Full Stand-Up Comedy Roundtable: Ramy Youssef, Taylor Tomlinson, Alex Edelman, Jenny Slate & More

it was cool to see you on SNL a so good thank you so good it that's Taylor's bucket L to see and I can die now was that a bucket list for you SNL yeah yeah that was it' be crazy if you were like oh hello welcome to offs script with The Hollywood Reporter I'm your host Ivon orgy here at the beautiful georan hotel in Sunny Santa Monica C California now normally five comedians is usually a pretty long show six and you're pushing it today we're definitely pushing it but the good news is there are no tickets no drink minimums and definitely no hecklers well unless you count the comics heckling themselves but today we are going to hear from Mike biglia of The Old Man and the pool Alex Edelman of Just For Us Jaclyn Novak of get on your knees Jenny slate of season professional Taylor Tomlinson of have it all and after midnight and Ramy Yousef of more feelings so sit back and relax as our panel goes on the record but just a little off script with The Hollywood Reporter they're all yours Lacy thanks Ivon hi and welcome to the standup round table I'm Lacy Rose and thank you all for being here I'm going to start with a question for for every everyone you're standing on stage you look out at the audience describe the audience member that you dread the most a man sorry I had to I couldn't resist okay I've changed something's changed in me since joining around table it could be uh someone that's drunk it could be someone you know I mean it could be any number of things the figure in the joke the figure person in the joke I've had that experience before you're telling the joke the person the joke is about is in the crowd and you're just like oh God and you go for it anyway I mean you you have to I think anybody you know is a really good answer like I've had people from high school come and sit in the front row and you're like no please not there why do they do that they love that they love that they think they're supporting you they do and they are and we appreciate it but it's do we though I mean I do I'm just like just sit like halfway back right when the darkness starts Midway point in the audience and any like folded pair of arms in the front row I think no matter who they're attached you're kind of like unfold those over the course of the night people you know is not who you want in a stand of Comedy audience Jac I tour together for like a few years and we always compared it to if you were an exotic dancer or a stripper where it's like you don't really want your friends to be there when you're stripping you're non-c comedy friends yeah you're non- stripping friends or whatever you're not spping friends maybe they tip more though I think it's a seduction job it's embarrassed to be seen in a seduction absolutely like we used to talk about business Voice or whatever right oh my God yes or like how someone catches you on the phone with your doctor's office being like I'm around on Tuesday but if Wednesday works that could work too it's like your business voice and if someone catches you doing your business voice you're like oh I'm so shamed yeah it's a little bit of that but jacine you I feel like I've read you used to actually look at who was coming to the show each night and that would pervert I was going to say that but that does feel like RIS will say the journalist pushed that towards hyperbole okay she got it the name you know what I did do the night before like uh opening my show at um Cherry Lane very very nervous I started looking at the names the ticket sales just like literally I'm a I'm a login girl you know I like to get into the back end and see it all live and um that's that's that's and I just went through and I just names I didn't know let this be a warning to all future comedy audience members for watching you but I I could never look at the list well that's what I was going to ask who else has looked and and have you been whether it's whether it's an ex whether it's an idol do you look at the list do you actually want to know and has it ever sort of rattled you in real time for logistical reasons sometimes like my cousin cuz sometimes my cousins are coming I have a lot of cousins apparently and my mom would be like Nancy was there and you didn't say hi and I'm like I didn't know was and she was like she told you on the family WhatsApp and I like well I forgot so my MC will sometimes go through and pick anyone with the last name Edelman or any of the other Associated names and she'll be like does this person Belong To You does this person Belong To You does this person it is weird when an idol comes to see your show it's like how did anyone ever like kill Lincoln cuz the entire audience is watching the famous person I was like wasn't at that show everyone's like is Lincoln enjoying this is Lincoln think our American cousin is good is he is he oh oh no [ __ ] there like you know I that's how I felt like anytime like a famous comedian came people be like what does so and think of that joke does so and so think that punchline is fun is like a very very but are you doing that too I mean from stage are you also I try not to look at them I scan the audience like do you blur your eyes at the audience I look right into the light I like do you want bright you got to engage I yeah I played to each section of the like it's like it's Tic Tac Toe like kind of like you gotta but you section them you don't have a leader I I cater to the Pockets that aren't laughing and try to sort of like try to tickle them from below or sometimes they go They're not laughing cuz I'm looking at them so I'll look at the other side like I'm working you're working Corner eye do you tickle them from below like I just I I don't want us to move off that phrase because I saw you trying to get away from now I'm like I want a little I I was hiding my pride I love it how do you actually Define a bad show like there's got to be some memorable disasters in this Bunch cuz everyone has them it's always kind of nice when you