Take 93 - Comedian, actor, showrunner Gina Yashere, Bob Hearts Abishola

SPEAKER_03 0:00

Any of us who've been in it for long enough, our entire career has been littered with jobs that we didn't get, projects that we thought were gonna go for sure, dozens of unproduced scripts literathing the floor.

SPEAKER_01 0:13

All of us are running into both major and minor failures in Hollywood every single day.

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For every success, there is months, sometimes even years, of painful failure. This is one of the only businesses I can think of where failure is the default.

SPEAKER_01 0:31

That's the normal thing you have to be able to persevere. Like everything in our business here, hands gonna count.

SPEAKER_03 0:43

I was being told by my manager that it's yours to lose, and I promptly lost it. And I remember thinking like, well, that's it for me. I blew my one big shot. What I've realized from that moment is it's never one big shot. There will be other shots.

SPEAKER_01 1:01

Screaming into the Hollywood Abyss is brought to you by Scriptation, the Emmy.

SPEAKER_00 1:07

It sounds awful when you say it. Let somebody with a more charming accent do this bit. Screaming into the Hollywood Abyss is brought to you by Scriptation, the Emmy Award-winning app for anyone that reads scripts. Makes notes, organize them into layers, and save hours of time by automatically transferring those notes into new script revisions. Sitha listeners can get a free month of Scriptation by going to scriptation.com backslash Sitha. Now that's how you do it, Noah. Welcome back to Screaming Into the Hollywood Abyss, a podcast about rejection, failure, and adversity in the entertainment industry. I am your non-entertainment co-host, Dan Rutstein.

SPEAKER_01 1:50

And I am your industry co-host, Noah Ebbslin. On today's Screaming Into the Hollywood Abyss, I'm excited to introduce actor, actress, writer, and comedian Gina Yashere. As an actress and performer, she was a correspondent on the Daily Show with Trevor Noah, amongst many, many other shows. Honestly, too long to read here. You can currently find her playing Gina on Bob Hart's Abyssola, which she also co-created and currently co-showruns. As a comedian, you can find her performing literally everywhere your favorite comedians perform. She also wrote a book called Cack Handed.

SPEAKER_02 2:24

Welcome, Gina. Thank you. I'm playing Kemi on Bob Hart's on the show. I knew I'd screw it up.

SPEAKER_00 2:33

I um, as I often have to do for my American co-host Gina, I'm sorry that he got the intro wrong. Um not the first time. Uh I am trying to I'm trying to move him off and just have only English people on the show as guests and hosts. Um so you've got a a ridiculously extensive uh set of of credits across the different disciplines.

SPEAKER_02 2:59

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 2:59

So you're obviously very successful, uh, and this podcast is not about that. This podcast is about the bits in between. So let's go back to earlier in your career before you'd you'd made it. Tell us a bit about some of the struggles you had earlier on and how you dealt with uh the rejections that this industry inevitably brings.

SPEAKER_02 3:25

Yeah, it's so funny because um you know I started doing comedy back in 19, I'm gonna say 95, I think was my first gig or end of end of 94, end of 94, early 95. And my first spot, I had a great time, absolutely killed, and I was like, oh, this, and I was an engineer at the time. I used to build and repair elevators. That was my job. And I just left that job, and I'd, you know, I was like, I'm gonna have the summer off and have a good time, and then get another engineering job when summer's over. And then I did the stand-up gig and I was like, oh my god, this is what I want to do. I'm gonna have fun with this until it's not fun anymore. And then I'll go back to my regular job. And uh, within the first few months of doing comedy, I got on a talent show in England called The Big Big Talent Show. It was hosted by Jonathan Ross. And I and this was within the first six months of doing starting comedy. So I was like, oh my god, look at this. Within six months, I'm on TV, I'm gonna be a star. This is it. After this, you know, and I got to the finals of this competition. I thought, well, there you go, I'm on my way. And then nothing. So, you know, you I my one of the problems I had as a comedian starting out, I still fought like an engineer. My brain still worked like an engineer. I was like, right, well, I do this amount of things for this amount of time, get good, and then when I get good, I'll get that promotion. When I get that promotion, I get that TV show because obviously I'm good enough to get this TV show. And I kept thinking like that and got disavowed of those notions very early on in my career, realizing it doesn't work like that. It's, you know, is your does your face fit? Do people think that you're gonna sell whatever product they want you to sell? You know, and your whole career at the time is, especially in television and film, is based on what other people think of you. And that was a very hard pill to swallow early on in my career. Because, you know, I thought I was good enough as a stand-up, but it just never, it was a long time coming, this success, put it that way.

