Ep. 19 - The Stand Up Conversation with Stephanie Peters

Comedian Stephanie Peters shares how she began stand-up comedy at 40, overcame stage fright, performed with Joan Rivers and other comedy legends, and built a successful second-act career in entertainment.

This week’s guest, comedian Stephanie Peters, entered comedy at the age of 40 and hasn’t looked back!  Prior to discovering comedy as her calling, she studied and trained as a jazz vocalist at The Berklee School of Music in Boston, yet a serious bout of stage fright cut her music career short - so how did she ever manage to perform comedy?!  Tune in to find out!

Winner of the Marshall's Women in Comedy festival, which crowned her one of the top "new" female comics in the country, Stephanie performed as an opening act for one of her comedy idols, Joan Rivers.  She’s also worked with Denis Leary, DL Hughley, Colin Quinn, John Pinette and Jackie Mason among others.

Stephanie shares how her comedy career took off, some harsh realities of the business she experienced and discusses when doors of opportunities closed, how she found other doors and even a few windows opened in their place.  Her shoot-from-the-hip opinions and hysterical antics will have you laughing along with us as she shares her journey and the many twists and turns she’s navigated.

Episode and Guest Links:

Stephanie Peters Comedy

Connect with Stephanie Peters on Facebook

Stephanie Peters - My Boston

Stephanie Peters on The Steve Katsos Show

Stephanie and Chef Jeff crack up FOX25 Boston News Anchors

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Music Credit:  True Living by Patrick Moore

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Transcript

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0:14  
Welcome to assorted conversations.

0:17  
The podcast with everyday people sharing stories of following their passions as they pursue happiness.

0:28  
Welcome back to anybody that is listening to us for a repeat performance and welcome to anybody that is joining us for the first time on a sort of conversations. Maureen, I am so excited about this week's episode we got to talk to local comedian Stephanie Peters. 

Amazing. 

Her story just resonates with me. I met her probably 20 years ago after a show I had seen her do had a quick conversation with her and found out that when she was 40 years old, she took her first stand up comedy class and at 40 years old is when she got into stand up comedy. And she is she has a big personality on stage, as well as a big personality in real life not and you're gonna hear all about it this week. So take a listen to this week's episode and we'll see on the other side

1:38  

Our guest this week got her started stand up comedy at the urging and with the support of her husband. From there she developed her larger than life stage presence and won the Marshalls women in comedy festival, which crowned her one of the top female comics in the country. She has appeared on Boston talk radio, morning news programs, and appeared on BTS ComicView. Welcome to assorted conversations Stephanie Peters. 

Good, good. Wow, I sound awesome.

2:16  
I do. I am amazing. What are we doing girls?  What's happening?

2:24  
We are we are just chit chatting with you. Because that's how I want to spend an afternoon is spending time with someone who makes me laugh.

2:32  
Awesome. who is that now?

2:35  
Actually, I get to spend time with two women who make me laugh.

2:41  
Cool. Sounds good.

2:42
I want to know where it began. How did it begin, Stephanie?

2:45  
Okay, so let's let's let's I was a baby. No, no, here's, here's how it began. I always loved comedy. And I know you hear this from comedians all the time. But I swear to God, I used to cry if my parents didn't let me stay up and watch Johnny Carson. And I think how do they know when like, as a little kid, I would do like, I gotta watch because I loved and you know, it's funny. They call me a modern day Totie Fields. But I loved Totie Fields. And I loved Phyllis Diller. And the reason I think that I I identified with them so much was back in those days, a lot of the women on television were the typical, very quiet white housewife that, you know, was better seen than her and blah, blah, blah. And these women were more like my Italian Sicilian family of women that were loud. And, and had things to say. And, you know, were funny, and and didn't let men you know, tell them what was right and what was wrong. And and so they identified with these women, because they were just like the women that I that I knew, you know, that that sat around the table you learn to, to be able to not only get people's attention, but keep it because there are so many people I came from a huge family. So if you weren't interesting, funny or loud, forget it. You're out, you know, so true. I truthfully was a chubby kid. And I think being funny had a lot to do with you know that you're not gonna, you're not gonna make fun of me because I'm going to be the one that you know, makes fun of you first, you know what I mean? Like, but in a funny way, or I'm going to make you laugh or I'm going to show show you you can't hurt me because I can make you laugh. Exactly. Right. I can make

4:37  
more fun of me than you can.