don't get what you want from a show because then the next show is better that's kind of the only way I ever wrote material just having really bad shows but how do you define that what does that actually feel like in real time for me it just feels like not connecting with the people who were there so sometimes if I walk off and I'm like oh I was just saying what I had in my head before I got up there then it wasn't really effective you know so if I'm just saying things I could have said to myself in my hotel room it's a pretty bad show like I didn't connect with who was there and and and there's a there's something wrong with that Ramy for the first time because um one of the writers for ramy's show is a friend mutual friend of ours Joshua venet he's a brilliant writer and he's a great comedian and and he was like I think that you'd love my friend Ramy so I went to see at the comedy seller one night when I was there and it's interesting hearing you talk about like having a good show versus not having a good show I don't think you can have a bad show because I think your essence is fundamentally funny and interesting to watch that's very kind I definitely will walk off and feel like you know that that glazed eye thing you know so there's sometimes times where I'm just like I feel like I didn't give people what they needed CU I wasn't able to get present enough that really might be the thing that kills me because I'm like y not even that they paid it's like they put on their shoes like they they came out they gave us our time like their time like we have this time together and we have like mutual friends in comedy whove who've passed away right and then you really start thinking about time and you go oh my God like those seven minutes are everything cuz I remember people's sets when they really give themselves so anytime I have a show where I'm like I was checked out or whatever I've gotten to a point now where I just don't go to The Comedy Club if I think that's the show I'm going to have if I'm not ready to like fully be myself I'll just I'll just stay home but there are different briefs for different shows but like a bad different briefs there are different goals that you have to sorry I thought anyone is what I was thinking you said what I almost thought like a brief like like the pelic this round table is out of control I it there's we've lost the threat he was saying some kind of sentence who creates the brief and it who creates the brief the venue and the ticket price and the audience M choose a different word Alex fine remit is that that's worse do you mean like goal there's a different goal for the show so like at the comedy seller sometimes a bad show is a show where you [ __ ] Crush sometimes like you go up there and you destroy and you come off and people are like great set you're like no I want to try new stuff but I tried a sort of half new joke and it didn't work and I lost a little faith so I was like well here's 15 minutes of you know like here's 15 minutes of stuff that I know is going to do well and so like if I plan on going down to the comedy seller which is where you have to do well but also like really work stuff out and I go on stage and I lose my nerve and I and I do really well with the audience but I don't come away with anything that's a failure that's a big mistake cuz it's still service industry but you also have to progress as an artist and sometimes those two things are like neily ins yeah oh my gosh I was just here sitting here listening to Alex going I'm so glad I didn't tackle this bad show question cuz Ramy and Alex had these very artistic answers and I was like Acoustics a high ceiling a nightmare like I mean you're not wrong not wrong oh my God When you crush it can be a bad show I was like oh no that is such a humble brag amaz wait I always crush is it possible having bad I'm the comedy seller never not past uh never audition you didn't audition you you can't be passed being can we tell the actual story of this I think that I can be overly concerned with having to do what's important to me within an environment that feels set and sometimes and I'm not saying this is like necessarily true it can sound like a cop out but like it just from my perspective if something feels I hate that I'm going to say this because I know everyone like people have said before but like old school male there's a part of me that's like I reserve the right to say this is not important to me and like I just want a stage where for me I can get past um the things that separate me from other people which is also by the way the thing that's why I go to therapy like to try to achieve intimacy which also means like not hating parts of myself like if if you if you think like Part of Yourself is like essentially bad you'll probably hide it which means then you can't like be truly intimate and like everyone does whatever we're doing for different reasons but for me I'm like I'm sensitive I already feel bad enough it's not because I'm like undeveloped it's just the kind of like mammal I am but also for real I can't do less than like a 48 minute set I'm a long distance runner on this one and like I I don't want to like be in plays but I want to like stand on stage and talk for a long time and that's just like what's up I guess is that yeah like 46 to to lure them in 47th minute like everything's connected to something else is how I feel and I know that's not true and like the people that like I do comedy with like for years like Gabe leedman and Max svest will be like no Jenny you can do 15 minutes like you just don't and it's like yeah but it feels like if I do this one then it's like I'm not going to be able to go to sleep for 3 days unless I do that one but if I don't do that one if I do that and then I have to do the other one so maybe I have OCD there are places that that audiences will go with you and and there are places where you can sort of feel perhaps they won't I feel like Taylor I've heard you talk about sort of earlier in your career there were sort of Darker material