0:00

Welcome to the Cripes cast. I'm

0:02

your host Charlie Barons. We are

0:04

powered by Everlight Solar. Here's today's

0:07

episode. Hey

0:11

guys, welcome to the Cripes

0:13

cast. How we doing

0:15

today? My guest is comedian

0:17

actress Angela Johnson

0:20

Reyes. She she's

0:22

got a new special

0:24

that she just released. It was kind of a

0:26

from the vault special.

0:29

She's got say I won't and

0:31

technically not stalking both are out

0:33

on YouTube. She put both her

0:35

recent specials out on

0:37

YouTube is kind of like a thank you

0:40

to her fans for their support over

0:42

the years, but she has

0:44

six specials out in total very

0:47

very funny comedian. And

0:50

yeah, I really enjoyed talking

0:52

to her. Colleen Maraca joins me in

0:54

the Cripes cast studio for this intro.

0:56

How's it going? It's going

0:58

good. It's just a rainy day in Milwaukee. So

1:00

it's just kind of like can't

1:02

believe the day's gone by already. And yeah, I don't

1:05

know. It's kind of weird day. I know

1:07

it's already 4 o'clock. Isn't

1:09

that weird? Yeah, time flies time

1:11

flies when you're having fun. I

1:13

had a weird entry

1:15

to this. So I charged my car.

1:18

Oh, yeah, what happened there? Well, I charged it. I

1:20

charged a car and then I woke up and I

1:22

got out and I got halfway to where I was

1:24

going. It's like how do I only have 23 miles

1:26

on this thing? And you

1:29

know, for you to

1:31

actually charge it. Yeah, I did. I

1:33

did charge. I know you don't believe me. I

1:35

know nobody believes me, but I did put the

1:37

charger in there. Some broken with the charger. I

1:39

can't be broken with me. It can't possibly be

1:41

that I forgot to plug it in considering

1:43

that you live on like 1% phone battery

1:45

all the time. I know. I highly doubt that

1:47

you actually plug it in. Oh

1:49

my God. I am definitely one of those guys.

1:51

You know, there there I feel

1:53

like there's two types of people those

1:56

who keep their phone fully charged and

2:00

Me I'm a one percenter Yeah,

2:04

no, that's a hundred percent I'm I could never live

2:07

like that Not

2:09

judging not judging. No. Yeah, I think

2:11

it's a product of ADD

2:16

can I can I make so I'm like somehow

2:18

a victim Anyways,

2:25

that's how it goes for you went and

2:27

found a place to go charge Yeah,

2:30

oh, yeah, I forgot see this lady

2:32

D. I started story and then finish

2:34

it No, I'd like it.

2:37

It went from like the alright

2:39

you have like 14 miles left

2:42

To just where it says power low and I

2:44

was on the highway This

2:47

isn't good so I Pulled

2:50

off and I looked for the nearest

2:52

charging station and then they never really

2:55

Like they got a I think they're

2:57

currently in the process of fixing or

2:59

figuring out these whole charging Infrastructure

3:02

in Wisconsin. Wow. I think there's a

3:04

bill out on it or something which

3:06

is Good cuz like

3:09

there's no way these things are

3:11

practical without like a consistent without

3:17

Yeah, the fact that you are that person in

3:20

life and then you I got like

3:22

have an electric car It's just astounding. I

3:24

got that one. It's one of the more

3:27

or less The

3:29

cheapest one you could get essentially the cheapest.

3:32

No, I'm just saying that like the way that you live

3:34

your life like your phone Your

3:36

computer like nothing in your life is

3:38

charged or you know, I mean like,

3:41

okay That's

3:44

name one your ring I'm surprised your

3:46

ring I have a I got this order

3:48

ring Which honestly these ring

3:50

is the battery life like it's It

3:55

can go a week if it's on airplane

3:57

mode, you live it on airplane mode. Yeah

4:00

on Airpoint Mode, but the thing I do

4:02

with this aura ring, ladies and gentlemen, which

4:04

sounds really stupid. And I

4:06

brought it up. It wasn't him bringing it up

4:08

himself. Yeah. It's not him. I definitely do not

4:10

tell my dad the name of this ring. I

4:12

just say it's a heart rate monitor. You know,

4:15

cause I'm trying to monitor my sleep. It's

4:17

my Zen ring. Yeah. I know. Why, why

4:19

did they call it an aura ring? What

4:21

is it? Oh, A U R

4:24

A. I don't know. A O

4:26

U R A or whatever. A lot of my girlfriends have

4:28

it. They love it. Yeah. I don't love

4:30

it. I don't love it at all. Cause

4:33

then I look, the reason I

4:36

look at my stats and I

4:38

can just see my, my blood pressure going

4:40

or my heart rate going up in real

4:42

time. Cause yeah, there's this

4:44

thing called the HRV on it. And

4:47

HRV is like some measure

4:49

of your, I don't

4:52

know. You're, it's like, if you

4:54

have a low HRV, it could mean problems down the road.

4:56

And I wake up after and I was sleeping, looking at

4:58

my like HRV of nine. I think I'm

5:00

going to die. How many

5:04

years until you die? I don't

5:07

know. And, um, anyways, that's, that's

5:09

me. But I'm just surprised that

5:12

like it's lasted this

5:14

long. Oh yeah. I am proud of

5:16

you. I am too. I'm making, uh,

5:18

I'm making some changes in my life.

5:20

Kallene. It's hard, man. It's hard. Well,

5:25

I'm not going to say it's hard. I mean, it's very lucky

5:27

to be able to tour and everything, but going on the road

5:29

a lot, it just throws you out

5:31

of your rhythm all the time. So I literally

5:33

have so much respect for you when we come

5:35

back from stuff. If I'm ever on the road,

5:37

like I'm still recovering from LA. Oh yeah.

5:40

Like, like I'm still on Pacific time. Like that's

5:43

why I came in two hours late today. You came

5:45

in two hours late today. That's neither here

5:47

nor now. But I didn't

5:50

like mentally, like I've, for the last

5:52

few nights, like usually I'm probably in

5:54

bed by like 11, like probably asleep by

5:56

11 last two nights. It's like,

5:58

I literally, like I was, making something

6:00

for my family and like what look up

6:03

it's 130. So yeah, it's like I've

6:05

been, I can't imagine like props to you. No,

6:07

thanks. Long-winded way of talking about me in

6:10

order to compliment you. Well, I appreciate that.

6:12

Even if it had to come with some,

6:14

uh, you know, some, uh, self-indulgence. I'll take

6:16

it. I'll take it. I'll take it. Well,

6:19

um, we do have a fun episode today,

6:21

so we'll just dive right into it. Uh,

6:25

and, um, yeah, I think, uh,

6:27

I just want to thank everybody who's come out

6:29

on the, on the deal. Do we have any,

6:32

um, fan comments? We got this from

6:34

Susie to eight. Your family is unhinged.

6:36

I cannot express how much I enjoy

6:38

your banter. And we're out to the

6:40

casino. I miss my grandmother and aunt

6:43

tremendously and it made me feel like

6:45

home. Shout out to Lois as well.

6:47

Glad you all watch out for deer.

6:49

And thank you for this episode. That

6:51

was, uh, in response to one of

6:54

our episodes with, uh, grandma

6:56

Sue last week. We had the grandma Sue, um,

6:59

uh, how the highlights of the grandma

7:02

Sue podcasts and hopefully more of those,

7:04

uh, podcasts to come. So thank you

7:06

so much. Uh, Sue's

7:09

Susie for that, uh, comment. And

7:11

yes, my family is unhinged and,

7:14

um, I am just here to, uh,

7:17

financially reap the benefits of your, they all

7:20

bring it up to, they're like, how much

7:22

money have you made up this? I'm like,

7:24

it's not been. What

7:26

do you want? What

7:30

do you want for free? Yeah. Oh,

7:32

I was given. No, um, my grandma has never

7:34

asked for that. She's the only one who's never

7:37

asked. She made money off of your money. So

7:39

like, and now you're like a net because

7:42

of the casino because you gave her money, I owned it

7:44

20 bucks and she came out with

7:46

1800. Yeah.

7:48

Yeah. So, uh, she's taken care

7:50

of. She's fine. Yeah. Um,

7:53

but yeah, that's kind of all we got. Oh, well,

7:55

so this weekend, if you're wanting to see Charlie, he's

7:57

in Nashville and Louisville.

