Are Women of Color Disappearing From Comedy Again?

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Speaker 1: The following podcast contains explicit language. Tickets.

Ida: Welcome to the Waves, Slate’s podcast about gender feminism. And today we’ll be talking about surviving as a woman and a mother and a truth teller in your industry. Every episode, you get a new pair of women to talk about the thing that we can’t get off our minds. And today you’ve got me Daisy Rosario, senior supervising producer of Audio here at Slate. And I’m thrilled to be having a conversation with a incredibly funny and intelligent woman who I admire quite a lot.

Ida: Today, I am joined by comedian Ida Rodriguez. You might know her work from her HBO Max special Fighting Words, or her Netflix comedy special, which was part of the Tiffany Haddish series They Ready? She’s also been a longtime contributor to the Young Turks. Now, Ida is not just a comedian. She’s also a mother. And that has been true the entire time that she has been pursuing her career, which is not the order that a lot of people tend to do that type of work in. So I’m especially excited to talk to her about that. In addition to the many other challenges about being a woman in the industry in which she is. So we’re going to take a quick break here. But when we get back, you will hear more from me and Aida Rodriguez talking all about what it’s like to be a woman, a creative in comedy.

Ida: And we are back with Aida Rodriguez. Ida, welcome to the Waves.

Speaker 3: Thank you for having me. I haven’t been. I’ve been in isolation for a couple of weeks, so this is like my first communication.

Ida: Well, thank you for making the time for this. I am a huge fan of your comedy. You know, in our intro, we listed all the great work that people can check out. It’s been about a year since your HBO Max special Fighting Words came out. You.

Speaker 3: Thank you. I’m so happy to be here tonight.

Speaker 4: Yes. And the boogie down, bra. Oh. In the food stamp building.

Speaker 3: What? Poetic justice. I’ve come full circle. Those of you who I see the way people like the food stamp building. Are we in danger? You absolutely are. So much so.

Ida: How has this year been for you since the release of that?

Speaker 3: Well, it’s been great. You know, I one of the things that happens in a comedy world is that it can be very toxic. And you’re surrounded by people who are always measuring themselves to another person. And you think about, like, all the things you don’t have because somebody has a TV show and somebody booked a movie. I won’t be arrogant to say that that that’s beneath me because I can say that I had, you know, a moment where I expected more things to happen. And then someone was like, You’re a woman. Like I What did you think was going to happen? That they were going to part the city for, you know, whatever.

Speaker 3: I’ve had a lot of time to be introspective and have a moment, and I had a really good year. And I’m very thankful because I don’t want everybody, you know, I don’t want all the audiences. I want people who are thoughtful and caring. I want people who want to move, who are progress. And I have you know, I directed three comedy specials for HBO Max since I wrote a book for Harper Collins. I did my first animated movie. I you know, I’m in development on a TV show. So I had a great year. And I just want to make sure that I stay in gratitude because a lot of people will minimize what you do because it’s not grandiose or it doesn’t it is not superstar status or whatever. And that’s very toxic, especially for women who have to work twice as hard. So that long answer is for you to say, I finally arrived at this place where I’m like, Man, from November to this November, I had a hell of a year.

Ida: Yeah, No, I mean, I think that appreciation is is important, at least to me. I definitely value it. But I also in my, you know, own past, I remember when I was, you know, actively pursuing comedy and film and all of that stuff. Yeah. There was always this moment of like, okay, you’re finally having your moment. Are you ready to have 18 other moments? And it’s like, you’re supposed to be ready for them, but maybe they won’t happen. Nobody can tell you what it looks like. It’s a wild thing. At least, you know, at least as much as I’ve also continued to see it happen with friends over the years.

Speaker 3: Young know me. And when I’m in a unique space where as a woman, as Latina, I don’t know that any woman has broken this ceiling in comedy. I think maybe Ellen DeGeneres is probably the most successful woman who’s been a standup. And in terms of economics, because, you know, we like to say, well, Amy Schumer has TV shows where I’m talking about being on that Forbes list, which Amy, I believe was on once. But I have to create what I want to see because it doesn’t exist. There’s no Latina who’s ever made it to the A place where I can say, I want to do that. So I have to be what I want to you know, I want I got to be my own role model in this. And so that can be that can be hard sometimes.