whether it had to do with your mom or or something else where you could feel audiences didn't want to go with you I'm curious sort of what does that feel like and when does that shift for you yeah with that specific material I mean I just started really young I started in high school so watching a 19-year-old do standup at all is very uncomfortable and people are already scared for you and nervous about the show so I don't think I had the maturity as a performer to pull those jokes off but what does it look like when when like it's not working how do you know that how are you people aren't laughing devastating oh it's so bad um it's what I would call a bad show um for other people it's when people are laughing too much and you're like none of this is new uh no I I really like yeah it just when people are sad and uh uncomfortable and looking at you like are you almost done like yeah I think I think that's what's so great about standup is uh you know pretty quickly if something does or doesn't work like Alex was saying you just go up wherever you can and you try out the same material in front of as many different audiences as you can whether they're there for you or not I think that's important to go up in front of people who aren't there to see you specifically like you were saying so that you know it is going to work if not everywhere most places so that when it does get on a big platform like Netflix or HBO that people who aren't familiar with you will hopefully be converted into fans sure are there subjects that you feel like your audiences were at any point sort of uncomfortable going with you Mike said something to me PR uh said something like you know there's your agenda and and the audience's agenda or or the Booker's agenda or whatever and and some something along the lines of like work your agenda right so for me that meant working on my show or or like okay I'm going to put it up in New York and or whatever but like I'm doing it at the Jukebox in in Poria and like I know it's not going to I mean some people might find it kind of interesting or whatever but there is no sort of pleasing them I am I am planting my feet and saying the words and I'm kind of like maybe burning chance in the room you know what I mean and like or like I did it at the punch line in in Philly and like Chris my my boyfriend was like you know the way you went up in Philly and just like bombed and and I was like I bombed you know like I was almost like what do you what do you mean I mean I I stood up there doing doing my art like it was almost the delusion the required delusion but this this phrase like my agenda really helped me almost you know not listen to the crowd kind of and go like I got to just I got to do what I think I got to do and trust that what I'm saying that will find its audience and and so I I had to block the almost the crowd reaction I mean just like it's weird but it it was huge for me that like my agenda doesn't matter tonight everyone in this room might hate me this club will never hire me again I had a lot of bad nights like you know and those nights were I had to stand there and and say my words and and get them in my head thanks B big you're getting you're get but you're getting at something right like the thing is trying to get somewhere like you can't just rehearse in a space um I've heard stories about some Comics who have who just run their set in run their set in a Carriage House filled with mirrors they know who is that Chris Rock Chris Rock yeah but yeah you know I thought that was a metaphor I was like that's beautiful no but he actually built Mir built mirrors and and like and like did that for I think before bringing the pain someone else has a mirrored room in their house no stand there with a hairbrush and do the thing but like you have to get on stage and there is a goal and the goal is growth and it's also a service thing so like what do you what do you do how do you show up for both for some sometimes I'll go on stage material that I know works and then graft it onto it very carefully new material and then material I know works and then graft it onto it very carefully new material oh and that's working I'll follow that path oh that didn't work here's new material grafted onto like a thing So Pro like that that to me is like a discipline that I don't always have I kind of like you know I'm like let's drive it into the ground like you know sort of like these big swings of I don't know well sometimes you get desperate sometimes if if a big new show where you need a lot of new materials approaching you go well tonight can't be Serv night tonight is uh kamakazi night and you just go out there with all this stuff then some nights you're like I've got a couple months till that show that's that needs to be ready and so here's a little more uh risk averse X Y and Z so that you you kill but it's like a what felt at the time like the riskiest bit I did a show called the new one it on Netflix and it's and it was about having a child and about the darkest feelings cuz I I never wanted to have a child it's all the reasons why I never want to have a child and about how I had a child and how all the ways that I was right and then I was wrong and it's kind of an emotional turn and there's a moment in it where I say you know at my darkest moments I thought like I get why dads leave and there's a you know comedians laugh at that humans don't uh you know it's it's more of a dramatic term emotional moment emal moment show but there were times early in the process of that joke where I really felt that the audience felt almost betrayed by the show that I led them down a comedic path and then all of a sudden I'm saying essentially my deepest darkest um Dark Night of the Soul confession and I even had a reviewer prominent reviewer said he lost me when he my dad's very prominent reviewer see but I I smiled when he said that yeah I'm like that's cool Mike I'm like I'm like proud of you for that yeah I'm really proud of you like for losing them because you know how to get them you know