4:39  
Exactly. And it was like, you know, it was a powerful a, you know, it's like a power. I'm a superpower most especially for a kid, you know, as I got older, I used to go to Boston comedy because Boston comedy was on fire back in the 70s. Right? I mean, there was the I lived in Cambridge, and there was the club that ding Whoa, yeah. And I'm telling ya Oh my god, I saw Stephen Wright come up. And of course Lenny and Steve Sweeney and all those guys, and I used to hang out with them. They used to be a place called the, I think they call it the barracks and it was an apartment around the corner. And it was, oh my God, it was just a den of iniquity. It was just things I won't even talk about. The things went on in that place, but I dated Believe it or not, and your audience can't see me but I am a women a woman of size, but back then I was then and I was very cute. I dated Denis Leary. You're, you know, it wasn't it wasn't like, you know, like, I think we went out a couple of times, but I watched these guys. It just complete and the, YEAH. Jimmy tangle was the bartender. The only women that were really playing the club back then. But I mean, they went far. Paula Poundstone used to play there. Yeah, Rosie O'Donnell used to play they had Janine garafolo used to play there. So fast forward, I, I actually went to Berkeley. I was a musician. I was a jazz vocalist in Boston for years. Oh, wow. Yes, yes. And a music was was always a big thing to me. And then once I chose it as a profession, I put too much weight on it. Now. It was the way I had to make money. Now it was I was responsible for other people. I was the lead. So you know, if my bass player was drunk, you know, what am I going to do? If my if my guitarist doesn't know the song? What am I going to do? It was just was whole. And I and I ended up getting really bad stress and and, you know, a lot of pressure. Yeah, I wasn't enjoying it anymore. And I ended up quitting quitting music because of well, then I started drinking to get rid of the anxiety. And then I started doing drugs. And it was like, Listen, I'm either gonna, you know, die, or I gotta just take a break, you know, right. So I took a break from it. I absolutely identified with having stage fright. Because, you know, anytime I went on stage, I just felt like I was having a heart attack. And I remember, I was singing one day in a store. And this woman said to me, Oh, you have a lovely voice, you should you know, you should share that with people. And I'm like, Well, I used to be a singer. She goes, What do you mean, you used to be a singer? And I said, Well, I got really bad stage fright. And she said, Oh, darling, she says, Don't you know about beta blockers? And I was like, No, what's that? And she says, Well, what happens when you get stage fright is by adrenaline rushes to your system, right? Right. Flight or fright or whatever that is, you know, and she says, a beta blocker will just stop that from happening. It'll relax you enough so that that, you know, doesn't happen. I was like, Oh, that's really interesting. So, um, I kind of stored that in my head, like, well, I guess I didn't have to quit music, but whatever, you know, so fast forward. I, I go to school for design. I become an interior designer. I love interior design. But you know, the people that you work for a steal of my ideas. Someone has a backhoe lounger that I have to design around it. You know, I decide my my mother owned an antique store. She was a big real estate broker. But she also did an antique store on Charles Street. I'm going to get into the whole antique scene. So I become an antique dealer. And I love that as this very kind of carnival atmosphere you go when you do Brimfield, and all these fun outdoor shows. So I'm very content. And then I meet my husband, who's a chef, and he basically had me you know, they say you had me at hello? Yeah, he had me at a chef.

8:39  
Winner. Yeah, exactly. When I went to chicken dinner, so we get married and, and he thinks I'm hysterical. And I think he's hysterical. And I really do think a good relationship is is very, it's important to laugh and we laugh all the time, you know? Yeah. No, he knew, because I used to get these pamphlets from the Center for adult education. And it would say take a comedy class, but at the end of it, the paragraph it would say, and then you do it on stage, and I was like, Oh, forget it. My, my stage fright could never I mean, that would be being on stage by myself. Never mind being on stage with a whole band, you know. So finally, he just I was turning 40 And it was just something that he decided to do. He was the chef at either the Ritz at the time, or the college Club, which was like the Harvard Club for women on commonwealth and Baja. So we had a pack and space right there across the street from the Boston Center for adult education it was too easy for me not to do it. So things like Stephanie Worst comes to worst take the class and then don't go on stay don't just go and have fun. Yeah, so which is funny because no one ever

