Sarah Jones

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Today's quote is from Lift as You Climb by viv
gross Scop. She's talking about this exercise where she encourages
people to say their full name and their title out
loud when introducing themselves because so few of us do,
and she says with a lovely amount of tough love,
if you cannot say your name properly and confidently, and

(00:24):
you cannot say your job title without cringing, then I
really do question whether you are using your one precious
life in the way that you could be using it.
It's a great exercise for figuring out whether you're okay
with who you are, and maybe a sense of self
is what a lot of this work is really about.
Are you okay with who you are? If so, be

(00:47):
it and say it. If you're not, then change something.
This sounds easy, but it is the work of a
lifetime to be at ease with yourself. Welcome to the podcast.
That's all about the Voice, which means it's all about power.

(01:10):
Who has it, how we get it, how we sound
when we have it. I'm your host, Samarve, and this
is permission to speak, where we can throw all our
best ideas about how to get ourselves heard into the
pot and Start. Today's guest is Sarah Jones. She has

(01:36):
one Tony Award and an Obie Award for her one
woman shows, starting with Bridge and Tunnel, which was originally
produced by Meryl Streep and then went on to Broadway.
Her TED mainstage talks have gotten millions and millions of views,
and I truly hope you go and check them out

(01:56):
after this if you haven't seen them already. She has
performed for the Bamba's. I mean, she's friends with Gloria
Steinham and Brian Stevenson and is a legend. I wanted
to have her on for obviously all of these reasons,
but also because I remember the feeling when I saw
her first TED talk, which was like fifteen years ago.

(02:17):
She does funny voices, guys, but I mean she does
so much more than that. She inhabits the bodies and
the worlds of the people that she plays, so that
the voices emerge out of the life experiences and hopes
and fears of the characters, which is how our voices work,

(02:37):
as I always like to talk about. And I mean
the other thing is that the people who live in
her and by the way it come out, all the time,
and it is bonkers and amazing. The people who live
in her are wrestling with their identities and with the
promise or the fake promise of the American dream. And

(02:57):
something that we talk about in this interview, which is
the very real urge to speak when it becomes stronger
than the fear of being seen and being heard. And
I loved this conversation and how much wisdom she is
full of as well as forces and uh, we went

(03:18):
a little long. You'll see why this is Sarah. I've
looked back over some of the videos where I'm like,
oh my god, did you really, you know, put yourself
into a public forum looking like that? And what it
teaches me is I'm too focused on how I look.

(03:40):
But that's the work. The work, the opportunity is like
a messy, it's a pandemic. I'm in the hospital, I'm
out of the hospital. I don't know how to talk
about that. I'm going to say all of that instead
of hiding it. And what it has done is opened
up a lot of space for me to feel a
little bit more connected. Although we can talk about zoom
and I'm not a social scientist a neurologist, but I'm

(04:01):
convinced that there's a sort of a you know, like
there must be a cognitive dissonance that's happening for all
of us collectively because we can FaceTime, we can zoom,
we can WhatsApp or whatever, but you're not here. And
so I'm sort of tricked into feeling like I could
reach out and hug somemorrow right now, but you know,
I'm like, hey, there's nothing there. And I had this

(04:23):
boyfriend who didn't like to face time, and I was like,
what's down and hey, and he was like, it's not real, Sarah.
He was like this Vermont snowboarder, like you know, he
wanted to like hug trees and like rip them out
of the ground. I don't know, but he really made
this point that it's it is real, but it isn't.
And there was something very beautiful about that. And I'm
experiencing it now. It is connected, but I want to

(04:44):
be clear with myself. I'm not getting human you know,
unmitigated eye contact and hug. I mean, and what you're
dipping into is also something that we're that we've had
to deal with for our entire lives as technology has
progressed like this and our physical bodies are all the
bodies of people from thousands of years ago, exactly, and
like there is something in our brain that is making

(05:05):
that connection, that is saying, especially in times like this
where we need connection, that is saying, this is good enough.
This is a ghost hug, right, it's I will, I
will envision a hug, I will see you, and those
two things together will do something that's better than nothing.
But on the other hand, no, it's not the same
as a real hug. Not the same. Sarah, Hi, Hi,

(05:26):
how are you, my love? I'm okay, I'm okay. I
mean all everything you're talking about, it's so true. I think, um,
you were talking about the concept of lowering expectations and
I act right and reframing it as broadening. And I
actually wonder also if it's the expectations themselves that we

(05:48):
should be taking a closer look at, you know, I
mean a lot of this, a lot of what we
were talking about was the expectations we've set up for
ourselves of what it would look like if we had
everything put together. Yes, the myth, the myth of you know,
we've all talked about it, the superwoman who has to
juggle everything and um, even as we try to get