Ida: How do you navigate some of that personally in your career, in the sense that, like, you know, that your audience does exist, right? Like you and I both know that it’s not like there’s a shortage of Latinos or families from the Caribbean who have dealt with many of the things that, you know, that you’ve talked about which are so relatable to me, but also knowing that to work in the entertainment industry, you also have to be able to, you know, quote unquote, fit certain molds in certain spaces that they can’t kind of see you in otherwise. And how do you kind of navigate both trying to access some of those spaces that will help people that don’t know who you are, find you, and also just trying to, you know, stay true to the things that you want to talk about and to, like reach the audiences that you know you care about most.

Speaker 3: That’s the crossroad that I’m faced with right now is being true to myself and then being having this mass appeal that will create, you know, waves were which will allow you to be seen and in bigger spaces so that you can reach more people. I mean, I suffer from depression, so I have to check out sometimes and just you know, I have to say I got to take care of myself in this moment. This business is not healthy. I don’t want to be anything other than what I am in order to have success. And that’s just a decision that I have to contend with.

Speaker 3: You know? And Allison, ageism, sexism, racism is all real, and I have to face it on a daily basis. So I just have to show up and I continue to let Viola Davis inspire me. You know, like women who are older than me that are leading the charge and saying, no. Angela Bassett, you know, who’s my mom’s age? You know what I mean? Like, I’m like women that are like, I’m. Still here. I’m still doing it and I’m doing it big. So I just I just have to seek inspiration outside of the mode.

Ida: You also and police correct me if I’m wrong, but you also I’ve seen you talk about kind of starting your career as a comedian, as an adult or, you know, a little older as compared to a lot of people, you know. People may not realize you go to open mikes like there’s a lot of young people there. A lot of people like Jump in early have been really doing it a long time. I mean, how do you how do you think? Because I would imagine you’ve got plenty of friends through the comedy scene who did get started a lot earlier. You know, how do you think that your experience has been shaped by kind of starting when you were already an adult and a mother, I believe, right?

Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely. You know, I think it worked in my favor, honestly, because I knew who I was. So I wasn’t subject to a lot of the peer pressure. I was already dealing with a struggle of my own. I didn’t have a I was unhoused. I didn’t have a place to live. I had two children. I was struggling, you know, working a full time job and still not having a place to live. Stop telling people. Stop saying, if you’re listening and you’re one of those people, stop saying that people who are unhoused don’t want to work and don’t have jobs. A lot of people who don’t have a place to live, work and still can’t make ends meet.

Speaker 3: And I started doing standup like as therapy. For me, it was just an outlet, something that I could do by myself while my kids were safe and asleep. It was cathartic is something that I learned, but I didn’t think I would ever be able to do anything with it. I think it worked in my favor because nobody was going to slide me some drugs in the bathroom and say, Hey, you need this to be funny. I didn’t have time to, like, hang out. Like, I just I was able to so balance my life and do standup. And I just think it worked in my favor. Being a grown up like I was in allowing people to do to me what I see them do to younger people now. And. And I had to stand up for them, you know? I was I wasn’t so I wasn’t allowing the bullying that was going on with the older comics that were like to, you know, do to the newer comics. So I just think it worked in my favor.

Ida: One of the things I loved about your HBO special is that at the end there is like a brief documentary that is included. And you know, in that documentary you go back to both the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico. You meet your father in person for the first time. All of that stuff is just beautifully shared.

Speaker 3: I’m in the Dominican Republic. This is a first place that I lived after I was born with my father and my mother. My mother took me from my father when we were living here. I grew up not knowing him. I wanted to come here and meet my father and confront my issues there and understanding a part of me that I never knew. All good for comedy. Because all the trauma, I mean, some really go there, but I can’t help but to think about the series of things that happened in my life if they would happen if my father was around.

Ida: But what I really want to talk about from that little documentary at the end is you surrounding yourself with other people that you wanted to bring up with you. So we see in this documentary, it’s it’s a brief and beautifully emotional. But at the end, we also see you doing what you can to help elevate other Latino comedy voices. Why is that important to you?

