June 12, 2023 • 52 mins
Gina Yashere is not an overnight name; her resume reigns long in the comedy world. However after humble beginnings, she attempted to make her mother proud by pursuing a career in Engineering, but the comedy bug bit her and there was no turning back. Once Yashere established her name in England, she knew America was next. She learned very quickly the difference between the LA vs NYC comedy circuit. She self-produced and sold her first two American specials, now fast forward she is the Executive Producer for Bob Hearts Abishola on CBS, and she's creating jobs and enjoying the adventure.
Get Tickets Here: The Woman King of Comedy Tour
Read: Cack-Handed: A Memoir
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Then I got to La and I go to the
Imperor and I'm doing a set and they give me
a check for eight dollars and I'm.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
Like, oh, no, a check.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
A check eight dollars seventy five cents. And I was like,
what the hell is this?
Speaker 3 (00:20):
I could not imagine someone giving me a check as
an adult for eight dollars and seventy five cents. But wait,
Gina Yashara's story is so inspiring, so that little eight
dollars and seventy five cent check makes perfect sense. It
was good for her, it motivated her. We got to
pay some bills. You can fast forward if you like,
but the next edition of Naked continues after the break.
Speaker 4 (00:51):
It's the greatest sponson entertainment can make you put carry
Champion and carry Chappy is to be a champion.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
A champion they carry Chappi and Nigger Chion. The care
with Shepion.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
They care with.
Speaker 2 (01:03):
The same inking naked wording on. Hey, everybody, thank you
for listening to another edition of Naked.
Speaker 3 (01:11):
I really like our next guest because I think she
is the definition of hustle, hustle personified. It's rare that
I think I am out hustled, but she made me
feel lazy.
Speaker 2 (01:21):
I need to do something with my life.
Speaker 4 (01:23):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (01:23):
Gina Yashera was born in the UK. She's Nigerian. She's
a comedian. She's also an actress. She's also a writer.
She's also currently a showrunner on the hit show that
she stars in her co stars in. It's on CBS.
It's called Bob Hart's Abby Shola. So go out and
support your girl. And the reason why you would want
(01:44):
to go support her is because she's really not an
overnight success. Her story is one of if you're not
going to give it to me, I will go take it.
This story should inspire you no matter what your discipline is,
no matter what you do for a living. I appreciate
Gina for telling her story and of course she's clearly hilarious.
Speaker 2 (02:03):
To back, relax and enjoy.
Speaker 4 (02:06):
Champion and carey chayann care chep.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
I just fresh from London yesterday, landed yesterday. Oh really? Okay?
Speaker 3 (02:17):
So I want you to talk to me about growing
up in London and living in London. What was What
is that like for a Nigerian born woman?
Speaker 2 (02:29):
Well, I was born in London. You're born in London?
Speaker 1 (02:31):
Okay, yeah, my parents were born in Nigeria, but I
was actually born and raised in London. My first few
years were in an area of London called Bethnal Green,
which is East London. I'm very much of Cockney by birth,
but at the time of my birth in the seventies, England,
especially East London, was going through a little bit of
(02:51):
a change. There were a lot of immigrants from Africa,
from the Caribbean, from India and Pakistan coming into East
London because it was a lot of council which is
kind of the projects and kind of slum buildings, so
that's where immigrants could get property. So the white working
class Brits were not happy about all these immigrants coming
(03:13):
into East London.
Speaker 2 (03:15):
So there was a lot of.
Speaker 1 (03:17):
Racist abuse on the streets, lots of skinheads, lots of graffiti.
So that was kind of what I was brought up
in the first for ten years of my life. You know,
I'd go out and my mum would be like, be
careful of.
Speaker 2 (03:32):
The bad boys.
Speaker 1 (03:33):
Used to call them the bad boys, and these were
skinn edds that'd be waiting in the stairwell of the
apartment building when you're going upstairs and call your names
and spit on you, that kind of thing. So that's
what the first eight to ten years of living in
London was like. Then we moved to North London, which
was a little bit more affluent and so racism wasn't
(03:54):
quite as in your face there because it was kind
of a more wealthier neighborhood. And then we, you know,
with my mom and my stepdad, bought a house so
that we left the projects and went into a house
and so it wasn't so bad.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
But I, you know, I was a kid. I didn't
know any different. I was like, this is just how
it is.
Speaker 1 (04:13):
You just stay away from the bad white people.
Speaker 2 (04:17):
And dunting the good white people.
Speaker 3 (04:19):
Yeah, yeah, were they were the good white people, easily
identifiable as opposed to the bad white people.
Speaker 2 (04:24):
Well, when I was at school, you know, I had
a mixture of friends at school.
Speaker 1 (04:27):
You know, I was going to school at age five,
six seven, and you know I had black friends, white friends,
Indian friends.
Speaker 2 (04:33):
At school. We were just kids.
Speaker 1 (04:34):
We at that age, we didn't really take on our parents'
prejudices until sort of later. So age four or five,
we didn't know we needed but we were just kids
running around just heay so I didn't, you know, I
didn't recognize the racism per se. I just thought those
are bad people who were spitting on me in the street,
and these are my friends at school.
Speaker 2 (04:56):
Okay.
Speaker 3 (04:56):
So then what I find interesting is that when I
was reading your bio, it said that you did comedy
for twenty years in the UK.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
Is that accurate?
Speaker 1 (05:08):
I've been I started comedy in nineteen ninety five, so
by the time I moved out to America in two
thousand and seven, I've been doing it about twelve years.
Speaker 3 (05:17):
So tell me the start of comedic life for you
in the UK, because I could imagine your parents weren't
necessarily excited about that career choice for you.
Speaker 2 (05:29):
I'm other was happy at all.
Speaker 1 (05:31):
Now she wanted to be a doctor or an attorney. Perhaps, yeah,
I originally she worked me to be a doctor. But
eighteen doing a level biology, which is our advanced level biology,
we had to cut open a rat. Yeah, and that's
when I discovered that I, oh no, I could not
(05:52):
stand the sight of the blood. It was disgusting to me.
So I switched to engineering and I studied. I did
my degree in electrical let engineering and I actually worked
as an engineer. My last job was working for Otis,
the biggest elevator company in the world. I was building
and repairing elevators for a living. So that was my
(06:14):
last job. I was their first woman engineer in their
one hundred year history in the UK. Wow, which sounds good,
but it was a horrific experience because first woman and
a black woman of that. And I'm working on construction site.
So I'm walking into work and somebody's hung a banana
(06:35):
skin above my overalls, or I put on my boiler
suit and there are pictures of monkeys stuffed into the pockets.
Speaker 2 (06:43):
Things like that. I put up with.
Speaker 1 (06:44):
I put up with a lot of abuse at that job,
but I stuck it out for four years because I
refused to be driven out and I wanted to stay
there and prove that I can do the job as
well as any of these men.
Speaker 2 (06:56):
Which I did. But I ended up leaving, and that's
how I ended up in comedy. I ended up leaving.
Speaker 1 (07:03):
The building industry went through a bit of a slump
in the mid nineties, and they were making people redundant,
they were laying people off. They were never going to
lay me off because I was their token black girl
that they put on all their posters and magazines and stuff.
They were never going to lay me off, but I
was like, I want to leave. So I marched into
my manager's office and I was like, you need to
(07:25):
let me go. You need to pay me off and
let me go because I don't want to be here anymore.
And they were like, well, we have no intention of
doing that. And I was like, well, unless you want
me to go public with the racism and misogyny I suffered.
Speaker 2 (07:37):
On this job, you need to let me go. And
they went, you know what, We're going to let you go. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (07:45):
And that was in the summertime, so I was like,
I'm going to enjoy the summer off. So I was
having a good time over the summer. And people had
always told me I was funny. People always told me
that I should be an actor as a kid.
Speaker 3 (07:56):
You know.
Speaker 1 (07:57):
Teachers were always saying to my mom, you know your daughter, Gina,
she's very lively, she's fun. You know, maybe she should
go in, you know, into acting or something. And my
mom would always say, well, she can act like a
doctor when she becomes until she becomes a doctor, that
she was not entertaining the prospect to me going into
(08:19):
the arts. So after I left my job as an engineer,
let me try this thing, you know, let me just
do some fun things that I've always been kind of
interested in, but never you know, never tried.
Speaker 2 (08:33):
And so, you know, I started going to workshops and.
Speaker 1 (08:39):
I joined the Nation of Islam for about twelve minutes,
and then I started getting into community works doing stuff
within my community. And they were doing a fundraiser one
day and they were like, okay, singers and dancers, and
so me and my two friends were always messing around
doing our parents' accents.
Speaker 2 (08:58):
And I wrote what I thought was a play for
us to perform. What kind of play was it?
Speaker 3 (09:05):
Then?
Speaker 2 (09:05):
You thought you guys were going to perform.
Speaker 1 (09:07):
It was a play about the cultural differences between us,
the young, the first generation, the British born Nigerians and
our parents who come straight from Nigeria. And I wrote
this play, but it turned out was a play. It
was a comedy sketch. People laughed their asses off through
the entire thing, and I was like.
Speaker 2 (09:29):
And everyone was like, huh, I love it. I love it. Okay,
I love it. Give me more. And I was like, oh,
this is comedy.
Speaker 1 (09:37):
So then we took that play stroke comedy sketch, and
we kept performing it at various talent competitions around London,
and we kept kept winning these competitions with this one sketch.
And then one day two of my friends who were
in this group with me didn't turn up for a
competition we were in and we were in the semi
(09:59):
five and they didn't turn up and I was there
on my own and they were like, you've got to
go up on stage. You're doue up on stage and
my two friends weren't there, so I kind of just
went up on stage and talks for like ten minutes
and just told silly stories and the audience loved it,
and I got us through to the final with this
(10:20):
monologue that I did, and then people were coming up
to me afterwards going you're a stand up comic, that's
what you are, and I was like, what is this
stand up comedy? And then I started researching into that
and started doing open mics and I was like, I'm
going to do this for a bit, for fun, because
this is a good time. And people started going, Oh,
(10:40):
I'll give you ten bucks, I'll give you fifty bucks
if you come and do my show, and I'm like,
fifty bucks for five minutes work.
Speaker 2 (10:46):
This is fantastic. This is more than I'm going to
earn as an engineer.
Speaker 1 (10:50):
And I was like, I'm gonna do this for six
months and then come winter, I'm going to go back
and get a proper job and get another job as
an engineer. And that just never happened. I ended it
up just continuing and it's just never. I never ended
up going back to work.
Speaker 3 (11:05):
I was going to ask you too, I was like,
if you went from being an engineer to stand up comedean,
how did you survive? But you're saying, are you saying
you were making more money initially starting out than you
were as an engineer?
Speaker 2 (11:16):
Not more money initially, But I was making money, so
it was enough.
Speaker 1 (11:24):
You know. I had a very cheap apartment at the
times of the revenue cheek. I owned my car outright,
it was a paid off car, bought it cash, so
I didn't need a lot of expenses. So I was
I was like, well, as long as I'm making enough
to pay this two hundred dollars a month rent mm
hm and enough to buy groceries m hmm, that's all
(11:45):
I need. And so from the beginning of my comedy career,
I was making enough money to pay my two hundred
dollars rent and to put food and put gas in
the car. So I was like, well, I can survive
off this more income. Let me see how much further
this comedy will take me. And so I started driving
(12:06):
all over the country doing shows for nothing, just to
build my experience and just to try and get and
that's what I did, and eventually within six months I
landed on a talent show on television.
Speaker 2 (12:22):
What was the name of the show.
Speaker 1 (12:23):
It was called The Big Big Talent Show. And thinking wise,
the comedians went, triloquis, magicians, singers, it was everybody, and
I was the only stand up that got through to
the final and this is within six months of starting.
So I was like, oh, I'm going to be a star.
(12:44):
I've got on television within six months of starting this.
