weird this is going back to the thing you're just talking about like there was a period I think it was like a year ago, maybe six months ago where there was like, Madam Secretary and like some other lady president show and then like another. And it was like all of a sudden people were like,

hey, why don't we make a show about like, female presidents or like, women in power or whatever. And so it's like, you think they could apply the same concept to other things. Like, there could be more than one female comedian that breaks out at any rate. You'll see people say, like, well, it's women are killing it right now.

You're crushing it. Women are crushing. But that's still, I mean, they just put out a study of how it's gotten worse. Has it? Yes, since the 80s that the amount of female roles on TV have declined the amount of jobs for female director. You know, it's not bad.

That's probably because women are crushing in so many other places. They don't even have time to do TV anymore. That's what people say and that I know I'm joking. I'm as a joke. I'm sure it's because of sexism. Yeah, it is institutional sexism is probably more likely the reason that's happened. Anyhow, so you're you're going to be catching me. So we got to catch MTV.

We also like made a viral video, which, you know, did I see this video? It was about Justin Timberlake. It was black. Oh yeah, oh yes. We made a video about it. It was very hot. It was very hot.

And I told Nicky, I was like, I had the, well, we were talking about Justin Timberlake and then I'm the one that kind of was like, wait, what if we do a PSA about him wanting to make music again? And then we like wrote it overnight, shot it right away, and we ended up holding it and not putting it on. I had a feeling, this is when I was at peak.

Like, look at the social media savviness. Like, I was like, Nikki, I have a feeling this video is going to go viral. I can tell. I just, when did you hold it until? We hold it until a week before our pitch meetings. So that when we went in the pitch meeting, we would talk to somebody. Yeah, so that's Kimberly video.

And he tweeted it. No. It got to him and he tweeted it. It's part of why we got the show. Wow. So you had him. You were on, he had him on the show, right? We.

Or you had a thing where, yeah. Yeah, yeah. We were they surprised us and we met him and it was one of the best. And I remember that video. I think a lot of people saw it. Yeah, so we pitched it. MTV wanted it. We developed it and we shot a little presentation. Real like it's a pilot, but shorter pilot, but it was last Monday. Yeah. And we waited for a really long time to find out if it got picked up or not and we found out. And it was I could I just sometimes I look back

I'm like I still don't believe that that happened right and we had two seasons and it was a really amazing experience. Was it the show you wanted to make? Um, not quite because it was for MTV which I didn't know until I got in there just how young their audience is like really young. It's not like it's not the MTV that you know, probably from your youth or that I know from the youth. No, and but it is the same in that, and this is a misconception, is that MTV hasn't changed in that it has always

catered to teenagers. Yeah. And so if you don't see something on there that you recognize anymore, it's because you're old. Yeah. No, but it's not just that. It caters in a different way though now. I think it's changed.

Well, I think they've gone a little too far with the market research. But when I say it wasn't the show, I want it. We ended up making a show that I thought was very funny and we maintained our voice. But we had to fight. Every inch was a battle of like getting the show we wanted on. And they kept making us change it. Like from week to week, the format changed. You know, big things were being changed. Like when they told us that they were giving us the show, which is like one of the greatest moments of my life, they also were like, and are you sitting down? I'm like,

what? It's like, it's gonna be live. And that isn't the show we pitched. Right. I do like that idea, but it's hard to do like this. It was hard, and second season wasn't live, and then that created all these other problems. And like, it just, wasn't live in the name of the show.

Yeah, Nikki and Sarah live, and season two wasn't live, but we were pretending it was live. Oh. Now we weren't, we weren't shouting it in, you it. Right, right. But still it was like part of the thing. And they just they changed it constantly and they were the notes they gave were just very detailed. And I thought that that was I didn't know at the time because I'd never had my own show before how extreme their control over everything was. I mean, down to like what we wore and our hair. Really?

Yeah. Interesting. I think I feel like when I watch it, and I did watch a bit of it, like when you guys started, if anybody had known you or known like what you've done previously, and I not that I knew that well, but I kind of frowned. It was a little off-frag me. I kind of frowned, you think.

I was like, this doesn't seem exactly like the Sarah that I think is like the true, like the really funny, or reverent service. It was a little, I don't wanna say dumbed down because I never, I don't think we ever did anything on the show that I was like, this is so stupid and not funny. But I thought it wasn't as, it just wasn't in my lane.