Speaker 3: You know, I want to see our stories being told. Media. The media has been not very inclusive when it comes to Latino voices, even though they include Latinos and Latino people. They only include a certain type, which is what they believe the majority of the people are going to. That’s going to resonate with the majority of the people. And a lot of people feel excluded and unseen.

Speaker 3: And so for me, when it comes to comedy, you know, you don’t hear many Caribbean voices who I mean, I think Freddie Prince and is been the biggest, you know, Caribbean comedian, Puerto Rican that people know. And I think, you know, since him, you know, George Lopez is as Mexican and fluffy as Mexican. And it’s been exclusive of other voices. And that is not I’m not blaming, you know, Mexicans or or a George Lopez or Fluffy. I’m I’m directly, you know, talking to the industry, which is what people don’t do. They like to tear each other down and miss the culprit. And I just think it’s been really, you know, harmful to us because when people do talk about us, they talk about us in a very harmful way.

Speaker 3: I did a comedy show with a woman who was I don’t know if she’s a comedian anymore. She’s a musical comedian who I learned later hated me. She brought me up to a show. She introduced me as having a knife. You know, she said, oh, she’s a Puerto Rican woman, so she probably has a knife. And then she made it. She wrote a little jingle about it. So I snapped back and I said, Oh, you know, here we go. Another talentless, talentless white woman who has an opportunity because of her privilege. And that made her hate me without her ever acknowledging what she said about me, how harmful and hurtful it could be. So I just I just think that those are the voices that are out informing people about who we are. And it’s and it can be harmful to us.

Speaker 3: So I want to create a way for people who look like me that don’t all necessarily sound like everybody who’s Caribbean, everyone who’s Latino and X doesn’t have the same experience. Everybody didn’t grow up poor getting beat. What a chunk, like some of us, you know, grew up with two educated parents who never had did time out. And we we are we deserve the spectrum. And so I’m fighting for that spectrum.

Ida: I appreciate the anecdote that you share, too, about this other woman comedian, because one other thing is that I do love about your comedy is something that you say often is like, it’s all relative. It’s all relative. And when you were telling me that anecdote, I was absolutely thinking about how common it was, you know, especially when I was getting started. If you were a woman at the open mikes, you just got introduced and there was a joke about it being a woman. And they often would play the Beastie Boys song Girls Girl.

Speaker 3: Alan. I really wanted Gus. And in the morning it got cozy.

Speaker 1: Maybe it got.

Ida: Like, it was just like, every single time they were just like, It’s the one song we have for the female comedians. And I point that out because it is relative. Like even then, once you moved over to, you know, it’s like it’s not just women helping women. Like you still had this tension there that this person was exploiting in a way. And it is relative like it isn’t it isn’t just one list of like good people, bad people. It’s like it can all shift all of the time.

Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely. And also the the introduction that that cannot go without saying something about you, how you look, you know like and that that is you know that for some people some comedians think it’s a compliment. They don’t realize that it actually isn’t.

Ida: We’re going to take a quick break and we will be back with more of our conversation with comedian Aida Rodriguez. And if you want to hear more from Ada and myself, check out our Slate Plus segment. Today, we’re going to be diving into whether or not it’s feminist to stand up for yourself in a loud way. Slate Plus members get tons of added content, like no paywall on the Slate site, bonus segments on a bunch of different podcasts. Plus no ads on Slate podcasts. You can go to Slate.com, slash the Waves to become a member. Today.

Ida: We’re back with comedian Aida Rodriguez. Before the break, we were talking a little bit about some of her experiences in comedy and having certain things kind of said about you in a way that is not helpful when you’re trying to do your work. And I wanted to talk just a little bit more about that racism and sexism in comedy, in part because comedy can be so irreverent. And sometimes I feel like people first get that. Like just because some of these people are willing to talk about all kinds of stuff, that that also doesn’t mean that they’re necessarily accepting of certain things. I still see those lineups where you’re like. That’s just, you know, six white comedians in a highly diverse city. Like, could you seriously not find anybody else to, like, add to your lineup?

Ida: You know, and you also mentioned, you know, earlier that, you know, at the special that you were like some people were like, well, you’re a woman. Like, that’s what’s going to happen. I mean, like what? What? There isn’t a clear path. There isn’t a an obvious person to look up to. So, you know, how do you consult with yourself about what feels right for Ida and the career that Ida wants to build?