I'm going to be huge. Forget engineering. I'm going to
concentrate all my efforts on this comedy thing because I'm
going to be a huge stand up star.
Speaker 2 (12:55):
That's what I thought. Yeah, it didn't happen that way.
Speaker 3 (12:58):
Yeah yeah, Well listen, I think that it started off
good for you though, because every this is a beautiful story.
I hear stories. I interview a lot of comedians and
it's never I did it once and I was like, oh,
I'm perfect, very rarely not perfect, but very rarely do
I hear the story of I gave it a go.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
People were like, this is what.
Speaker 3 (13:17):
You should be doing, Like you found where you belong.
I looked at how it's such a tough ask. What
is the difference between being a stand up comedian in
the UK versus when you come to the States and
you want to make it. Tell me the significant differences,
or the comedy clubs all the same. Do you have
to grease the wheels and be friends with certain people
(13:38):
to get time on stage?
Speaker 2 (13:39):
Like tell me the right of passage if you will well.
In England.
Speaker 1 (13:46):
At the time that I was starting out, there were
a lot of comedy clubs and they all paid good money.
So the difference is if you became good and you
got those clubs, you'd get regular work and it didn't
matter whether you were famous or not. Because the audiences
went to the comedy clubs based on the comedy club's reputation.
(14:08):
They didn't know who was going to be on It's
similar to how the comedy scene is in New York
with the comedy sellers and the Gothams. For the most part,
the comedy seller people just go there because they know
it's the comedy seller and they know that they're going
to get a great night of comedy. They don't necessarily
know who's going to be on. And that's how the
comedy scene was in England. You went, they booked you.
(14:31):
Everybody got the same money, whether you were on the
beginning the show or the end of the show. Everybody
got whatever it was two hundred bucks a set, and
the MC got a little bit more because he had
to be or he or she had to be there
all night. Whereas in London I could do a set here,
finish my set and then jump in the car or
jump on my motorbike, go to another comedy club, do
(14:51):
another set. So I could make four six hundred dollars
a night just running a down doing shows. So that
was the joy of doing. And then when doing the
comedy clubs, when you got to a state in your
estate in your career where people started to come to
see you, when you were starting to get on television
and starting to get known, then you transcended the comedy
(15:12):
clubs into small theaters. So I did comedy clubs for
about seven eight years, and I started to build a
good audience, and I started to get little bits of
stuff on television, so people started to know me and go, oh, well,
that girl off the TV. So then I transcended the
comedy clubs and started booking my own theaters. Because I'd
go to comedy club and i'd as soon as I
walk on stage, they'd go Genie Asha, and I'd hear
(15:34):
the cheers and I'd go, oh, those people are cheering
really loudly, which means they know who I am. So
if I'm if I was to go and book my
own theater, then rather than just being paid two hundred
bucks for a set here, if I book a small
theater for a hundred people and all those people are
paying ten bucks each to come and see me, then
(15:54):
I'm going to make a lot more money. So that's
what I started doing, and I started going into small theaters,
building my own thing and doing my own shows. Why
it would just be me doing rather than doing a
twenty minute set at comedy club, it'd be me on
my own doing an hour and then I'd get all
the money. So that's what happens. That's the kind of
write passage in England. You start for the open mic
(16:15):
and you start getting paid at the comedy clubs, and
most a lot of comics, the majority of the comics
stay at that comedy club level because not everybody gets
on TV, not everybody gets famous. But if you stay
at that comedy club level, you can still make sixty
to one hundred thousand a year just doing comedy clubs.
But if you're even if nobody knows who you are,
(16:36):
could run around the country because there were comedy clubs
all over the country. You could run around all the
country doing all the comedy clubs and making anywhere between
sixty one hundred year and maybe more if you did
corporate shows where you a company will go, we need
a comedian for our yearly Christmas party, and you'll get
five or ten thousand or whatever. So as a no
name comedian in England, you could I was making a
(16:58):
good living before I even got to the level where
I was doing theaters wow wow, where Whereas that is
pretty much impossible in America, absolutely, Because in America, when
I came and I didn't know that when I came here.
So when I came to America, I was like, I'm
a comedian. I'm a well known comedian in England. I'm
making a good living here. Once I get to America,
(17:20):
I'll just go go to the comedy clubs. They'll see
how funny I am. I'll start getting booked and I
can at least make sixty grand a year doing comedy
clubs in America until I get on TV and get sick,
come or get in an audio or something. That's what
I thought. Then I got to La and I go
to the Improv and I'm doing a set and they
(17:42):
give me a check for eight dollars and I'm like,
oh no, I check out a check eight dollars. I
remember my first check from the improv eight dollars seventy
five cents, and I was like, what the hell is this?
So basically clean? To headline a comedy club in America,
(18:04):
it's a different beast. You have to be famous. So
for a comedy club to book you as a headliner
and pay you a decent fee, it is the onus
is on you to bring the audience. When an audience
comes to comedy club to see a headliner. They're coming
because they've seen him on a sitcom or seen her
on this show or see and so you get paid
(18:24):
according to that. But if you're not a big name comedian,
they don't care how funny you are. You're not putting
bums on seats. So when I got to America, I'm like,
I'm really funny. I'm selling out theaters all over the
country in the UK and I'm a TV style in
the UK. Can you pay me to do comedy? And
they're like, we don't know who the hell you are,
so nobody's paying to come and see you. You can
(18:47):
open for this other comedian who's on a sitcom and
they'll get whatever, twenty thousand dollars for the weekend, but
you're going to get eight dollars seventy five.
Speaker 2 (18:57):
That's insane. And that's what was happening in LA.
Speaker 1 (19:01):
And it's very specific to LA because in LA, the
comedy clubs, their attitude is very much listen, you're in LA.
Speaker 2 (19:09):
You could be seen by Steven Spielberg.
Speaker 1 (19:13):
We're doing you a favor by letting you performer our
comedy club for five cents. Yeahitude, And I'm like, that
doesn't make sense. Because the bar staff are being paid,
the security are being paid, the people's you know, everybody
else in the comedy club ecosystem is being paid except
(19:36):
for the reason why the audience is there. That didn't
make sense to me, and I couldn't understand why LA
comedians were putting up with that.
Speaker 2 (19:45):
You know, I was like, why haven't you guys got
a union? This doesn't even make sense to me.
Speaker 1 (19:49):
That's just how the system was set up in LA
is everybody wants to be seen, everyone wants everybody wants
to be seen, and that they'll do these sets of
peanuts and hoping to get audition out of it, or
hoping there's a casting director sitting in the crowd and
it will lead to other things. But I'm like, when
I came here, I was like, I'm a comedian. I
don't care about being an actor. I'm a comedian. Like
(20:14):
there are in LA there's a lot of actors pretending
to be comedians, so they they ah, I stand up
as a way to get as a calling card to
get on TV. Then once they get on TV, they
never do stand up again. Whereas I am a comedian
first and foremost. If I could make half a million
(20:35):
or a million a year just doing stand up. I
would never step foot in an auditional room, do you
know what I mean?
Speaker 2 (20:42):
Yeah, that was me.
Speaker 1 (20:43):
So when I came here, I was like, I want
to do stand up. I don't care about whether there's
a casting agent sitting in the crowd. I want to
make a living doing what I do, which is stand up.
And I struggled for seven years in LA earning peanuts,
and I'd have to keep going. So every month I
have to go back to England. I'd call my agent
in England and I'd go time for bankfrade and I'd
(21:06):
fly back to England through a bunch of shows, make
my money, and then bring that money back to LA
and live off that money because I was making no
money in La.
Speaker 3 (21:15):
Hey, everybody, we gotta pay some bills and we will
be right back with Gina Yahara.
Speaker 4 (21:20):
Every champion and carry champions. To be a champion, a
champion and carry champion and carry chat be out a
champion and carry chapion and carry chaffray is the sports
and entertainment and naked work.
Speaker 3 (21:38):
Kerry.
Speaker 4 (21:38):
Champion and carry champion is to be a champion, a
champion and carry champion nigger shot a champion and carry
champion and carry chap.
Speaker 2 (21:47):
Entertainment and naked Word.
Speaker 3 (21:49):
Welcome back to this edition of Naked Actress, Comedian, all
around Badass.
Speaker 2 (21:54):
Gina Yashara is still here with us.
Speaker 3 (21:57):
You said it's time for a bank raid, you needed
to go and get your cash, come back here, And well,
why did you want to just stay there in the UK?
Why did you want to quote unquote do it here
in the States.
Speaker 1 (22:10):
Because I'd hit a glass ceiling as a black comedian
in England, I'd hit a glass ceiling and he made
I got to a certain level of fame and fourteen
and I was coming up with white comedians who were
very similar to me talent, and they were where I
was selling theaters based on my own hard work. You know,
(22:31):
I could sell out a two thousand seat a theater.
Perhaps my white peers were able to do seventeen thousand
sea stadiums because they were given a lot more opportunities
to be on TV. I'd always be the guest on
someone else's TV, but I could never get on someone
else's TV show.
Speaker 2 (22:50):
But I could never get my own TV show as
a black woman.
Speaker 1 (22:53):
Whereas my white peers who I came up with were
all getting their own TV shows, which then led to
them being a exposed to a much larger audience, which
meant they can go and do these massive tours. And
I was never going to get to that because the
TV industry in England is run by old white men
who only give TV shows to other white men. So
(23:14):
I'd hit a glass ceiling. And for me, as a
child living in England, I'd always known from the age
of four, I knew that England was not where I
was supposed to be. I was supposed to be in America.
From childhood, I thought American kids had a better life.
You know, every TV show I saw was American kids
running each to hang out with their friends on the
beach and riding bikes around town solving crimes.
Speaker 2 (23:37):
So I always.
Speaker 1 (23:40):
That the kids in America had a much better life.
So from childhood, I wanted to be in America. Even
when I worked as an engineer, I worked for Otis,
which was an American company, because my plan was to
transfer and becoming an engineer in America. Always my plan
(24:00):
had always been to come to America from the age
of four. So then when I started doing comedy, I
was like, well, America is the home of comedy, so
one day I'm going to go to America and do comedy.
So even when I started out, even when I was
doing really well in England, i'd fly out to America
every year and just go to comedy clubs and just
go up and do my stuff, just to see if
(24:21):
my stuff traveled.
Speaker 2 (24:22):
So I knew I could perform in America long before
I moved.
Speaker 1 (24:27):
Here, because I was out here coming out on vacations
again in New York, going to Miami and just going
up at comedy clubs and going I'm a comedian from England.
Let me go up and do five minutes. You don't
even have to pay me, And I'd just go up
and do five minutes. So I always knew, and I
knew that I and when I hit that glass ceiling
in England, that was even more you know, of an
(24:48):
incentive for me to get the hell out, Yeah, to
do what you are So you it's interesting you knew.
I feel like Hollywood is running by white man, but you, yeah.
Speaker 3 (24:57):
You there is, but there is more of an app
opportunity for you to thrive then there is one in
the UK.
Speaker 2 (25:05):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (25:06):
I always say that I hit the glass ceiling in
the UK and I was probably making at that point
one hundred and fifty grand a year.
Speaker 2 (25:13):
Uh huh.
Speaker 1 (25:13):
But when you hit the glass heel, the glass ceiling
for black performers in America is much higher than the
one in the un Yeah.
Speaker 2 (25:21):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, you want to play hit the.
Speaker 1 (25:25):
Glass ceiling in America, I can hit the glass ceiling
as a millionaire.
Speaker 3 (25:29):
Uh huh.
Speaker 2 (25:30):
You know you're right, You're right, you know you're right.
Speaker 1 (25:31):
You're I was like, I'd rather go to America and
hit that glass ceiling because I'll be a millionaire when
I hit it, and I can cry in my money.
Speaker 2 (25:39):
Yeah it's so awful air, but I've got my money.
Speaker 3 (25:45):
So then you you come here, you get on the
circuit eight seventy five, something I'll never ever forget as
a robbery. And but it is.