SPEAKER_00 5:30

We've we've had about, I think this is like the 93rd episode of this show, and I think we've had about somewhere around eight to ten of our showrunner guests were stand-up comedians at some point, some for for not very long, and some for actually a reasonable amount of time. And I think I remember I think I asked other people this, but does the what you have, the resilience that you have to go through to stand in front of people and ideally make them laugh, but obviously not always, um, and have that instant reaction to what you're doing, does that give you something inside you that allows you to go through a career like this where you know people are rejecting your ideas, people are rejecting your pitches, people are firing you out of rooms? Does it does it help you, do you think?

SPEAKER_02 6:16

Uh it does because obviously, as a stand-up, you know, you've got to get a room full of people who don't know who the hell you are to trust you and relax and enjoy you. And so, in a way, it helps when pitching show ideas, because when I was pitching, I saw every pitch as a performance to sell what I was trying to sell. But then, yeah, it also yeah, it does make you thicker skin for rejection. I mean, it still hurts, it still hurts a lot, and you know, I never planned to get into writing on TV and being a show runner. This was of absolutely no interest to me. My whole career, all I've ever wanted to do is to stand up and be the best friend on a sitcom and use that best friend status to sell theaters out and comedy clubs around the world. That's all I ever wanted. The writing and showrunning thing is all a very recent occurrence that I've kind of fallen into. It was of no interest. I like for years, people have been offering me gigs writing on um shows, and I've turned them down, going, I don't want a day job. The reason I do comedy is so I can get up when I want and I work for myself and travel the world and whatever. I don't want to work for anybody else. I've never wanted to do that. I just kind of felt this is just the way I followed my instincts and I kind of just ended up doing this.

SPEAKER_01 7:37

I I I I want to sort of stay on this theme. And first off, I want to apologize for getting the intro wrong. The worst part, which people don't realize, is we did a pre-interview where I asked you a lot of pointed questions and I thought I had nailed it, and I was so excited to pronounce your name right that I blew the rest. So that's that's my my my my opening failure sort of sets the tone for the rest of this. Uh I, you know, I was I was doing some uh research into you uh before we got on, and I saw a, you know, first off, I was watching your stand-up, and I highly recommend people starting to, you know, many, many people have already seen your stand-up. If you haven't, go dig it out. It's all over the place. Go watch if you want to laugh. And I feel like you're the perfect guest for us in many ways because you seem to mind your personal pain for laugh. I think I think a lot of comedians do, where you talk very famously about coming out and very famously about uh telling your mom uh that you're also that you weren't gonna be an engineer anymore and you're gonna be a comedian and lumping those two things together. But more seriously, you you you you talk to Trevor Noah about was something you write about in your book, about sort of an attempt on your own life early on as a teenager. Yes. And it's this sort of like Dan sort of began this kind of conversation about resilience. We have a lot of uh people come on the show and talk about how hard this career is. Do you think some of these early uh uh adversity that you faced again helped you overcome? Are you still sort of mining your teenage years for, you know, to kind of turn it into comedy? Is it a sort of form of therapy for you to kind of turn the hardships into laughs?