Speaker 3: You know, I always think about how I feel when I’m done doing something. So, for example, how do you feel? I check in with myself. Do you? Are you proud? Did you feel do you feel like you showed up as your best self? Do you feel embarrassed and shame? And I know a lot of people of color feel this when they do a all white room. And you know, you’ll see a lot of comedians who are very accepted by people of color. And I don’t like to berate them because I think we’re all surviving. And we all have our own way of surviving. You know, like I don’t like to berate people because I used to and I’ll hear people saying, oh, he’s a sellout. He’s this. But I you know, for me, it’s like I always got to go home with me. And I know that this stuff is temporary and it really doesn’t matter. And the big scheme of things because you can be gone tomorrow and none of it matters. So what what you leave behind is very important and it’s your legacy.

Speaker 3: And as we know now, like we see now, while we fighting for our own bodies and reproductive rights, you can still see videos of George Carlin circulating talking about how, you know, how hypocritical the people who do this are. And that to me is very has been very powerful and reinforcing, you know, what I stand on sometimes because it does get discouraging and sometimes it is easier for some people to just, you know, do whatever they need to do to make as many people as they can laugh because they want the money and they want to they want to get out of their situation.

Speaker 3: And, you know, for me, it’s like I’m not willing to negotiate myself in that way and compromise myself in that way. So I you know, I have to be responsible so that I know that I can live, so I can if I can turn down a job where I don’t want to be in the presence of these people and I want to do this, you know, And it’s a lot of talking to myself honestly, like a lot of metaphysical work and a lot of this spiritual work, because it’s very hard on the soul. This is you only you, you know, you’re the one that takes all the hits. You’re the one that people criticize. They either laugh or they don’t. I have to consult with myself quite often so that I can really just take care of myself, you know?

Ida: Yeah. I mean, even in the world of creativity, standup in and of itself is a very special laying in that, you know, anybody who’s making their stuff is putting it out there. But it is different to put out a painting and an entity, a thing that was created versus just putting yourself up there and sharing the things that you want to share. And it’s just all you. It’s just all you. You talk so much about the real things in your life. I mean, do you have a particular process in terms of, you know, stand up art? You know, do you sometimes find yourself going, I’m not ready to talk about that yet, even though I want to? I mean, what’s how do you balance that?

Speaker 3: So for me, it was the kidnap story that I did, and they ready was something that I had never talked about. And, you know, it was very traumatic for me. I got kidnapped twice. I was hot in those streets. Both times by family members all the time. My whole life I was waiting on a white lady to come steal me. Right? A white lady with a house, a pool, some cherry pie.

Speaker 4: And a daddy in the house. And I just kept getting snatched up by.

Speaker 3: Motherfuckers with my last name off my flock. The first time it was my mom, my mom kidnapped me from my father. I was living in the Dominican Republic with my dad, and my mom stole me. She brought me to America like basic parental kidnap shit. You know what I mean? She stole me. She was like, That motherfucker cheated on me. He will never see you again. You hear me? And that’s how it went down.

Speaker 4: That bitch was serious.

Speaker 3: And, you know, when you put it out into the world as a joke. And the trauma stays with you. But it goes the humor goes with other people like, you know, being kidnapped. People will say things like, oh, you got kidnapped by family members. Like, it’s not the same. And they all realize that my mother taking me from my father is created a very big void in my life because I didn’t I didn’t see my father until this documentary that I did. Also, I she she changed my name. So I was technically illegitimate, according to whatever Game of Thrones. And I had a lot of issues because of that, you know, not knowing part of me, you know, it took a long time for me to talk about it. And when I did, I put it out into the world and I never talked about it again. And it really impacted a lot of people who have been taken by one parent or the other. It was very, very common.

Speaker 3: And so, you know, when I think about that kind of stuff, I’ve been talking a lot about my personal life or what seems to be my personal life, because I really don’t talk about my personal life. I talk about what I’m ready to talk about because people will always tell me, people don’t know who you are. So you got to do the introductory comedy. You can’t just jump into observational comedy because people don’t know who you are. That’s not a privilege that you have. And now I’m you know, now I’m talking about whatever I want to talk about. But at that at that point in my career, I had to get that out because it was cathartic.