And as the stuff I'm doing now is like me 100%. Right. I had, I did a pilot for FX for a late night show. And I have a really good story about this actually, the timing of it's kind of amazing. So we've been doing stuff on the verge. I don't know if you ever paid attention. We actually did a talk show thing called on the verge

that a lot of people seemed to like. And we're like, well, why isn't somebody doing like, talking more about like things like net neutrality or online harassment or whatever, you know, which now by the way, like everybody talks about. And so we're like, why isn't there like a show that's like every day or even once a week where somebody like talks about the stuff,

it does it in a funny way and does it in a smart way. So anyhow, so we pitched this thing and I actually liked it and they were like, oh, you should do it. Like, and they gave us money to do a presentation does it in a smart way. So anyhow, so we pitched this thing and I actually liked it and they were like, oh, you should do it. And they gave us money to do a presentation, which was a cheap pilot. But I was working with somebody on it and I realized really quickly, like a showrunner that didn't ultimately work out. But I really really quickly, like, there's like a TV way of thinking about things. And there's like a TV way of like delivering things. And it's not at all how I talk or think.

It's like landing punchlines instead of a conversational kind of humor. And I think that for you, and like just having to listen to your stand up, it's not just landing punchline kind of humor. It's much more conversational, much more sort of train of thought. And so like I can see where those would clash.

But also, I don't know, I feel like what works best is what is if people are talented, you let them be how they are. Now that seems increasingly clear to me. Yeah, oh, absolutely. Trying to fit somebody into like a punchline role doesn't work. The game of trying to sell a show, I'm now realizing is this dance of like, just let me show you. And then they give you a presentation and you show them,

but it's so limited in the budget that you can't really show them. And also everything is like, now let me, now let me see the potential. And it's all focused on that one moment. They were, I remember when we were in the midst of it, and I was like, we love what you're doing, we don't care, we don't really have any notes.

I'm like, what about guests? Like do you wanna have a big guest or somebody who's a celebrity or do you care? And they're like, we don't care. We just about you having conversations with people. That's what we're interested in and seeing. I was like, okay, cool. So I got this guy, Josh Barerman, who wrote the story for Argo that was in Wired and he just did this big thing. And why is it like a writer? It's a really interesting guy. He was on MPR on this American life. There was like an episode of the episode. Anyway, it's a really interesting guy. And then they were like,

uh, to care. You're not gonna get somebody who's like, you're not gonna be like, I'm like, you said you didn't fucking care. So I booked somebody that I thought I'd be, have a good conversation with. They, it's, they were great, but I'm just saying. It was always like that.

And now that I've worked with other networks, I'm like, okay, MTV has a way of doing things. And the thing is that they do well, is that they do well is that they do understand their audience. They're very in touch with them and things that they would tell us were cool are now everything. People, you know, I would be like, who the fuck is that? Ike Gaselea. We'd be like, who is that? And now she's like massive. Well, now she's dead. She's over. Well, right, you've kind of screwed it up.

But there were so many positive things about that experience that I don't want to sound like I'm being negative about MTV. But it was such a great gauntlet to go through. And an opportunity that I never really, part of me had given up on the dream right and then they let me have it for a little while and it was it was amazing. What's weird is I mean I know a lot of people are talking about this. There was this some was a vanity fair.

Did the peace on late night hosts. Yeah. It's all guys. So mad. And it's all and it's like and I know there's some diversity. Like it's not like it's a not it's not like there isn't some diversity in that group now. Yeah. diversity, like it's not like it's a not, it's not like there isn't some diversity in that group now, but there's there's no women and there is like the degrees of diversity seem like relatively minor. Yeah. Oh, so that's what I can say actually speaking of. So W. Kamaubelle had a show and F.A.K.

which was like a really, I thought like he was really different. The same time as our show. Yeah, and so you were four, five late night cable shows that year, 2013, that all got canceled. Well, so my, so here's what's really fun about my pilot is we were working and we ended up, FX was like, you can use his crew and like, they're all, they'll be psyched to do this, they'll do it on a Saturday or something. So we ended up like using his studio, his crew, everything, and then, and then the day before we taped, they canceled his show. And so when we went in to do my pilot,

and we was like, really would love for this to happen. Like all the people who had been working on that show. They really loved it. It was like the vibe was terrible. Because they had canceled Russell Brands show. Then they canceled his show. And I was like, oh, they're not really even doing that. And then after that, I heard, you know,

who knows if this is true or not, but that I heard they don't want to mess with late night. That's exactly. They very longed up. That is, that is basically, they basically were like actually, I think. Look back to it. Everybody goes back to it. They can call me, but I do think, but I do think they were actually like when they were

like, and we're not going to pick it up, it was like, we really aren't doing this stuff now. And like, if we're going to make an investment, it has to be like a slam dunk, no questions at all. But that doesn't, that's impossible. You know, the show would have been fucking great. The Daily Show and Conan were not slam dunk. Hey, that's what I said. They wouldn't listen Sarah.