Speaker 2 (25:54):
I do I know the scene. I'm very familiar with
how people are like, this is this societ. You're going
to make it. You start working.
Speaker 3 (26:01):
How long does it take you in terms of years,
five years, six years, where you find it to a
point where you are moving comfortably and not making eight
to seventy five a show.
Speaker 2 (26:14):
After I moved to New York.
Speaker 1 (26:16):
So I was in LA for seven years, and then
in those seven years, every year I'd fly to New
York and just ingratiate myself with all the comedy clubs
in New York. So I got into the Seller, I
got into the Gotham Comedy Club, and I just started
getting and that I do like two or three weeks
in New York. And the comedy clubs in New York
(26:39):
paid decently, not as much as they paid in England,
but you could do a bunch of sets around New York.
Get one hundred and twenty dollars here, one hundred here,
eighty dollars here, so over a weekend you could make
one thousand to twelve hundred to fifteen hundred dollars over
a weekend to doing sets all over New York, just
(26:59):
running around New York doing different comedy clubs, because they
paid anywhere between fifty and one hundred and thirty dollars
for a set. Some clubs even paid two hundred dollars
a set. So I was like, oh, the comedy clubs
in New York, it's it's merit based. It's not based
on who your agent though is because in La. I
couldn't get on it a lot of the comedy clubs
(27:20):
in LA because I didn't have a big name agent
who could make a call and get me on stage there,
whereas in comedy in New York, the comedy clubs it
was more merit based.
Speaker 2 (27:31):
If you're good, you got booked. So I'd go. When
I was living in LA, I fly to New York
every year.
Speaker 1 (27:37):
And I'd come back to LA with my pockets full
of fat, and I was like, Oh, if I go
to New York, I can actually make.
Speaker 2 (27:49):
A somewhat.
Speaker 1 (27:49):
I've been living in New York while I'm waiting for
the big break. So I left LA after seven years.
I'm like, I'm going to New York because I want
to do comedy.
Speaker 2 (27:58):
I don't want to.
Speaker 1 (27:59):
I don't want to go auditions. I can't do an
American accent. I don't want to play on Young Sheldon.
Speaker 2 (28:05):
I want to be.
Speaker 1 (28:10):
I didn't want that. So I was like a lot
of my agents kept sending me auditions and I was like,
I don't want that. I'm not going to turn up
for this audition. You know, I'm not going to learn
an American accent so I can be the fucking's the sassy.
Speaker 3 (28:29):
Or you know, yeah exactly. I know, we just need
some diversity in this episode, so I put in the
like security.
Speaker 2 (28:37):
Yeah, so I.
Speaker 1 (28:40):
Refuse to go for those auditions. So I was like,
I'm going to go to New York and do comedy
there and and I'm just going to do comedy and
then from there I will try and get booked to
comedy clubs about the country. It just try to make
a living. So I moved to New York, and in
between my the road gigs where I'd go to comedy
(29:01):
club in whatever, Philadelphia and do a weekend at a
comedy club, I'd be able to work in the city
so I didn't have to go to London so often
to do the bank rates because I could work and
earn my rent money doing comedy clubs in New York.
And then from then I started to get booked for
you know, I booked my first I made. I started
(29:23):
making my own specials. So I was trying to get
stand up specials on show Time and Netflix and and
nobody would give me a special. So I was like, well,
then fuck you guys, and to make my own special.
Speaker 2 (29:36):
So my first.
Speaker 1 (29:37):
Special I made in London in two thousand and eight,
went to London, sold out a two thousand seater theater,
booked my own camera crew, my own director, and shot
my own special good for Real. And then I got
that special and I sent it to Showtime and I
was like, what do you think of it? And they
(29:58):
were like, this is nice.
Speaker 2 (30:00):
Why off you? We'll option it for a year. So
that's what they did.
Speaker 1 (30:04):
I sold my first special called Skiddy Bitch to show
Time and they paid me a lump time.
Speaker 2 (30:10):
It wasn't a lot of money. It was like maybe
fifty sixty grand.
Speaker 1 (30:15):
Well that was a nice chunk of money that I
could go, Oh, I could live on this is I
could live on this for a good year while I'm
still hustling to make it. Yes, So I did that.
I sold that first special to Showtime. Then I made
my second special. I made in San Francisco. Nobody knew
who I was. I was still living in LA. It
(30:36):
was just it was in the interim between the time
I was moving from because I spent a year closing
down my life in LA to New York. I spent
a year just slowly winding everything down. And it was
in that year I shot my second special, Laughing to America.
I shot it in San Francisco. I didn't want to
shoot it in LA because LA audiences are full of
actors who were.
Speaker 3 (30:57):
Not that's all this and there, and they're not generous
with their laughter either. There's stingy. I was like, let
me shooting in San Francisco, where there's real people.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
Book. I rented a theater nine months in advance in
San Francisco, just rented this theater. Nobody knew who I was,
So what I would do for the next nine ten months.
Every weekend, I would fly or drive to Los Angeles
is from Los Angeles to San Francisco, and I'd go
round every comedy club, every venue in San Francisco and
(31:34):
do shows for free.
Speaker 2 (31:36):
Go up and go, Can you just let me do
five minutes?
Speaker 1 (31:38):
You'll have to pay me, and I'd go up and
do a set I'd kill and then after those sets,
I'd stand outside handing out flyers with my special by
work that I was shooting nine months later, and I'd
do that every weekend for nearly a year. I did that,
and by doing that, I managed to sell out this
little three hundred and fifty seater theater go free loss
(32:00):
in San Francisco, and then I flew my director over
from London from England to so I got an Airbnb.
I've got a house in San Francisco and Airbnb, and
I flew everybody from England because it was cheaper to
fly my guy from America to direct their special, then
(32:23):
to book an American direct couldn't afford an American one,
so I flew him over and then he sourced the
camera crew in San Francisco, so he did all the
technical stuff.
Speaker 2 (32:35):
I concentrated.
Speaker 1 (32:36):
I'm getting the theater selling tickets, sold this place out,
and then I shot my own special in last that
in San Francisco. Shot the special in San Francisco, got
the DVD, and then was like who wants it?
Speaker 3 (32:51):
So you were like a legit how rappers back in
the day, did you gave out your comedic mixtapes like so,
let me just tell you.
Speaker 2 (33:00):
This is the highest hit on the bike, go ahead
and get it. Good for you? Yeah, good fore you.
Speaker 1 (33:05):
Yes, I made my special selling it at shows and
then I ended up option in that one to MBC Ciso.
Do you remember when MBSC tried to do their own
version of Netflix. It was called Siso, No, I don't.
It lasted about.
Speaker 2 (33:22):
But you got sold it.
Speaker 1 (33:24):
But I told them the special and they paid me
a nice chunk for that. And then when Ciso died
a death, the ownership of the Special reverted back to me.
Speaker 2 (33:35):
Them.
Speaker 1 (33:37):
Yeap, I sold it to them because the what I
used to do, I didn't sell this them out right.
I'd go, you could have it for twelve months, so
they kind they kind It was like a lease almost.
So when SISO went defunct, the Special converted back to
me as owner, and I resold it Serious. So now
I made it into a sound file and now Serious
(34:00):
and I get checks every month from my specials playing
on Serious.
Speaker 2 (34:05):
And so tell story is sure you're rich, is what
you're trying to tell us. I'm not rich. I'm definitely.
Speaker 1 (34:13):
Riched from that, but I earned a good living from
it that was able to sustain me while I was hustling.
And then I started, you know that, I got booked
on the daily shows a British corresponden, So that didn't
pay much money, but it got me a little bit
of notoriety, notoriety which helped get other things U the
(34:33):
moment I started, so I was earning good living. You know,
at that point, I was comfortable. You know, I wasn't
earning by a house money in America, but I was
earning rent a nice place money, you know what I mean.
I've never had a roommate. I've never done any of that.
Even when I came to La, I had my own apartment.
I was like, I'm I'm a grown ass woman. I'm
(34:57):
not doing roommates and I have to because I owned.
I owned property before I came here.
Speaker 2 (35:02):
I owned Yeah. Yeah, yeah, you lived a whole nother
life that you just couldn't have a house on. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (35:07):
Yeah, yeah, I had a house I have. So I
was like, I'm not going I'm gonna come ahead and
start again for less money and make no money. But yeah,
I would not compromise on my living situation.
Speaker 2 (35:18):
I have to have my own. Yeah, and no one
wants to be bothered. Who wants to be bothered? Okay,
So I will ask this.
Speaker 3 (35:23):
Then you get this, you get you get this CBA show,
Bob Heart's Abbi shola Am I saying.
Speaker 2 (35:30):
It right, Yeah, that's when everything changed.
Speaker 3 (35:35):
So tell me now, I was thinking, as you're telling
this story, you're a very specific type of actor, like
that's what you The role you would get would be
who you are, you know, not who you are, but
you didn't have to change too much of yourself.
Speaker 2 (35:48):
Tell me about the role you play on this show
and how that impacted your life.
Speaker 1 (35:54):
Well, originally I didn't start as an actor on the show.
I wasn't meant to be an actor on the show
I got. When I was living in New York. I
got a call from Chuck Glory's production company that they
were the Chuck had an idea for this TV show,
but he wanted a Nigerian comedian to help him create it,
(36:16):
so he just finished Michael Molly. He wanted to make
another show about another couple, but he didn't want to
make another Michael Molly. He wanted the female protagonist to
be an African woman, and so they called me over
ostensibly to help them create the show, help them write it,
because they're like, we're three white guys, we don't know
how to write about Africans. It's going to be an immigrant,
(36:38):
you know, the it's gonna be immigrants. We need someone
you can help us write. So I came on originally
as a consultant. Then I went from consultant to co
co creator and producer Yay and then so I was
helping them write the pilot, and obviously I'm a comedian
and my dream has always been to be the funny
(36:59):
best friend in a sitcom.
Speaker 2 (37:01):
So I wrote myself in as her best friend.
Speaker 1 (37:04):
I didn't want the lead role because I was like,
I don't want the lead role because I'm going to
be writing this show. But the funny best friend is
always the fun gets the best lines, and I don't
have to carry the show. It's not based on me. Yeah,
so let's get some beautiful woman to be the lead,
lead actress and let me be the funny friend. So
I wrote myself in as the best friend. The character
(37:25):
is kind of based on my mother and how my
mother is around her friends. I was Shore based on
my mom, the harsh side of my mom, the serious mother,
you know, matriarchside of my mom.
Speaker 2 (37:37):
And then to Kenny is based on my mom when
she's around her friends.
Speaker 4 (37:42):
Every champion and carry Champion is to be a champion,
a champion and carry Chatpi and in carry Chat Beta
Champion and carry Chatty and in carry Chat Great is
the Sports and Entertainment and Naked Wok. Harry champion and
Carrie Chappy is to be a Champia champion. They carry
(38:02):
Chatty and they champion. They carry Chappy and they carry
Chafra is the sporting entertainment.
Speaker 3 (38:08):
You all right, so you're you're the best friend is Kimmy,
who's based off how your mom behaves around her friends.
And Shola is based off of your mother. So you
had the shee, you have the the best lines, and
you wrote yourself in. Now did you write yourself in
as a series regular or you just wrote yourself in
for just the pilot. Originally I was just Kemmy, didn't
(38:31):
even have a name. She was woman on the bus
and she wrote the pilot and Chuck comes in one day.
Because they didn't know, I didn't tell them I wanted
that part.
Speaker 1 (38:41):
I just kept I was subliminately feeding them information, going,
you know what, you know, Abishchola needs a best friend,
don't you think she needs a question? But I didn't
tell them that I wanted that role. So then one
day Chuck comes in and goes, Okay, this pilot is
almost finished. I think it's going to be a goer.
I think CBS is gonna like it. If you want
the role, of Abishchola. You're gonna have to order and
(39:01):
I went, I don't want the role of that Bashola
and they were like what. I was like, I want
and I pointed to the whiteboard and I was like,
woman on the bus. I want woman on the bus.