8:00

And then after that, the next week

8:02

is Show Wagon in Milwaukee. After that

8:04

is Janesville with Wisconsin rapids got

8:06

shows in Iowa, Florida. So

8:08

just check out

8:11

christcast.com. Click on tour. We got a lot of stuff coming

8:13

into the end of April and then we'll have a like a

8:15

little bit of a break. So yup.

8:18

Act now act now. And folks, Barron's

8:20

old fashioned. Brandi is out. If you're

8:22

looking for a nice brandy to make

8:24

your old fashioned, check it out. It's

8:26

at a liquor store near you in

8:28

Wisconsin. If you live outside of Wisconsin,

8:32

you can order it. I'm warning you. The

8:34

shipping is a little spendy. It's nothing we

8:36

can do about it. It's just the laws

8:38

of the land. Sorry about it. So there

8:41

you go. And before

8:43

we get into the podcast, I just want to

8:45

say, if you go to doctors without borders.org, we

8:47

are continuing to raise money for doctors without borders.

8:49

They are doing everything

8:52

they can to help out, especially

8:54

in the conflict in the

8:57

middle East right now. So check them

8:59

out. Doctors without borders.org. And

9:01

folks, without further ado,

9:04

here's my conversation with Angela

9:06

Johnson Reyes. You

9:10

were just in Milwaukee at the improv, right? Yes,

9:14

I was my first time there at that

9:16

club. How'd you like that? I

9:18

liked it. It's a beautiful club. Um,

9:20

I'll be honest, the crowds were different

9:23

than what I'm used to. Oh

9:25

yeah. Not as good. That's usually something you

9:27

say when the crowd's not that good. Listen,

9:30

I'm not trying to put Milwaukee on blast.

9:33

I'm sure they thought they were amazing. You

9:36

know, like you never know you're in the

9:38

bad crowd. I know anytime

9:40

I go to a live show, whether it's on Broadway

9:43

or theater or a

9:46

comedy show, a concert, I always am wondering, like, I

9:48

wonder if I'm in a good crowd or bad, like

9:50

you don't know. All you know is like, I'm having

9:52

a good time, but I don't know

9:54

if the artist is like, I can't wait to leave this

9:56

city. I know. And I feel

9:58

like if you was. crowd can

10:01

tell that the artist is feeling

10:04

that then it's just it's

10:06

a snowball effect right there it's just

10:08

cascading yeah you can't

10:10

be like what's up with

10:13

you guys are you and then they get better

10:15

they don't get better you get it off

10:17

your chest yeah I know

10:19

I know I don't think I've ever

10:21

I've seen some people

10:24

just I think if you go

10:26

down that road you just have to roast the crowd until

10:29

they're back on your side I

10:33

mean sometimes just going full into

10:35

crowd work at those points and

10:37

just canceling 10 minutes of your

10:39

material and then finding an entry

10:41

point back in the material could

10:43

be the move yeah if I

10:45

was that believed in myself that much with crowd

10:47

work I'd lady that but

10:50

I know that's really the trick that's really

10:52

the trick I don't know for

10:54

the record that I believe in myself that

10:56

much with crowd work either so I

10:58

feel you on that what

11:01

what like wasn't feeling

11:03

right were there just certain jokes that like hit

11:05

in every room and didn't even hit in this

11:07

room was it that bad of a crowd is

11:10

this like top 10 worst audiences I'll

11:12

tell you what I said in my green room after

11:15

the first show oh I

11:18

said and this was like just to my opener

11:20

and my road manager I said

11:22

this is probably the worst

11:25

audience I've had in years

11:27

like I don't remember the

11:30

time that I I couldn't get an

11:32

audience to wake up

11:34

for the whole show Wow

11:37

there were moments throughout the show where they would give me

11:40

a good laugh but for the most and they thought they

11:42

were having a good time like I'm looking in the audience

11:44

and like there's people like thinking they're having a good time

11:46

but they're just like and

11:52

I'm like okay at one point I

11:54

go all right Milwaukee I'm trying to figure you

11:56

guys out I'll figure you out and

11:59

that was it and And then here's the thing.

12:02

Typically, if a crowd

12:04

is giving me like no energy, it sucks

12:07

my energy right out and I come down

12:09

and I'm like, Oh, you're not doing energy?

12:11

Well subconsciously, neither am I then. So now

12:13

we're both at a level two, and we're

12:15

gonna rock this show at a level two.

12:18

And even my voice comes down a little

12:20

bit. And I don't even project a lot

12:22

of time because you're not giving me nothing.

12:24

So my body automatically goes, Oh, this is

12:26

where we're at. It's like that energy there

12:28

more than me. I can't over it wasn't

12:31

that kind of welcome at all. It

12:33

was just a little more like, Oh, well,

12:36

it's better. I'll

12:39

take it. Yeah. Well,

12:41

I'm sorry that Milwaukee didn't give

12:43

you the laughs that you

12:45

deserve. You know, I apologize

12:48

on behalf of Milwaukee. Well,

12:50

listen, I'm sure there's a lot of comics that

12:52

would listen and be like, no, they didn't give

12:55

you laughs you deserve because you didn't deserve them.

12:57

If you would have deserved them, you would have

12:59

got them. Like there's comedians who full on feel

13:01

that way. I don't like there's like, there's no

13:03

bad audiences. There's only bad comics fully disagree. There's

13:06

audiences. I'm outstanding. I

13:09

did. I just did a show

13:11

in San Diego where I did pretty

13:14

much the same show back to back

13:16

one audience. Absolutely

13:18

amazing. The other audience. And

13:22

I really think I did the same

13:24

performance back to back with the exception

13:26

of a few things here, a few

13:28

things there, but I just, I

13:30

feel like, you know, it's like, it's,

13:32

that's the weird thing about standup. You

13:34

really just feeding off this energy. And

13:37

when you get to the point of like, it's

13:40

almost like starting a fire, I feel

13:42

like. And if, if it, um,

13:45

sometimes when you're starting a fire, you're like, this should

13:47

not be taken so long. You get

13:49

frustrated with it. You kick the fire down, you

13:51

know, and you just need to be delicate

13:53

and build it at first. And then just, if

13:56

that doesn't work, just fan the flame, just blow

13:58

on the flame until So it doesn't, I don't

14:01

know. When I get big and loud, I feel like

14:03

it's me desperately just blowing on the flame. You know,

14:05

the funny thing is like, there are a

14:08

few moments where I have like some banger

14:10

jokes where I'm like, okay, this one's for

14:12

sure. Gonna get them. Right. And

14:14

I would get like a really good laugh. And then

14:17

they went back to their like, yeah. Yeah.

14:20

I'm like, wait a minute. I thought I just

14:22

proved to you that we're, we're, it's worth having

14:24

a good time. It's worth just shaking it off

14:26

and like giving a good laugh. You know what

14:28

I mean? And you're like, no, no, no, that

14:30

part was, but. That

14:34

sucks. Do you do two, you did two shows

14:36

a night there. I did. Yeah.

14:39

Oh man. Well, did you

14:41

stay downtown Milwaukee or did you stay out

14:43

in that suburb? I stayed in the burb.

14:46

Yeah. Yeah. Any,

14:48

do you have any

14:51

nice experiences there outside of the

14:53

show? You go get some food

14:55

to eat. Yeah. The lawns that

14:57

they have out there in Brookfield,

14:59

you know, the what front

15:02

lawn yard. Oh,

15:04

no, we did. We had, um,

15:06

I had my daughter and our

15:08

nanny with us and

15:11

she's from Venezuela and I was like,

15:13

let's order some food to the room.