But they just won't let people. What's really going is like everybody's like talking about, all of like the biggest breakouts from like these shows that are about real things now are like, net neutrality, which nobody was fucking talking talking about and like we would have definitely been talking about or like gamer gate which took you know co bear like six weeks or john stew or whoever six weeks of total madness on the internet to have to say one word about it meanwhile like that's actually the stuff that to people in my generation and your generation like is the topic of the day.

So anyhow I'm not bitter it's fine it's good you know I've got to know. But what I have realized is you kind of have to do, at this point, the barriers, there is some prestige to being on television, but honestly you can do a lot of shit that is on television and there's a much bigger audience and much bigger potential. And now there is, kind of like do it yourself, and if TV really loves it and wants it,

they'll come and let you know. So tell me what you're working on now. I just completed a pilot presentation for IFC, which was a news satire program, but instead of the daily show, which refers to cable news, and in terms of what the format is. And this is more of a news magazine,

so like 60 minutes or a date line, and it's an ensemble. I wanted it to be all female correspondence, but we had to put a man in there. Just one man? Just one man, a token male. Okay. Wow, that's a change. Yeah, yeah.

What have been a token? One man a few years ago. Yeah. And I'm really, really excited about it. Have a name. Can you talk about the name? Yeah, it's 1,320 seconds, which is how many seconds there are in 22 minutes. Is it like onion? Is it like onion in the sense that like the stories aren't real?

It's satire, so it's real. Okay. So like one of the topics we tackled for the presentation was rape culture and specifically people of celebrity rapes scandals. Like we don't, the show wouldn't- What does the celebrity rapes scandal? Billy Cossby? Oh, oh, okay. Sorry, right, that big. The reason I came at it that way is because I've been

so deep in this project. So the reason I said it like that was because the show would be evergreen, meaning we would be covering overarching zeitgeist topics as opposed to responding to news that week. Right. Which is very challenging and very has very short shelf life. Yeah. So this would be stuff that would respond to overarching topics, like instead of talking about something that happens in the Bill Cosby scandal, we did a piece about women who accused celebrities of rape and the myth that they are doing it to get rich. And I really went at it in a very literal way. Like, and I talked to career counselors like,

how do I, how many people do I have to achieve? It sounds very uncomfortable. It was a really strong. Like, it sounds like you're really fucking uncomfortable conversation. It was. I was really nervous about it, but we worked with people that were like chill and I did it. We didn't tell them, you know, it was important to me to not do a prank show, right? Or something that was like, pop out at the end of the end. Yeah, and I'm not there to make I'm the dumb one like in the, in the place, right? You know, and I, I, you know, we were talking to the person ahead of time,

like, look, this is comedy. I'm gonna say crazy stuff. I just want you to react literally as you would really react. And feel free to correct me and educate me. And it worked really well. And we got some great reactions. Interesting.

So can you get Rich from that in that way? Well, that was the whole, like, just pointing, we attacked it from a bunch of different angles. And I think that's the type of show I want to do where we investigate a topic. Right. But so there's also some, like, realness to it. It's not like you're just doing it for content.

Oh, yeah, it's a point. There's a point. Making a point, which I think is very cool. And we had silly stuff in it too. I think it would be a great show for IFC. I have no idea if they're gonna pick it up. So you just finished it, they have it now. They have it now.

I think it's, we're maybe a month away from finding out. Okay. And I know that this show is needed. And like the Vanity Fair picture alone was like, it actually scared me when I saw that picture because it's not oh the old boys club these are new shows right these are shows that have come on the air in the past few years not a bunch of them so I haven't even started airing yet but yet Samantha

he wasn't it okay yeah why is no no offense to Trevor Noah but he's not a titan of late night his show hadn't even started I, that's how they described them. I mean, the The very he's got their public. He might be. Yeah, exactly. So I think. Well, he's taking over, but he's taking over for like a show. Yeah, that he was the stand-in for John Stewart in a way.