And he looked at me and he was like, they're
very fucking smart. So originally she was just a guest,
(39:21):
but that was only because they didn't know what I
was bringing to this law because Chuck and them a
lot had just found me. If I tell the story
when when I asked them how they found me when
they brought me over to LA for our first meeting,
I was like, how did you find me? And I'm
assuming they were going to go, oh, we've seen you
on Netflix specials, we saw you on the Daily Show,
we've seen you on the Tonight Show.
Speaker 2 (39:42):
We'd be following your work. What they said was, oh, no,
we googled Nigerian female comedian. Yo, are you serious?
Speaker 1 (39:52):
That is how they found me. So they didn't know
anything about me. They just went they googled Nigerie comedian.
Set that I'd done on TV in England came up
and they were like, oh, she's funny. Get her over
here for this meeting. Wow.
Speaker 2 (40:07):
So they'd done no research on me.
Speaker 1 (40:10):
No, I want to say.
Speaker 2 (40:10):
I was like, that was it. They just googled one
person and.
Speaker 1 (40:13):
That was it. Yep, they googled and I was the
best one that came up because I'm the best. And
they were like where is she and they were like, Oh,
she's in New York. Fantastic, get her over for a meeting.
So they flew me from New York to LA for
this meeting. So they'd done no research. So when So
when I created this best friend character, they just assumed
(40:34):
it was just going to be a guest starring character
that might pop in once every ten episodes. But what
they didn't know is that I had a long career
of creating characters in England for television and the character
this was a character that I'd been waiting to play
on a sick camp for years. I knew that once
they saw this character, they were going to fall in
(40:56):
love with this character. So we shot the pilot. Now,
in the pilot, my character had literally three lines in
the whole pilot, but when they put the trailer of
the show out, every one of those three lines was
on the trailer, so they obviously saw the character and
they were like, oh, we love this character. And then
(41:16):
obviously I'm in the writer's room, so I'm writing. So
for the first few episodes of season one, I was
just guest star getting guest star rates, which was a
fraction of what the other actors were getting. But I'm
in the writer's room, so I'm seeing that I'm in
every episode, because every time we wrote an episode, Chuck
(41:36):
will come into the room and go, wait, I don't
see Kenny put Kemy in. So I called my agent
and I was like, listen, I'm we were episode eight.
Speaker 2 (41:47):
We got to so far of the.
Speaker 1 (41:50):
You know, the story setups, the outlines of these stories,
where we've outlined eight episodes so far, and Kemy's in
every single one of them. So you need to go
back and get me bumped up from guest star because
this is obviously I'm a series regular now, but I'm
not getting series regular money. So my agent went back
and reallygotiated, and I became a series regular.
Speaker 3 (42:15):
I I love it.
Speaker 2 (42:20):
You're so you don't understand how this is really so
right on time for me.
Speaker 3 (42:23):
I love it. I love your hustle. I love it
whatever it takes. I love how smart you are. I
love how you were fighting for yourself always. I love
how you didn't want the main role because everyone was
all about I want to be on TV.
Speaker 2 (42:35):
You're like, I want to do the real y'all. Remember,
I love it. I love it, I love it. Congratulations
to you. Just amazing. Do you ever just sit in
marvel at what you've been able to accomplish? No, because
I'm so competitive.
Speaker 1 (42:50):
I'm like, all right, and you know, sometimes you know,
and sometimes I've had to force myself to sit down
and just enjoy the moment because I was joy I'm like,
I've got to sit Come on TV. I'm making amazing
money now and I've managed to buy two houses in
Los Angeles off of it.
Speaker 3 (43:10):
I'm like, I'm doing well. I'm billing The first check
was eight that was in seventy five cents. Yeah, and
I got two houses. Talk yo, Gina, I am so
happy for you. My producer's gonna have to bleep out
all my curse words. Oh yeah, sorry, No, No, it
doesn't matter.
Speaker 2 (43:30):
I'm kidding. I'm joking. She's probably be like, y'all silly.
I will say this. I will say this.
Speaker 3 (43:36):
What when you what is it about ambitious people that
can't appreciate what you have? Because I see the distance,
and when you tell this story, I'm marveling. All I
imagine is seeing you out there. Let me just have
five minutes driving back and forth and ride to California.
Excuse me, LA to San Francisco's not a small one.
It's a nine to eight hour drive. You're going back
(43:58):
and forth for a year. You're maybe you're flying, maybe
you're driving. You're selling yourself so that you can sell yourself,
and you like.
Speaker 2 (44:04):
I'm a flower on my own.
Speaker 3 (44:05):
You're doing everything it takes because they wouldn't do it
for you, So I'm gonna do it myself.
Speaker 2 (44:10):
Do you see the distance between then and now?
Speaker 1 (44:15):
Yes, I definitely do. And I have to sit down,
you know, because and I tell you what you know,
as I've got a big competitive spirit, so I often
you know, Instagram and these social medias is a good thing,
is a bad thing? Yeah, because you're watching other people
and going have they got that I'm fair?
Speaker 2 (44:34):
Then they are.
Speaker 1 (44:35):
I was doing a lot of that and I had
to you know, And I tell you when everything changed
for me before I got this show. I one day,
I sat myself down and I was getting very angry
and very bitter when things weren't going my way, and
I was like, why am I struggling so much when
I'm this good and you got these mediocre people just
sailing through and just getting opportunities after opportunity. And then
(44:58):
he had that to set myself down and listen, you're
doing comedy for a living. You're making a very good
living doing something you love. Ninety nine percent of people
on a planet and not doing things that they love
for a living, You're doing something you love. You're traveling
the world and telling jokes, and that is paying your bills.
(45:19):
Stop complaining, stop looking sideways at other people, and just
concentrate on enjoying this journey. And that slight changing mindset
open the world up for me. The moment I started
doing that, It's like the universe was like, oh, okay,
you're ready now. And that's when everything started to click
(45:41):
into place. Then the specials started coming, I started getting
more TV work, and then this show landed, and that
was after I went I'm just going to enjoy the journey.
So now I'm doing with you well, making good money.
I have to try and sit myself down again because
now I'm like, now, why are getting any nominations? Why
(46:02):
is this show getting any nominations?
Speaker 2 (46:04):
And we ain't.
Speaker 1 (46:05):
I'm getting into that mindset again, so I have to
sit down and go, Gina h seven years ago, you
would have killed to be in the position you're in now,
where you're a show runner. You wouldn't even have known
you And I had no intention of writing on TV shows.
People were offering me writing gigs for years, and I
refused because I was like, I don't want to work
in no office. I don't want no one telling me
(46:26):
what to do, and I've heard horror stories about how writers'
rooms are for black writers.
Speaker 2 (46:31):
So I never took writing gigs. Now I'm show running
a show.
Speaker 1 (46:36):
I'm the show runner, yeah, and I'm you know, I'm
hiring black writers and I'm making sure that yeah, they're
that they they you know that they will get opportunities
going forward from this. I provided work for black actors
that wouldn't have got anything in this industry. So I
had to sit myself down and go, five years ago,
(46:58):
you would never have known that you'd been in the
position you're in now. Yeah, joy it it's an adventure.
A don't be looking at other people's TV shows and
comparing yourself. So I've gotta set I'm gonna do that
mindset changing.
Speaker 2 (47:13):
You gotta you gotta if you need me to hype
you up. But you did get a good black woman
to hype up another one. I feel that's neither. I'm
so imported, Gina.
Speaker 3 (47:21):
You have motivated me, like in my world and what
I do. I love this because I'm gonna go get it.
You're not gonna give it to me. I'm going to
take it. You're gonna give me a special I'll make
my own. I exactly want wait for the gatekeepers to
validate you. You gotta go take the power you want
because they're not giving it away.
Speaker 2 (47:41):
A man. A'men okay, So in that same vein, but
still keeping focused on focus. What's next? What can I tell?
Speaker 3 (47:49):
Obviously we need to watch Bob Heart's Abby Shola, and
then we also Bob as in Bob Hearts as in
Love's Abby Shola, and that's on CVS, and then.
Speaker 2 (48:01):
And it's on Max. I think it's on Max, and
I think it's amaz.
Speaker 1 (48:05):
Yeah, it was on Age the first three seasons one
on HBO, Max but I no, that's now changed to Max.
I think it might have migrated over to Max. And
I've seen it on Amazon Prime, so it's out there
to watch. It is easy to find, and I will
be the biggest advocate can I? And then what else
do you have? Are you in it?
Speaker 2 (48:21):
Are you doing any stand up? Coming up soon?
Speaker 3 (48:23):
In La?
Speaker 2 (48:24):
I'm doing a tour right now called The Woman King
of Comedy. A yeah, and where can I find out more?
Word website?
Speaker 1 (48:33):
But my website, Gina Yashave dot com. Just go to
the website. I've got all the links for all the shows.
I'm doing New York next month. I'm doing San Francisco,
I'm doing Chicago, I'm doing Portland, Detroit, Los Angeles, and
I'm sure I'm missing one, but they're all listed on
my website Genie dot com The Woman King of Comedy.
(48:54):
It's gonna be really fun, show me a couple of comedians,
probably gonna get some DJ on stage so we can
have fun.
Speaker 2 (49:01):
It's gonna be a good night. So I'm doing that.
Speaker 1 (49:05):
I've got a book, a memoir out called cat Candied,
which means left handed.
Speaker 3 (49:09):
And yeah, but when did you? When did you write that?
I was going to ask you about when did you
read I wrote that in the first few months of
the pandemic the shutdown. So I got the deal a
year before I got the TV show, but I'm a
terrible procrastinator and hadn't.
Speaker 1 (49:24):
A word. And then I got the TV show and
I was like, oh my god, I don't know how
I'm gonna have time to write this book because I'm
now writing this TV show.
Speaker 2 (49:32):
And then the pandemic happened and I was like, Okay,
that's given me nothing but time. Yeah, And I wrote
that book during the first four months of the pandemic.
Speaker 1 (49:46):
Go for You. That came out last year in the States,
and it came out in paperback recently in England and
after Bob Harts that's the next show I'm working on.
Speaker 2 (49:56):
I'm going to be turning that memoir.
Speaker 1 (49:58):
Into a scripted series, like a grittier version of Everybody
Hates Chris. So it's gonna be yeah, like you know,
the book covers my life from birth to the day
I step on a plane to move to America, So
it's gonna be covering different aspects of my life and
it's gonna be me narrating it. Hopefully with a younger
(50:19):
actor playing me. And it's been gritty, it's gonna be live.
And this is the moment I decided to punch the
bitch in the face, you know. So that will be
the next project. But the next immediate stuff is, Yeah,
I'm on tour, the Woman King of Comedy coming to
your city.
Speaker 2 (50:36):
We're putting this all in the note. They will find it.
Speaker 3 (50:38):
I will also post it on Instagram and every other
social media outlet that I have. Gina, thank you for
inspiring us today. And I am truly, I'm truly moved
by your hustle because I thought I had hustle. You're like, no,
let me just move over. Let mession good for you,
and let me share what this hustle looks like. Now.
Speaker 2 (50:55):
You deserve it all. You deserve it all. You deserve
it all and more.
Speaker 3 (50:58):
And I hope you can really appreciate the distance. That's
what I try to for myself, see where it used
to be, where I am. Thank you, thank you, thank
you for coming on, Nate, thank you, thanks for having me.
And again, don't forget you need to go get her
memoirs called cac Handled. It's basically about her life story
everything she shared with us, but more detail, more gritty,
(51:20):
and obviously more entertaining. I appreciate her coming on the show.
I feel motivated. I feel also the need to say
I should appreciate the distance. I am giving you all
that message today. You may not be exactly where you
want to be in your personal life or in your
professional life, but you can always see the distance. I
say that a lot, but it's so true. I'm in
(51:41):
this phase of my life where I'm just trying to
appreciate what I've accomplished, although I still have so much
more to do, and we're always on our own timeline.