Ida: There’s already some chatter in the media. I’m definitely seeing it in some places of it feeling like there is already less space for some black and brown voices. I mean, yeah, and I’m just wondering how much that you are seeing that and kind of being aware of that as well as somebody who did come into this as an adult. Because I feel like if you are older, you do realize that there’s always these kind of like cycles and like swings and things like that. So, you know, knowing that, you’re like, okay, you had the HBO special, you’ve had a good year, you’ve been able to, you know, make some movements on some things, like, is that something that you find yourself paying attention to or concerned about in terms of continuing to get not just your voice out there, but those other people that you do want to bring up with you?

Speaker 3: I think that this push when George Floyd and the Black Lives Matter and OscarsSoWhite. Happens. There was a wave of people who actually really wanted to make a difference, and they started to consciously, you know, make decisions to make a difference. I’m at one place. I’m I’m developing a TV show. They’re not going to they’re not going to air more than one Latino TV show. So they pick the one they think is going to go the most. And then they do and then nothing happens.

Speaker 3: First and foremost, it’s very important for us to exist in media because media informs the way we feel about ourselves and the way other people feel about us, especially people who never come in contact with us. The only information and education that they have sometimes is through the media. And if the media is constantly telling people that we are violent, we are dangerous, we’re lazy, we’re trying to steal what’s theirs, and people who never had encountered us come in contact with us and are immediately defensive and ready to hurt us because they don’t know us any other way. Also, if you’re a little kid and every time you see a version of yourself or a reflection of yourself in the media, it is a negative one. It’s going to impact how you feel about ourself. And people who look like us think we’re ugly because we never get to see ourselves in those places. So that’s that’s important. And it is important and it is very important because it is probably one of the most impactful ways that people are informed.

Speaker 3: So that being said, there’s this there was this group of people that you can tell we’re really making a big effort to make a difference and make a change. And there are some people who are there are some people who are oblivious. I don’t believe that everyone who works in any industry is consciously malicious. I think some people just have a blind spot. They don’t know it’s not their world.

Speaker 3: And now here we are again with this facade that we were fed about diversity and inclusion. You got all these departments going up, you gay people getting people hired to make sure that they come in with sensitivity. And then you turn on the television and you look at who is running every TV show and the majority of them are white men. So really, I never allowed myself to be deluded into believing that it was going to change that quickly because it doesn’t. And how was I going to show up and be part of the solution? And it can be very disheartening because you will watch TV shows with white people get made and canceled all the time, and they continue to have opportunities. But you see, because they’ll make a TV show and then it takes I don’t know how many more years for her to get another TV show. And now she’s a secondary cast member on somebody else’s TV show. Exactly.

Ida: We’re talking about Cristela Alonzo, Very, very funny comedian.

Speaker 3: Yeah. So you think about that and she’s like the first woman to the first Latina to write produce star in her own TV show. And I was in the 2000s, you know, and the thinking of the people who are making the decisions, sometimes it’s a very exclusive mentality. And you you look at this and you’re like. Oh, really? Nothing really did it? Nothing really changed. The lineups changed for a little bit, but now they’re back to, you know, four white guys, one queer person and a person of color that represents everybody. How do you deal with that? To me, it’s like I have to ignore it. I don’t read the trades. I don’t have a Twitter account. I’m barely on social media. You know, my Instagram account, I have someone who helps me with it. I just I’ve had to disconnect from the machine because constantly feeling discouraged will stunt the art. And I just got to keep creating.

Speaker 1: That’s.

Ida: Always a pleasure to get to have a conversation with you again. Please. Go check out her specials on HBO, Max and on Netflix. The very funny and incredibly smart Aida Rodriguez.

Speaker 3: Thank you for having me.

Ida: That is our show this week. The Waves is produced by Sheena Roth Daisy Rosario. That’s me is senior supervising producer of Audio, and Alicia Montgomery is the vice president of audio. We would love to hear from you. Please email us at the Waves at Slate.com. The waves will be back next week. Different hosts, different topic, same time and place. Thank you so much for being a Slate Plus member. Since you remember, you got this bonus segment. I’m back with Aida Rodriguez. So four is this feminist, which is a way of recurring segments. I wanted to talk to you about this in particular, but the idea of pulling your punches and just kind of not standing up for yourself in a loud way. Is it feminist to be someone who’s always willing to kind of pull their punches and quiet their feelings for the good of the room?