(06:10):
into less you know, gender normative conversations about family. And
I'm not a mom, but I remember my mom who
it's interesting in this time of COVID, I'm thinking about
doctors differently. Both my mom and dad were doctors. Guess
who was responsible for maintaining you know, all the household
stuff and the kids. And my mom still she went

(06:31):
and delivered babies and was still expected to keep it
all together. And I think we haven't strayed very far
from that. We've just sort of ignored our limitation, like
our normal, healthy human limitations, and so we multitask and
we buy a million systems and things to keep ourselves,
you know, impossibly efficient and together. And I don't think

(06:55):
it's healthy for anybody. I was so excited to have
you on this podcast about voices, because hello, hello, we're
all here. By the way, we're all here, well good,
oh good high. I can't wait to maybe here a little. Um.
They're all welcome, and this is my first podcast with
like ten people. But you know what I was thinking is,
you know, like it's such a surface level thing to

(07:18):
say that you do voices, because you know, yes you do,
and they're brilliant. And also you bring fully inhabited other
people onto the stage with you. I mean, for anyone
who's loosen your shows, starting with Bridge and Tunnel, which
ended up on Broadway, it's it's just you, but it's
also truly not thinking that you could do quote unquote

(07:41):
do funny voices and end up on Broadway. Like you
know what I mean. It was so wild to me
that the thing I had always done. I mean this
Lorraine Levin, oh idea, I brought my glasses. She even
though you can't shaming, which seems show hilly, but I
I if I can't, if I don't have my glasses,
I can't see any way, Sheeris started doing the voices,

(08:03):
like she says, because her family, you know, she came
from the multicultural family, the black, the white. They intermarried
and all. It's very normal now. But anyway, um, I
think that it kept her feeling um playful as your child.
You know that she could do that, and she would
do it with her friends. I would I would do

(08:25):
I would do that with my friends. I know, I know.
It's so interesting. It makes me think of you said,
I believe it was your first Ted talk. This is
a direct Sarah John's quote. You said, we're all born
into certain circumstances, with particular physical traits, unique developmental experiences,
geographical and historical contexts. But then what to what extent

(08:46):
do we self construct? To what extent do we self invent?
How do we self identify? And how mutable mutable is
that self identity? You know, obviously I came up through
doing dialect coaching with act or so it's in a
literal way. You know, when we put on a new accent,
what does it reveal to us about how that character

(09:07):
has gone through their life and how they hold their body,
and you know, how does it inform us? But it's
not just for actors. I mean that's really you know,
the heart of this work is what we're both talking
about in different ways, is how our life experiences are
reflected in our voice and what that says about how
we how we are perceived by others and how we

(09:29):
perceive ourselves. And also the part I want to talk
to you about is like this mutability issue, this idea
that like certain things we don't have control over and
then what do we do with the things we do? Yeah,
thank you for that. I really as I was listening
to I was like, did I say that? But I
do remember writing that. I remember writing it because it
felt so true for me. It felt so kind of

(09:52):
essential as a question, who the hell am I? I
mean that really it was like who am I? Anyway?
Like like you said, how much does the outside gave
days of others? You know, inform who I am? Decide
who I am, decide whether I live or die? You know,
if you're a black or brown man or woman. Uh,
in an encounter with police, like how you're perceived, your

(10:14):
voice can be the difference between your survival or not. Um,
so I will. I never want to be one of
those people who says, oh, you get to decide completely
everything about your fate. Absolutely not Yes, And we do
have right like we do. I mean the performance that
you help an act or find hopefully is as authentic

(10:36):
and beautiful as whatever they can muster using the tools
you're giving them. And then like all of us are
kind of performing a life right And what you're talking
about is such an important distinction or like lack of distinction,
which is on the one hand, performing what are we
putting on? Because it's interesting because we're becoming this person
because we're acting as if and what is a coping mechanism? Yes,

(10:58):
and knowing the difference, I think there's like, you know,
I'm paid as an as an actor to go on
stage or be in a film and be someone other
than I am. Then it's like, wait a minute. If
I'm having a low self worth moment at a party
and I turned to the guy next to me and decide,
I'm just going to be a sexy Naomi Campbell version
of myself or whoever, um, which I used to do

(11:21):
by the way I would when I was really nervous
at a party. If I felt like it, I would
just sort of slip into this and you would not believe.
First of all, I thought I was sexier, right, So
then these blokes were line up around me. I had
not changed one iota. My appearance didn't change. Nothing about
me changed. But something about this voice, of this alter
ego made me feel safer because I was fearful myself,