And that's sure he was the legacy of it. But I don't understand their choice of putting him in there. But it scared me because it made me nervous about, all it would take is some high up guy, or woman at AMC networks to be slight, not hate women, to be slightly afraid of female content, to ruin my chances of having this show on the air. And I think that that scares me. And I've, because I've encountered that fear

in the most, in the tiniest ways, every step of my career. Right. I mean, just the little things they'll say, and you know, you pitch a show, and the feedback you get is it's too female. What does that mean? You know, or like, how is this gonna appeal

to our male audience? Yeah. Well, I've been watching all male content mostly. Yeah. My entire life. And I've enjoyed it. That content mostly yeah my entire life and I've been That's because it's superior. I mean Just better content I don't understand what you don't understand about that Male content is empirically better Want to say the word content more. Yeah, contents the best word. It's so cool. It turns

Things it turns like actual pieces of art into a commodity garbage. So what can we do with it? Oh look, you made something, you put your heart and soul into it. It's in a stack over here. It's in a database and we're just going to slide that into for the males. Pass it out, pass it out. Oh, females. Yeah. Anyhow, I love, I'm a big content creator. I love creating content inside of it. Me too. So this show, so they have it now. They have it now. And well, let's hope I would love to see that sounds like a really entertaining show. It is sort of insane that, I mean,

the balance is so seem so off-kilter when it comes to like who we see as our leaders of industry and how few of them. I mean, particularly like an entertainment though. It's like a gregious, how few women are really represented. The late night thing I think is, to me, there's so much you can do with the form that isn't being done.

There's so many shows that could be done that aren't being done. It's like why aren't there not just like A-show that's hosted by a woman, but like multiple shows. Yeah, right. Like, as if people don't wanna see like a woman talking or something. I had a confrontation one time,

a contentious conversation one time with a booker, someone who books a festival and the comedy part of a festival. The conversation was extremely depressing. I left the conversation and went to my hotel room and sobbed. What was that? Can you recount the conversation? It was essentially him confronting me because I had tweeted about his festival and the female representation over your prior.

And I guess he had been hanging on to it and then when he saw me, he just waited, and he went that funny, and when Sarah gets here. And he ambushed me, he tricked me into that, he didn't reveal who he was until we made nice cities. And then he was like, just wanted to let you know. Oh God, these are the worst situations in the world.

And he just wanted to let you know, you're welcome here. You know, I don't have a problem with women. And it's like, I think if you have to say that. Yeah, right. I think if you have to say just to let you know, I don't have a problem with women. So we get into a conversation.

Basically, the point, the main point he was trying to make, the point I was trying to make was, what if next year you just booked half women half and he was like half no we would come to the festival he said he was like no that would be morally wrong what morally wrong and unfair to all the talented male comedians and his point was you know that's but you know it is fucked up what you're saying You know, it's like why why are you trying to hold back the male comedians from succeeding? It's so I get that response so long they'll say well, it's not fair to the men and I'm like excuse me Okay, cuz they'll go that's a reflection. So if you see on a booking

20% women 18% women and 80% men or whatever the breakdown is usually under 20% in any kind of booking you see. A festival, a local show, half hours on Comedy Central, those are the half hour specials they give out every year. You've done some, you've done some, I've done some very real research. Because I want to make sure I'm not making it up in my head. Right, you know, like listen, yeah, they're like no actually it up in my head. Right. You look like you look cute. Yeah, they're like no actually 75% of our shows.

Right. I've been accused of being wrong. Right. And I'm like, I'm not wrong. I've done the research. And so the, but the, the response you'll get is, well, that's because that's how many women comedians there are doing comedy. My gut is telling me that's wrong. So I actually have, which I'll never reveal it because it would would just people would just attack me and I'm not mood for that

But um well, I have an excel sheet that I just keep where I put every time I find out about a new comedian I put their name in it and I'm up to maybe 2,400 names now Mail and female male and female and I've got it marked by who's male and who's female. Okay. And it's more. There's more female. No, no, no, no, it's more than what those that percentage, what's the percentage? I won't say because I don't want people. Because it's not 50%. Is it high? It's between, it's between 25 and 50. I'll give you that range. Okay. But that's more than what people think. Right. And it's more than what people think, but I would never give the number because then that would become the new status quo. Right. And it's more than what people think, but I would never give the number because then that would become the new status quo.

Right. And over and over. But then that argument would be like, sound, you could use it anytime you want. You've actually done, you've actually, you should get rid of that, that excel sheet right now. Because like the argument is then if like the number is there, people go like, well, look, you know the numbers, the only 30% of comedians are women. So I can't look so many.

But 30% isn't what is, the opportunity is less than 30%. So that's my point is, and as they've made the same argument about female directors being like, well, there just aren't any. And it's like, that's not true. Well, that's the easiest argument to me. And the less, the less opportunity

you give, the less women sign up for this. And that's why that picture upset me so much as well. Because it was like, There is a point where, yes, there are fewer choices to make in that, like whatever area that you're trying to like, if you're trying to diversify. But like then it's not like,

oh, so just like keep doing the same thing. It's like, well, then you recognize a problem because like there aren't fewer women on the planet. There's like, it's more than half. Right. And so it's like, so logically, if we really like figure this out, like we should

be encouraging more of this because then it will be more even. And then we want to have these stupid fucking conversations about like throwing in a female comedian. So book this, you know, there are plenty, there are plenty. I'm sure there'll be more than off active female comedians. There are so many. And if you don't, if you're a booker and you and your, your show or whatever it is that you book is very low on the female scale. You aren't doing your job. Right. And that's very frustrating.