what I mean I'm like I'm like yeah like thanks keep it coming baby because you have to see right like you have to see what will sometimes you just don't care about the thing as much and then you say it and you're like why did I even say that I don't even care that much about it like I had the the thing I think like after I had my baby I was like trying to talk about the changes in my body but I didn't want it to sound like cliche like after the baby body Mater material but also there was like some stuff that really weirded me out about my own body and like it was really hard to do the material because it was uncomfortable and sometimes I would do it it would like hit like the right spot and sometimes it would just seem like I didn't like myself and I was like asking people to be like yeah you're ugly and your body sucks as well like it was like this like terrible focus on and I was like and I couldn't figure it out and eventually I gave up and like I really regret it because there's like one joke that I liked that I like but I was so afraid to like lose I didn't want that feeling of like feeling like such a the word that comes up for me is like Abomination like she made us eat [ __ ] with her you know like we thought we were invited to a party with K and she shhot and she made us eat her [ __ ] [ __ ] like it's like oh my God like I did not I just wanted to talk about how like my nipples used to be for sex and now they're not and like I don't know it got ruined and like it's just like the collaps like I can't even go in that area anymore and like but it's really hard when you're like I'm interested in it but it might just show actually where I'm like sick well it's not I am but maybe camera I'm like straight down the barrel I I think that's why like comedians like spending time with other comedians cuz like you and Chris your boyfriend were on the road with me when I was developing that and it took comedian friends saying like no no go towards that because audiences often w't tell you go towards that audien will be like easy on that but it's people who who are comedians who are usually most likely to be like no no say the thing that's like really deep in your subconscious but then on the other end of figuring out the joke the audience is so happy that you figured it out but there's that like middle of the like growing out your hair where you're like you know like just that middle where where it's just a little like a little weird and then it's like oh yeah I like that you know it's there's that bit that I think is is comedians will tell you no no no like going like you should do that that's why yeah it's so fun is there a clear third rail for for each of you um I don't do jokes about people in my family or like friends of mine uh or people I'm dating without running it past them CU I just don't think it's worth like destroying your relationships for you always seconds for a good laugh probably not no not when I was like 21 I'm like burn it all down to be a legend but yeah then you get older and you're like oh I'll be alone so a lonely Legend yeah uhhuh I always have to be kind of dragging myself into it if I'm talking about somebody else like it's never really about anyone other than myself and I think that's kind of the solo act of it so even pulling in like uh you know you mention a celebrity you mention a this you mention I don't like doing jokes at people like I'll mention them but it's really kind of like oh because I'm also kind of jumping off the same Cliff with you like we're going to do it together and also everyone here is just as you know just like is guilty of the same exact thing and the whole thing is like how do you offer something about yourself that actually would make someone feel less afraid or less alone but then it gets like like really messy on the way to do that but I just I can't like point at someone else and say like that's a mess it's like no no like I know that mess because it's literally the same one that I have or I have a version of and and so yeah third rail would be like if I'm not it I wouldn't even do it wouldn't even it wouldn't even be fun yeah but topic you like there's not a single topic you can't talk about does anyone that have spoken about you have joked about do you hear from people after positively or negatively I try to obscure I try to turn real people into archetypes for like you know for obvious reasons and I also don't talk about people that I date it bothers me that I talk so much about my family sometimes only because I speak very lovingly about my family always and so people still sometimes come to my parents and they're like oh he really got you and I'm like what by saying my dad is like really nice and smart and thoughtful and my mom is very cool and collect like I speak really well of my family but in terms of like third rail topics like It's tricky because all the power is in the third rail totally like there all these things you can't talk about anymore and like it's actually kind of more exciting there are more tensions more interesting tensions to ComEd is about the build up and release of tension you have free tension deal with the new ones and like try to release them or find tension in a topic that no one thought there was tension so like third rails are like a big part of it but like what ramy's talking about is Elegance you want a degree of Elegance you want a degree of person personalization another thing I picked up from bigs when we started sort of chatting in Earnest is some Mike would be like the joke's good but it's not personal enough to you yet even it's about something random and so like it's a really I don't know I think about this topic a lot October 7th happened and I think you called your producer one of your producers and said I don't I don't know if if we should maybe we cancel these shows I think I I heard you say who can dance in the slaughterhouse you obviously didn't cancel the shows I'm curious if it actually felt that way once you got back on stage it was a complicated moment it remains a complicated