15:15

And one of the first restaurants that popped up was

15:17

a Venezuelan restaurant. And it was like, had the highest

15:20

reviews. And we were like, well, hey,

15:22

Milwaukee, like what in a

15:24

suburb of Milwaukee, there's a Venezuelan restaurant with

15:26

high reviews. Like, what is this? So

15:29

we ordered from there and she was like, I'll,

15:31

I'll tell you if it's good. You know what

15:33

I mean? And she thought it was amazing.

15:36

She was like, Oh my gosh, I feel like I'm back

15:38

in Caracas. This is so amazing. And like, she loved it.

15:40

So what was the name of the restaurant? Do you remember?

15:43

I think it's called a repas. I don't remember. Okay.

15:46

Nice. Well, shout out

15:48

to hopefully our a bus. Yeah.

15:51

And then we also went to a

15:53

Vietnamese restaurant, a pho place. What was

15:56

it called? I

15:58

can't remember the name of it, but it. It's in

16:00

Brookfield, Brookfield? Is there an S

16:02

or just one? Just one

16:04

field of Brooks, yeah. Okay, one

16:07

field of Brooks. We went to a Vietnamese

16:09

restaurant to go have some pho. That

16:12

was also pretty delicious. And

16:15

then there were fans of mine, so that was fun. Oh,

16:18

that's great. Yeah. You

16:20

get a little discount off the

16:23

top. No! No? I mean,

16:25

no time for a discount. They were just like, you're

16:27

hilarious. That'll be $168. Do

16:33

you, when you travel around, do you

16:35

often, like if you are going out, will you

16:37

get a discount if people are fans? Is that

16:39

a typical thing? Sometimes, but

16:41

I honestly, I don't expect it or

16:43

ask for it. I would never in

16:46

a million years. Yeah.

16:48

Yeah, it's always kind of weird. Like once, you know,

16:51

you get to a point where you, where

16:53

you be okay without the discount that you

16:55

get the discount, you know, or you get

16:57

free stuff. I know. No, it's

17:00

wild. It really is so dumb. Like,

17:02

as soon as you can afford it, they're like, I'll just give it to you.

17:04

No, I needed you to give it to me seven years ago. That's

17:06

going to give it to me. Yeah.

17:11

Oh, well, that's how it goes. Do you

17:14

like traveling with your

17:16

daughter? Do you enjoy that, that

17:18

whole thing? I mean, she's very

17:20

young, right? She's a year, nine

17:22

months. Oh my gosh. So

17:25

yeah, you, you kind of, you got to travel

17:27

with her at this point, right? Yeah. I

17:30

love it and it is more difficult.

17:32

Definitely traveling with a baby. Travel

17:35

times are different and everything. The way

17:37

we travel, the kind of car we

17:39

rent, like all, all the stuff

17:41

is different. The kind of hotel that we stay

17:43

at different, like everything's different when

17:45

I travel with her, but I love having her

17:48

there. I love that she's right there. As soon

17:50

as I get home from the club, she's right

17:52

there in the room. As soon as I wake

17:54

up, she's right there. Like I love having

17:56

that, but it is just a bigger

17:58

to do for sure. Yeah.

18:01

Your your last special I saw

18:03

on you tube was so. So.

18:06

Funny and I love that you i

18:08

think you put it out on you

18:10

tube for a sound think it was

18:12

on a different platform. Am I right

18:15

about that? In. Kiwi, what are you

18:17

talking about will have on both of them were just

18:19

you'd him. And secondly,

18:21

not. Sucking he always were you talking

18:23

about Nashville and the tornado and

18:25

all that sounds that we asked

18:27

him. Oh My. God. back

18:29

crowd was a lecturer at and you

18:31

were at Polaris com. By. I

18:34

love that you put on you because

18:36

that one side flight it's. Seventy.

18:38

Five seventy four minutes some might that. ah

18:41

our and you know I feel like all

18:43

the ones on Netflix and everything are a

18:45

tight our but like I don't I was

18:47

kind of thing and about it afterwards. I

18:50

like that when I like I wouldn't kill

18:52

fifty men. saw that special at all I'm

18:54

he was that par the reason you decide

18:56

to self publish at her. I

18:59

mean that was definitely a bonus Black

19:02

I feel like for me it was

19:04

important. This was my first self produced

19:06

self financed special. And. I

19:08

said i'm gonna bring it back to the

19:10

platform that kicked off my career for me

19:13

all those years ago. In that one video

19:15

went viral infill. It's kind of like a

19:17

full circle moment for me and my thing

19:19

due to the fans to the audience for

19:22

like riding with me for this on. Like

19:24

you started my career by sending this video

19:26

clip to everybody you noom and it went

19:28

viral. So I'm bringing this whole special that's

19:30

beautiful. It's gorgeous, has not just like a

19:33

cheap little i did it in my living

19:35

room. nods and I can be who does

19:37

that bus. Obviously that's an artist bet.

19:40

He. Was gorgeous. I spent money on it.

19:42

I cared about it. I'd put a

19:45

lot of love and heart and hard

19:47

work into this special and that we

19:49

like. This is my gift back to

19:51

you. On you tube those of

19:53

you who. Made. Me who I

19:55

am today like I would not be here

19:58

without anybody who shared that video clip. Yeah,

20:01

that that's really cool and that that

20:03

makes a lot of sense after doing

20:05

it and going through the work and

20:07

producing it and everything. Is that something

20:09

that you wanna continue doing? Or is

20:11

that he know something you wanna fade

20:14

away from. You. Now it's

20:16

It's an interesting conversation

20:18

for sure, because. If

20:21

I look at some of the numbers that

20:23

are like ah on Netflix and numbers of

20:25

what I'm doing like. It's

20:28

pretty similar and. So.

20:30

I see like the reason that you do Netflix

20:32

is for the name. It's for the cloud, It's

20:34

for the you know, like. Everyone wants

20:36

to say like Netflix backs them and is

20:38

behind them. And then at the

20:40

same time there's also oh you like this

20:43

special? You might also like this one. Like

20:45

people know, to go to Netflix for comedy

20:47

self some the I'm in the mood for

20:49

Stand up, let's watch somebody new. They're gonna

20:51

go to Netflix first in any means, so

20:53

you'll definitely be. Introduced to more

20:55

people then you tube would like you tube

20:57

it starts with your fans and your fan

21:00

base and depending on like what you're talking

21:02

about or like with algorithm to like doing

21:04

that day then it'll pop you up and

21:06

like new people. There's definitely a lot of

21:09

people commenting on my special that are like

21:11

I've never heard of you you just popped

21:13

up in my feed I'm so glad you

21:15

did. Like I'm gonna go watch all your

21:18

videos now and stuff like that. Facing.

21:20

It's just for like one the notoriety the

21:22

cloud of Netflix backs me and says like

21:25

a stamp of approval immediately like oh, you're

21:27

professional Even Netflix as all brothers and all

21:29

either mean like it gives the that like

21:32

St Clair. Yeah on enters. The

21:34

you know new people are gonna find

21:36

you because. That. Is the place to

21:38

go if you want to see standup comedy. As

21:40

reader, right yeah i've always

21:42

kind of thought about that to

21:44

just a i produce my special

21:47

in the reason i produced it

21:49

is because nobody else was gonna

21:51

producer you know and then use

21:54

getting you got you've had specials

21:56

for like six puzzles something like

21:58

that and you had several other

22:00

people do it. So to go back to

22:02

YouTube, I was curious and that makes a

22:05

lot of sense. It's a very cool thing

22:07

for you to do and to give back

22:09

to the fans like that. Um,

22:12

and yeah, 4 million views. Congrats on

22:14

that. Super cool. Super cool. Um,

22:17

the tornado bit in there was

22:19

especially funny because you can incorporate

22:22

a bit on the junk drawer

22:24

and, and all of that. And

22:26

those, those really small nuances of,

22:29

um, just things that

22:32

we can all relate to, but are also kind

22:34

of hyper specific to sort of the middle of

22:36

the country. Um, it's

22:39

basically moving to Nashville. How did

22:42

that, did that change you

22:44

comedically at all? Um,

22:48

no, I feel like I've always

22:50

been. Just who

22:53

I am. And I let

22:55

people adapt to me, you know?