SPEAKER_02 9:11

Yes, and no. I mean, my comedy is very much a storytelling. You know, I'm a storyteller and I do tell stories for my life. And some of the stuff I've not planned to turn into comedy. It's just like with the story of my my suicide attempt when I was 16. I've never planned to tell that story as stand up. It was when I was writing my memoir, my brother reminded me and said, Oh, are you gonna tell the story when you try to kill yourself? And I was like, Holy shit, I'd actually forgotten about that. So I wrote about it in the book, and then I was doing another podcast and I was telling the story because of how I tried to kill myself and how useless I was, even at trying to kill myself. And it turned out to be a very funny story, and people were laughing. And I was like, Oh, this could be a stand-up routine. People really, even though it's a serious subject, there's still humor in it, and that's how it ended up becoming part of my stand-up. But yeah, I do um I'm very much an oversharer, and I do, you know, I feel like it's good to talk publicly about, you know, as as I'm an open book, and it's I I think it helped my comedy being an open book. You know, when I first started in comedy, I wasn't out, and and I felt like it in a way it stifled my comedy because I was always frightened, you know, I didn't want to talk about certain subjects because I didn't want to go down that road of who I was seeing or what and I felt that the day that I went, it got to a point where it's like, you know what? I'm not getting the things I want anyway from hiding who I am. So I might as well be who the fuck I want to be. And who cares? Whatever happens, happens. And the day I did that and just went, you know what, I'm just gonna be who I am. I felt my my comedy went up another level. I got better as a comedian, and I felt like the universe kind of opened up a little bit more to me as well. Once that negativity towards myself disappeared, my negativity towards others, because there's a comedian coming up, you you can't at least but look at other people and go, hold on a minute, why are they getting that? I want that, I'm better than them. You know, and when you think like that, it kind of that negativity kind of turns inwards. And I feel like you attract that negativity to you. And the moment I stopped doing that and just enjoying the journey for what it is, I felt that's when the universe opened up and things got better for me, life-wise and career-wise.

SPEAKER_01 11:32

But yeah, I want to I I'm gonna guess that we're gonna circle back and talk about the universe opening up for you and this sort of this journey to where you are now, which is you know, but season four of a hit sitcom on CBS. Yes, just being picked up for season five. Yay! And uh and uh and a showrunner and a creator and all of these things and a market that's really difficult. But I'm gonna ask, I'm gonna ask one of our last questions early, which is we have a lot of showrunners coming on, uh talking legitimately about how hard the job is and how they don't sleep and how they're some of them are in therapy and it's tolling because they're putting their life, you know, on the line emotionally on the page, and they're doing the same day and there's just demands on them managerially. Uh, you've gone through a lot, you've done a lot, you've performed at huge venues. Is show compared to the other things that you've done in your career, is showrunning difficult, or are you just sort of riding going, oh my God, this is amazing. I'm doing this amazing job that I've always wanted, and now I'm here.

SPEAKER_02 12:28

Uh for me, it's definitely hard on the body and mind because you're constantly thinking, you know, as a stand-up, I know what I'm gonna say when I get on stage and I know I'm telling stories about my life. And I I know, but where when you're show running, it's you're managing uh a company because you're managing uh a show that employs a lot of people. So you're writing scripts, you've got to make it really good. It's gotta, you know, you're looking at ratings and we're making sure that people like the show, and then you've got your managing actors, you're managing other writers, you're managing so it's definitely new for me, and it's more stressful in a different way. But because it wasn't something that I've always wanted to do, it's a little bit less stressful because I'm kind of enjoying the learning process for me. I'm just like, well, this is fun and this is new, and maybe I might want to do more of this, but it's not as stressful for me because in my heart I'm a stand-up. And if this doesn't work out, I'll go, well, that was a fun thing. I'll go back to doing what I do know, which is stand-up. So um I don't get the same level of anxiety that other show runners do because this is not my main, I mean, right now it is my main living, and this is what I do, but it's a new thing to me. And I'm just like, well, this is fun and it's an experience, and I'm and I'm trying it out, and I'm giving it all I've got, I'm doing it to the best of my ability. But if after this show I don't get another show running gig, I've got plenty of other skills and plenty of other things that I can do. So that's the way I see it. That's the way I think when I think about what I'm doing. But having said that, I still want to do a great job, and it's still a lot of work, and it's still, you know, it can be stressful. But at the back of my mind, I'm like, well, I'm having fun and I'm trying something new. It's great.

SPEAKER_00 14:19

I I love that answer. Uh, particularly because it'll probably annoy Noah, because like a lot of writers in America, they do their time, they start off as sort of writers' assistance, they work their way up, they're all desperately showrunners, and they and and you've just sort of swanned in, done a lot of comedy, you're very funny, you're very good at something else, and now you've taken one of their jobs. I think it's great.