moment certainly does Ramy was the first one of the first people to call me and we had a really amazing like like really fome helpful for me uh conversation and is really appreciated that it was it was it was hard and it's madebe more mindful of the fact that it's still hard after a while you get inured to to human suffering cuz that's the way the thing works but like it's been been constantly reminded not to which has made it difficult yeah getting on stage again another conversation I have with Mike after like what how do what do you do do you change the show and I thought that the best thing to do is make the show conversent with the moment that we're living in but still an escape from it I think the best comedy is conversent with the tensions that we live with but it makes me sad so at some point going on stage and talking about not that feels like a real problem so I'm glad we didn't cancel the shows I went on right before I went on stage in San Francisco for that first show after October 7th I was standing in the back of the room and I just saw like thousand people on their phones watching a war and I was like okay maybe this is like a better thing to do than not least getting people away from like a war for an hour so like an hour and a half like but I wrestled with it all the way through whether or not this is right whether or not this I put some new lines in to like talk about this feeling but didn't change the whole show but like yeah something I wrestled with all the way through so and Romy I feel like you got would go up you were on stage you were on tour in those weeks after and you would talk at the top of the show about this very thing of of is this the right thing to be doing right now I'm curious sort of what you learned about yourself and and your audience in those experiences well I think my audience has always been kind of open for these conversations and it's kind of why like I don't think I've never never felt standup is actually that risky because I've kind of always been in conversation with an audience that has like a really global perspective as to tragedy I think and and and suffering and so there is uh a way to kind of go at it that you know leads with connecting Hearts you know because I think that the news is very much like Talking Heads and people just like it's literally mental and what we get to do gets to be emotional and so it's really liberating because we're not we don't need to kind of I don't know anytime anything gets too factual or anything gets too even historical um overtly it feels very like I'm just like this stopped being comedy right and so I I kind of try to you know Center the emotional piece and and and and yeah so for me like it's interesting because my special is much different than what I thought it was going to be you know even the special that I that I just put out I probably left like 30 maybe even 4 40 minutes of other material on the table because I kind of felt like oh there's actually something back to what we were talking about before if like if I'm actually present with the moment and with the audience there's something totally different that they should be hearing that they want to hear Alex I went and saw his show and he has a diverse audience but also like a really Jewish audience which was really cool yeah and like you know it's like really cool and that was also really fun too for me because I do think like there' be a bunch of like Orthodox Jews who were like yo dude I've seen like I've seen your show like like they're like uh because we pray a lot on my show Orthodox Jews Like praying and uh so they're like wait three times a day we do a version of that but then you know same thing with my audience is obviously there's there's a lot of people who come out who are Muslim and so I've always kind of felt that there is a space to have where you're talking to people who need to hear a specific thing they can't hear somewhere else and also challenging them to hear something that they probably might not want to hear and getting to play with that and and and I think that is kind of what's fun about it it's like the very little thing that we could do I constantly contend with how important that piece is and I also think like a lot of the language around that can feel like a little a little hard for me to stomach when there's like people who are who really put you know put themselves on the line to to kind of try and help the world because I'm always going for the joke so it's like my my space the space I want to have in the conversation is like really really small really small like I kind I want to be like I want to be like the door man like letting people into a room where there are actual interesting things happening like I am the valet like there is nothing this is not like about this like philosophy thing like this is truly just like a little bit of like the the with the grease that makes the door not sound so squeaky so that like the people can kind of walk into a room and actually process real things and so I'm really aware of you know kind of of that standup comedy is one of the rare art forms where it's one person speaking to a group of people there's no Studio there's no network there's no filter so you do have a sense when you're watching somebody speak that that's roughly what they're thinking about and it's so raw and it's the reason why I love watching Comics I just love comedy because it doesn't feel like it's processed there's a lot of conversations around sort of Truth in this in this moment but I'm curious like do you worry about sort of your your comedy being fact checked in this moment which is this ridiculous thing to say and yet I think that that's sort of where we are after the hen article came out in the New Yorker I got a lot of text messages that said I hope you jump through that Second Story window referencing a show I did many years ago where I jumped through a second story window um I heard it was a first story right yeah that was definitely like something people wanted to talk to me about I