(11:44):
and I realized, you can't do that. Number one, It
doesn't work out well for the relationship. But Elizabeth Holps
comes to mind. That's there's one cautionary tale. I could
tell you a few um It definitely makes the one
night stand. It's a lot of work to keep that up.
You gotta like maintain you know, Um, it's not easy

(12:07):
to maintend that. But I will say that's sort of
one end of the spectrum. But somewhere on that continuum,
you know, if I'm not careful, I'll pretend my way
through my day, through my life, uh, even in my
most intimate relationships and even with myself. And so I
think it is interesting whether it's voices. I mean, there's
like all my voices of like all my people. That's

(12:28):
not just a voice, Like I'm Bella, I'm a person,
you know, and like I yeah, like I exist in
a context, like a radical feminist context, Abbie, And like
you know, when I think about Bella, she's not just
a vocal fry like a concave chested you know, self
deprecating but still wanting to be you know, powerful young

(12:49):
feminist because of her voice, Like she's it's not just
a voice, it's it's all of who she believes she is.
And then how that gets questioned every moment of every day.
And are we present enough to listen? Like? Am I
present enough to hear? Wait a minute, that was an
inauthentic thing I said. Just then, I don't really mean that.
I just told that person love you by do I

(13:11):
love them like at all? Or is it you know
what I mean? Like just checking in and being like,
what am I putting out into the world? And how
is there this kind of feedback loop between me and
the world and what I think I need to be
and how I think I need to sound or look
or you know, be in my life on the socials
or whatever. And then what I'm telling myself isn't adequate

(13:34):
about me. Maybe because of that, I think there's a
loop that can get started that's this is who I
have to be. And then oh, look, I'm not actually
really measuring up. And so I'm interested in how how
can we self reinvent? You know, how can we invent
ourselves or step more fully into who we actually are

(13:56):
in a way that makes our voice more authentic, more powerful,
and ultimately more loving. Right, because when you hate yourself,
you go off and do things like make a giant tiger,
you know, uh whatever, Like I couldn't watch the whole thing.
But no, I couldn't even started. I'm too much of
like an EmPATH, Like I got through it. I got

(14:16):
through it, but I got through some of it. But
it just it reminded me like, oh, when you're alienated
from yourself, you don't have access to your authentic voice
or your wants, your needs, And then how can you
be in a community like that? So I think in
some ways, you know, being in this pandemic is, um

(14:37):
it's an odd opportunity to really listen more closely to
ourselves and like ask who am I and how do
I feel? And what do I want and what do
I need? So I've really been thinking about voice in
that context. But of course, you know, everybody else comes
along too. That's Linda. Linda never comes out. You know
why because my nails are not done, and um, Lindsay

(14:59):
is like an old wool you know, New York City,
Like the thing with the nails. She was like that man,
you know, the manicure and um, now it's like, oh
my god, my nail's a naked Like she would be
the person to be like, oh my god, don't look
at my hands. Where did you? Where did you find
Linda Long Island? I was so my mom. I mentioned
my mom's a doctor. She had a private practice all

(15:20):
Long Long Islands with a Z a z at the end.
One no, just Long Islands, but you got to hit
the sibilant at the end. So Long Islands, you know
what I mean. Um, you could be from Staten Islands.
But there has like a little zizzizza at the end
of it, not plural, just a little little the D

(15:40):
and the T, the D and the T can handle.
And then it's also a New Jersey thing like tonight
with like this little the end and um, what are
we doing Tonight's yeah, I don't know. Anyway, Lindsa Lindsa,
so there's even a little z in the Lindsa. Oh
my gou is Lindsa. You know. Um she represented the

(16:02):
sort of second third generation, you know, European immigrant wave
that then everybody went into you know, my brother is
a cop, my my sister sners, my husband's and electrician
like that, you know, sort of like this solid working
class um into middle class um white Long Island and

(16:23):
that's part of my family. Oh my guard. So anyway, um,
and then if you like went to nicest schools or whatever,
it started to come out of you. And then you
went to n y U and you completely got rid
of it because it's embarrassing. You know. There was a
lot of associations of class with accent. But that's where
Linda came from. Was she was a nurse, so she
was a she was a tech in my mom's office.

(16:43):
There was this amazing New York Times article about you
from a while ago that sort of followed you as
you approached people on the street. I guess part of
what I'm interested in is like, what is it to
approach strangers, like what is that muscle in a way
that isn't disrespectful and that isn't treating them like a
subject of like a specimen. Well, and I think I
occupy in interesting space, right because I'm a woman of

(17:06):
mixed heritage black from a distance as we say, um,
and on the kind of racial hierarchy and the gender hierarchy.
I you know, it's very different for me to approach
of sis white male, you know, straight dude and kind
of larnery talks and like spend time with them and

(17:28):
like whatever. Um, yeah, we'll leave Andrew out of this
for now. But going up to people on the street,
I think that, like I said, I feel a certain
responsibility to remember that, especially as a traditionally marginalized person. Myself,
my voice was usually you know, belittled, mocked, and so

(17:49):
I always feel like I remember, you know, listening to
a woman on the bus who hit like you know,
you can hear the Russian Ukraine, you can hear her
voice when she's talking. What is accent and the How
does it feels to um imagine what is her life?