But when it's supposed to be, it is supposed to be.
Gina Yaesharee, thank you for that message, and thank you
all for listening. Naked back next week.
Speaker 2 (52:01):
Have a good one y'all. H
Then I got to La and I go to the
Imperor and I'm doing a set and they give me
a check for eight dollars and I'm.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
Like, oh, no, a check.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
A check eight dollars seventy five cents. And I was like,
what the hell is this?
Speaker 3 (00:20):
I could not imagine someone giving me a check as
an adult for eight dollars and seventy five cents. But wait,
Gina Yashara's story is so inspiring, so that little eight
dollars and seventy five cent check makes perfect sense. It
was good for her, it motivated her. We got to
pay some bills. You can fast forward if you like,
but the next edition of Naked continues after the break.
Speaker 4 (00:51):
It's the greatest sponson entertainment can make you put carry
Champion and carry Chappy is to be a champion.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
A champion they carry Chappi and Nigger Chion. The care
with Shepion.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
They care with.
Speaker 2 (01:03):
The same inking naked wording on. Hey, everybody, thank you
for listening to another edition of Naked.
Speaker 3 (01:11):
I really like our next guest because I think she
is the definition of hustle, hustle personified. It's rare that
I think I am out hustled, but she made me
feel lazy.
Speaker 2 (01:21):
I need to do something with my life.
Speaker 4 (01:23):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (01:23):
Gina Yashera was born in the UK. She's Nigerian. She's
a comedian. She's also an actress. She's also a writer.
She's also currently a showrunner on the hit show that
she stars in her co stars in. It's on CBS.
It's called Bob Hart's Abby Shola. So go out and
support your girl. And the reason why you would want
(01:44):
to go support her is because she's really not an
overnight success. Her story is one of if you're not
going to give it to me, I will go take it.
This story should inspire you no matter what your discipline is,
no matter what you do for a living. I appreciate
Gina for telling her story and of course she's clearly hilarious.
Speaker 2 (02:03):
To back, relax and enjoy.
Speaker 4 (02:06):
Champion and carey chayann care chep.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
I just fresh from London yesterday, landed yesterday. Oh really? Okay?
Speaker 3 (02:17):
So I want you to talk to me about growing
up in London and living in London. What was What
is that like for a Nigerian born woman?
Speaker 2 (02:29):
Well, I was born in London. You're born in London?
Speaker 1 (02:31):
Okay, yeah, my parents were born in Nigeria, but I
was actually born and raised in London. My first few
years were in an area of London called Bethnal Green,
which is East London. I'm very much of Cockney by birth,
but at the time of my birth in the seventies, England,
especially East London, was going through a little bit of
(02:51):
a change. There were a lot of immigrants from Africa,
from the Caribbean, from India and Pakistan coming into East
London because it was a lot of council which is
kind of the projects and kind of slum buildings, so
that's where immigrants could get property. So the white working
class Brits were not happy about all these immigrants coming
(03:13):
into East London.
Speaker 2 (03:15):
So there was a lot of.
Speaker 1 (03:17):
Racist abuse on the streets, lots of skinheads, lots of graffiti.
So that was kind of what I was brought up
in the first for ten years of my life. You know,
I'd go out and my mum would be like, be
careful of.
Speaker 2 (03:32):
The bad boys.
Speaker 1 (03:33):
Used to call them the bad boys, and these were
skinn edds that'd be waiting in the stairwell of the
apartment building when you're going upstairs and call your names
and spit on you, that kind of thing. So that's
what the first eight to ten years of living in
London was like. Then we moved to North London, which
was a little bit more affluent and so racism wasn't
(03:54):
quite as in your face there because it was kind
of a more wealthier neighborhood. And then we, you know,
with my mom and my stepdad, bought a house so
that we left the projects and went into a house
and so it wasn't so bad.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
But I, you know, I was a kid. I didn't
know any different. I was like, this is just how
it is.
Speaker 1 (04:13):
You just stay away from the bad white people.
Speaker 2 (04:17):
And dunting the good white people.
Speaker 3 (04:19):
Yeah, yeah, were they were the good white people, easily
identifiable as opposed to the bad white people.
Speaker 2 (04:24):
Well, when I was at school, you know, I had
a mixture of friends at school.
Speaker 1 (04:27):
You know, I was going to school at age five,
six seven, and you know I had black friends, white friends,
Indian friends.
Speaker 2 (04:33):
At school. We were just kids.
Speaker 1 (04:34):
We at that age, we didn't really take on our parents'
prejudices until sort of later. So age four or five,
we didn't know we needed but we were just kids
running around just heay so I didn't, you know, I
didn't recognize the racism per se. I just thought those
are bad people who were spitting on me in the street,
and these are my friends at school.
Speaker 2 (04:56):
Okay.
Speaker 3 (04:56):
So then what I find interesting is that when I
was reading your bio, it said that you did comedy
for twenty years in the UK.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
Is that accurate?
Speaker 1 (05:08):
I've been I started comedy in nineteen ninety five, so
by the time I moved out to America in two
thousand and seven, I've been doing it about twelve years.
Speaker 3 (05:17):
So tell me the start of comedic life for you
in the UK, because I could imagine your parents weren't
necessarily excited about that career choice for you.
Speaker 2 (05:29):
I'm other was happy at all.
Speaker 1 (05:31):
Now she wanted to be a doctor or an attorney. Perhaps, yeah,
I originally she worked me to be a doctor. But
eighteen doing a level biology, which is our advanced level biology,
we had to cut open a rat. Yeah, and that's
when I discovered that I, oh no, I could not
(05:52):
stand the sight of the blood. It was disgusting to me.
So I switched to engineering and I studied. I did
my degree in electrical let engineering and I actually worked
as an engineer. My last job was working for Otis,
the biggest elevator company in the world. I was building
and repairing elevators for a living. So that was my
(06:14):
last job. I was their first woman engineer in their
one hundred year history in the UK. Wow, which sounds good,
but it was a horrific experience because first woman and
a black woman of that. And I'm working on construction site.
So I'm walking into work and somebody's hung a banana
(06:35):
skin above my overalls, or I put on my boiler
suit and there are pictures of monkeys stuffed into the pockets.
Speaker 2 (06:43):
Things like that. I put up with.
Speaker 1 (06:44):
I put up with a lot of abuse at that job,
but I stuck it out for four years because I
refused to be driven out and I wanted to stay
there and prove that I can do the job as
well as any of these men.
Speaker 2 (06:56):
Which I did. But I ended up leaving, and that's
how I ended up in comedy. I ended up leaving.
Speaker 1 (07:03):
The building industry went through a bit of a slump
in the mid nineties, and they were making people redundant,
they were laying people off. They were never going to
lay me off because I was their token black girl
that they put on all their posters and magazines and stuff.
They were never going to lay me off, but I
was like, I want to leave. So I marched into
my manager's office and I was like, you need to
(07:25):
let me go. You need to pay me off and
let me go because I don't want to be here anymore.
And they were like, well, we have no intention of
doing that. And I was like, well, unless you want
me to go public with the racism and misogyny I suffered.
Speaker 2 (07:37):
On this job, you need to let me go. And
they went, you know what, We're going to let you go. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (07:45):
And that was in the summertime, so I was like,
I'm going to enjoy the summer off. So I was
having a good time over the summer. And people had
always told me I was funny. People always told me
that I should be an actor as a kid.
Speaker 3 (07:56):
You know.
Speaker 1 (07:57):
Teachers were always saying to my mom, you know your daughter, Gina,
she's very lively, she's fun. You know, maybe she should
go in, you know, into acting or something. And my
mom would always say, well, she can act like a
doctor when she becomes until she becomes a doctor, that
she was not entertaining the prospect to me going into
(08:19):
the arts. So after I left my job as an engineer,
let me try this thing, you know, let me just
do some fun things that I've always been kind of
interested in, but never you know, never tried.
Speaker 2 (08:33):
And so, you know, I started going to workshops and.
Speaker 1 (08:39):
I joined the Nation of Islam for about twelve minutes,
and then I started getting into community works doing stuff
within my community. And they were doing a fundraiser one
day and they were like, okay, singers and dancers, and
so me and my two friends were always messing around
doing our parents' accents.
Speaker 2 (08:58):
And I wrote what I thought was a play for
us to perform. What kind of play was it?
Speaker 3 (09:05):
Then?
Speaker 2 (09:05):
You thought you guys were going to perform.
Speaker 1 (09:07):
It was a play about the cultural differences between us,
the young, the first generation, the British born Nigerians and
our parents who come straight from Nigeria. And I wrote
this play, but it turned out was a play. It
was a comedy sketch. People laughed their asses off through
the entire thing, and I was like.
Speaker 2 (09:29):
And everyone was like, huh, I love it. I love it. Okay,
I love it. Give me more. And I was like, oh,
this is comedy.
Speaker 1 (09:37):
So then we took that play stroke comedy sketch, and
we kept performing it at various talent competitions around London,
and we kept kept winning these competitions with this one sketch.
And then one day two of my friends who were
in this group with me didn't turn up for a
competition we were in and we were in the semi
(09:59):
five and they didn't turn up and I was there
on my own and they were like, you've got to
go up on stage. You're doue up on stage and
my two friends weren't there, so I kind of just
went up on stage and talks for like ten minutes
and just told silly stories and the audience loved it,
and I got us through to the final with this
(10:20):
monologue that I did, and then people were coming up
to me afterwards going you're a stand up comic, that's
what you are, and I was like, what is this
stand up comedy? And then I started researching into that
and started doing open mics and I was like, I'm
going to do this for a bit, for fun, because
this is a good time. And people started going, Oh,
(10:40):
I'll give you ten bucks, I'll give you fifty bucks
if you come and do my show, and I'm like,
fifty bucks for five minutes work.
Speaker 2 (10:46):
This is fantastic. This is more than I'm going to
earn as an engineer.
Speaker 1 (10:50):
And I was like, I'm gonna do this for six
months and then come winter, I'm going to go back
and get a proper job and get another job as
an engineer. And that just never happened. I ended it
up just continuing and it's just never. I never ended
up going back to work.
Speaker 3 (11:05):
I was going to ask you too, I was like,
if you went from being an engineer to stand up comedean,
how did you survive? But you're saying, are you saying
you were making more money initially starting out than you
were as an engineer?
Speaker 2 (11:16):
Not more money initially, But I was making money, so
it was enough.
Speaker 1 (11:24):
You know. I had a very cheap apartment at the
times of the revenue cheek. I owned my car outright,
it was a paid off car, bought it cash, so
I didn't need a lot of expenses. So I was
I was like, well, as long as I'm making enough
to pay this two hundred dollars a month rent mm
hm and enough to buy groceries m hmm, that's all
(11:45):
I need. And so from the beginning of my comedy career,
I was making enough money to pay my two hundred
dollars rent and to put food and put gas in
the car. So I was like, well, I can survive
off this more income. Let me see how much further
this comedy will take me. And so I started driving
(12:06):
all over the country doing shows for nothing, just to
build my experience and just to try and get and
that's what I did, and eventually within six months I
landed on a talent show on television.
Speaker 2 (12:22):
What was the name of the show.
Speaker 1 (12:23):
It was called The Big Big Talent Show. And thinking wise,
the comedians went, triloquis, magicians, singers, it was everybody, and
I was the only stand up that got through to
the final and this is within six months of starting.
So I was like, oh, I'm going to be a star.
(12:44):
I've got on television within six months of starting this.
I'm going to be huge. Forget engineering. I'm going to
concentrate all my efforts on this comedy thing because I'm
going to be a huge stand up star.
Speaker 2 (12:55):
That's what I thought. Yeah, it didn't happen that way.
Speaker 3 (12:58):
Yeah yeah, Well listen, I think that it started off
good for you though, because every this is a beautiful story.