9:51  
ever supported me though everyone always thought I was funny. But then I when I would say like, you know, I always wanted to try comedy that kind of look at you like oh, that's tough, you know, because you Yeah, let me tell you a stand up comedy is in the top five of the scariest things that people can do like people listed like writing with firefighter. Like not that it's the same don't get me wrong, but it's people have that big of fear of public speaking and whatever, you know. So Jeff, Jeff gives me the, you know, gives me the class as a gift. And it's so funny, I get to this class, and it has those, those desks that have the little thing in front of it, right? The little desktop? Yeah, yeah, I'm too fat to sit in the chair. And I'm like, Oh, my God, I'm in a room full of funny people. And I'm like, you know, the joke, you know? Cuz I know. So the one guy in the class, this guy who ended up becoming a very good friend of mine, went into another room. And without even cuz I kind of made a little joke about it. But it was embarrassing. He went into another room, and he got me another chair, and we became really good friends. Now the beauty of taking that class was meeting the other people in the class that I respected. And we would workshop later and help each other figure out you know, where to go with the joke, or what was funny about it, or where to, you know, where to get it from another angle, blah, blah, blah. But it was also because they were strangers. Now you can say funny stuff to your friends. And they're going to go like, Oh, yeah, that's funny. But and then and then and then your friends, so they're never going to be completely honest, strangers are going to look at you and go, I don't know what's funny about that. Like, what? Yeah, they gotta be more honest. So you know, it's, it's what's gonna happen when you go in front of an audience. So it's the best practice in front of a bunch of guys that you don't know. But it was funny to see how the class dwindle down and dwindle down because Oh, the closer we got to a stage performance really that? Yeah. Oh, yeah. So then we finally came to the night that we had to do our performance. And it was at the Comedy studio in Harvard Square on the third floor, this comedy club was right. And I remember going up there and almost having a panic attack, because I was out of breath from going up the three flights of stairs, and had it not be had it not been for me being fat and lazy. I probably would have left, because I was so scared. But I just didn't want to walk down the free flights of stairs. So I almost want to credit even more than my husband, stairs, making me a comedian because I stay you know. But I remember I was in the bathroom, I was hugging the wall. I just the cold porcelain. God knows what kind of weird things were growing on that wall. But I was hugging that cold porcelain just to get, you know, like to cool off. And I went on stage. And let me tell you, the first laugh was like I've done and I'm not saying this. Kids don't do drugs. But I had done pretty much every drug that was out there except heroin. And it was like better than any drug I had ever tried. It was just this automatic. Oh my god. This is like the best thing because it was, and my husband is great at that. But it was better than sex really was better than sex, you know. So it was like, alright, but I got to deal with this. This skid you know, being scared. I still was very scared that like I was gonna die. But I knew I loved it. So I went to the doctor. And I remembered that conversation that I had with that woman about beta blockers. And and my doctor prescribed me a beta blocker. And I the next time I was going to go on stage. I think a bunch of meet me and some friends got a gig in New York, which I don't know how we got the gig, but it was called the Boston Comedy Club. And it was in New York. And I took the beta blocker and it worked. But here's here's what's weird about that. Just having it. I never had to take it again. Because just having it in my in my bag. Just knowing that there was a door that I could open to get out. You know what I'm saying? Like, just knowing that I had that pill if I needed it caused me not to be afraid anymore. So well, yeah, it it's like a psychological thing, right? It's like having a lucky term. Yeah, it was like you put these kind of params you know, these these weird, whatever on yourself, you know what I mean? Like, and so I really never was afraid again, I just, I just kept wanting to get on stage. I kept wanting to do it. I just it really became like, an addiction addiction in a way. You know, I'm in the business maybe three months at that point. I always had this fantasy that if I became a comedian, Lenny Clark, you know, people have sexual fantasies, fantasies. I had comedy fantasies, right. Lenny Clark would see me and he would laugh so hard. He would fall off his chair. That was my fantasy. And I would have rather not do comedy than have that not happen. You know what I mean? Right? Because because that's how much I I respected him and wanted him to like me and think I was funny. So there's a friend in my neighborhood running for office, and we go to this place that he's gay, he's going to have a comedy fundraiser, and we go there. And he says to me, all right, Stephanie, I did this and I know you're going to be upset. But But I think you're ready. And I was like, What are you talking about Bobby? He goes, Well, Lenny clocks going to be here tonight. And I was like, no, no, I'm not ready. I gotta go. I'm out of here. And he's like, No, you're gonna do this. I, you know, I he's, he's gonna love you. Oh, my God. I was dying. Dying, right? I went on stage. And when I tell you, and I'm not lying, I get goosebumps when I tell it. Exactly. The fantasy. Really. It was like something that was meant to be Lennie laughed so hard. He literally fell off his chair. And it was it was like, like, almost like foreseen, future, you know? Like, like a premonition. Yes. It was crazy. Right? So now Lenny comes up to me. And at the end of the show, and he goes, I love you. He says, I'm going to have my brother call you because his brother runs giggles on In on ruwan. So the next thing you know, I get a call from Mike, who's lady's brother and he says to me, Listen,