22:58

Yeah. And of course I blend, I'm like a Camila. If

23:00

you have an accent, I'm gonna start talking in your accent

23:02

probably. Like it's a little bit of that. So

23:05

just in life in general, I

23:07

definitely added more y'alls and more

23:09

like, uh, a little bit of

23:11

a, like, uh, not twang,

23:14

but like sing songy

23:16

to speak,

23:19

you know, when I'm out at the store,

23:21

the grocery store. Thank you so much. Like

23:23

giving a little bit of a sing song

23:25

that, you know? And

23:28

so I think just in life, but like,

23:30

as far as like my comedic voice is still

23:32

me. It's just who

23:34

I am for sure. Being

23:36

in the South, did you, did you

23:38

change? Um, I appreciate it too. I

23:41

appreciate you. I

23:44

before, okay, this is silly, but I

23:46

would say I appreciate you earlier

23:49

on almost as like, um,

23:52

an intentional thing that I would do,

23:55

not necessarily from where I live

23:58

or anything, but like. Uh,

24:02

if somebody did something nice, but oh my God, thank you

24:04

so much. I appreciate it. Thank you. That was nice. And

24:06

then I would intentionally change it to thank you. I appreciate

24:08

you. And it just gives it

24:10

more like personal, like,

24:12

Oh, I received that differently.

24:15

Like, appreciate it. No problem. I

24:17

appreciate you. Oh, you're

24:19

welcome. It feels different. You know

24:22

what I mean? It does. Yeah. Cause I, I

24:24

mean, I grew up in the Midwest. It was

24:26

always, I appreciate it. Then I lived in South

24:28

Carolina for a little bit. And I remember this

24:30

woman at the grocery store, first time I heard

24:32

it. She was like, appreciate you. I

24:34

was like, damn, you know, she's like

24:36

a 60 year old woman. I was like, I think, I

24:39

think Tracy's got a thing for me, you

24:41

know, before I realized everyone said it, but

24:43

then I started saying it down there. And

24:45

now I just kind of say it, but

24:47

I was just curious at that. I

24:49

thought it was a Southern thing, but you did that

24:51

when you were in LA or. Yeah,

24:53

that was just more of like,

24:56

uh, being to be more intentional.

24:58

And after years of

25:00

therapy was like, Oh, with

25:02

everything else that I'm working on in life, that was one of

25:04

the things being

25:06

a better person, communicating my feelings, thank you

25:09

so much being intentional. Like, yeah. Yeah.

25:11

Cause you did the, I appreciate you

25:14

the full use. That's new age LA.

25:16

That's new age. That was, thank you. That's

25:19

very new age LA. And

25:21

then I, I tightened my Kabbalah race it

25:23

and walk on. Now

25:27

you grew up in California, right? Born

25:29

and raised. And,

25:31

uh, when did you decide,

25:34

uh, you kind of had, uh, uh, serve

25:36

a roundabout way to get to stand up,

25:38

right? How'd you decide you were going to

25:40

get into comedy to begin with? So I

25:43

moved to Hollywood to be an actress and

25:45

I, I was a cheerleader

25:47

for the Oakland Raiders first. And

25:50

that was like my introduction to

25:52

entertainment industry. And I cheered

25:54

for one year. We went to the Superbowl that year.

25:57

Came home from the Superbowl packed up my

25:59

bags. I moved to Hollywood and I was like, I'm

26:01

going to be an actress. And,

26:04

um, standup comedy is what took

26:06

off for me. And I

26:08

did not expect to be a comedian. I didn't know that

26:10

I was funny. My whole family is funny.

26:13

And I think that's why I didn't know. I just thought

26:15

like, we're all just funny. It wasn't

26:17

like a thing that you could actually do for

26:19

a living. My dad's hilarious. My sibling, I'm not

26:21

the funniest one in my family. My,

26:24

my siblings are hilarious. My brother Kenny, he

26:27

probably wins for like all the things he's

26:29

like. The best singer. He's

26:31

the prettiest. He's the

26:33

funniest. Like he's our Kim Kardashian.

26:37

And then there's like my other

26:39

brother. He's funny too. Like he's so quick-witted.

26:41

He had the puns, like he's one of

26:43

those pun guys and he's just like so

26:45

quick with it. So I'm not even

26:47

like the funniest one in my family. I'm just the

26:49

one who learned how to make a living off of

26:52

being funny. And I took a class,

26:54

I took a joke writing class and not because I was

26:56

trying to do it for a living, it was just because

26:58

it was a free class at a church on Tuesday nights

27:00

and I was like, sure, I'll do it. Oh,

27:02

interesting. Was it the church you were going

27:04

to at the time or just some random

27:06

church? No, yeah, I was going to this

27:08

church and, um, on Tuesday nights was creative

27:11

arts night and they would have dance class,

27:13

acting class, singing, a production

27:15

class, because they knew a lot of

27:17

people at this church were in the

27:19

entertainment industry or wanting to be. So

27:21

they're like, let's just offer some free

27:23

classes. So that's what they did. And

27:25

then I was in the acting class and we would

27:27

do improv games in the class. And I was funny

27:30

in the improv games. And then there

27:32

was a comedian there and she was like, I'm going to be

27:34

teaching a standup joke writing class. Do you want to come take

27:36

my class? And I was like, I don't know the

27:38

free. And she's like, yeah, I guess I

27:42

had no desire to be a comedian at this point. It was just

27:44

like, yeah, I guess. I mean, I

27:46

do this like nail salon character. I probably make

27:48

that a joke. I don't know. And

27:50

she was like, nail salon jokes are so hacky. Stay away

27:52

from nail salon jokes. I don't know

27:54

if anybody doesn't like me. I'll give it a

27:56

try. I'll try it anyway. Isn't that hilarious?

27:58

Like you could do a. I

28:00

feel like there could be a book on

28:02

advice. I'm glad I didn't follow or maybe

28:05

that is a book, you know, but yeah,

28:08

that sounds like a good coffee table book.

28:10

Yeah, that's true. Just a collection of different

28:12

people with advice. They didn't follow and why

28:14

they didn't yeah tangent.

28:17

We can author a book right now. I think

28:19

we did. Oh, I think we're

28:21

co-authors. Yeah, I mean it's right here the

28:23

IP is out there. So if anyone takes

28:25

it we can still them. I'm done.

28:29

Which church was it because I feel like churches

28:32

like in the Midwest where in churches

28:34

and churches anywhere else in churches in

28:36

LA are very different. LA's got like

28:39

it's almost like a scene going to

28:41

certain churches. You know,

28:43

I was on the first of all,

28:45

it's called the Oasis. Oh,

28:47

is that in where is that

28:50

Hollywood? Oh, it's in Hollywood.

28:52

Okay, that got it. It's not

28:54

there's that one like like

28:57

a copy is that one? No, that's

28:59

not it. All right Oasis. All right.

29:01

Cool. It's in Hollywood. Is it a

29:03

celebrity type church or is it? Yeah,

29:06

it's gone through its phases of

29:08

being celebrity and not celebrity like

29:10

yeah, there's definitely celebrities who attend

29:12

or have attended for sure. Got

29:14

it. Got it. Got it. All

29:17

right. So you there you're doing the joke

29:19

writing. What were your earliest jokes about? I

29:23

will tell you they're all in my first hour special.