I hear stories. I interview a lot of comedians and
it's never I did it once and I was like, oh,
I'm perfect, very rarely not perfect, but very rarely do
I hear the story of I gave it a go.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
People were like, this is what.
Speaker 3 (13:17):
You should be doing, Like you found where you belong.
I looked at how it's such a tough ask. What
is the difference between being a stand up comedian in
the UK versus when you come to the States and
you want to make it. Tell me the significant differences,
or the comedy clubs all the same. Do you have
to grease the wheels and be friends with certain people
(13:38):
to get time on stage?
Speaker 2 (13:39):
Like tell me the right of passage if you will well.
In England.
Speaker 1 (13:46):
At the time that I was starting out, there were
a lot of comedy clubs and they all paid good money.
So the difference is if you became good and you
got those clubs, you'd get regular work and it didn't
matter whether you were famous or not. Because the audiences
went to the comedy clubs based on the comedy club's reputation.
(14:08):
They didn't know who was going to be on It's
similar to how the comedy scene is in New York
with the comedy sellers and the Gothams. For the most part,
the comedy seller people just go there because they know
it's the comedy seller and they know that they're going
to get a great night of comedy. They don't necessarily
know who's going to be on. And that's how the
comedy scene was in England. You went, they booked you.
(14:31):
Everybody got the same money, whether you were on the
beginning the show or the end of the show. Everybody
got whatever it was two hundred bucks a set, and
the MC got a little bit more because he had
to be or he or she had to be there
all night. Whereas in London I could do a set here,
finish my set and then jump in the car or
jump on my motorbike, go to another comedy club, do
(14:51):
another set. So I could make four six hundred dollars
a night just running a down doing shows. So that
was the joy of doing. And then when doing the
comedy clubs, when you got to a state in your
estate in your career where people started to come to
see you, when you were starting to get on television
and starting to get known, then you transcended the comedy
(15:12):
clubs into small theaters. So I did comedy clubs for
about seven eight years, and I started to build a
good audience, and I started to get little bits of
stuff on television, so people started to know me and go, oh, well,
that girl off the TV. So then I transcended the
comedy clubs and started booking my own theaters. Because I'd
go to comedy club and i'd as soon as I
walk on stage, they'd go Genie Asha, and I'd hear
(15:34):
the cheers and I'd go, oh, those people are cheering
really loudly, which means they know who I am. So
if I'm if I was to go and book my
own theater, then rather than just being paid two hundred
bucks for a set here, if I book a small
theater for a hundred people and all those people are
paying ten bucks each to come and see me, then
(15:54):
I'm going to make a lot more money. So that's
what I started doing, and I started going into small theaters,
building my own thing and doing my own shows. Why
it would just be me doing rather than doing a
twenty minute set at comedy club, it'd be me on
my own doing an hour and then I'd get all
the money. So that's what happens. That's the kind of
write passage in England. You start for the open mic
(16:15):
and you start getting paid at the comedy clubs, and
most a lot of comics, the majority of the comics
stay at that comedy club level because not everybody gets
on TV, not everybody gets famous. But if you stay
at that comedy club level, you can still make sixty
to one hundred thousand a year just doing comedy clubs.
But if you're even if nobody knows who you are,
(16:36):
could run around the country because there were comedy clubs
all over the country. You could run around all the
country doing all the comedy clubs and making anywhere between
sixty one hundred year and maybe more if you did
corporate shows where you a company will go, we need
a comedian for our yearly Christmas party, and you'll get
five or ten thousand or whatever. So as a no
name comedian in England, you could I was making a
(16:58):
good living before I even got to the level where
I was doing theaters wow wow, where Whereas that is
pretty much impossible in America, absolutely, Because in America, when
I came and I didn't know that when I came here.
So when I came to America, I was like, I'm
a comedian. I'm a well known comedian in England. I'm
making a good living here. Once I get to America,
(17:20):
I'll just go go to the comedy clubs. They'll see
how funny I am. I'll start getting booked and I
can at least make sixty grand a year doing comedy
clubs in America until I get on TV and get sick,
come or get in an audio or something. That's what
I thought. Then I got to La and I go
to the Improv and I'm doing a set and they
(17:42):
give me a check for eight dollars and I'm like,
oh no, I check out a check eight dollars. I
remember my first check from the improv eight dollars seventy
five cents, and I was like, what the hell is this?
So basically clean? To headline a comedy club in America,
(18:04):
it's a different beast. You have to be famous. So
for a comedy club to book you as a headliner
and pay you a decent fee, it is the onus
is on you to bring the audience. When an audience
comes to comedy club to see a headliner. They're coming
because they've seen him on a sitcom or seen her
on this show or see and so you get paid
(18:24):
according to that. But if you're not a big name comedian,
they don't care how funny you are. You're not putting
bums on seats. So when I got to America, I'm like,
I'm really funny. I'm selling out theaters all over the
country in the UK and I'm a TV style in
the UK. Can you pay me to do comedy? And
they're like, we don't know who the hell you are,
so nobody's paying to come and see you. You can
(18:47):
open for this other comedian who's on a sitcom and
they'll get whatever, twenty thousand dollars for the weekend, but
you're going to get eight dollars seventy five.
Speaker 2 (18:57):
That's insane. And that's what was happening in LA.
Speaker 1 (19:01):
And it's very specific to LA because in LA, the
comedy clubs, their attitude is very much listen, you're in LA.
Speaker 2 (19:09):
You could be seen by Steven Spielberg.
Speaker 1 (19:13):
We're doing you a favor by letting you performer our
comedy club for five cents. Yeahitude, And I'm like, that
doesn't make sense. Because the bar staff are being paid,
the security are being paid, the people's you know, everybody
else in the comedy club ecosystem is being paid except
(19:36):
for the reason why the audience is there. That didn't
make sense to me, and I couldn't understand why LA
comedians were putting up with that.
Speaker 2 (19:45):
You know, I was like, why haven't you guys got
a union? This doesn't even make sense to me.
Speaker 1 (19:49):
That's just how the system was set up in LA
is everybody wants to be seen, everyone wants everybody wants
to be seen, and that they'll do these sets of
peanuts and hoping to get audition out of it, or
hoping there's a casting director sitting in the crowd and
it will lead to other things. But I'm like, when
I came here, I was like, I'm a comedian. I
don't care about being an actor. I'm a comedian. Like
(20:14):
there are in LA there's a lot of actors pretending
to be comedians, so they they ah, I stand up
as a way to get as a calling card to
get on TV. Then once they get on TV, they
never do stand up again. Whereas I am a comedian
first and foremost. If I could make half a million
(20:35):
or a million a year just doing stand up. I
would never step foot in an auditional room, do you
know what I mean?
Speaker 2 (20:42):
Yeah, that was me.
Speaker 1 (20:43):
So when I came here, I was like, I want
to do stand up. I don't care about whether there's
a casting agent sitting in the crowd. I want to
make a living doing what I do, which is stand up.
And I struggled for seven years in LA earning peanuts,
and I'd have to keep going. So every month I
have to go back to England. I'd call my agent
in England and I'd go time for bankfrade and I'd
(21:06):
fly back to England through a bunch of shows, make
my money, and then bring that money back to LA
and live off that money because I was making no
money in La.
Speaker 3 (21:15):
Hey, everybody, we gotta pay some bills and we will
be right back with Gina Yahara.
Speaker 4 (21:20):
Every champion and carry champions. To be a champion, a
champion and carry champion and carry chat be out a
champion and carry chapion and carry chaffray is the sports
and entertainment and naked work.
Speaker 3 (21:38):
Kerry.
Speaker 4 (21:38):
Champion and carry champion is to be a champion, a
champion and carry champion nigger shot a champion and carry
champion and carry chap.
Speaker 2 (21:47):
Entertainment and naked Word.
Speaker 3 (21:49):
Welcome back to this edition of Naked Actress, Comedian, all
around Badass.
Speaker 2 (21:54):
Gina Yashara is still here with us.
Speaker 3 (21:57):
You said it's time for a bank raid, you needed
to go and get your cash, come back here, And well,
why did you want to just stay there in the UK?
Why did you want to quote unquote do it here
in the States.
Speaker 1 (22:10):
Because I'd hit a glass ceiling as a black comedian
in England, I'd hit a glass ceiling and he made
I got to a certain level of fame and fourteen
and I was coming up with white comedians who were
very similar to me talent, and they were where I
was selling theaters based on my own hard work. You know,
(22:31):
I could sell out a two thousand seat a theater.
Perhaps my white peers were able to do seventeen thousand
sea stadiums because they were given a lot more opportunities
to be on TV. I'd always be the guest on
someone else's TV, but I could never get on someone
else's TV show.
Speaker 2 (22:50):
But I could never get my own TV show as
a black woman.
Speaker 1 (22:53):
Whereas my white peers who I came up with were
all getting their own TV shows, which then led to
them being a exposed to a much larger audience, which
meant they can go and do these massive tours. And
I was never going to get to that because the
TV industry in England is run by old white men
who only give TV shows to other white men. So
(23:14):
I'd hit a glass ceiling. And for me, as a
child living in England, I'd always known from the age
of four, I knew that England was not where I
was supposed to be. I was supposed to be in America.
From childhood, I thought American kids had a better life.
You know, every TV show I saw was American kids
running each to hang out with their friends on the
beach and riding bikes around town solving crimes.
Speaker 2 (23:37):
So I always.
Speaker 1 (23:40):
That the kids in America had a much better life.
So from childhood, I wanted to be in America. Even
when I worked as an engineer, I worked for Otis,
which was an American company, because my plan was to
transfer and becoming an engineer in America. Always my plan
(24:00):
had always been to come to America from the age
of four. So then when I started doing comedy, I
was like, well, America is the home of comedy, so
one day I'm going to go to America and do comedy.
So even when I started out, even when I was
doing really well in England, i'd fly out to America
every year and just go to comedy clubs and just
go up and do my stuff, just to see if
(24:21):
my stuff traveled.
Speaker 2 (24:22):
So I knew I could perform in America long before
I moved.
Speaker 1 (24:27):
Here, because I was out here coming out on vacations
again in New York, going to Miami and just going
up at comedy clubs and going I'm a comedian from England.
Let me go up and do five minutes. You don't
even have to pay me, And I'd just go up
and do five minutes. So I always knew, and I
knew that I and when I hit that glass ceiling
in England, that was even more you know, of an
(24:48):
incentive for me to get the hell out, Yeah, to
do what you are So you it's interesting you knew.
I feel like Hollywood is running by white man, but you, yeah.
Speaker 3 (24:57):
You there is, but there is more of an app
opportunity for you to thrive then there is one in
the UK.
Speaker 2 (25:05):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (25:06):
I always say that I hit the glass ceiling in
the UK and I was probably making at that point
one hundred and fifty grand a year.
Speaker 2 (25:13):
Uh huh.
Speaker 1 (25:13):
But when you hit the glass heel, the glass ceiling
for black performers in America is much higher than the
one in the un Yeah.
Speaker 2 (25:21):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, you want to play hit the.
Speaker 1 (25:25):
Glass ceiling in America, I can hit the glass ceiling
as a millionaire.
Speaker 3 (25:29):
Uh huh.
Speaker 2 (25:30):
You know you're right, You're right, you know you're right.
Speaker 1 (25:31):
You're I was like, I'd rather go to America and
hit that glass ceiling because I'll be a millionaire when
I hit it, and I can cry in my money.
Speaker 2 (25:39):
Yeah it's so awful air, but I've got my money.
Speaker 3 (25:45):
So then you you come here, you get on the
circuit eight seventy five, something I'll never ever forget as
a robbery. And but it is.
Speaker 2 (25:54):
I do I know the scene. I'm very familiar with
how people are like, this is this societ. You're going
to make it. You start working.
Speaker 3 (26:01):
How long does it take you in terms of years,
five years, six years, where you find it to a
point where you are moving comfortably and not making eight
to seventy five a show.