SPEAKER_02 14:40

Um and it just it it and literally it was not planned this way at all. Like, you know, I got a call from Chuck Lobby to come in and consult on an idea for a show that he had that wasn't even written, there was nothing written down on paper. So originally I was meant to be just a consultant. Then it went from consultant to co-creator and writer. And obviously, I'm a comedian, so I wrote myself into the show because my dream has always been to be the best friend on a sitcom. And I'm like, well, I'm here I am, supposedly consulting on a sitcom. Somewhere put myself in it. Why wouldn't I? So I wrote myself in. And so I wrote myself in as an actor, but all I've ever wanted to do was act, but then I was also writing the show and help and creating the show. So then I was like, well, this is fine. At least I get to write what I want to say and write the stories that I want to tell. And that's kind of how it came about. And then, you know, as the show went on, I gained more and more and more responsibility, and I've ended up what was season four, being made co-showrunner with with Matt Ross, who's another writer on the show. But it all just came, it just it was kind of organic. I never planned to be a showrunner. In fact, when I was offered the gig, I was like, I don't know if I can do this. I I don't know what that entails. I'm not manager material. I just want to tell jokes. That's all I want to do. This seems too much like a job, and I didn't want a job, but doing it now, I'm enjoying the the here's the thing, because I'm co-show running with someone else, it's much better because he does more of the management side of things. I am more of a creative showrunner, which I like a lot better. I don't like the firing people or the telling people what they're supposed to be doing, even though I do do it, I'm getting better at it. But I prefer the creative side where I go, right, let's look at the script, let's do this differently, and I'm I'm more that I have to do it all, but I'm definitely more of a creative showrunner. I prefer that.

SPEAKER_00 16:41

So the um when we first talked started talking about this, you said that all you ever wanted to do was be a best friend in a sitcom, yeah, um, and then you know, sell out comedy venues off the back of that. So what what is is that being a best friend is it's not as much work as being the lead, but you still get to be you get a bit of screen time that builds up your presence that can help you on the comedy side.

SPEAKER_02 17:04

Yeah, it's not as much pressure because the show, the the success of the show is not on your shoulders, so it's less pressure for one, and the best friend always gets the funniest lines. Most sitcoms, the main guy is more like the straight guy. Like you watch Seinfeld, he was the least funny of all the people on the show. Everybody around him was hilarious. He was funny, but everybody else around him was really funny. So I feel like the best friend always gets the funniest lines and you can come in and steal a scene. And that's always what I wanted. I didn't want to be the main person. I never saw myself as the head of the show or the lead. And I was told from my career I was never gonna be a lead. I didn't have the looks for it, I wasn't, I didn't look, I wasn't the right person. I never quite fit the boxes that was I was expected to fit in as a lead for any show. So I never saw myself as a lead, but I always saw myself as the funny friend because I'm weird looking, quirky, whatever. Um so I always saw myself as that, and I and that was what I aspired to.

SPEAKER_01 18:06

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 18:08

So obviously, um you're you're English, um and it's Amer a lot of people have well have differing views about America, and obviously it's a very different system. Like in England, you don't really have rooms for shows in the same way. I think the word showrunner, I didn't know what it meant until I moved to America. Um that transition from the freedom of you know wandering around the comedy hall, telling jokes, talking about anything that you want, to not just being in the structure of a writing room, but being the structure of a writing room on a network show in risk-averse, corporately slightly scared, modern America. How have you managed that transition? Do you have to like are 20% of your jokes not allowed to be used because they're not appropriate for network American televisions? How do you how do you filter your censor yourself so you can fit into the system?