don't know about you guys but they wanted to talk to me about that a lot and I take it you know I love H and I think the the intent of that writer remains uh very nebulous in why they would write that it's very confusing to me yeah it's not a thing to fact check like this isn't this is a thing I don't I don't want to break anyone I don't want to break anyone's heart nobody ever nobody ever fact checked s in Cambodia it's not something people do I I think you you you have a sense of what level of Truth the person is telling and you take a guess and sometimes you're right and sometimes you're wrong it's also really like interesting in terms of like what you need to say as like what's true to you that like you really want people to know and I thought a lot about this when that article came out cuz I was like everything in my special is true but a lot of it also is about my perception like it's like well I didn't like hear what the people who decided to you know send me an audition to be Pennywise actually thought when they sent that to me but like I'm trying to tell you I know it's such a bummer but I didn't go in on that um but like it's like I'm trying to show how I felt rather than saying like I mean I I guess I did end up screaming like that really hurt my feelings because that is also something that I wanted to say but I wanted to show like how confounded I was but also humiliated and so like I acted it out and like yeah I'm not like accusing people of actually doing that or whatever but I I just started thinking for me like it would be weird if that was how my Act was or my performance or whatever was assessed or something because it's so much about like the psyche about like how you are in the world and like how it feels and and the Artistry yeah and it's like I'm I'm trying to show not just like I'm not just trying to make an impression but I'm trying to show what it feels like to have an impression made on me I don't know it's all about the how though and like I have to say this cuz we're in this comedy thing cuz it's like I I and I told you this but the first ever one person show I saw was Jenny's at UCB and I remember the the one where you were doing you were playing the ays yeah and it was like it literally made me go I want to do that like I I think I was 17 or 18 or something like like I was just I remember just like maybe it was like my first year of college and I remember seeing it and I just loved how you did it and and it was just all about that raw energy and I think that's all that this is so to fact check it is so weird because it's like I think it speaks to a larger we have like an Integrity problem like we have a spirit spiritual void we have an inter like as a society because the common person a politician talks and they don't even they're like yeah he's probably lying but this comedian you know so I don't care I don't care where Mike jumped from I don't care if Alex actually went to a meeting like it doesn't matter because it's all about like what the approach is and the how and the why you're approaching it that way and I think that it speaks to a massive Integrity void that we look at entertainers the way that we do that we look at standup the way that we do and and and cuz it really is at the end of the day there's nothing funnier than a fart joke and it remains to be and that should tell you something about this whole art I agree I agree there's nothing funnier than a our joke my faite J Pro someone it met big falling on their head you mentioned the Pennywise thing and I'm curious sort of this idea of like what does Hollywood know what to to do with all of you and and and some of you written your own stuff um you're laughing at this thing what to do with all you I think here what we wanted any other way I don't think I don't think Hollywood knows what to do right now we're at an inflection point and I think everyone here has been really clear as to what they want to do how they put it together and I don't think that anyone here needs to be confined to any sort of box I don't think there are types there are barely even channels like everything is open for grabs so that that like what does Hollywood know what to that's a whole other and that's and no one's at fault like that's actually just a reflection of the entire landscape of media and how things are made is just radically shifting Mike you at like 30 got a CBS sitcom pilot right which was the thing you thought you you wanted this is like this is like Jerry McGuire like like but it wasn't the thing you wanted you ultimately yeah no it was like so the look in your face suggests that there's more here go that's like in my 20s I just thought that I wanted to be a star somehow yeah just like I want to be a comedy star you know I don't I don't even thinking hindsight I knew what that meant and then I when I was 30 I was given my own sitcom at CBS and they they shot the pilot and Bob Odenkirk played my brother and and you know Nick croll played my cousin and all this stuff and it was like oh my God I can't believe it and then by the time it went through the factory that is Studios and networks and all that kind of thing it just wasn't really my life it wasn't my Creative Vision and I it didn't get picked up to Air and thank God I went back to New York I mounted Sleepwalk with Me Nathan lanee put his name behind it um and his reputation and was Nathan Lane presents Mike bigly Sleepwalk with me and it changed my life and career and I haven't looked back I just make my own things now although then you did that for us too as well that's like my favorite kind of thing is when comedians can have their own authentic voice what's the brass ring I mean some you I feel like my generation grew up and and I I'm in your thinking SNL was was the thing thinking the did you want to do a late cuz I saw you worked like like I when I think of you you worked so like oh always you were always doing it that's why I was telling you it's so cool that you got this show that's nice thanks Ry um no I never wanted to late night show like