But what I'm just thinking of this guy, what is he seems like a total creep. Like I don't like that entrapment situation where you're like, oh, and then he's like, I sent him an email afterwards because I was, I didn't get flustered. I got a little classic woman. I know. I sent him an email afterwards because I wanted on in writing very clearly my point Yeah, to get to him right never respond of course. That's that you know This actually segues nicely and we don't have a ton of time

But I do want to talk about this a little bit. So you've you've dealt with some online harassment I mean you're a woman on the internet. So it's it's by default. Yeah, it's not with online harassment But you're also you know you have followers on Twitter, you have people who are paying attention to your career, you're doing things on TV. So you've got people who are not, most people have their networks of people. I have the same thing.

You've got your network of like friends and family, those are real human beings that you talk to on regular basis. And then you've got like people who you don't know at all, you may never ever meet, and they are just like floating out there in the ether. So you, like I've recently seen you like having, because you'll just like tweet something about like this kind of stuff. And people do not respond well on the internet to fact the truth bombs.

No. Like there was your love it. Especially if you're trying, if you're just being like sarcastic or clever about it in any way, that really, really bothers them. So what is it? So what are the things that you, what are the things that you find yourself like talking about publicly that are like the most controversial in terms of your broader audience?

Um, I've. I can barely know. Yeah, so I, and I actually just started being more bold with this stuff because I was just like, I'm just becoming more passionate about things and I don't care anymore. I used to be very afraid to speak up about stuff because every time I did I would get some sort of negative, you know, unpleasant interaction going.

Right. That's what I would worry about other comedians, like what they would think of me. Yeah. You know, now I just don't give a fuck. So, the things that are the most hot button are abortion. Anything political. Yeah, Anything political. Anything political. Anything political. Anything feminist.

And then beyond that as a woman on the online, I find this to be true. If anything, any opinion about music, TV, what I'm doing with my life, my relationship with social media, I'm telling you it is I never, I get a response from a man. At least one. Yeah. That is, man's planie or critical or condescending. I mean, it's insane. You know, everything.

I'm not typically harassed. So I have no, I think one of the things that's really true for most men who are on the internet. And you should do yourself a favor and try to get harassed. So I have no, I think one of the things that's really true for most men who are on the internet, and you should do yourself a favor and try to get harassed on the internet. Because I, you know, listen, I say things that are annoying to people, and I get people who tweet at me and they're like, fuck you, you're an idiot,

or, you know, commy bastard. We got everyone's in a while, but it's like such normal internet harassment. I'm annoying person in comments. Not even personal, it's like, you're just like a dumb person who sucks. But then, so I recently tweeted something about guns, That's not the main thing. That's not the main thing. That's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing. That's not the main thing. That's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing.

That's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing. That's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing.

Yeah, that's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing.

Yeah, that's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing. Yeah, that's not the main thing.iver. just awful 24 hours of my online existence. But also it gave me a window into,

I suddenly realized, I understood why Gamergate was so fucked up, and I understand completely intellectually how it must suck for women on the internet. You can imagine. But then when you see what real harassment looks like when people are really vile, it's like you get a totally different, I recommend if you're a man, say something controversial, if you

have anybody who's following you and see the responses to it. But I assume for you, that's like every day because these are people who are all seemingly only politically motivated, who are filled with hatred. I kind of parse it into two things. There's one that's, yeah, I know if I'm going to tweet about gun control, about politics, about abortion, I'm going to get a nut, who doesn't follow me. Yeah. Coming at me. Yeah.

And potentially threatening me or saying something really unsolved. Usually, they usually move very quickly to a threat within like five steps. Um, but what I find to be the most insidious and the most frustrating for me, aside from when I'm at, if I'm actually threatened by, I had like a cyber stalker at one point. Now it was the worst I've ever dealt with. And it was someone from my real life,

which was, it was terrifying. I like was worried for my safety for awhile, but it's over now and it was figured out. It was a prank. No, it was not a prank. It was for a show actually. It was really scary, but I'm sure. And then one time I had a brush with 4chan,

and it really scared me, and it made me go crazy. It was the security. And there's a lot of connectivity between the 4chan mindset and the mindset of these. Yes, they're all connected. They're all connected. And then, but to me, on a day-to-day basis, the most frustrating, the most irritant, and

this is the hardest to explain. Because it's easy to say to someone, can you imagine if someone said, like, I'm going to shoot you? Yeah. That's scary. Someone just said that to me. Yeah, I saw your... I saw your...