SPEAKER_02 19:09

I consider every episode of the show kind of like a corporate gig, whereby you, you know, when you do a gig for corporation, they're like, you can't say this, you can't say that, you're not allowed, you know. So that's how I see it. Also, working under the banner of Chuck Laurie has been better in that we don't get as many notes from the network as other shows do. We've been kind of left to do what the hell we wanted, as long as it fits within what would constitute a network TV show. But even then, we we have pushed the boundaries a little bit and and put stuff out there that not necessarily we could have got away with 20 years ago. I mean, it's we're it we're charting new territory, we're at a time when the whole industry is reckoning with their racism, with their misogyny, with you know, that I came about the timing just worked out perfectly that our show and and my rise coincided with the whole industry reckoning with all that kind of stuff. And so the fact that I'm able to, because you know, just a year before I got the show, I was pitching, running around Hollywood trying to pitch a show that talked about my family and talked about my background, and basically based on the book that I wrote, and nobody wanted it. And then just a year later, Chuck Lorry decides he wants to make a show where half his cast are going to be Africans, and there's a market for it all of a sudden. Um, and that's how I got in the door. It took a wealthy, very uh powerful white man to go, I want to do this for it for my for ideas of mine that I'd already been sort of picturing beforehand that nobody was interested in. I was able to take some of these ideas and put them into this show because I had the back end of Chuck Laurie, which is in this industry is very irritating, but it also is fantastic the fact that he was a he took a bet on me and was able to open the door for me. And I'm hoping, hoping to turn around and open the door for other people. But that's how I got in the door, and that is, but you know, it that's how that transition happened. You know, it was just kismet, I don't know what the word is.

SPEAKER_01 21:26

Hollywood is tremendously risk-adverse, as that story uh highlights, and and I'll think they're uh, you know, need a truck lorry type to get anything interesting off the ground. But I want to go a little further back. I, you know, when I was doing some research, you again, like I said, you have a billion credits, you've you've you've performed all over the world. You you've done a and you've been doing it for a really long time. So maybe the answer is this has never happened or you've never felt this way. But going all the way back to, you know, before you know, when you were still really struggling. Uh, and you just said even last year you were pitching and nobody was buying things and you A lot of success behind you. But before all that, was there a time where you had, you know, given up being an engineer? You'd let your mom down that way, you were struggling to be this other thing, this comedian, uh, and it wasn't working. And you were like, Holy crap, I I made a bad decision, or did it just start to already, you know, just go because you're extremely talented?

SPEAKER_02 22:22

Well, it went for for a long time in England, and then it got to a point where it just wasn't going anywhere. So the first sort of few years of my career, it was all gangbusters. I was doing well, I was working um consistently and making a living quite early on. But then when it got to the point of trying to get to the next level, get you know, get on television on a regular basis, that's when I started to have doors shut in my face, and I couldn't understand why. And people just kept telling me that, you know, basically I've got the feeling that my face didn't fit. And this, you know, even though I jumped through all the hoops the establishment put in front of me, I jumped through all the hoops, I just wasn't getting the same um opportunities that other people getting. You know, there were comedians that I started out with, you know, like if you're from England, Dan, you know uh Michael McIntyre, you know, huge star in England, selling out arenas. Me and him start with starting, we're on the road together. You know, he used to open for me. And then within a year, he's gone and he's selling uh uh you know arenas all over the world and um becoming a huge multi, multi-millionaire. And I'm like, I don't understand. Me and him are the same level, you know, he was opening for me. How is he getting these opportunities? I'm not, and it kept happening to me over and over again, which is part of the reason why I ended up leaving England, because I was like, well, I've hit a point where I'm not going anywhere, and if I stay here, I'm gonna become one of those angry, bitter comedians, jealous of all the new, younger, talented people coming through. And as a kid, my dream has always been to go to the States. So I was like, I'm gonna go and start again somewhere else and see if I can buck that trend in America, because America is the land of dreams. So that's why I came. So I came here in 2007 with the plan to go, well, I'm this good. I've been at this point, I've been doing comedy 12 or 13 years by the time I got to America. So I was like, I'm this good. I'm at a point in England where I've been selling theaters. When I come to America, surely they're gonna see how good I am, and I'll walk straight in and start working and I'll get on television immediately. And that wasn't the case. And then I found out that coming to America, you know, I struggled for a very long time in the States, a long time, you know, hustling, trying to get things off the ground, people not knowing what to do with me, people just not getting, you know, at least in England, people had seen black British people, but a black British person coming to America, they just didn't understand it. Remember, I was here before Idris Elba became a shoot star, before black British actors were, you know, all the rage, I was here and nobody understood. And it was great for my stand-up because then it I the first half of my stand-up will be explaining who I am. But then when it came to try and get more better work, I couldn't get the work. And it was a struggle for a long time. And at one point I was like, have I made a mistake? Did I make a mistake coming here? Is this ever gonna happen? You know, if if it's not, what are my options? And by this point, I've like, I've been getting stand up this amount of time, I can't go back. I just got to keep going forward and hope that something hits. And if it doesn't, I'll just keep going until until I run out of ideas. And that was what the thinking was. I didn't know what I was gonna do, but I was like, I'm just gonna keep going forward and just keep doing what I do and keep believing in my talent, and hopefully something will kick off. But it did get to a point where I was like, ooh, I don't know. You know, I've been at one, I've been in America 12 years, been in comedy nearly 30 when I got this show. And you know, it was getting to that point where I was like, wow, I don't know, I don't know what I'm gonna do next.