Speaker 2 (26:14):
After I moved to New York.
Speaker 1 (26:16):
So I was in LA for seven years, and then
in those seven years, every year I'd fly to New
York and just ingratiate myself with all the comedy clubs
in New York. So I got into the Seller, I
got into the Gotham Comedy Club, and I just started
getting and that I do like two or three weeks
in New York. And the comedy clubs in New York
(26:39):
paid decently, not as much as they paid in England,
but you could do a bunch of sets around New York.
Get one hundred and twenty dollars here, one hundred here,
eighty dollars here, so over a weekend you could make
one thousand to twelve hundred to fifteen hundred dollars over
a weekend to doing sets all over New York, just
(26:59):
running around New York doing different comedy clubs, because they
paid anywhere between fifty and one hundred and thirty dollars
for a set. Some clubs even paid two hundred dollars
a set. So I was like, oh, the comedy clubs
in New York, it's it's merit based. It's not based
on who your agent though is because in La. I
couldn't get on it a lot of the comedy clubs
(27:20):
in LA because I didn't have a big name agent
who could make a call and get me on stage there,
whereas in comedy in New York, the comedy clubs it
was more merit based.
Speaker 2 (27:31):
If you're good, you got booked. So I'd go. When
I was living in LA, I fly to New York
every year.
Speaker 1 (27:37):
And I'd come back to LA with my pockets full
of fat, and I was like, Oh, if I go
to New York, I can actually make.
Speaker 2 (27:49):
A somewhat.
Speaker 1 (27:49):
I've been living in New York while I'm waiting for
the big break. So I left LA after seven years.
I'm like, I'm going to New York because I want
to do comedy.
Speaker 2 (27:58):
I don't want to.
Speaker 1 (27:59):
I don't want to go auditions. I can't do an
American accent. I don't want to play on Young Sheldon.
Speaker 2 (28:05):
I want to be.
Speaker 1 (28:10):
I didn't want that. So I was like a lot
of my agents kept sending me auditions and I was like,
I don't want that. I'm not going to turn up
for this audition. You know, I'm not going to learn
an American accent so I can be the fucking's the sassy.
Speaker 3 (28:29):
Or you know, yeah exactly. I know, we just need
some diversity in this episode, so I put in the
like security.
Speaker 2 (28:37):
Yeah, so I.
Speaker 1 (28:40):
Refuse to go for those auditions. So I was like,
I'm going to go to New York and do comedy
there and and I'm just going to do comedy and
then from there I will try and get booked to
comedy clubs about the country. It just try to make
a living. So I moved to New York, and in
between my the road gigs where I'd go to comedy
(29:01):
club in whatever, Philadelphia and do a weekend at a
comedy club, I'd be able to work in the city
so I didn't have to go to London so often
to do the bank rates because I could work and
earn my rent money doing comedy clubs in New York.
And then from then I started to get booked for
you know, I booked my first I made. I started
(29:23):
making my own specials. So I was trying to get
stand up specials on show Time and Netflix and and
nobody would give me a special. So I was like, well,
then fuck you guys, and to make my own special.
Speaker 2 (29:36):
So my first.
Speaker 1 (29:37):
Special I made in London in two thousand and eight,
went to London, sold out a two thousand seater theater,
booked my own camera crew, my own director, and shot
my own special good for Real. And then I got
that special and I sent it to Showtime and I
was like, what do you think of it? And they
(29:58):
were like, this is nice.
Speaker 2 (30:00):
Why off you? We'll option it for a year. So
that's what they did.
Speaker 1 (30:04):
I sold my first special called Skiddy Bitch to show
Time and they paid me a lump time.
Speaker 2 (30:10):
It wasn't a lot of money. It was like maybe
fifty sixty grand.
Speaker 1 (30:15):
Well that was a nice chunk of money that I
could go, Oh, I could live on this is I
could live on this for a good year while I'm
still hustling to make it. Yes, So I did that.
I sold that first special to Showtime. Then I made
my second special. I made in San Francisco. Nobody knew
who I was. I was still living in LA. It
(30:36):
was just it was in the interim between the time
I was moving from because I spent a year closing
down my life in LA to New York. I spent
a year just slowly winding everything down. And it was
in that year I shot my second special, Laughing to America.
I shot it in San Francisco. I didn't want to
shoot it in LA because LA audiences are full of
actors who were.
Speaker 3 (30:57):
Not that's all this and there, and they're not generous
with their laughter either. There's stingy. I was like, let
me shooting in San Francisco, where there's real people.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
Book. I rented a theater nine months in advance in
San Francisco, just rented this theater. Nobody knew who I was,
So what I would do for the next nine ten months.
Every weekend, I would fly or drive to Los Angeles
is from Los Angeles to San Francisco, and I'd go
round every comedy club, every venue in San Francisco and
(31:34):
do shows for free.
Speaker 2 (31:36):
Go up and go, Can you just let me do
five minutes?
Speaker 1 (31:38):
You'll have to pay me, and I'd go up and
do a set I'd kill and then after those sets,
I'd stand outside handing out flyers with my special by
work that I was shooting nine months later, and I'd
do that every weekend for nearly a year. I did that,
and by doing that, I managed to sell out this
little three hundred and fifty seater theater go free loss
(32:00):
in San Francisco, and then I flew my director over
from London from England to so I got an Airbnb.
I've got a house in San Francisco and Airbnb, and
I flew everybody from England because it was cheaper to
fly my guy from America to direct their special, then
(32:23):
to book an American direct couldn't afford an American one,
so I flew him over and then he sourced the
camera crew in San Francisco, so he did all the
technical stuff.
Speaker 2 (32:35):
I concentrated.
Speaker 1 (32:36):
I'm getting the theater selling tickets, sold this place out,
and then I shot my own special in last that
in San Francisco. Shot the special in San Francisco, got
the DVD, and then was like who wants it?
Speaker 3 (32:51):
So you were like a legit how rappers back in
the day, did you gave out your comedic mixtapes like so,
let me just tell you.
Speaker 2 (33:00):
This is the highest hit on the bike, go ahead
and get it. Good for you? Yeah, good fore you.
Speaker 1 (33:05):
Yes, I made my special selling it at shows and
then I ended up option in that one to MBC Ciso.
Do you remember when MBSC tried to do their own
version of Netflix. It was called Siso, No, I don't.
It lasted about.
Speaker 2 (33:22):
But you got sold it.
Speaker 1 (33:24):
But I told them the special and they paid me
a nice chunk for that. And then when Ciso died
a death, the ownership of the Special reverted back to me.
Speaker 2 (33:35):
Them.
Speaker 1 (33:37):
Yeap, I sold it to them because the what I
used to do, I didn't sell this them out right.
I'd go, you could have it for twelve months, so
they kind they kind It was like a lease almost.
So when SISO went defunct, the Special converted back to
me as owner, and I resold it Serious. So now
I made it into a sound file and now Serious
(34:00):
and I get checks every month from my specials playing
on Serious.
Speaker 2 (34:05):
And so tell story is sure you're rich, is what
you're trying to tell us. I'm not rich. I'm definitely.
Speaker 1 (34:13):
Riched from that, but I earned a good living from
it that was able to sustain me while I was hustling.
And then I started, you know that, I got booked
on the daily shows a British corresponden, So that didn't
pay much money, but it got me a little bit
of notoriety, notoriety which helped get other things U the
(34:33):
moment I started, so I was earning good living. You know,
at that point, I was comfortable. You know, I wasn't
earning by a house money in America, but I was
earning rent a nice place money, you know what I mean.
I've never had a roommate. I've never done any of that.
Even when I came to La, I had my own apartment.
I was like, I'm I'm a grown ass woman. I'm
(34:57):
not doing roommates and I have to because I owned.
I owned property before I came here.
Speaker 2 (35:02):
I owned Yeah. Yeah, yeah, you lived a whole nother
life that you just couldn't have a house on. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (35:07):
Yeah, yeah, I had a house I have. So I
was like, I'm not going I'm gonna come ahead and
start again for less money and make no money. But yeah,
I would not compromise on my living situation.
Speaker 2 (35:18):
I have to have my own. Yeah, and no one
wants to be bothered. Who wants to be bothered? Okay,
So I will ask this.
Speaker 3 (35:23):
Then you get this, you get you get this CBA show,
Bob Heart's Abbi shola Am I saying.
Speaker 2 (35:30):
It right, Yeah, that's when everything changed.
Speaker 3 (35:35):
So tell me now, I was thinking, as you're telling
this story, you're a very specific type of actor, like
that's what you The role you would get would be
who you are, you know, not who you are, but
you didn't have to change too much of yourself.
Speaker 2 (35:48):
Tell me about the role you play on this show
and how that impacted your life.
Speaker 1 (35:54):
Well, originally I didn't start as an actor on the show.
I wasn't meant to be an actor on the show
I got. When I was living in New York. I
got a call from Chuck Glory's production company that they
were the Chuck had an idea for this TV show,
but he wanted a Nigerian comedian to help him create it,
(36:16):
so he just finished Michael Molly. He wanted to make
another show about another couple, but he didn't want to
make another Michael Molly. He wanted the female protagonist to
be an African woman, and so they called me over
ostensibly to help them create the show, help them write it,
because they're like, we're three white guys, we don't know
how to write about Africans. It's going to be an immigrant,
(36:38):
you know, the it's gonna be immigrants. We need someone
you can help us write. So I came on originally
as a consultant. Then I went from consultant to co
co creator and producer Yay and then so I was
helping them write the pilot, and obviously I'm a comedian
and my dream has always been to be the funny
(36:59):
best friend in a sitcom.
Speaker 2 (37:01):
So I wrote myself in as her best friend.
Speaker 1 (37:04):
I didn't want the lead role because I was like,
I don't want the lead role because I'm going to
be writing this show. But the funny best friend is
always the fun gets the best lines, and I don't
have to carry the show. It's not based on me. Yeah,
so let's get some beautiful woman to be the lead,
lead actress and let me be the funny friend. So
I wrote myself in as the best friend. The character
(37:25):
is kind of based on my mother and how my
mother is around her friends. I was Shore based on
my mom, the harsh side of my mom, the serious mother,
you know, matriarchside of my mom.
Speaker 2 (37:37):
And then to Kenny is based on my mom when
she's around her friends.
Speaker 4 (37:42):
Every champion and carry Champion is to be a champion,
a champion and carry Chatpi and in carry Chat Beta
Champion and carry Chatty and in carry Chat Great is
the Sports and Entertainment and Naked Wok. Harry champion and
Carrie Chappy is to be a Champia champion. They carry
(38:02):
Chatty and they champion. They carry Chappy and they carry
Chafra is the sporting entertainment.
Speaker 3 (38:08):
You all right, so you're you're the best friend is Kimmy,
who's based off how your mom behaves around her friends.
And Shola is based off of your mother. So you
had the shee, you have the the best lines, and
you wrote yourself in. Now did you write yourself in
as a series regular or you just wrote yourself in
for just the pilot. Originally I was just Kemmy, didn't
(38:31):
even have a name. She was woman on the bus
and she wrote the pilot and Chuck comes in one day.
Because they didn't know, I didn't tell them I wanted
that part.
Speaker 1 (38:41):
I just kept I was subliminately feeding them information, going,
you know what, you know, Abishchola needs a best friend,
don't you think she needs a question? But I didn't
tell them that I wanted that role. So then one
day Chuck comes in and goes, Okay, this pilot is
almost finished. I think it's going to be a goer.
I think CBS is gonna like it. If you want
the role, of Abishchola. You're gonna have to order and
(39:01):
I went, I don't want the role of that Bashola
and they were like what. I was like, I want
and I pointed to the whiteboard and I was like,
woman on the bus. I want woman on the bus.