(18:11):
Not only oh this is essential, I'm going to make
funny voice to make fun some lady who maybe have
been through hell, maybe have survived unbelievable things, Maybe is
genius in her home country, but here she comes, she
doesn't have what she's needing. How do you make sure
your your honor this person. You'll give to them what

(18:35):
they deserve like human beings. So that's my I always
really try to imagine the internal life of the person.
And then I'm not gonna get spot on every time.
But I have been observing a lot of people for
a long time. I lived in New York. I lived
in Queen's most diverse borrow in the world, and uh,
I had access to a lot of different people because

(18:56):
of my family and I went to the U N School,
So I started to get a set of like this
is a person I can approach. This is a person
I should leave alone. I was having a moment and
it's none of my business to sneak up on them.
I always when you see a photographer, and I hate
to say it, but like, you know, a nice white
hipster getting in the face of like some brown person
in Williamsburg when I left New York. That's what was

(19:17):
going on, Like I'm going to take pictures and be gritty,
and it's like, no, dude, that's actually your white privilege,
you know, and your lack of understanding that that person
doesn't belong to you, even if your intentions are good. Um.
So I think there's that right, like ownership of narratives.
And I think it's subversive for a black woman to
write for a wealthy white frat dude. That's why I

(19:41):
enjoy doing it. Yes, indeed, um, and you use do
you use voice memos and actually record them or? I
mean voice memos are basically how I get by. So
when I heard that I would need to have some
voice memo work to join you here today, I was like,
oh home, it's home of so many and I try

(20:02):
out new Oh you'll be the I have started to
work on it a little bit. Is very new and
not at all where I would like it to be.
But I started to think about in Nigeria or what
would it be if I wanted to just work on

(20:23):
that and work on that a little bit during this pandemic.
So it's starting to be fun. I'm starting to have
a good time with it. But yeah, you know, I
like voice memos. Give me that pure opportunity to feel
into something and then try it out and let it
be hairy and ugly and have words um and not

(20:45):
be where I'd like it to be yet. Or I
could just share that with your entire audience on the
theme of letting perfection go exactly and also honestly letting
us into the process, because that's you know, it's not
like you're a magician and if you give away the
there is no trick anymore. It's still magical at the end.
Don't worry. Well, that's funny that you say that, But

(21:06):
that was a huge fear of mine. I would never
I mean until so my grant, my my mom, my
mom's mom was Irish American and German American. But I
went to Ireland. I spent a lot of time there,
I spoke to loads of different people. There's so many
different accents, and I thought, I've got to have a
perfect It can't be like you can't think, oh, you know,

(21:27):
did you start off in kind of County Cork and
then migrate down to Dublin. But she can't tell what
I was so obsessive, what schools would she have gone to?
And what was the slang of the time, And it
was just it's it's spilled over out of the respect
for the character and into perfectionism, which is a subtle
form of self abuse really and abuse of the art.

(21:49):
So I I am mindful of that now that I
don't have to present a perfect I can't. There's no
such thing as perfection. I will never be perfect. I
will have X. That was such a fear. Was like
what I do is so important to me and I
believe in it so much that I wanted to be perfect.
But then it's spilled over into kind of you know,
what do they say the three peace, perfectionism, procrastination, and paralysis.

(22:13):
That's what started to happen to me as a creative
person until I got some help around it. That's really real,
that's really real. That's real I'm starting a new project
right now, and I could stand to be reminded that
those three peas are not not a path that is
going to serve me, but you. But you're forgiven for

(22:34):
you know, I mean, we're all human and we're raised
in a culture. I mean, especially in Cancel culture. Right.
It's like if I I mean, I don't want look,
there is a great extent to which there is a
reason for me one thing to I want to be excellent.
I want to bring the truth and the love of

(22:58):
this person, for example, at d who is based very loosely,
loosely on the Palestinian women that I met, who is
Jordanie and wanting to again what is her story? Not
to judge, not to decide before that, if I get

(23:19):
caught in my own head, then it is not about
her anyway. It is about me. And what do you
think of Sarah John's not what do you think of Hella?
What do you think of this you know person? So
I think like in a way, whatever you're working on,
if you remind yourself that you are it's I don't

(23:41):
want to say servant, but that's why I do. I
think of myself as a public servant. Or I work
in service of whatever it is that I think is
important enough that I need to put it out into
the world. And then I'm not allowed to say, oh,
but I'm not perfected up. I have to just suck
it up and be a worker, and you know, do
what the project asks you to do. So I'm excited

(24:02):
for whatever you're working on. Let it dictate. You don't
have to do anything except show up and be you. Yeah,
that's that's beautiful and really hard to do. Um, thank you, Sarah.
We'll be back in a moment, and we're back with

(24:24):
Sarah Jones. Okay, So when your characters are on stage
aware of the audience, Yeah, something happens to them. It's
not just them in their natural state. It's them finding
themselves in a public arena, and it feels like it's
a metaphor for all of us. How do you think
about that side of it? You know, it's really um.