16:22  
I'm going to put you on some shows with Lenny. So I did some shows with Lenny and everything went great. And then I don't know, like, like, maybe even a month later. So what I'm in the business for months at this point, they come to me and they say now Now keep your mouth shut. But we're thinking of using you on comics come home. And I was like, what? Right now I'm the Business literally four months. Comics come home is huge, which was at the Orpheum at the time. And it was ran run by cam Neely, whose family had you know, as my both his mother and father had died of cancer, and he raised money for cancer, it was a great cause. So now every Boston comic wanted on this show, right? And they like they had famous people, but they had some local guys too. But there were still enough really big Boston comics that hadn't been on it yet that for anyone to find out that I was going to be chosen for this. It was going to start a shitstorm right? It was going to be like guys, we're going to be like, What do you fucking kid you know, like, Are you kidding me? Like why thickener. And the truth was they wanted a woman on the show a local woman because it was comics come home, it was a Boston thing. What they don't understand was I wasn't this young kid. That was just getting into the entertainment business. I had already been an entertainer, entertainer for 20 years and the mute you know, I'm saying like, No, and I just want you to comedy. And I was I was there appear I wasn't a child. I wasn't someone who was just, you know, starting something. And you know, I treated it like a business. I was very professional about it. Okay, so I get comics come home. And here, it's gonna be this big opportunity, this huge opportunity in my career. And and I'm, and I'm down for it. And the night before, there's a dinner at the child's hotel. And I'm sitting next to the guy who's the producer of rescue me and candy Ellie's brother. So we're joking around. And I said, I said, so guys, I'm pretty sure I'm on the show. Because this is one particular thing I do. And so people who don't know my act, I talk about how food ends up down my cleavage. And how like, if I ever get if my plane ever crashed in the Andes, I probably could survive on whatever ended up in my bra. And then usually I prove it by pulling a huge sandwich out of my books. Right? And it's very funny and everyone goes crazy. And oh my god, it's J Moore. Anthony clock. Steven, right. I mean, it's rainy Steve Sweeney who I have to follow doing river he did river dance. Oh, I have to go on after Steve Sweeney, Boston hero doing river dance. And I just looked at them. Like, are you shitting me? Like really? Why don't you just feed me to the shock right now? Because you know, this is not gonna go well, you know. But anyway, the night before I was talking to those guys, I told them about my sandwich shop. They were like, Oh, you got to do it to camp. So I was like, Well, does he? Is he in the front row? And they said no, but we'll figure it out. And if you can get him that would be awesome. Blah, blah, blah. Okay, so I go on, they introduced me I stopped doing my SAT I get to them and I'm doing great. They love me. I get to the point where I pull the sandwich out. And they did say to me that if for some reason I couldn't get cam. There was a guy in the front row that donated a Mercedes Benz every year so he goes if you can't get can't get this guy, so Okay, so I pull the sandwich out and I say to the guy cuz I don't see him now.