29:25

Yeah, they all made it in there. Yeah,

29:28

that's nice. That's the only reason

29:30

why I kept doing stand-up is because it turns out

29:32

I was good at it. If if

29:34

I wasn't good, I wouldn't keep doing it. I would have moved

29:36

on because I didn't want to be a comedian. I wanted to

29:38

be an actress. So if like I

29:40

got on stage and I was doing jokes and nobody's

29:42

laughing, I'd be like, oh moving on. Sorry, apologies

29:45

for trying to do this. My bad. Um,

29:48

but the jokes that I wrote in

29:51

my class were about my name, the

29:53

my opening joke of my first

29:55

hour special about Angela Johnson and

29:57

it's not Mexican Angela. John Sonnes

30:00

and that whole thing. Like I

30:02

wrote that in my class. I

30:06

wrote a joke about my

30:08

my D.M.A.R.I. my grandpa. I

30:12

wrote my nail salon joke in the

30:14

class. So yeah that's

30:16

that that's it's really interesting

30:18

because a lot of times you'll hear like I

30:21

mean I grew or I came up doing kind of

30:23

the open mics in LA and and

30:28

you would always hear like oh you can't take a

30:30

class and stand up you can't you can't learn how

30:32

to do it you just have to go up and

30:34

do it and there's maybe some truth in the fact

30:37

that you have to get on stage but I feel

30:39

like that's that's kind of a crazy

30:41

thing to say because you absolutely can learn

30:44

how to like write a joke

30:46

there are certain things like juxtaposition

30:48

or you

30:51

know recognition triggers or whatever

30:53

that are all very teachable.

30:56

It was a really great class her

30:58

name is Lisa Alvarado and she taught

31:00

us everything from like the rule of

31:03

three to

31:05

like imagine if and paint

31:07

a picture for the audience

31:09

and things like reversal

31:13

or like

31:15

just different techniques and they may have been

31:17

things that I naturally do but I would

31:20

have never known to identify them so I

31:22

can replicate it and do it again in

31:25

my next joke writing situation or figure out

31:27

how to tweak this joke to make it

31:30

hit like this there's something funny in this

31:32

joke for sure but I just can't make

31:34

it hit and then you try these different

31:36

techniques and it's like oh well maybe that

31:39

third one I'll make it something obnoxious and

31:41

something crazy and whatever it is like oh

31:43

it's because I listed in four let me

31:45

take one out and just make it three

31:48

and like a good example of that is

31:51

my joke in the tornado joke when

31:53

we go down into the basement and I

31:56

say it was just me my husband and

31:58

hella spiders and I do a call back to

32:00

the spiders. In real life, it

32:02

was me, my husband, my dog, and

32:05

spiders. And I would never

32:07

not mention my dog because he was like my

32:09

child at the time. Yeah, I would never

32:11

not mention my dog. However, comedies in rule of three, so

32:14

I had to take somebody out so that I can hit

32:16

the spiders because I was about to do a callback to

32:18

the spiders. So I was like, all right, listen, son, you're

32:20

not gonna be in this joke because three. So she

32:25

taught us a bunch of techniques like that

32:27

and everything from like stage etiquette, from

32:29

how to hold a microphone, how to

32:31

adjust the mic stand, how to shake

32:33

the host hand when you trade places,

32:35

how you don't just abandon the stage

32:37

until you get relieved from the stage

32:39

and somebody else comes up to take

32:41

your place, like all these different etiquette

32:43

things that you don't know. And sure,

32:46

you could just learn by throwing yourself in or you

32:48

could just take a class and she teaches you all

32:50

these things. Yeah, I mean, that

32:53

it's a huge hack right there on

32:55

the whole thing to just kind of

32:57

take a class to start off. And

33:01

even like the thing you say

33:03

about the mic stand or what

33:05

you just said, like, how many times do

33:07

people pull the mic stand from the top

33:09

and pull the top right off, you know?

33:12

So there you have it. Don't be shy about

33:14

doing the class. We have a fair amount of

33:16

standups that listen to this so that I always

33:18

just like to throw in a few of those.

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34:56

Back to the podcast. So

35:01

after you kind of got the first

35:04

special going, I know you have Mad

35:06

TV, you've got all that. I

35:08

heard a podcast where you were

35:10

talking about kind of your anxiety about going

35:13

up on stage and how

35:15

that impacted you. How did you deal

35:17

with your anxiety? That was one other

35:19

quote. I know you mentioned it on

35:21

the podcast I listened to, but just

35:23

for this audience, how would you deal

35:25

with it? This stage fright? I

35:28

mean, so my anxiety was

35:32

not so much stage fright, but more so

35:34

because I was a performer. I was already

35:36

like I was a professional cheerleader performing from

35:38

thousands of people, which is different being

35:41

by yourself on a microphone and everyone

35:43

is listening to just you. Where

35:45

I'm in front of like 40,000 people at

35:47

the Super Bowl, but they have 40,000 other

35:49

people to look at and pay attention to.

35:51

They have the football game to watch. They

35:54

have other cheerleaders they could watch. So it's

35:56

definitely different when it's just you and a

35:58

microphone and your voice is being ambushed. And

36:00

the goal of what you're doing is to make people laugh. So

36:02

if you don't hit your goal already, it's like,

36:05

you know, for me, the most

36:08

anxiety I had was about writing and getting

36:11

up and going and actually

36:13

getting there and being by

36:19

myself, it was like being

36:21

in a man's world, you know, this is

36:23

like boys club. And then I would be

36:26

like the only girl a lot of

36:28

times. And then I wasn't like overweight.

36:30

I wasn't like wretched looking. So already

36:32

it was a different vibe when I

36:35

walked in the room. It

36:37

wasn't like, Oh, she's one of the boys.

36:39

It was either people were trying to

36:41

hit on me or they didn't take me seriously. Or

36:44

I was just ignored

36:46

or they would talk to me,

36:48

but then I'm in my head going like, Oh, are

36:51

they trying to hit on me or are they taking

36:53

me seriously? So it was a lot of

36:55

that. And

36:58

then just with like writing new material, I

37:00

would be like, how am I going to top the joke

37:02

that I just wrote? Like everybody laughed at that one. I'm

37:04

going to make one funnier than that. And

37:06

it was constantly just getting in my head

37:08

about it all. And

37:10

then there's just plain anxiety that has no

37:13

identifiable source. It's

37:15

just anxiety in

37:18

my chest, in my neck, in

37:20

my throat, and in

37:22

my stomach. And I can't even

37:24

identify what it is, but

37:26

it's there. So anytime I would like, okay, I

37:28

got to set the improv at 8pm, like not

37:31

my show, but like I'm doing 10 minutes at

37:33

the improv on Thursday, I would

37:35

have diarrhea all day long because I was

37:37

just anxious about it. And it was going to be fine,

37:39

but I just knew I was going to be like driving

37:42

by myself. Is the

37:44

bouncer going to remember me when I walk in or do

37:46

I have to like prove to him like, Hey, I'm a

37:48

comedian. And then I how embarrassing. And then like, there's everybody

37:50

else. They're all friends because they hang out. And I don't

37:52

have any other friends. Like it was like a lot of

37:54

that. And I would just be

37:57

nervous to perform in front of an audience. That wasn't

37:59

my audience. because I got

38:01

spoiled by really amazing crowds from

38:03

day one. So

38:06

I would be like spoiled on the weekend and

38:08

go do my headlining shows and then I would

38:10

come to the improv on Tuesday and

38:12

it would be like crickets and nobody

38:14

cares that I'm there. And

38:17

who cares? You know, Chris

38:19

Rock just did a guess that right before you

38:21

don't care who you are, who are you? You

38:23

did a YouTube video? Oh, that's funny. You know

38:25

what I mean? Right, right. No, I

38:27

get that. And... Oh,

38:30

but you asked what do I do to... Yeah,

38:32

yeah. How do you center

38:34

yourself and all that? Okay, so I have lots

38:36

of tools and these are things that I learned

38:38

over time. So there was years where I just suffered with it and

38:40

it was just diary all day long and there's nothing I can do

38:42

about it. But over

38:45

the years I learned tools and

38:48

these are some of my favorite ones. Easiest

38:50

one is gratitude, practicing

38:53

gratitude. And the way you do it is,

38:55

the way I do it is I say it

38:58

out loud and I

39:00

think five things that you're grateful for and you

39:03

say them out loud. Because when you say them

39:05

out loud, you also hear yourself saying

39:07

what you're grateful for. So it's not just

39:09

thinking like, oh, I'm grateful that I'm healthy.