I only ever wanted to tour theaters like that's all I ever wanted to do is just tour theaters off of my standup like Brian rean and the reason I took after midnight is because they're like we film Monday through Wednesday so you could Tour on the weekends and then everyone who's involved is just incredible and I wanted to work with all of them and you know once you're on tour by yourself you don't see other comedians that much so I was like oh you can just like play around with other comedians on TV for half the week that sounds great but yeah no it was never like a goal of mine to do a traditional talk show or anything like that you know it was uh our special on HBO like Chris Rock uhhuh I mean that was it was center of a vision board that was the to me that was like the height of the form and I know there's now more specials than there used to be and you know that's a whole thing right but it was like marching around on a on a big stage with confidence I guess so you've you've achieved the yeah that was really it and um you know I I do feel some bit of like not that it's a constant question of okay if I died tomorrow kind of thing but I'd feel a lot better dying tomorrow than I would have felt dying tomorrow five years ago I think the brass ring for me is like this sounds really poac but like I always wanted to like be seen not as like a star but like genuinely I always always wanted to like I guess like there's a romance in being seen I was like looking for romance like you said like 45 minutes like long form so works for me because like I require a good amount of explanation I require be like what are you I'm like here let me just talk for an hour and then maybe I'll get maybe there's something of that I guess it's the being seen thing but like I do kind of feel like we're here you know as individuals right and it's like what do I have specifically that's mine to offer up during my lifetime like what the me thing and I felt like I did that in one part you know at least I felt I did that one part of me once so far and before I don't think I had so you know there I was almost like to the gods you know like kind of like again don't want to die tomorrow but just like okay like we got one on the [ __ ] books you know what I mean like I feel like Jaclyn's an example of like someone who in a different era you might have been watered down to like a your comedy might have been watered down to a different type of comedy so like when people see get on your knees they really see your brain like out on the table you know what I mean and it's like that's so beautiful and it's I think part of partly because of the moment that we're in where people have because comedy so you big with is people have become connoisseurs so people found Jacqueline's comedy and it's become like when you ran the show Cherry Lane in New York it was a phenomenon you know when Alex ran his show in New York it was a phenomenon it's like if you didn't see it you're not in the no kind of thing and that wasn't of a that wasn't of the era when I was a door person in the 1990s when I was in college at the Washington DC Improv there wasn't that people weren't comedy connoisseurs in that way where they were seeking out like oh what's different from the the people who are here for the next six weeks it's so funny though because I was reading an interview that Romy did a couple of weeks ago maybe months ago and someone asked him a question that I get asked a lot also which is sort of about the cultural specificity that they suppose your thing has right they're like is your I assume they're asking in a euphemistic way about you being a Muslim and in the same way they're asking me euphemistically about me being a Jew and you said that people come up to you and go oh I understand because that's my family my family is Jamaican or they come to me because that's my identity and my desire to do XYZ but I'm you know from anywhere else and the first thing I thought when I read that was that's Norman Lear that's Norman leer always said I'm just another version View and the like the specific being Universal like I do think that like people are looking for specificity now in this like very scattered media landscape and like the individual in the way that they used to maybe get from television shows yeah and so like there's something very old school about the aesthetic even as the content vessel for it is really different U right we're going to end on a lightning round um number one thing on your bucket list this isn't an answer but it was cool to see you on SNL so good thank you so good it's really really amazing it that's Taylor's bucket left I can die now I can die tomorrow now to see to see Jenny at the comedy cell oh my gosh was that a bucket list for you SNL yeah yeah that was it be crazy if you were like no I mean it was it and it and I've been so fortunate and I think everyone here has we've all checked a lot of bucket list out even by getting to talk to you like it's it's kind you kind of have to check bucket list St to get here but that SNL's still it's really it's crazy that for me it's crazy she asked that that was one of the first things I thought I don't think that's my answer but that but hosting SNL I think all of us are fans to some extent everyone pretends a little bit to different degrees but we're all like fans of Comedy we're all like i' I rarely meet comedians where I truly believe they're not fans so like it's a thing that I almost was like what's being an SNL like you know I think that probably was my like bucket list it's weird to like get the bucket list and then be like oh I guess I'm not sure like that I really that it was what I wanted or you know it just it wasn't the thing but like if I hadn't been on it I would be trying to be on it still and when I watch it I still feel like magical about it I also have this like feeling that it will become more relevant actually because I I was watching something and there was just this like AI video of um LeBron doing op pressor and like I believe Leed it for the first