20:01  
You know, take a bite of the sandwich because usually someone takes a bite and, and they like the hero for the rest of the night. I mean, it's like, right, people can't believe they take a bite of the sandwich, you know? And the truth is, if they don't take a bite, I can't do the couple of jokes. There's a couple of tags afterwards. So the joke kind of falls if the person doesn't eat it, but they always eat it. It's a funny thing, right? So I do it to kind of exalt the person not to embarrass them, you know? So anyway, I go to give it to the car dealer guy and he won't take a bite. And he says you should get Key says to be you should get km I like, I know, but I don't know where he is. So some people stop pointing that he's like in the middle of the audience. So I said, Well, you know what, maybe if you guys give some more money to the cause, can we'll come up here and take a bite of the sandwich. Okay, now it's out of my control. I'm only in the business for months this thing is taken on a life of itself. And I have lost somewhat control. I've lost complete control, actually. Right. So people stopped throwing $100 bills on the stage. I'm walking around the stage making that money right? I have a fan of probably $2,000 in my hand. And cam Neely still isn't isn't we're having trouble finding him. But they're pointing they're pointing you know, so I say to the lighting guy, because I don't know any better. I'm just in it at this point. Hey, lighting guy and they put a big spot on cam Neely, right. Oh, I know. I know. So now cans kind of embarrassed but people start chanting Kham Kham Kham. So he walks to the front of the stage, and I offer him the sandwich. And I think if we were level with each other people wouldn't have noticed. But because we were on an angle, they noticed that he took a pretend bite. And it was it was such a pussy thing for a big hockey player to do that the audience started to boo him. Oh, my God, I have lost complete control. I am now getting the guy who's responsible for doing a cancer benefit, booed. And it's like, oh my god, what is happening? Right? So this isn't good. This isn't good, right? So I get very nervous, but in the wings, I see Dennis. And and you can see he's kind of got a look on his face. Like, what are you gonna do? And I'm like, I know we'll eat the sandwich. And I'm like, Dennis come out here. Dennis comes out. He puts a cigarette out on a cigarette out on the stage. He grabs the money, takes the sandwich looks at cam calls him a fucking pussy. Eats, eats the sandwich and we get a standing ovation. The crowd goes wild. All right, God. So now Dennis walks off stage. I finished the rest of my act. I get another pretty big applause at the end of it. I get off on stage. I'm pretty high. From you know, it's it's I mean, I'm playing the Orpheum. It's I don't know, 1000s of people. But it's awesome. Right? I get offstage. And I see cam Neely, who's huge Now, mind you, I seem bigger than I am. Because I got a big mouth, but I'm 411 Okay. i Yeah, cameo. He's like six, seven or so I don't even know how big he is. Right? He's a giant right next to him is his brother, the guy I was having dinner with the night before who told me to do it. And the other guy who was a producer of rescue me right? Now, this was my best introduction to the business and I'll never forget it as long as I live. Cam Neely looks at me. And he goes, who the fuck told you you could do that to me? And I look at them. Like, you're gonna help me out here guys. And they turned around and threw me under the bus. Oh, are you kidding me? No cam nearly proceeds that evening. And I don't care if this gets out there because it's a true fucking story. And I tell my truth. I'm proceeded to tell people that night, Lenny, Mike, everyone involved in the Boston comedy scene that if they ever used me, he'd have nothing to do with them. So four months into the business, I am not now not allowed to play giggles I'm not getting hired at the cow loon. All these places the doors start showing up. So what should have been one of the best things to happen to me ended up being one of the worst comedians resented me. Cam nearly hated me. This one woman who was a writer wrote terrible things about so now what happens is I go to the after party. I don't realize that that there's as much resentment going on as there is there's like a bus and I'm just oblivious because I had fun. This woman comes up to me and she's kind of hanging out. And I don't think Laura told me at the time it was Laura reposer from the Boston Herald. Yep. I don't think she really told me that she wrote for the Herald. I think we were just hanging out. She's Italian. I'm Italian. We were just joking around and laughing most of the night. So I get a call the next day from her. And she's like, listen, I saw the piece that so and so wrote, I think it was horrible. I just wrote something else about how great you are. And I'm putting your picture in the in the inside track. And I was like, I didn't even know you weren't for the hair. You know, like, I know, I don't. I was talking to her because she was fun, you know? So she goes, Listen, she says, that's not the reason I'm calling the reason I'm calling her Patna Gail fee and have an appendicitis attack. And I was I mean, had like, you know, sepsis almost died. And Laura had just gotten a talk radio show drive time. 96.9 FM needed someone to partner with her. And she asked me, and I never been near a radio station. And what's funny is my my best friend Billy went to school for radio, and I called him up and I'm like, Oh, my God, you're not gonna believe this. And he's like, only you. Stephanie goes, I go to college for four years. Because