SPEAKER_01 26:09

It is thank you. Great, great answer, by the way. And I I want to flip that same question on his head, and I'm gonna apologize in advance because this is a success question and not a failure one. But was there a moment where you realized, and maybe prior to becoming the show owner of the show or getting on the show? Because this is huge, this is undeniably huge what you're doing now. But was there a moment after a big uh performance or you know, a big sell-out comedy show or whatever, where you thought to yourself, holy crap, after all of that work, I made it. I did it. Mom, my dreams came true.

SPEAKER_02 26:42

A few times it happened where I really thought this is it, this is it, and then nothing. Like, you know, I'd go, I used to go to Montreal for the comedy festival, and I'd do these huge galaxies and destroy in front of all these industry people, and I'd go, they just saw me and destroy. Surely something will come of it. This is it, and then nothing, and then I'd be disappointed, and then I'd go out again and do another great big show. And even when I got the daily show with Trevor Noah, I got that job as a British correspondent, and the day it was announced, my heart was thumping. I was like, This is it, you know, this is the big gig, this is the one that's gonna catapult me to the next level. And I did my first appearance, and it was a great appearance, and I was like, All right, when's the next one? And then they didn't book me again for three months, and I was like, What? I thought I was gonna be this regular, you know, correspondent on every week with Roy Wood Jr. And you know, just and it just didn't happen for some reason. They were like, Yeah, we'll see in a few months, and then a few months later, and I kept pitching stories and pitching stories to try and get back on again, and they weren't accepting my pitches. And in the end, I only appeared on the show three times in a year, and I was like, and so because of that, I couldn't build the momentum that I thought I was gonna get to build from being on this show, and and and that happened many, many times over the course of my career. I did the tonight show, you know, and I got on the tonight show and I was, and you know, when you're coming to America and you've heard about Johnny Carson, and when you get on the tonight show immediately overnight, your career goes to the next level. And then I did the tonight show and I was like, all right, this is it. And then nothing the next day. I still couldn't get books at some of the bigger comedy clubs in America. So it's been a just a constant disappointment throughout my entire career. Where I've gone, is this it? This is it, no, okay, what about this? Is this it? This could be it. No, that's not it. And it's just been like that for a very long time until this finally hits with this show. And even then, I still I've still got some certain things that I'm like, hold on a minute, we're making this wonderful show. Why are we not getting Emmys? Why are we not getting Golden Globes? So, you know, you're always looking and going, Oh, I'm trying not to do that. That's the thing that I'm trying to get my brain out of doing. Just going, well, hold on a minute. That show, our show's just as good as that show. Why are we not getting Emmy nominations? But I have to stop myself and go, hey, I've got the show. This is looking 10 years ago, this would have been the dream. I'm living the dream now. I need to stop looking at what's next and looking at other people and just enjoy what I have in this moment.

SPEAKER_00 29:29

Another, another amazing answer. I just so you know, um, actually, coming on screen into the Hollywood Abyss often is the tipping point for people's careers that's sending to the next level. So the day after this episode comes out, you're your agent will be getting a lot of calls. Um do you do you think uh apart from the not getting nominated part, do you think that now you're on this show and your show running, does it feel like you've made it now, or you or or the you can't let yourself feel that way yet?