(24:46):
It depends on the stage, it depends on the context.
And I find that they each have their own reaction
and their own internal conflict, which can frustrate me by
the way I want them to articulate and project. If
I'm you know, at an outdoor venue in India with
five thousand people. That's not the best time for you know,

(25:10):
I don't know Rashid to suddenly start, yeah, you know,
saying we in India and Yo, this is crazy right now.
I don't want him to. I want him to sound
better than that. But he's gonna say and experience what
he's experiencing. Um I remembering. You know, there's a character
Pauline Ling. Pauline is not her actual name, but that's

(25:31):
the name that she wanted me to eat use for her.
And she had to be on stage in front of people,
and she was very aware of it, and it's it
was always a meta thing because there's the there's the
stage in the Broadway House, and then there's who she's
really talking to, which is a small cafe audience in
her mind. And she taught she is, uh, there's people,

(25:55):
don't she does not want people to misunderstand to be
a immigrants from China, but also uh to come through
Hong Kong. This is a very difficult uh time in
her life that she had to explain that to strange

(26:17):
people and uh, this is so difficult, like maybe, um,
you don't want to say it can be shameful, uh
to talk about yourself in front of people, But that's
what she had to do for her daughter. The story
in the play was that her daughter is coming out

(26:38):
UM and at the time didn't have the right to
get married to her partner who was Chinese born and
needed the immigration status that she couldn't get at that
time because of homophobia. I couldn't get married. And so
for Mrs Ling to have to come out as like
a p flag parent, you know, and just just to

(27:01):
speak that feeling of and I will just be honest,
I know that she always felt like these idiots. Sorry,
I just need to say in her mind. I could
feel her saying, I speak two languages. They don't know
how hard it is for me to have to speak
right now in front of them, knowing my English is imperfect,
and that they might be so ignorant they don't even

(27:24):
realize I am actually the badass here. And I remember
that feeling for her. I remember my I would just
get a little a little mix of anger, UM would
come in. But and I remember that feeling of if
your mission is vital enough to you, you will tolerate
the discomfort of standing in front of a crowd and

(27:45):
saying what you need to say. Speak even if your
voice shakes, Speak even if you feel like your audience
isn't the most friendly. I remember that. That's what comes
up for me with the characters. Each of them has
their own experience of reluctance or but there's a motivation
that's stronger than their fear of being perceived as less
intelligent because they're an immigrant and they speak halting, you know,

(28:06):
English as a second language. That's the thing, that's the thing,
and that's the thing for everybody, I mean for everybody
who's listening, and for all of us. You know, obviously
there is fear that comes from public speaking because we're
being seen. And yet if our need is bigger than
our fear, and so how do we invest in what
that need is? If we if you know, if we
have to public speak for our job, for our livelihood,

(28:29):
for or whatever, how do we find the way to
make it something we want to do or we need
to do so hard that we overcome the fear side
of it. You know, what helps me remembering back to childhood,
who I was as a child before all of the
kind of messaging about um you know, image, image management,

(28:50):
how you have to sound. I mean I had so
many messages had relatives or sound like that, and I
was like, oh, I'm supposed to sound like that too.
I had to be from the West Indies and I
have to be like this a week cool. And then
I got to Washington, d c uh. My parents moved
around because they were students, medical students and all of
that when I was really little, and so I remember
arriving at the black school and all of everything I

(29:13):
thought was cool was terrible. You know. I was like
they were like, they were like, he's not like a
white girl. You know I could. I don't know. I
had just so many different ways of talking to all
my different relatives, and um, I had to learn how
to you know, I had to learn something else Sarah Jones.
You know, I had to learn how to say my
name told just a different way, and I had to

(29:34):
learn how to fake. You know. People would be like, yeah,
I was in church. I'd be like, yeah, yeah, me too.
You know. It was like I wanted to see mechanism.
This is the coping mechanism. I don't know. I may
have an a d h D diagnosis. I haven't find
it found out yet. I think it might be part
of so I don't know if I want you to
medicate it. I you know, I haven't ever done the meds,