I saw your... I saw your... I just said it to me. Or wish that I would get cursed or whatever. Right, right, right, you know. Any variety of horrible things. The whole like, I hope you get raped. Yeah, they don't understand that's a rape threat, but The most people are the worst. I know they really are the most frustrating part is and this is trying to explain this to people is

a regular guy who considers himself intelligent and not having a problem with women coming at you and condescending to you. Like I posted a thing recently of a mean message I got on Facebook and I screen-cribed it and post it. What is that? It was you seem like a

stupid liberal and you have no comedic abilities at all or something like that. And I responded like yes, I might have different political beliefs as you but I have, I make a living off of comedy so I do have abilities. Unfortunately comedy is subjective. I like that. There's some verification that my comedy thing just by my beliefs. Like very straightforward but there was some, there was some, I was being you know a little bit conistening. Sure,. Like very straightforward. But there was some there was some I was being you know a little bit kind of sure it's very annoying. But the responses I got to that frustrated me so much because this guy starts coming at me like you should read a book instead of wasting your time on this. And I my response was the conversation. Yeah I'm wasting your time responding to an internet hater

Right, and I said you don't understand that I get crap like this all day long You know, I can't do anything on the internet without being right, right, you know talk to this way and then all these other guys start piling on like Well men get it to and Just I just explain it to you, and not with everything they say. They kept. Sometimes I'm just like, I'm having a sandwich. And people are like, cool, I like sandwiches. You're being like, I have never sandwiched people

like you fucking woman always eating sandwiches. Just missing my experience that I'm speaking to on my social media. And like, you know, and just getting to the point where they were just proving my point over and over again. And finally I posted a Venn diagram that was just, and I may not have done it correctly because I'm not a fucking mathematician but it was a joke I drew a divin diagram was just two circles right on top of each other where there was no separation I said tweets that tweets by women and tweets that men

must respond to that joke that's right they feel they must respond to that's right because a venn diagram would be like two separate circles it right, because a vendigrant would be like two separate sort of. It will be really three things, right? It would be like this thing every year, this thing every year, and then the thing that is like where they overlap. The intersection.

And I had both circles on it. Actually, maybe I don't really know how to do a proper vendigrant. Yeah, and so I did that. And most people, it was getting a lot of pickup people were laughing. Sure. And then I get a direct message from a guy I know.

Man's point. Guy's been explaining. This long long description like such a nerdy description of what a Venn diagram is and correcting my Venn diagram and I was like every time I think it's over. Yeah, but you get it's like you get the point really you do the Venn diagram wasn't perfect. You do understand what I meant by it. The meaning of that is like pretty clearly anything I fucking say somebody has to say some shit about. Like that's the meaning of it. Yeah, it is.

You know, insane. You know, I'll get responses as well. That's everybody on there. And I'm like, you don't understand. Almost no women are responding to me in this way. Oh no, I mean, it's a, It's a, it's a fave or it's a like hell yeah. It's like only normal conversation.

Or they're just like, yeah, I agree. You know, or, or well, for me, it's this. But yeah. It's like only normal conversation. Or they're just like, yeah, I agree. You know, or for me, it's this. But men don't understand like. No, it's, there is a- Not all men, not all men. No, all men, all men are terrible. No, I mean, we are, listen, I mean, we are living in a society where we've been trained

to basically be terrible. It's not everybody's fault. I mean, like you can't like blame every man for having learned a bunch of really bad habits. You can only blame them for not trying to correct their bad habits. And it's like staggering how, I mean, it's like fucking Twitter, right? Like, I love Twitter. I think Twitter's just awesome.

You can be really funny on it. It's a weird place to have a conversation. You can have like, you talk to really diverse people. You learn a lot. I have learned so much on Twitter. Totally. It's an awesome service. Except, when it comes time for like you to manage your interactions with people, there's no way to like, I was like, just let me block all the

people who follow this this dick who retweeted me. Just let me on, let me like block those people so they I actually don't have to see because like, listen, the world is really big. There's billions of people on it. Most of them, I probably wouldn't get along with. I mean, the reality is like, I'm not easy to get along with. I have very extreme viewpoints. So I'm sure they probably don't like what I have to say. But it's like, then fine.