And he looked at me and he was like, they're
very fucking smart. So originally she was just a guest,
(39:21):
but that was only because they didn't know what I
was bringing to this law because Chuck and them a
lot had just found me. If I tell the story
when when I asked them how they found me when
they brought me over to LA for our first meeting,
I was like, how did you find me? And I'm
assuming they were going to go, oh, we've seen you
on Netflix specials, we saw you on the Daily Show,
we've seen you on the Tonight Show.
Speaker 2 (39:42):
We'd be following your work. What they said was, oh, no,
we googled Nigerian female comedian. Yo, are you serious?
Speaker 1 (39:52):
That is how they found me. So they didn't know
anything about me. They just went they googled Nigerie comedian.
Set that I'd done on TV in England came up
and they were like, oh, she's funny. Get her over
here for this meeting. Wow.
Speaker 2 (40:07):
So they'd done no research on me.
Speaker 1 (40:10):
No, I want to say.
Speaker 2 (40:10):
I was like, that was it. They just googled one
person and.
Speaker 1 (40:13):
That was it. Yep, they googled and I was the
best one that came up because I'm the best. And
they were like where is she and they were like, Oh,
she's in New York. Fantastic, get her over for a meeting.
So they flew me from New York to LA for
this meeting. So they'd done no research. So when So
when I created this best friend character, they just assumed
(40:34):
it was just going to be a guest starring character
that might pop in once every ten episodes. But what
they didn't know is that I had a long career
of creating characters in England for television and the character
this was a character that I'd been waiting to play
on a sick camp for years. I knew that once
they saw this character, they were going to fall in
(40:56):
love with this character. So we shot the pilot. Now,
in the pilot, my character had literally three lines in
the whole pilot, but when they put the trailer of
the show out, every one of those three lines was
on the trailer, so they obviously saw the character and
they were like, oh, we love this character. And then
(41:16):
obviously I'm in the writer's room, so I'm writing. So
for the first few episodes of season one, I was
just guest star getting guest star rates, which was a
fraction of what the other actors were getting. But I'm
in the writer's room, so I'm seeing that I'm in
every episode, because every time we wrote an episode, Chuck
(41:36):
will come into the room and go, wait, I don't
see Kenny put Kemy in. So I called my agent
and I was like, listen, I'm we were episode eight.
Speaker 2 (41:47):
We got to so far of the.
Speaker 1 (41:50):
You know, the story setups, the outlines of these stories,
where we've outlined eight episodes so far, and Kemy's in
every single one of them. So you need to go
back and get me bumped up from guest star because
this is obviously I'm a series regular now, but I'm
not getting series regular money. So my agent went back
and reallygotiated, and I became a series regular.
Speaker 3 (42:15):
I I love it.
Speaker 2 (42:20):
You're so you don't understand how this is really so
right on time for me.
Speaker 3 (42:23):
I love it. I love your hustle. I love it
whatever it takes. I love how smart you are. I
love how you were fighting for yourself always. I love
how you didn't want the main role because everyone was
all about I want to be on TV.
Speaker 2 (42:35):
You're like, I want to do the real y'all. Remember,
I love it. I love it, I love it. Congratulations
to you. Just amazing. Do you ever just sit in
marvel at what you've been able to accomplish? No, because
I'm so competitive.
Speaker 1 (42:50):
I'm like, all right, and you know, sometimes you know,
and sometimes I've had to force myself to sit down
and just enjoy the moment because I was joy I'm like,
I've got to sit Come on TV. I'm making amazing
money now and I've managed to buy two houses in
Los Angeles off of it.
Speaker 3 (43:10):
I'm like, I'm doing well. I'm billing The first check
was eight that was in seventy five cents. Yeah, and
I got two houses. Talk yo, Gina, I am so
happy for you. My producer's gonna have to bleep out
all my curse words. Oh yeah, sorry, No, No, it
doesn't matter.
Speaker 2 (43:30):
I'm kidding. I'm joking. She's probably be like, y'all silly.
I will say this. I will say this.
Speaker 3 (43:36):
What when you what is it about ambitious people that
can't appreciate what you have? Because I see the distance,
and when you tell this story, I'm marveling. All I
imagine is seeing you out there. Let me just have
five minutes driving back and forth and ride to California.
Excuse me, LA to San Francisco's not a small one.
It's a nine to eight hour drive. You're going back
(43:58):
and forth for a year. You're maybe you're flying, maybe
you're driving. You're selling yourself so that you can sell yourself,
and you like.
Speaker 2 (44:04):
I'm a flower on my own.
Speaker 3 (44:05):
You're doing everything it takes because they wouldn't do it
for you, So I'm gonna do it myself.
Speaker 2 (44:10):
Do you see the distance between then and now?
Speaker 1 (44:15):
Yes, I definitely do. And I have to sit down,
you know, because and I tell you what you know,
as I've got a big competitive spirit, so I often
you know, Instagram and these social medias is a good thing,
is a bad thing? Yeah, because you're watching other people
and going have they got that I'm fair?
Speaker 2 (44:34):
Then they are.
Speaker 1 (44:35):
I was doing a lot of that and I had
to you know, And I tell you when everything changed
for me before I got this show. I one day,
I sat myself down and I was getting very angry
and very bitter when things weren't going my way, and
I was like, why am I struggling so much when
I'm this good and you got these mediocre people just
sailing through and just getting opportunities after opportunity. And then
(44:58):
he had that to set myself down and listen, you're
doing comedy for a living. You're making a very good
living doing something you love. Ninety nine percent of people
on a planet and not doing things that they love
for a living, You're doing something you love. You're traveling
the world and telling jokes, and that is paying your bills.
(45:19):
Stop complaining, stop looking sideways at other people, and just
concentrate on enjoying this journey. And that slight changing mindset
open the world up for me. The moment I started
doing that, It's like the universe was like, oh, okay,
you're ready now. And that's when everything started to click
(45:41):
into place. Then the specials started coming, I started getting
more TV work, and then this show landed, and that
was after I went I'm just going to enjoy the journey.
So now I'm doing with you well, making good money.
I have to try and sit myself down again because
now I'm like, now, why are getting any nominations? Why
(46:02):
is this show getting any nominations?
Speaker 2 (46:04):
And we ain't.
Speaker 1 (46:05):
I'm getting into that mindset again, so I have to
sit down and go, Gina h seven years ago, you
would have killed to be in the position you're in now,
where you're a show runner. You wouldn't even have known
you And I had no intention of writing on TV shows.
People were offering me writing gigs for years, and I
refused because I was like, I don't want to work
in no office. I don't want no one telling me
(46:26):
what to do, and I've heard horror stories about how writers'
rooms are for black writers.
Speaker 2 (46:31):
So I never took writing gigs. Now I'm show running
a show.
Speaker 1 (46:36):
I'm the show runner, yeah, and I'm you know, I'm
hiring black writers and I'm making sure that yeah, they're
that they they you know that they will get opportunities
going forward from this. I provided work for black actors
that wouldn't have got anything in this industry. So I
had to sit myself down and go, five years ago,
(46:58):
you would never have known that you'd been in the
position you're in now. Yeah, joy it it's an adventure.
A don't be looking at other people's TV shows and
comparing yourself. So I've gotta set I'm gonna do that
mindset changing.
Speaker 2 (47:13):
You gotta you gotta if you need me to hype
you up. But you did get a good black woman
to hype up another one. I feel that's neither. I'm
so imported, Gina.
Speaker 3 (47:21):
You have motivated me, like in my world and what
I do. I love this because I'm gonna go get it.
You're not gonna give it to me. I'm going to
take it. You're gonna give me a special I'll make
my own. I exactly want wait for the gatekeepers to
validate you. You gotta go take the power you want
because they're not giving it away.
Speaker 2 (47:41):
A man. A'men okay, So in that same vein, but
still keeping focused on focus. What's next? What can I tell?
Speaker 3 (47:49):
Obviously we need to watch Bob Heart's Abby Shola, and
then we also Bob as in Bob Hearts as in
Love's Abby Shola, and that's on CVS, and then.
Speaker 2 (48:01):
And it's on Max. I think it's on Max, and
I think it's amaz.
Speaker 1 (48:05):
Yeah, it was on Age the first three seasons one
on HBO, Max but I no, that's now changed to Max.
I think it might have migrated over to Max. And
I've seen it on Amazon Prime, so it's out there
to watch. It is easy to find, and I will
be the biggest advocate can I? And then what else
do you have? Are you in it?
Speaker 2 (48:21):
Are you doing any stand up? Coming up soon?
Speaker 3 (48:23):
In La?
Speaker 2 (48:24):
I'm doing a tour right now called The Woman King
of Comedy. A yeah, and where can I find out more?
Word website?
Speaker 1 (48:33):
But my website, Gina Yashave dot com. Just go to
the website. I've got all the links for all the shows.
I'm doing New York next month. I'm doing San Francisco,
I'm doing Chicago, I'm doing Portland, Detroit, Los Angeles, and
I'm sure I'm missing one, but they're all listed on
my website Genie dot com The Woman King of Comedy.
(48:54):
It's gonna be really fun, show me a couple of comedians,
probably gonna get some DJ on stage so we can
have fun.
Speaker 2 (49:01):
It's gonna be a good night. So I'm doing that.
Speaker 1 (49:05):
I've got a book, a memoir out called cat Candied,
which means left handed.
Speaker 3 (49:09):
And yeah, but when did you? When did you write that?
I was going to ask you about when did you
read I wrote that in the first few months of
the pandemic the shutdown. So I got the deal a
year before I got the TV show, but I'm a
terrible procrastinator and hadn't.
Speaker 1 (49:24):
A word. And then I got the TV show and
I was like, oh my god, I don't know how
I'm gonna have time to write this book because I'm
now writing this TV show.
Speaker 2 (49:32):
And then the pandemic happened and I was like, Okay,
that's given me nothing but time. Yeah, And I wrote
that book during the first four months of the pandemic.
Speaker 1 (49:46):
Go for You. That came out last year in the States,
and it came out in paperback recently in England and
after Bob Harts that's the next show I'm working on.
Speaker 2 (49:56):
I'm going to be turning that memoir.
Speaker 1 (49:58):
Into a scripted series, like a grittier version of Everybody
Hates Chris. So it's gonna be yeah, like you know,
the book covers my life from birth to the day
I step on a plane to move to America, So
it's gonna be covering different aspects of my life and
it's gonna be me narrating it. Hopefully with a younger
(50:19):
actor playing me. And it's been gritty, it's gonna be live.
And this is the moment I decided to punch the
bitch in the face, you know. So that will be
the next project. But the next immediate stuff is, Yeah,
I'm on tour, the Woman King of Comedy coming to
your city.
Speaker 2 (50:36):
We're putting this all in the note. They will find it.
Speaker 3 (50:38):
I will also post it on Instagram and every other
social media outlet that I have. Gina, thank you for
inspiring us today. And I am truly, I'm truly moved
by your hustle because I thought I had hustle. You're like, no,
let me just move over. Let mession good for you,
and let me share what this hustle looks like. Now.
Speaker 2 (50:55):
You deserve it all. You deserve it all. You deserve
it all and more.
Speaker 3 (50:58):
And I hope you can really appreciate the distance. That's
what I try to for myself, see where it used
to be, where I am. Thank you, thank you, thank
you for coming on, Nate, thank you, thanks for having me.
And again, don't forget you need to go get her
memoirs called cac Handled. It's basically about her life story
everything she shared with us, but more detail, more gritty,
(51:20):
and obviously more entertaining. I appreciate her coming on the show.
I feel motivated. I feel also the need to say
I should appreciate the distance. I am giving you all
that message today. You may not be exactly where you
want to be in your personal life or in your
professional life, but you can always see the distance. I
say that a lot, but it's so true. I'm in
(51:41):
this phase of my life where I'm just trying to
appreciate what I've accomplished, although I still have so much
more to do, and we're always on our own timeline.
But when it's supposed to be, it is supposed to be.
Gina Yaesharee, thank you for that message, and thank you
all for listening. Naked back next week.
Speaker 2 (52:01):
Have a good one y'all. H
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