39:11

You're saying, I'm grateful that I'm healthy. And

39:14

then you're hearing, I'm grateful that I'm healthy.

39:16

And then you have this gratitude that's like

39:18

a big circle that goes out and in,

39:20

out and in, and you're like constantly filling

39:23

yourself up with gratitude

39:25

and like raising your elevation.

39:27

And Jensen

39:30

Sero wrote a book that I loved.

39:32

It's called You Are A Badass. And

39:34

that is where I learned this gratitude

39:36

technique. And it's just this constant

39:38

like circle of gratitude. Even when you tell a

39:40

joke, like when you say a joke and they

39:43

laugh, that's their thank you to you for saying

39:45

the funny thing. And then you say another joke

39:47

and the laugh is another thank you. And it's

39:49

like raises the elevation in the vibration in the

39:51

room. So I would

39:53

do gratitude and I would say five things that

39:56

I was grateful for. And I would say them

39:58

out loud. So you're pausing. take

40:00

time to think about what you're grateful for, then you

40:02

say it and you hear it. And not only that,

40:04

I would do it with my whole green room, whoever

40:06

was in the green room at the time, my opener,

40:09

road manager. Um, if

40:11

the waiters in there, like whoever's in the

40:13

green room, we're all going around the room

40:15

and everybody saying something that you're grateful for

40:17

because we're all going to raise the vibration

40:19

in the room right now because something's off.

40:22

And even if it wasn't me having anxiety,

40:24

I could see my opener was

40:26

super anxious. I'd be like, yo, your energy is

40:28

affecting me right now. So we're all going to

40:31

pause and we're going to do gratitude because

40:33

we got to shift this energy right now. And

40:35

then we'd all go around the room and say,

40:37

oh, grateful. So that's probably my favorite

40:39

one. I just want to stop

40:42

you before you say the other ones.

40:44

But as you're saying this, I have

40:46

my producer, Colleen, just staring

40:48

daggers at me the entire time

40:50

you're talking. She always says, okay,

40:53

have we done our gratitude list today? But

40:55

I always think about how many times I

40:57

come in with that like kind of frantic,

40:59

like, I have so much to do today.

41:01

We got to do this. We got to

41:03

make this hit. And then it's like, okay,

41:05

let's say our gratitude list. I have ignored

41:07

her every single time she said it. She

41:10

feels completely validated now. She is laughing

41:12

over on the other end. And we'll

41:14

have a conversation after this conversation

41:17

with you about it. So thanks.

41:19

I appreciate that. Absolutely.

41:22

What? So but

41:25

truly that that does make

41:28

a lot of sense. What are your other

41:30

tactics that you use? So

41:32

other than that, there is my

41:34

breathing techniques, there's many different ones

41:36

that you can even look up

41:38

on YouTube or whatever. But one

41:40

of them I was taught is

41:43

you plug one of your nostrils, you

41:45

inhale for five, and then you let it

41:47

go. And you plug the other one and

41:49

you exhale for five and you're focusing on

41:51

your breathing in that and it's really getting

41:53

you centered into your body. There's

41:57

that one I do a lot of pressure

42:00

points with my fingertips and I practice my

42:02

breathing and a lot of times I just

42:06

start pushing on fingertips and something

42:08

about it just takes me

42:11

out of whatever I'm in and I

42:13

just start doing this one and

42:15

whether it's my hands wherever we're at a

42:17

lot of time if I'm getting like an

42:19

IV or something like a vitamin IV or

42:21

I have to draw blood or whatever for

42:23

you any medical reason I'm always this

42:25

anytime I'm something is about to

42:28

be painful just Here

42:30

I am. Yeah, I know this

42:33

Yeah That

42:35

have you ever done the Wim Hof

42:37

one where you like breathe in breathe

42:40

out like I'm aware of it But

42:42

I don't practice it got it got

42:44

it. That's when I do because it

42:46

lowers the oxygen and you kind of

42:48

get a little Body

42:51

buzz. So yeah, I'm like a

42:53

cheap. Hi, you know I

42:56

like that finger one though. That does actually work.

42:58

That's probably where okay comes from, you know You're

43:02

not okay. Yeah Okay, you'll be

43:04

more. Okay, if you push harder, you'll be okay

43:10

That's cool so you do these kind of

43:12

every Every time

43:14

or you just kind of need it you

43:17

pull whatever tool you need sort of

43:19

whenever I need it now we've started

43:21

doing gratitudes with my My

43:24

team techs thread of my manager my

43:27

road manager my social media managers

43:31

And we're all in a tech thread. And so every Monday

43:33

we send a voice note

43:35

and We say what five things

43:37

weren't grateful for from this past week and we

43:39

just kind of start our week off with

43:41

gratitude Well, that's great man.

43:44

That is that is very much.

43:47

I appreciate you Energy

43:49

right there. That's great Um

43:53

What what's kind of

43:56

like you look back on you

43:59

know your career And that's kind of an

44:01

interesting place for you to be in where

44:03

you have this whole career that you've already

44:05

done. Do you look back at it like

44:08

you are kind of here at the top and

44:10

you are ascending

44:13

creatively? I don't mean from a

44:15

career standpoint because you

44:17

are, I feel like, at the

44:20

top and still ascending. But is there a

44:22

point when you look back where you're like,

44:24

that's where I felt like the most whole

44:26

as a creator? Is that in the past

44:28

or is that in your right now? Really

44:31

good question. I'm

44:34

going to say the past

44:38

because there's

44:40

something special and unique

44:44

about being hungry. And

44:48

when you've attained a

44:51

level of success,

44:54

there's a lot of temptations. There's

44:56

a temptation to get comfortable and

44:58

cozy and coast. There's

45:01

the temptation to doubt

45:04

yourself. Oh, I'm a fraud. It

45:06

was a fluke that I even got here. I'm

45:08

not as funny as people think. I'm not as talented as people

45:10

think. I just, this is

45:12

an accident that I got this far. There's

45:15

the temptation to do all

45:17

of these things that are

45:20

self-sabotaging. Right? And

45:22

stifle your creativity. When

45:25

you start listening to your own voice telling

45:27

you these things, it stifles

45:30

your creativity. But there's

45:32

something unique about when

45:34

you're hungry. It

45:37

like encourages your creativity, I feel

45:40

like. Even when an actual hunger,

45:42

when you haven't eaten and you

45:44

have those hunger pains, there's

45:47

something about it that moves you

45:49

to the kitchen to

45:51

make yourself something to eat. But

45:53

if you like snack a little bit, a little bit, then

45:55

you're probably not going to make yourself a whole little meal.

45:57

You're going to be like, I'm good. I'm

45:59

fine. had a little bit already. I kind

46:01

of had a little bit of this and I had a little bit of that.

46:03

I'm good. But there's something about when

46:05

you have nothing, when you're

46:07

hungry, when you're all you have

46:09

is your dream. All you have is

46:12

your dream of wanting to be a headliner. All you

46:14

have is your dream of wanting to cook that roast

46:16

beef for dinner. All you have is your dream

46:19

but you have little bits here and there. It kind of like,

46:21

I think I'm okay right here. This

46:23

is probably a good, I'm good with

46:25

this. I feel

46:28

like when I had nothing but

46:30

my dream, I was more creative. I

46:33

was more willing to take a risk because

46:36

I had nothing to lose. No,

46:40

that makes a lot of sense. So

46:42

being where you are

46:44

now, are you sort of surrendering

46:49

to the fact that that is just a

46:52

part of your past or

46:54

are you in some ways trying to

46:56

recreate that hunger? Recreate the

46:58

hunger, trying to be intentional. And I

47:00

need reminders all the time, whether it's

47:02

from my husband, or my

47:04

team, or being inspired,

47:07

honestly, like doing podcast interviews. And

47:09

I hear myself tell my story

47:11

from this

47:13

inspires me and reminds me like, yes,

47:16

I am capable. I can do

47:18

this. I can blah, blah, blah, whatever it is,

47:20

if I'm in a season of doubting myself or

47:22

whatever. And then there's sometimes where I'm just like

47:25

feeling so productive. Like earlier this year, in

47:27

January, I was filming a show.