I don't need to interact with them. I'm psyched that I could if I wanted to. There's no, I was actually saying when I was getting these gunnuts harassing me, and it was totally fucking harassment. I can only imagine what you get every day. What's, how do you fix it? Nope, yeah, you can change people's minds

in like maybe a hundred years, people will act nicer. Yeah, I don't know. I know. I don't know. I know that I have learned, you know, like, for instance, on issues of race, you know, because as a white person, I've learned by watching some of these interactions

on Twitter, I have learned about some of my own misconceptions. You're racist. You didn't really see the racist you were. Well, and I'm part of a system. And now I know if I was confronted with this issue, I would never respond in this way. And I feel very educated by seeing how people stand up

for themselves, especially women. I've been very inspired by a lot of women on Twitter being like, I will not back down and I will call you out when I feel like it. And that's the misconception I think that really irritates me is like, when a woman is taking a dude down, their show always gets like,

just ignore the trolls, it's like, you understand, I just picked this one dude as an example. Like I'm not responding, I'm living my life here. We've been ignoring the trolls. It's not getting better. It's actually getting worse. It's also like shooting people. Like I know, it's like this dude in Oregon

is definitely like a version of the kind of like aggressive person you see on the internet. I mean honestly, like my tweet was, so my tweet about the, sorry to keep coming back to this, my tweet was like, if you don't think we need stronger gun laws, like you're not just like wrong, like I think you're kind of bad.

Like I think if you don't recognize that. Right. That's when you get the strongest reaction. If you say anything of like- Of course, like you say you're bad for eating animals or something. Like people go fucking ballistic. I wouldn't say that. I've said that, I said that people who, one time I said that people

who unfollowed me because I was tweeting a lot about the mic brown case in Ferguson. Yeah. Good unfollow me. It I was tweeting a lot about the Mike Brown case in Ferguson. Good unfollow me. It helps me weed out the idiots. That is true. And people were like don't call people idiots. It's a wait. You know, and I was like, that's their little way in to begin like the assault on you know, you attacked me. Yeah, right. It's like, it's like, no, actually, I says I'm broad like broadly about what I thought about people who like didn't agree, which is a, which is scientifically proven. If, if you have stronger gun laws and fewer guns, the fewer people die from guns, it's like

a scientific fact. There's no way around it. Countries that have fewer guns are done allow them have fewer gun deaths. And people are like, they start saying crazy things and comparing things like women were tweeting like hardcore like libertarian right wing. They were like you tried to tell me You're gonna take my gun away so I can't protect myself from getting raped And I'm like well, it's so crazy and I I basically I read an article that I don't remember where it was or what it was And I'm totally I'm not very crazy It was on the internet. Yeah, it was on the internet

Um, and it was saying how we live in an era where people believe that their opinion, just because they have an opinion, that means it's fact. And it's like, no, you are entitled to your opinion, but your opinion could be based on something that's not true. And so you are wrong for backing that. And you don't know it. And you don't know it. Yeah, you're actually more wrong.

Well, no, I mean, but it's the kind of thing. You know, it's the kind of thing. I actually feel like the people who are the worst, craziest, like, fanatic, not just about guns, but anything. The internet has given them this perfect, like they have this perfect armor where they can just, like, pick and choose whatever facts fit their narrative. And they're like, no, actually,

there's this guy's scientist over here has proven that dinosaurs were around a thousand years ago. What, anyhow? Oh, there's always something. I mean, okay, so really quickly, because we have to wrap up. Unfortunately, I think we could probably type a harassment. I just want to vent to somebody who's been harassed

because I was harassed. So I want to ask you a couple quick. I'm going to ask you a couple of rapid fire crashes. Yeah. So you think about a bunch of things in your album. So you were very religious. Are you still very religious? No.

You have a lower back tattoo. This is the way at least you claim. I haven't seen it. I do. You have a lower back tattoo. This is the way at least you claim. I haven't seen it. You have a lower back tattoo of a butterfly. I got it when I was 18 as a symbol of my love for Christ. Yeah, because I was a Jesus Christ. A big old Christian. You were raised Baptist?

Southern Baptist in Virginia. I'm actually working on an essay right now about Jesus. It's like a letter to Jesus. Like because I get, especially with this abortion stuff, the stuff I got from religious people really upset me because I just was taught different. And I don't know if it was just the people I was around, but like I ended up leaving the church

because I couldn't handle the way that people scapegoated the message for political reasons and for fear like use Jesus as a weapon against that which they fear. And you know, for me, I don't, I never literally believed in the Bible, even when I was like a kid. You know, I mean, that's something funny about it. Yeah. And I was interested in the meat of it. I was interested in love. Right it. I was interested in love.