26:06  
I can hardly get near a station like that. He says, and you trip and shit and come up roses. I said, Billy, I'm scared. Will you come with me as well? Of course he comes. And what's so funny is she thinks he's my manager. Really just my best friend you know that I showed up with someone you know, cuz it looked like he was he was managing me whatever. And we end up being on like, three hours a day. It's the best. Let me tell you, I want to retire to radio. i You don't have to get dressed. You don't have to put on. You can say whatever you want. You don't even know who's out there. Which is crazy. Yes. When you're on stage, that's a term that you see who's out there. When you're on the radio. You have no idea. We the year we started. It was the year that for survivor was first on. So we stopped talking about it every day after the show was on and the lights on the phone would just I mean, it was unbelievable the response we would get right. So I went straight to drive time radios. So I really wasn't as concerned when some of the other doors were closing. Because one door closes another a weird one opens. I never thought that would happen. But you know if you had good, I so believe in karma. I know. It sounds earthy, crunchy. But I know that every time I do a good thing, something something good comes from it, you know, and here's here's the thing, and I guess because of your show was about following your dream and doing that thing that you always wanted to do bla bla bla, um, soon after that I was diagnosed with cancer. I had endometrial cancer, and I had never been able to have kids because I had endometriosis. But it turned into a form of cancer and I had to have a hysterectomy. I never was too bummed out about any event, because I couldn't wait to get back to do what I love doing. I seriously think it got me through that crisis because I really just couldn't wait until I could just get back on stage. And and you know, and you know, enjoy what it is that I that I love to do, you know, right. So then soon after that I got I opened for I did a little contest and I ended up opening for Joan Rivers, which was a dream come true. She was one she was wonderful. She was the most i She wasn't she because I was a comedian. It was almost like she was motherly. You know, she was like, you know, she cheats. She was just so sweet. And she didn't have to be I mean, she smelled of money. I mean, she had on the most oh my god she had on the most beautiful coat I ever saw in my life. She was so impeccably dressed and smells like the most expensive perfume you ever smell to get why she was she was just a mess. She was like a little fairy princess or something to me. You know? It's funny because she didn't look like and the way she talked to people sometimes. You know, anybody that didn't think Joan Rivers was their cup of tea was like, she's just too in your face. She's too brash. But you know what? People say? I'll tell you what, what how I feel about that. Because she's a woman. No one would ever say that about me on the business. I faced that my entire career too dirty. I'm too this. I'm to that and you know what? They would never say the same thing about a guy who does exactly what I'm doing. And I am not that dirty. I mean, I throw an F bomb out. And you know why? Because I'm a city girl. And I I say that in my regular conversation. That's that's a decision I had to make. Because I the main thing about being in comedy is you have to be honest, it's IT people know if you're real or if you're not real. Yeah. And that's what endears you to the audience. So I, I either could pretend to be a clean comic, and and not swear, but that wasn't me. You know, I'm a city girl, I go to the store, I pick up fucking eggs. I mean, that's just who I am, you know, and I and I actually think, really do I want to perform for an audience that doesn't want to hear the F bomb? Like, who are those people? Right? Maybe I want to perform for them. You know? Like, it's a choice I made? Yeah, your audience will come to you the people who are exactly Yeah, exactly. Let me tell you, early on, they wanted to tell me what I couldn't couldn't say on stage. And not because you can't say this on stage right? For any kind of illegal I mean, Lenny Bruce fought. So you should be able to say whatever the hell we want. And if they're not students of Lenny, Bruce, they should just get out of the business, right? I'm good friend, my father, who I tell a joke about how I'm Sicilian, my father looks exactly like Robert De Niro. And my mother looks like Joe patchy.