(29:55):
which is so I mean, I think my characters are
my meds. Which is not to say that I don't
need additional man's but this reminds me. I have a
quote I want to read of yours. You said, Um,
I have to get sleep. I have to sleep for
twenty people. I feel responsible for these people, so I
have to treat them well and exercise well. I meditate
and go to therapy twice a week if I can,
because it's a lot. And this is the part I

(30:16):
want to highlight. To feel I'm feeling people's experiences every
time I do the show, and surely more than just
every time you do the show. I remember when the
stages started getting bigger, like Broadway is. You know, it's
still six hundred people a night and you do it
every night, and it's a very specific discipline. I was
like a monk, you know. It really was um like

(30:40):
this uh you know, committed relationship that I had with
these characters. It was like, all right, I you know,
what is it? I don't know, do you solemnly whatever
I swear, remember my wedding vows? Yeah, do you solemnly swear?
Do you do you? Sarah? Take these characters to be
your you know, do you do you characters? Take Sarah

(31:03):
to be your emissary, to be your vessel um until
you know ticket sales, do us part or whatever? And
it just ran and ran, and I remember the feeling
of if I don't remember to tap into the resource
of the characters. They are pure love, They're messy, they're imperfect.

(31:24):
I have a white supremacist who won't admit he's a
white Suparcy's um. I'm a European American rights advocate and
that should not make anyone laugh or or or a
raising eyebrow anymore than all of the rest of you
women and whatever the other you know, black or I

(31:44):
don't know if you can stay black anymore. Whatever you're
supposed to say about them. They can have their uh
advocate groups and we can and I don't see, you know,
Sarah Jones can make fun of me all the time
and call me all kind of names, But I know
that I want to be able to be proud to
be European, so I have to carry that dude around
with me, and I take very seriously his drudge report reading,

(32:10):
you know, Fox News believing version of America because it's
the only one he has. He is doing his best
with what he has. He is, you know, behaving as
I would if I were born into his body, into
you know, the bassinet in his house. And then remember
that there's beauty. He has beauty. Like I've been I

(32:32):
have been moved to tears by the moment of his
courage in admitting how much of a failure he he
feels himself to be because his son is not making
more money than he did in every general I mean,
like I've you know, I've done interviews where somebody interviews
him or he's interviewing somebody, and the improv that comes
out is like, oh, this is the pain of the

(32:53):
white American male, you know in Middle America that I
am not going to privilege right over the pain of
people of color and you know, working class people in
immigrants who have suffered long and hard under racism and
all the rest of it. But it gets a place.
But he gets a place. He gets a place, and
that is work for me. I don't love having to

(33:15):
engage that conversation. And yet I mean, I think that
he that all of the characters fortify me if I
let them, and I have to do the work to
make sure I'm available to receive the gift of like
communing with other people within my own body and my
own voice. Well, and this feels like it taps into
your you know, we were talking about the characters urged

(33:37):
to speak as greater than their fear, but also yours, yes, greater,
but not without a mess sometimes, and I think the
willingness to play in the spaces where it is not
neat and tidy. I haven't figured it out. I am
not cancel culture proof. Um, you know, yeah, tell me

(33:58):
about that. What responses have you gotten that have really
challenged you? You know what's interesting? I remember performing for
I mean, I did you know Ted Talks. I think
it's important to say that the bigger the platform, the
bigger the sense of responsibility and whoever that audience is.

(34:19):
I noticed self I would do some self policing around
who I brought out and when, and you know that
I had to really look at like making a choice
I went. I remember getting to perform at the White House.
It was such a it was so otherworldly to like
have these black people in the White House. This was
like two thousand nine the first time I went, I

(34:41):
got to perform there. Bring us back anything you want
to tell us about that. We just want to live
there for a sec I know, right, Can we just
go back to I guess that was the last performance
I did there or twenty something like that. That feeling
of a democratized White House, I didn't know how to bring.
I have a lady. I had somebody name miss Lady.

(35:01):
She lived on the street, and she have you know
what happened in this country when you are female and
you black, and you Paul and you don't have no
access to the same education opportunity or job opportunity or
whatever like some other people got. Some people don't want
to hear you speak and talk. They don't want to

(35:22):
hear you. They think you sound ignorant or whatever. But
I want to tell them I don't need fancy words
to be uh important person. But Saide don't didn't want
to bring me up in the White House because she
wants to be dignified with the Obama I am dignified.
I may don't have no place where I could lay
my head at night. But that don't mean I'm not

(35:43):
no dignified person, you understand. So I noticed my own fear.
UH would sometimes mirror or not mirror. I guess what
I'll say is I remember performing a whole slew of characters,
different races, for ethnicities, different genders. This was at a
medical I was like at a medical school or something.