Speaker 3: I don’t know if it’s feminist or not. I know it’s not healthy for feminism. I think that’s too heavy a load to to put on people who are fighting for the just treatment of women, you know, and in all aspects of life. But I think that is unhealthy for feminism. People who tend to lean more liberal, progressive, more to the left are there’s an elite thinking there. A lot of times that’s very hurtful to us because we need all hands on deck. Everybody can be diplomatic. And I know people are going to disagree with me, especially people who come from elite places where they’ve never really had to fight in life.

Speaker 3: But there is a we need all hands on deck because the people who are don’t subscribe to our thinking are willing to do any and everything to shut us down, to shut us up and to take what’s ours are our freakin human basic rights. Sometimes you got to fight your battles, sometimes you got to be strategic, sometimes you got to figure out what’s the most effective way to operate in whatever you’re operating in. But I will not tell us that it is feminist to learn to pull punches because they don’t stop punching us.

Ida: That’s a good point. That is, they.

Speaker 3: Don’t stop watching us. And what are we doing? Blocking. But sometimes you got to punch back to get them off of you. And it’s okay to fight for what’s right. It’s okay to fight for yourself. And the idea that, A, you’re more you’re a more advanced human being because you allow somebody to clobber you is ridiculous. Ridiculous. I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t know how to fight for myself. I would be gone.

Ida: I mean, and that’s why I wanted to kind of posit the question that way is because I have seen you talk about those things in your standup specials. And again, like go check out Fighting Words on HBO. Max, go check out her episode of They Ready on Netflix. But having watched these specials. You know, so much of what you have mentioned is the strength of the women in your family who really did have to like, fight the fight. And that is something that I really saw in my family as well. And then in my adulthood, you know, spending time in, say, the professional spaces that I do, not just this one, but many of them over the years or some of the academic spaces I spent time in. Yeah, it very much felt like the message I was getting was people telling me to absolutely not do any of the things that had led to my survival and ability to even be in the space in the first place. And that can be a very confusing message.

Speaker 3: Well, I mean, a lot of times it’s privilege talking. It’s if you’ve never had to fight for anything because other people are doing the fighting for you, it’s, you know, the status, the standard, the status quo is always in your favor. And you’ve never had to really fight for certain things. And then you see this uprising of people saying, oh, now they’re trying to take this from me. I’m used to them taking it from you. Of course, they’re going to tell you don’t fight. But how ridiculous is that? What person has gone to battle? Not willing to fight and win? The people who are there that are there to attack you, dehumanize you, berate you, take from you have not taken one ounce of consideration of the diplomacy that you are basking in, and that is not going to win the battle.

Speaker 3: Some people need a taste of their own medicine. And this idea that you’re an elevated person and elevated thinking while you’re living in the midst of a barbaric world is just not conducive to your survival. And that that’s just basics, you know, like, I don’t I haven’t had a fight in years, you know, a physical fight. I don’t go around. I’m not going to beat a woman up at a at a gas station because she calls me out of my name or whatever. But if you put your hands on me and you’re there to assault me and attack me, I got to fight back. Because if not, I might not survive. So am I going to go down in the name of being she was an elevated thinking or she was she was set up, you know, she was so, you know, poised. And now my kids don’t have a mother.

Ida: Yeah. That was, I think, one of the things that was kind of making me laugh some about when the Queen of England died was that it was just constant, like she was so reserved, Like it just all the compliments were like things that just kind of pointed to how little we actually knew of her. Like, I realized I was like, I don’t think I’ve ever even heard her voice. And like, all of the compliments are just about taking up as little space as possible. Yeah. Which is completely opposite to what I needed to do to be able to even have a career and an adulthood that looks anything like what? You know, even 5% of what I dreamed.