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What my father, who was this tough selling guy couldn't tell me what to do. Mm hmm. So who were these guys? Who thought they were gonna tell me I mean, part of the reason I got in this was to be able to have that freedom, and say whatever I want to say and have my own voice. So I mean, you know, well, I don't think it's a good idea for you to do this. And I don't think it's a good idea for you. I just looked at them. And I was like, I watch like, are you crazy? You know? Yeah, you know, along that line now, with the sense of outrage or sense of being offended? Back then how has comedy changed for you? From then until now? I think because, um, I I've never been political in my app. Yeah. I know that. Truthfully, I'm so sick of politics, that if I go out to laugh, it's the last thing I want to hear about. I mean, I I love political humor. I love Jimmy tingle. I think it's an art form. Because I think that people like him. And and what's his name that has the show? And Stuart? Yeah, all those guys. Yeah, it's a it's a it's a comedy that is continuously changing, right? I mean, I can do the same act I did in January in and you know, just in December, you know what I mean? They have to keep changing every time there's a new political thing that happens. So it's, you really have to be a good writer. It's just not something that I ever saw. I never really got into saying anything that I think would affect the only thing that might offend someone. Is the fact that that yes, I do swear, truthfully, I almost wear it as a badge of honor. If I don't offend somebody, I don't feel like I'm having a good night. But I will, I won't allow anyone to stifle me. I go, I go even harder. Yeah, you know, right. I'll go even harder. Like you said, one door closes another door opens. Then I was in a competition that marshals women in comedy. Yeah. I didn't even know what the hell it was. They just said that we were gonna get they were gonna get a bunch of us together. It was across the country. They were doing this women in comedy thing. And I'm like, All right, I win the thing. It ends up being a TV, a one hour TV special about women in comedy and like a half an hour that is just about me. Hosted by Joy Bay. Ha, wow, Carolina. I'm gonna play in Symphony Hall. It was insane. I got to watch some of it online with the Mako river. And it was it was one of the only makeovers on television that you ever saw the person and went, oh my god, she doesn't look any better. It's like It was horrifying. I had to go on television looking like that. Oh, you know, is always a trade off. There's always something you know, I don't have delusions of grandeur of being on a sitcom someday, whatever. I love the live performance. I'm all about the live performance. I love the instant feedback, the instant camaraderie with an audience. It's almost like it's funny, I liken it to in music a conductor. I feel like I'm kind of a conductor up there where I'm gonna make this people this group laugh and now over here, I'm gonna make this group laughing now I'm gonna make you all laugh at the same time. Yeah, yeah, no, no, no, I'm gonna make you go oh, I'm gonna make you go. Oh, you know, I mean, it's, it's, it's beautiful. But you know, but you really feel like kind of like, I don't know, like, I don't want to say a puppet master. But you really it's it's a control that I've never felt in any other type of situation. Right? Yeah. But it's a good it's a good take. I mean, I'm not a forcing anyone I don't think I'm just leading people towards a good experience. Right? And like, you know, we're going to go this through this together. We're gonna, we're gonna love it. You know, it's got to be a good thing. You know, Stephanie wanted to ask you, you know, with with comedy now slowly starting to come back after COVID What are your plans for the immediate future? Is there anything on your comedy wish list that you haven't done yet that you're still working on getting to? Well, um, I will tell you, I just auditioned for

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Bob Summers, who was the producer for Def Comedy Jam. And he's, he's starting a new thing. And it's actually going to be a performance based television show at the Apollo Theater. Now. I don't know if I've gotten chosen for it. But that's, that's on my wish list. If I can play the Apollo. I mean, that's one of those like, I died. I haven't got yeah, that's, that would just be incredible. The other thing is, out of all the places I've played, and I played every venue in Boston, I've played the Orpheum have played Symphony Hall. And there's an I don't think there's a theater in Boston, I played the Berkeley for profit center, which is hysterical because I went to Berkeley, but I didn't say no on that giant. When I played Symphony Hall, they interviewed me and I told them that I used to be a singer. And I was like, apparently, how you get to Symphony Hall is don't practice, you know? Yeah, you know, so, um, but believe it or not, I haven't played Vegas. Oh, I know. I know. It'll probably be like every other casino I played and and you know, it's not going to be that. I don't know. It's just something I haven't done yet that I that I would you know, that I would like to do. And I really just haven't put myself out there enough. I probably could. But I'm not a good flier. Like I tried to stay east coast because I hate flying if and when not if when you get your Vegas date booked? Yeah, I will drive you out there, me and you doing a road trip? I am front and center anything in Vegas and anything? You know, what if I do if I do get the gig at the Apollo, which let's see. I mean, I think it's fraud. I'm going to get a bus. And I'm going to pay for the loss. And I'm going to have everyone a bunch of people come with me. So I have my I have part of my audience in the in the audience. Oh, that's awesome. Stephanie, we, we need to have you back. Because I didn't get to, like 1/10 of the questions I have for you. It

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has been so much fun st