(36:05):
I did a show about health and ethnic and racial
health disparities back when people were saying they didn't exist. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I came across that in your research and was like, well, hello, coronavirus. Oh, coronavirus.
So anyway, back then, I was doing this piece and
I still do it from time to time because medicine
is racist. I grew up in medicine and my father

(36:26):
being assumed to be in orderly because he's a black man,
even though he was the doctor and the head of
the department. So UM, this moment of UH performing in
front of a mixed race audience where there had been
some conflict and they had sort of invited me, I
felt like a you know, like a diplomat or something
coming to try to be like okay, everybody. But this

(36:46):
one white woman stood up and said and her voice
was shaking, and I had created a safe space and
I'm very proud of myself for that. I said, I
let everybody know. Look, this is racist, messy, tricky stuff.
And she said, well, all of them were good people
except for the one who looked like me. And I
was like, wow, I couldn't even unpack. And I said, well,

(37:07):
wait a minute, which one looked like you? Because I
I've looked like this the whole time. I'm still I
never changed color. And she I felt her experiencing the
reality that she had. Her mind told her I was white.
Her mind told her I was white when I was
doing the character that offended her, and she said the
white one And I said, well, I did a few

(37:28):
white characters. And she didn't identify Lorraine, who's Jewish, as
white like It was such a telling moment, right who
this woman latched onto as the mirror of herself. And
all the white nurse said was I don't see color.
And you know, why do I have to be culturally competent?
Why don't they learn to speak English, which is something

(37:50):
that a lot of people say and believe, including in
the medical field. So it was fascinating to watch this
woman suffer. She was in so much pain, confronted with
racism and confronted with you know, white supremacy and her
you know, possible complicity in it. So I mentioned that
because that was painful. I like to have a good time.

(38:11):
I like to get a standing oh where everybody's laughing
and rolling in the aisles and having a wonderful experience
with me and goes home feeling warm and fuzzy about me.
And I don't think that woman felt super warm and
fuzzy in that moment, but it was teachable moment for
everybody in that room. Well, and also, what's your I mean,
this is a bigger question, but what is your goal? Yeah?

(38:32):
I mean I just told you what I like. You know,
I like to feel delicious and for millions of people
to watch my TED talks and tell me how much
they love me. What I don't shy away from, and
what I know is more important, is that people have
an experience that holds a mirror up to them. In
which case, boy, did you fulfill your goal? I did,

(38:53):
and I didn't go home. You know, that wasn't a
day when I got to feel like I you know,
created a rollicking good time. For everyone in the audience.
It was more like and in fact, I remember there
was a meet and greet afterward and doctors, you know, white,
very straight laced, very straight. Yeah, I was I was trying.
I was trying to soften that a little bit, like

(39:14):
very very straight, um, like super white, that dude, you know,
that guy from like wherever we were, Michigan. I say
this like a super straight white guy, Like I don't
know what the I don't know what right. This is
the superest and the straightest, okay, and the guy st
And these are the men who are, you know, at
kind of the center of white supremacist, capitalist patriarchy in

(39:38):
our country. They are part of what I think of
as the medical industrial complex that is profit driven and
creates terrible problems for doctors, including right now in COVID
they're slashing doctors salaries. And I know it's like, oh
bo who doctors Listen. I watched my parents. I saw
what the insurance companies, the lobbyists, all of that, what it,
you know, does to our health as a society, including

(39:59):
destroying the lives of the medical professionals we need. But um,
I digress. These men, these white men, came up to me.
I swear to you a couple of them had tears
in their eyes, saying, I don't know how to talk
about this stuff. I don't know how to talk about
it with my staff. Um, I you seem nice, but
I don't you know, I have black friends or I

(40:19):
don't have black like I felt like Oprah. I felt
like a fucking therapist or something who was like the
maybe the one time anybody had ever said, hey, white man,
you know, maybe you're gonna wait until after the Q
and A because you don't want to publicly say this.
But people who after a couple of cocktails were able
to come up to me and say effectively, this feels messy,
this feels problematic. I don't want to feel like I'm

(40:40):
complicit in any of it, but you touch something that's
my work, that's my job, and it's not the Rara.
It's not it doesn't get me a million followers on
the Graham. It's very different work well. And also it's
funny because it actually ties into our are sort of
like off handed conversation at the top about expectations because
you're like the whole your whole job is making people

(41:02):
question what their expectations are for you and also for
every character you bring up there, and then also for themselves. Yeah,
I didn't pick the easiest job. Apparently I should have
picked president of the United States because you, I mean,
any day now, I'm happy to vote for you. I'm
happy to for you. M Yeah. Well, and also I