SPEAKER_02 30:03

Yes and no. Uh I do feel like I've made it. This is the dream. My dream is always to be on a sitcom, and I've this is the dream. I've got a sitcom. I'm on a sitcom, I'm on a primetime sitcom in America, I'm right in the sitcom. Yes, but then in the back of my head, I'm like, I've had so many disappointments in my career, but I would, you know, uh, even though I'm enjoying it, I'm also saving constantly saving my money because I'm like, after this finishes, I might never get another opportunity like this again. And that is always at the back of my brain. I'm like, this is you know, people are like, great, you're showrunning, you've set yourself up, you can go on and showrun other things. And I'm like, doesn't quite work the same for black women as it does for white men. White men will they get that gig and they're and once they're off and running, then they can walk from the next job to the next job to the next job. Whereas my in the back of my mind, I'm like, this might be the one gig I get, and then there might be nothing afterwards. So I save my money like as if there's going to be nothing afterwards. I'm enjoying life, I've got a nice home and everything's lovely, but I I assume in the back of my mind, I kind of assume that this is this is it, this is the one big hit, and after that I go back to obscurity.

SPEAKER_00 31:26

So if you had a choice for your next role after your next uh opportunity after this, yeah, I'll give you three choices. So, number one is uh you're asked to play a gig at let's do the Royal Albert Hall, and Michael McIntyre has to open for you. Um you get the chance to be in another network show over here, another story that means something to you, um, and you get to showrun it, and even though they ask you to be the lead, you only choose to be the best friend because obviously that's your preferred option. Um maybe here we go for a third option. How about how about a movie where you're playing a supporting actress? Um, but again, a movie with a you know a proper, big budget, ridiculous, feels very Hollywood American movie. Which of those three things would would you want to do next? Oh, that's a good question.

SPEAKER_02 32:31

Never seen myself as a movie star. Uh I'd probably go option two, because for me, a movie is a one-off thing, and it might it might be a hit, it might flop. But a network TV show, to me, that's a regular long-term gig. It lasts longer, and I think and I'm writing it so I've got more creative input. So I'd probably go for option two. Um that I think, you know, I'm I'm older now. You know, maybe if I was 25 and you were asking me this question, I'd be like, yeah, moving. But I'm not, I'm 50. So now I'm like, what can I do that's longevity that can set me up for my retirement? That I can that's the kind of thoughts process that I'm going through now. So I'd probably go option two, because my next uh project, I'd love to turn my book, I'd like to adapt my book and turn that into a limited series. That would be my next option, and that would be the dream option. And I also want to now, now that I am learning showrunning and and and now showrunning and knowing how to do that kind of stuff, I'd love to turn around and and pull some of my other comedian. I'd like to be the rich white man for some of my friends and turn around and get their project screenlit and exec produce their projects. I'd like to be the next Chuck Lorry for someone else.

SPEAKER_00 33:58

So actually, that's what I was gonna ask you. And obviously, as always, it's a slightly odd question coming from a I'm not a rich white man, but I am a white man asking about diversity. Well, my my kids are mixed race, so I've got at least a little bit more stake in asking this question. But obviously, given the frustrations that you have had in your career where you felt like you weren't given an opportunity to tell your story, now that you are your management, your leadership, um, both on this show and the potential for others, how important is diversity, inclusivity, giving people who might not normally have a voice, an opportunity? Like, how important a driver is that for you now you are a success and you can give that to other people?

SPEAKER_02 34:42

It is everything to me. It is extremely important to me. And, you know, that this show that we've I've created with Chuck and Alan Eddie is is giving me much pride in that I've provided work for actors, especially Nigerian actors. There are African American actors and Nigerian actors in the show, because I would go for the best people for job. But the fact is, you know, we provided work for Nigerian actors that were not getting work in this industry. They just weren't, because there was not enough roles for them. And when they did get these roles, it was always playing stereotypes and tropes. And this is a show where they, you know, they get to play characters, proper, you know, three-dimensional characters that happen to be Nigerian. And that is a definite source of pride for me. Even when these guys were coming into audition, I always made sure that I was sitting in the room with Chuck and Al, so that when those black actors walked into the room and saw me, they knew that this was legit, that they weren't going to be asked to do any kind of buffoonery because I'm sitting in the room. Because you'd be you would not believe some of the stuff that we've been asked to do by very, you know, unknowledgeable white directors and stuff. You know what I mean? So it was very important for me to you know to do that, to get more black writers in who might not have got the opportunities and who now can then go on and work on other shows after this. Very important. And I'd like to do more of that. I'd like to get other people's shows, women, people of color, disabled people, LGBTQI people's shows greenlit, you know, moving forward.