Right. And I've always been very interested in love. And like, it's so pure. And like, that is what it represented me. So I'm a pretty spiritual person. But I can't, just every time I get a, every time I tiptoe back towards any kind of organized religion, something I'm almost immediately happens

that reminds me why I can't be a part of it. How do you feel about the Pope? I'm glad he's like trying to do some stuff. Yeah, he's like, he's like better Pope than any other Pope. He's better Pope, but he's not a cool Pope. He's still a Pope. Yeah, and all that, and all that, and that's the thing people forget.

They're like, he's a cooler Pope. He's a cooler Pope, but he still does a bunch of Pope stuff. But it's encouraging because it means we are changing as a species. That's true. You know, I'm a hopeful person even though I get very depressed. That's actually good. That's a very hopeful person that there are changes happening. See, I am too.

I feel like it's all going to work out. We've got to say about this online harassment. All right, one other quick thing and then I'll let you out of here because I know you have to go. Actually, we're a little bit over You were married. Yeah, what when did you get married in 2005? You were how old when you got married? Oh, it was 27, but I started dating him when I was 19 Oh, so I was with him for 10 years. Yeah, he was my first boyfriend

He was your first boyfriend and then you never ended that and then you got mayor I mean you didn't I didn't stop being a girl friend Yeah, so you guys were together for 10 years. Okay, and then you got divorced. Yeah You talk a lot about sex like a show. I did is that was that was that always something that you as a comedian Was that always something you did that you were comfortable with where you were able to get up on stage and talk about like very personal? Yes, I actually, it's easiest for me

to be incredibly personal on stage in some ways, but it's also very challenging because if they don't laugh, they're like rejecting you as a person. And they're rejecting your soul and your truth. Well, it's weird that you choose to couch very personal things in a way that the required response is a laugh.

Yeah. Well, that's how I feel the psychology. Yeah, but I think the trick has been learning how to mix my very intimate storytelling with like a lighter fare. Yeah, which you definitely do. Yeah, I don't, when I was with him, I didn't talk about my relationship at all on stage. So my entire education and comedy was devoid of relationship jokes. Which kind of I think ended up making me unique, because

I think relationship jokes are dating jokes are kind of easy. Easy fair. But that doesn't, I mean, there's only so many premises in the world and I have no problem with, there's no hockey premise, there's just a hacky punchline. So to me, when I got divorced and I was talking about what I was going through it was very liberating, but It was a window and now I'm in a long-term relationship again So I'm like so you're back to not talking about you're really I have one joke I've been with him for five years and I just started telling a joke about my boyfriend

So can you tell me you don't tell the joke obviously, but what is the it's about it's about the way he plays video games It's pretty funny. Does he wear it? Does he have a headset? Does he? Yeah, and the thing I was hearing from the other room was just him going, sorry. Oh dang it. Sorry, man. I was like, what game are you playing? What is the game? What's happening? I have, I won't reveal the pie. Yeah, please don't. That sounds great.

But what he's apologizing for is when he accidentally kills a fellow soldier Like friendly fire I had like one in one period where I even know you could talk to people I had one period where Like in 2008 or seven like I had a friend who was like guys. Let's all like called duty Who he was like, guys, let's all call of duty, he was really into it. I remember it was a really depressing moment. My wife, Laura, would always sit and watch me play video games,

or should she be reading or doing something really edifying in IB playing video games. And she was the night that I did it for the first time. I went and got the headset out of the box that I'd never use. And she relentlessly made fun of it. I mean, it was like, oh, nothing, but headset out of the box that like I'd never use and she really relentlessly made fun of. I mean it was like oh nothing but like do you want fries with that joke. I mean like basically shame me from ever playing in that way again.

Although I have to say I don't like gaming with other people. I feel like it's a weird experience. It was on my boyfriend plays mainly with his cousin and my brother. It sounds like he's not very good. That's what I'm like you're good at. with his cousin and my brother. It sounds like he's not very good. That's what I'm like, you're good at, it's very good to do play. If you have to apologize a lot,

you're maybe not that great at the game. Well, I think that's a great place to end. It's here, thank you for coming here. Thank you, it's so nice. This is a lot of fun and you have to, this show I have a good feeling about it and when it gets inevitably gets picked up and then you become very rich and famous,

but you'll have to come back and talk about like the show and all the stuff that you're doing. Absolutely. All right, well thank you. Thank you. Well that is our show for this week. We'll be back next week with more tomorrow. And as always I wish you and your family the very best,

though I have mobilized an army of four channers to terrorize them in every way humanly possible. you