47:29

And in between takes,

47:33

we were in the dressing room

47:35

with my manager and my assistant.

47:38

And we're talking about producing

47:40

this podcast that I'm going to be releasing soon.

47:42

And we're talking about this sitcom that I want

47:44

to write in like, everything

47:47

was in dream form. Nothing was like green

47:49

light like, Oh, I got a sitcom. We're

47:51

filming it on Tuesday. It's nothing like that.

47:53

It was all about dreaming. But it felt

47:55

good. It felt collaborative. It felt creative. It

47:57

felt like I'm, I'm in the process of

47:59

filming one show while I'm with

48:01

my team dreaming up another

48:04

show, a whole different show. And it was like,

48:06

it felt creative. It

48:08

felt good. And like, if you were to

48:10

have interviewed me during that time, be like,

48:12

yo, I'm just moving and grooving. I'm,

48:15

I'm killing it. I'm crushing it. Like I'm dreaming.

48:17

I'm vibing. Like, what if my character was like

48:19

this and all these things, but

48:21

then there'll be times where I don't really have

48:23

much going on and I'm just

48:25

like kind of in the process of maybe

48:27

writing new material. I have like a couple

48:29

of club dates, but that's kind of all

48:31

that's going right now. Then I

48:33

get into that place of like, I don't

48:37

know. I already, I created a show seven

48:40

times already and they told me no. I

48:42

pitched the show to NBC, ABC,

48:44

CBS, Fox, everybody. They all said

48:47

no. It's whatever.

48:50

Okay. But so-and-so wants

48:52

to work with you. Okay. That's fun. But

48:54

I just finished working with America Freire and

48:56

Kevin Hart and they still said no to

48:58

me. So, eh,

49:00

it's whatever. You know what I mean? Like

49:02

sometimes I'll get in that place. And then other

49:04

times I'm like, yeah, let's write

49:06

a show. It's ebbs

49:09

and flows, you know? Yeah. No, I feel

49:11

that for sure. Because yeah,

49:13

you constantly are in this place of, oh,

49:15

maybe I just got lucky. Like you write

49:18

a show. You, it, maybe it takes, uh,

49:20

I've been working on like one show for

49:23

four years. I'm like, oh, maybe it just

49:25

wasn't meant to be, you know, but it's

49:27

like, or maybe just

49:29

the right person hasn't seen it yet or whatever

49:31

to keep you in that, because I feel like

49:34

the industry is changing so much too now. They're

49:36

green lighting less things. So

49:39

much more self-produced. I think

49:41

there's more here to keep you kind of in

49:43

that field where I can do

49:45

it. But yeah, it does definitely

49:47

ebb and flow, you know? And

49:50

then do you find too

49:52

that as you get maybe

49:54

more money and more fame?

49:57

Uh, that it's harder for you to go out. and

50:00

be maybe a real person and therefore you

50:02

kind of isolate a little bit more. Is

50:04

that, has that been part of your journey

50:06

at all? No,

50:10

um, I've always been a homebody, so I

50:12

always like to stay home and

50:14

then add to it that I travel for

50:16

a living even more. So I just want

50:19

to stay home. So like my husband's like,

50:21

babe, let's go on vacation. Let's go to

50:23

Europe. And I'm like, I

50:25

just got back from Indiana. Like I

50:29

don't want to go anywhere. I want to be home

50:31

in my own bed and my own

50:33

shower in my own kitchen. Like I don't want

50:35

to go anywhere. So I've always

50:37

been a homebody and that's something I've

50:39

had to like really like

50:41

wrestle with myself and getting out of the

50:43

house and making sure I'm still doing things

50:45

that are not work related, but not

50:48

because I'm like famous or

50:51

somebody's going to recognize me or anything

50:53

like that. Right. I got you.

50:56

Um, I did want to ask, I

50:58

was going to ask earlier when you're talking about family,

51:00

but you are, you've got, I'm right in the

51:02

middle of my sister. She's the oldest, then me,

51:04

then my brother Kenny, and then my brother, uh,

51:07

sunny, and then I have a half

51:09

brother from my dad who's 10 years older

51:11

than me. That dynamic of

51:13

sort of the middle child, then

51:15

that even plays in more. Do

51:17

you think that like impacted your

51:19

sort of, uh, your kind

51:22

of rise and your interest in

51:24

having other people sort of laugh at you?

51:26

Do you think that made you kind of

51:28

a comedian in some ways or not so

51:30

much? I don't know that it's middle

51:33

child syndrome. If anything, like

51:36

I said, like all my siblings are

51:38

funny. I think it's just having siblings

51:40

for me, bouncing

51:42

things off each other, playing off each

51:44

other, and we watching our

51:47

dad do that being, you know,

51:49

zingers in the conversation. Um,

51:51

I think for me, it's just the fact that

51:53

I had siblings. I don't know if it's where

51:56

I line up in the matter, but yeah.

52:00

I definitely feel like, and I only have,

52:02

I have one child. I didn't want any

52:04

children at first. And I decided to have

52:06

one. And then the idea

52:09

of having one child blows my mind because I

52:11

grew up with siblings, but I'm like, oh man,

52:13

I don't know if I could do this again.

52:16

But I would love for her to have siblings like

52:18

I did, but could somebody else

52:21

do it? Yeah, yeah, yeah,

52:23

yeah. Yeah, could you even

52:25

mention your special that,

52:27

you know, was there a certain

52:29

thing that made you want to

52:32

decide to have a child? COVID.

52:34

COVID, yeah. It was after

52:37

being home and we were all in

52:40

lockdown. Nobody was touring, nobody was

52:42

filming TV shows or movies. It was,

52:44

everybody was home. And when

52:46

I was home, I finally got to

52:49

enjoy the fruits of my labor that I

52:52

had never done before because I've constantly been

52:54

on the road traveling, working. So

52:56

like I had this beautiful home with a

52:58

balcony that overlooked the city. And I never

53:00

even put furniture out there to even enjoy

53:02

my balcony because I was never home long

53:04

enough to do it. And then finally

53:06

I was home for a whole year and

53:09

I put furniture out there. I

53:11

put like a little water feature. It became

53:14

like my little meditation area and I'm overlooking

53:16

the city. And it was like

53:18

that view of the city was something that always

53:20

inspired me. And here I was given

53:22

this gift of looking at it every single night and

53:24

I just kind of, pretty

53:27

for granted. And then I

53:29

had a pool that I never swam in and

53:32

never used. I had this

53:34

beautiful land that I ended up

53:37

making a garden and

53:39

started gardening. And it

53:42

was just all of these things that I

53:44

was like, oh, it's nice to be home.

53:46

And my career had always

53:48

been my baby, has always been the thing

53:50

that I held most high that was most

53:52

sacred to me. And

53:54

here I was, home, being

53:58

okay with not having those things. not

54:00

having a tour,

54:02

not having a show to go

54:05

film. I was like, huh, I don't

54:07

need it. It's whatever. And

54:10

that was the first time that I had

54:12

ever said to my career, whatever,

54:15

I don't need it. I don't need

54:17

it. That was the first time.