Speaker 3: Of course. But you’re talking about a woman who was able to, you know, live a lavish life based on the backs and the suffering and struggling of other people, which you can’t say because you’re being disrespectful, which is based on facts and truth. And and and, you know, it’s even like how many white people did suffered for her to have that life. All those people that worship her and struggling watching her from the television at home who don’t have food in their house thinking, oh, she’s regal because that’s aspirational for them and that’s what they want to be, because that’s the you know, that’s the lie that they feed us. And even in her own situation, I imagine her she probably had her own struggle as a woman that was like, shut the fuck up, wear your crown, go out there a way that people, you know, enjoy this art that we stole from the that the you know, the people from Africa and just go, just do your thing.

Speaker 3: And I just think it’s interesting that you know it we celebrate that because it’s it’s also part of the play, right. It’s like if you put that messaging out there, it’s easier to, you know, to hurt you and harm you and do things to you. If you are being told that you are of a higher grade because you don’t fight back, get out. Right. With that.

Ida: Right? Absolutely.

Ida: I was curious like, do you I know touring can be such a big part of life for comedians is like is touring something that you do a lot? And if so, how has that been the last couple of years? And also, just with you being a mother, I mean, I know your kids are grown now, but still, like how has kind of fitting touring into your life as a comedian worked?

Speaker 3: So I just started touring until my daughter got a little bit older because I didn’t want to I didn’t want to leave her during her teenage years because I did work a lot during her young years. And so that was something I wasn’t willing to do. I started touring when she got older, she was closer to a senior, get ready to go to college. And you know, I do tour, toured a lot. I toured for seven years straight with no break and I’ve taken a break now. This is this since October to January, which doesn’t really feel like a long time for me. It is because I. Been always on the road. But, you know, I’m touring next year. I start touring in January. My tour kicks off. And it’s not fun to be on the road sometimes, you know, we have to worry about people bringing danger to the clubs. If they’re bringing danger to everything else, we have to worry about our safety as women.

Speaker 3: You know, I think about my my fellow like queer comics who, you know, people like to beat up on because they’re queer. And, you know, toxic masculinity comes for women. It comes for queer people, comes for people of color. So they think about I always think about all of us. And I it’s been harder to tour, you know, with the split, the country split being polarized so much people. Audiences either hate your love you, and if you’re not speaking what they want you to speak, then they want to rebel and they want to get you canceled. So it’s been it’s been you know, it’s been challenging to navigate. And I still have to do it because it’s how I eat.

Ida: I mean, I think people who don’t if you live in probably like major cities like New York or L.A., like you, I don’t think a lot of people actually realize how much comedians are touring and like how a lot of a lot of the like working comedians, like those superstar names are a handful of people. But there’s a lot of working comedians fully making a living, and that is their full time job. But they are on the road a ton.

Speaker 3: They’re keeping the comedy clubs open.

Ida: Yeah, that’s a big part of what being a comedian is. And yet also, you know, unsurprisingly, it’s kind of like the part that we forget or see the least. I mean, I you know, I see it all the time, just people seeing somebody’s name headline and they’re like that person. I’m like, Yeah, they probably sell out clubs all over the country. But just because they’re not on the show that you watch, like you don’t realize that they actually have a big following.

Speaker 3: Yeah, no, no, they, they kept the comedy clubs open. They keep the comedy clubs open when there’s a pandemic or not, which they don’t get enough credit for. Every weekend that you go to a comedy club, there is a comedian. They’re servicing their the club for the weekend, providing you with the entertainment that you have after a long week of work and you don’t hear their names enough and they show up every week when Chris Rock and Dave Chappelle and Russell Peters and I are not there, you know, and they should be respected and and honored. And, you know, they they’re there every week.

Speaker 3: And so, yeah, there’s a big group of those people. I you know, I’m I’m a hybrid, I would say, because I do tour a lot. I do a lot, you know, as much as they’ll have me because a lot of clubs won’t book me, I’m still not enough for a big enough name for certain clubs, which is really hard for me. Like, you know, even at home, it’s hard for me to get booked for a weekend and stuff like that, you know? And I do TV work and I do other stuff. So, you know, I have a business within my entertainment business that is not solely dependent on standup comedy, but touring is touring is a lot right now. You know, you have to be you have to say exactly what people want you to say to some people. And that’s not what comedy is.

Ida: I’ve just so enjoyed talking to you. Aida Rodriguez Thank you again so much for joining me on The Waves today.

Speaker 3: Thank you for having me.