like minute but then he was talking about it was like LeBron's take on uh the Civil War or something and he was like I was there and then I was like oh wait this is a joke but it I do think being live in front of like 300 people it's happening now the stock on that is only going to rise so I actually think it's kind of going to be a lifetime brand like cuz I do think that there's something that people really crave which I think also makes standup this art form that I think will continue to like only have more and more people come to it because we all want to know it's happening like we want to know it's real and we want to know and I mean not the stories but the experience you know is like actually this person actually said that is going to be really I think really important to feel my bucket list thing would be like if I really could Master new things old things like I really I'm acting a little more now to master that seems like a whole new bucket list Challenge and like little goals along the way feel less like I'd love to win Awards or like do SNL or play Masson Square Garden but really it's for like the multiplicity of experience and I think the actual thing would be like God if I really got to a place Seinfeld always talks about the joy of Mastery and how like so many rich people aren't happy because they don't have Mastery in their life God to master something new where you express yourself in a way you never thought you could [ __ ] it's really cool what's something you guys used to joke about that you look back on now and cringe people's white it's not really a taboo yet and no one's ever called me on it and I was never like that guy's fat but I would make jokes like obliquely there are plenty of things that I wouldn't say now not for the reason of like cancellation but because my standards are higher than they used to be I I I've made some jokes that I would just like I'm embarrassed by a lot of my early stuff it was like I was not good there's a little bit of like I don't know like learning on the uh kind of like that like the wrong clay or something like that but there is a little bit of like really great way to out how to put things together and then the the building blocks are kind of arbitrary or something you're like you know like in the craft I don't worry about cancel culture but I worry about the iterative nature of comics figuring it out being someone arrested I would say that's a more not to be like like that's that's the thing I worry about more people figuring it out I had a lot of things I need to like figure out when I look back on things I did early in my career it's not that I'm embarrassed of the word choice or something that's out of date and time it's like that I wasn't opening up to the audience and being honest about how I actually felt I was attempting to project a Persona that I thought people would like and it's embarrassing and I think that what's helpful to look back on that for is to go okay but now I can now I can walk out on stage and say exactly how I feel like the best compliment I ever get is like recently I've been touring this new show and people are like that's what you're like and I'm like [ __ ] yeah yeah like that's like I don't know it's not done yet it's it'll be another year in the oven but like that's what I'm going towards I'm not even Jewish so it's really got to get away from now all right we're going to end on on something that going to feel silly but I feel like it is actually revealing what's the most used emoji on your phone prob the hands clapping there you go hand clapping eyes being wide open oh the side eye just wide open eyes yeah the big like that where he's like yeah I do use the heart a lot and but it's it's I hate it I truly I'm just it's just so like what a diaper you know like it's like a [ __ ] baby a lot heart a lot I like want people to know you know like I'm just like but don't give thumbs up because I feel like that's too um sporty but I do the lightning bolt a lot and I love it I absolutely love it and I feel like when people get it they're like oh you know like they like love that really like you got it yeah like see you there you know what I mean I like the little the one heart and then the little heart oh I like that together it's a little bit of like an ellipses heart or something it's like got a little movement to it and of course the ghost just the Classic ghost is he little silly too imbued with you know the spiritual yeah I like him and yes I gendered the ghost you can take it back yeah exactly go ahead go ahead ref apologizing to the lens I really like the face melting there's a lot of ambiguity there you're not sure what what they're doing just like why is there someone says something I don't know how to react I'm just like so yeah that homey I think I used the baby angel there like two angels but there's one that's the little angel cuz I'm I feel like I'm always I don't know I'm always in situations where I'm like let me show the the little baby angel so we can all remember that we're here know baby and he's got the little wings the Hal have like a little like is the one with the wings one with the Hal it's got wings so the Halo is the older Angel but I I use the baby to kind of say hey I know I'm being annoying but remember we're all just babies navigating this world so it's just no to the inner child I couldn't even I couldn't even finish it but I think I do use it I think that's why I use it I've never put it in these words but then I looked at Mike and I was like real Elegance to some of these emojis the one that looks like Mount Fiji you're just like wow that's really beautiful like a rock like when you can find one you're like this has not been used they're doing work feel incredible it's very ni on that thanks for having appreciate speaks for all of us I know Taffy today's takeaway with all the uncertainty in the world one thing is for certain we need comedy now more than ever we're not going anywhere until next time I'm Ivan orgy and this is Off Script with The Hollywood Reporter [Music]