54:19

I never in my life imagined myself saying that. So

54:22

it was at that point that I was like, oh shoot,

54:24

did I mess up? Should I have had kids? Because

54:27

I remember all my friends and family

54:29

telling me how kids are the most

54:31

fulfilling thing, more

54:33

so than a career. That kids

54:35

are the most fulfilling thing that you could ever

54:37

do with your life. And I would always be

54:39

like, okay. But it was

54:42

at that moment that I was like, uh oh, what if

54:44

I messed up? What if I should have had kids? And

54:47

that's when I started looking into it, seeing like, do I even have options? I

54:49

was 38 at the time. So I was like,

54:52

wait a minute, do I even have options? Do I have eggs left? I

54:54

don't know. And so that started my

54:56

whole journey of figuring out if I was even

54:58

capable of having kids. And then here I am

55:00

now, 41, and I have my nine month old.

55:04

Well, congratulations. Thank you. That's so awesome.

55:06

Is there anything about being a mother?

55:09

I'm sure there's a lot, but what's

55:11

been the most surprising thing about being

55:13

a mom that you wouldn't have expected?

55:20

I mean, I don't

55:22

know that I wouldn't have expected, like I did expect it,

55:24

but it's just a whole different thing is how tired I

55:27

am and how worth it it

55:29

is. And

55:32

all my friends used to say that. I

55:34

even have a joke about it in my

55:36

technically not stalking special where I talk about

55:39

my friend Maya, she would tell

55:41

me like, oh, Mateo has an ear infection. Noah

55:43

has the flu. She's throwing up all night. Then

55:45

I have to wake up at 5

55:47

a.m. to go to work. And then I got to

55:50

go pick one of them up from school with hand,

55:52

foot, mouth disease, whatever that is. But it's so worth

55:54

it. And I would always be like,

55:56

you are crazy. That does not sound worth it to

55:58

me. No, thank you. And

56:01

then here I am when she wakes

56:03

up in the middle of the night and I

56:05

gotta wake up early the next day But

56:07

I still go in and I love to just

56:09

be her mom and hold her when

56:11

she's crying and like rock her to sleep Like

56:14

it's my favorite. I'm like, oh my god, it

56:16

is worth it. What that's weird

56:19

So it's like people warned me about it, but you don't know until

56:21

you know Yeah, yeah

56:25

Do you find now as a mom and

56:27

kind of like being in the realm with

56:29

other moms that you have sort

56:32

of a whole new host

56:34

of Material is that part

56:36

of what you're currently touring with right

56:38

now some mom stuff or I'm

56:41

definitely talking about my experience Thus

56:43

far and becoming a mom in my 40s I

56:47

think as my daughter gets older and starts to

56:49

do more things I'll be able to like pull

56:52

from that for material But she's still

56:54

kind of just like a

56:56

baby and early on she was just a blob like what

56:58

she's not doing nothing for me to talk about So

57:02

I think as she gets older, I'll definitely have more

57:04

things to be like, you know what my daughter said to

57:06

me and Here's my

57:08

whole next hour. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

57:10

Yeah. Well that that's really amazing.

57:12

It's a great story and congratulations

57:14

Very you know, um,

57:18

where do you We're kind

57:20

of wrapping it up at this point. But before we

57:22

do I kind of want to figure out where do

57:24

you sort of see? Like

57:27

where is your passion and energy taking you

57:29

now you mentioned the podcast you mentioned some

57:31

shows Obviously stand

57:34

up, but where's your passion

57:36

pointing you? well,

57:38

I moved to Hollywood to be an actress and I'm

57:42

still trying to be an actress. So I

57:47

Would love my dream like my biggest dream

57:49

in life is to have my own multi-cam

57:51

sitcom one day That's my

57:53

biggest dream. And then every time I want

57:55

to pitch a show they're like, oh multi-cam

57:57

sitcoms are like old news Nobody's doing multi-cam.

58:00

sitcoms anymore and I'm like yeah I still want to do

58:02

one. So that's my dream

58:04

is to one day be able to do

58:06

a multi-cam sitcom. I would love it. I

58:08

started as an extra on Friends and

58:11

if I could just go

58:13

back and have my own Friends

58:15

that would be incredible. I would love it. I

58:18

feel like there's gonna

58:20

be a Friends Redux. I mean that's sort

58:22

of the way Hollywood does it. Is there

58:25

one in the works now? Have you heard

58:27

of one? I've heard no. Maybe you make

58:30

one. I don't know

58:32

but I do know what you mean. Yeah

58:34

there are no real multi-cams anymore. It is

58:36

an older style but I feel like there's

58:38

a way to kind of bring it into

58:40

kind of the YouTube generation.

58:43

I don't know how you

58:45

do it. I don't know either

58:47

but we'll do it and we'll

58:49

put it on YouTube. Yeah we're

58:51

offering books. We're doing multi-cams on YouTube.

58:54

Look at us. This is a

58:56

podcast. Yeah it adds. Well

58:59

thank you so much for coming on. I

59:01

really appreciate it and where can people see

59:04

you? Where are you touring next? Go

59:07

to my website angela.com. You

59:10

can see where I'll be at from

59:12

you know in Indiana. I'm doing Fort

59:14

Wayne next weekend. Not this weekend but

59:17

next weekend. I don't know when this podcast comes

59:19

up. Probably next week. Okay

59:21

so if I already did Fort Wayne, I'm sorry you missed

59:23

me. And

59:25

then where else am I gonna be? You know

59:28

I don't know. Check my calendar. I'm kind of

59:30

all over the place this year and

59:33

check out my specials. My special

59:35

Say I Won't is

59:38

on YouTube and I filmed it

59:40

in Nashville and I released it

59:44

last year in May. So that's my most recent

59:46

one that I filmed.

59:48

Then I just released a special a few

59:50

weeks ago but this one was actually from

59:52

the vault. I recorded it and I never

59:54

released it. It was just kind of sitting

59:56

in my vault and I decided

59:58

I was gonna release it to the world. and so that one

1:00:00

just came out a couple weeks ago. It's called Technically Not

1:00:03

Stalking. So it's the most recent one to

1:00:05

come out but the material is from my 2019 tour that

1:00:07

I did. So

1:00:09

you can go check that out as well. They're both on

1:00:11

YouTube. Awesome. Well, thank you

1:00:13

so much for coming on. This was a

1:00:15

real delight to talk to you and

1:00:19

get those meditative tactics and the

1:00:21

gratitude list. So that's my big

1:00:23

takeaway. So thanks. Thank you.

1:00:25

Thanks for having me. Oh, you

1:00:28

bet. Absolutely. I appreciate your time and yeah,

1:00:30

have fun with tell your husband and your

1:00:32

baby. I say hi. All right. I will.

1:00:34

Thank you. Bye. All right. Bye. Bye. Hope

1:00:40

that is it for this week's episode

1:00:42

of the Christ cast. Huge. Thanks to

1:00:45

Angela. Colleen. Where can people find her

1:00:47

on Instagram? She's Angela Johnson. A N

1:00:49

J E L A H. Johnson. The

1:00:51

way you think you'd spell it with

1:00:53

an O N and then she's

1:00:56

online. Check out her website. She's got all of her specials

1:00:58

there. She has all of her tour dates. Go to

1:01:01

angela.com. Pretty straightforward. There you have

1:01:03

it folks. All right. Well, thank

1:01:05

you all for listening, Kelly. And

1:01:07

thank you for producing this episode.

1:01:09

Shout out to Hannah Milose for

1:01:11

editing and thanks to all

1:01:13

of you for listening. It means

1:01:16

a lot and I hope you all watch

1:01:18

for dear. You have to say I appreciate

1:01:20

you. Remember? Oh yeah, that's right. I appreciate

1:01:23

you. I look at you and say, yeah,

1:01:25

you said you. I know. I thought I could

1:01:27

talk about it. Yeah. That's a call back.

1:01:30

All right. We'll see you

1:01:32

guys next week. So get the

1:01:34

fan brewing. Life's got you

1:01:36

down. Just keep removing.

1:01:39

You know, sometimes

1:01:41

when you're out

1:01:44

fishing, you put your foot in

1:01:46

the wall, you hold it and

1:01:48

go ahead

1:01:50

and go over to the chattel and you think

1:01:53

you're done. No, you got to keep removing.