SPEAKER_01 36:25

I feel like I'm in a little bit of time warp because I recently was watching some clips of you performing, and one of them was, you know, you're you're you make the joke about you know telling your mom that you want to go into comedy and the things that she said back to you. Uh, and now here I am talking to you, and you're very successful. Has your mom come around and realized that you're very successful? Were you able to take her to set and say, I'm the boss of him and him and him and him? Was there any of that?

SPEAKER_02 36:50

My mother has never been to America, but I mean, she came out very early in my career because I got on TV, a TV show which was hosted by Jonathan Ross, who is kind of our J Leno in England. And I got on a show with him within six months of starting comedy. So for the first six months, she was not interested at all. But then when I got on that show, she was like, Oh, I was validated. She was like, Oh, I see now you're on TV with Jonathan Ross, who we've been watching for 20-something years on television. Now I see what you're doing. So she came around quite early in my career. I mean, I've obviously kept the struggles from her. Otherwise, she would have said, well, then go back to engineering. So I kind of hid the struggles uh from her. And she's been very supportive from six months in. Uh, thank you for that.

SPEAKER_01 37:41

I I think I can speak for Dan when I say this has been a marvelous conversation, and we, you know, we we schedule these for a little under around 40 minutes. I think sometimes we'd love to go for hours and hours and hours. But with you, I think we definitely would have. But I know you're a busy person, so we're gonna this is gonna lead us to our our very last question that we ask everybody that comes on our show, which is if you could give one piece of advice to an aspiring comedian or actress or writer, your choice, what would it be?

SPEAKER_02 38:11

So many. Um never give up on yourself, keep creating. You know, you never know where the next opportunity is coming from. Just keep creating, keep believing yourself, and try and put blinkers on and just not look sideways at other people. And when you're constantly looking sideways at other people and and and uh bemoaning their successes or uh or envying other people's success, then you're concentrating less on what you're doing and enjoying your what you're doing in the moment. Um, that was a lesson that it took me 26 years to learn, and I'm still learning, but I think it's a such an important lesson. Um, you know, the fact that I had to wake up in the morning and go, you know what? You're doing something for a living that you love doing. All right, you might not be as successful as you think you should be, but you're better than 90% of the population who work in jobs that they don't necessarily want to be in. It's not their passion just to put money in the bank, food on the table. You're you're waking up in the morning, you're doing something that you want to do. Live in that moment, enjoy that, and and focus on that, and the rest will come. That is my piece of advice.

SPEAKER_00 39:33

Well great answer. Uh, this has been an extraordinary episode. I just want to say uh we're it's been an honor to have you on the show, someone who can uh entertain us, make us laugh, tell passionate stories, and potentially if our elevator or even our lift broke down, they could probably repair it. So, Tina and Shearer, thank you very much for being part of our podcast.

SPEAKER_02 39:56

Thank you very much. Thanks for having me.

SPEAKER_01 40:01

Well, that's a wrap on this episode of Screaming into the Hollywood Abyss. As always, this episode was brought to you by scriptation, the screen writing and annotation software that at the very least has made my life easier and will make your life easier as well. We'd like to thank our wives with us recording these episodes in our offices, in basements, and closets, and bathrooms, and anywhere we need a little space to record an interview. And of course, we want to thank James Launch who provided us with the great intro and outro music.

SPEAKER_00 40:34

If you want to find us on social media, you can find Noah at NEVSlin on Twitter, tweeting a variety of writer-based nonsense and some terrible puns and occasionally begging for sponsorship. Uh if you want more refined tweets, mostly about football and whiskey, you can find me at Dan Rutstein. If you're interested in buying a copy of Scriptation, if you go to www.scriptation.com backslash sither, S-I-T-H-A, you will receive a special discount. Thank you very much for listening. As always, we appreciate you. Uh please give us any feedback, mostly positive stuff about me, and we will see you next week.

SPEAKER_01 41:20

And if you do say a negative thing about the answer is a chance to make the free club subscriptors.