(41:25):
I wonder if it sounds sort of like it picked you,
it did choose me. And I do have a kind
of cultural a d H D probably in the sense
that I want to talk about immigrants and the prison
industrial complex, and you know, discrimination and healthcare and our
education system and capitalism and where we are as a

(41:48):
society economically. I want to talk about all of those
things at the same time. Also, you know, I don't
want I don't want for my audience you to leave
out cell by date, right. And the shirt I'm wearing,
which says eroticide equality is a you know, it's a
reference to actually glorious it's a glorious Synum quote. And
it's a reference to where we are with feminism and

(42:09):
power and sex and how we self identify and self
invent as women. And we I still know that when
I walk into a room filled with the white guys
who still by and large run Hollywood and decide whether
I get movie roles or TV roles or you know,
a show on the air. Um, I promise you every
single project I have ever done, a white man is

(42:32):
right there deciding whether it gets funded or not, period,
a white straight man. And to be clear about that
that even with movements, you know, some subtle movement, I
can count on my fingers and toes the women, the
people of color who have you know, the kind of
power to begin to shift all of this stuff. And
I think we do ourselves a disservice when we're like, oh,

(42:55):
you know, we have a hashtag now, so it's it's
changed or it's really changing in a meaningful way. No,
it isn't. It isn't yet. And I think, like getting
clear that there's a reason we're intersectional, right, I need
to bring all of that stuff into the conversation because
there is no talking about women without talking about the
environment and climate change. There is no talking about poverty

(43:16):
without talking about trafficking and human beings and why their
bodies are sold. Um, you know what I mean. So yeah,
I mean when you were when you were listening the
sort of themes you've always been interested in. I just
was thinking the entire time, like, it's just justice. It's
just justice. It's just justice. Justice. Like so when I
started taking my kid to marches, which was like, you know,
sadly early in his life in the world, we are

(43:38):
not sadly but sadly that they don't needed. But you know, obviously,
um what when he was old enough to sort of
slightly start to ask questions, I just no matter what
we were there for specifically. I mean, the first one
where I remember he was actually conscious was the March
for Our Lives and I was not going to tell
him that it was about, you know, gun violence against children,

(43:58):
and so I said, we're marching for fairness, and every
single one of them were marching for fairness. Fairness really honestly,
like it helps me a lot to think of this
in terms of humanity, Like when people are you and
I'll say social justice, and I'll say I'm an activist,
and I'll say I'm a progressive to radical, I'm a
fucking human being. Yes, yes, okay, we'll be right back

(44:23):
after this and we will find out who you brought
in for us to listen to. We're about to be
back for act three. Just a note, Sarah's audio did
not work for the final act, but we've got her
zoom backup sound. So UM, if you don't want to

(44:47):
listen because you are an audio purist, um bye. But otherwise, UM,
I think this actually worked out okay. The technology UM
supported us, saved us and and UM I loved this
act so I didn't want to cut it. Here, you
guys go, we're back and we're going to find out
who you brought in for us? You would you would
you first just tell us? So I'm very excited about this.

(45:11):
Sonya Renee Taylor is a woman I've actually never met
in person, but she has that kind of reach kind
of into your soul and I think, uh, maybe ironically
is not the word, but ironically it's through the body.
It's she has a book, The Body is not an
apology that makes an incredibly nuanced and loving argument that

(45:38):
when we, as I think so many of us do
in our culture, make our bodies, you know, kind of
the site of where we fight our battle, and you know,
how do I look and controlling our bodies and um,
wanting to occupy a certain space in the culture, we
actually cut off our soul um. Yeah, I'm going to

(46:01):
link to her book as well. And I also just
want to say, as somebody who's who's like on the
voice soapbox, that you know, voice doesn't exist except with
our bodies. And whenever somebody has something that's going on
with their voice that makes them feel like they're not
being heard or that it's not coming out, or that
they're not revealing their true selves when they want to be,
it has to do with their bodies. Yes, I agree
with that. Okay, here she is. Every time you call

(46:25):
truth with your body, you interrupt a system of violence
and power that profits off of your self hate. Every
time you interrogate the beliefs and biases that you have
about other bodies, you interrupt a system the profits off
of the way that you feel about other bodies and

(46:46):
the systems of comparison that we live in. Our relationship
with our bodies is our access to a more just
and equitable world. Our relationship with other people's bodies is
how we've been the box towards justice. When I watched
her ted talk, which that's from I was struck by.

(47:07):
I mean, of course, part of the the job of
being somebody who's whole, you know, being is to say
that the body isn't. An apology is how do you
show up on stage? You know, how do you show
up with your body? And one of the answers is
that I haven't seen an actor doing Shakespeare in a while,

(47:28):
and that's you know, like, that's what she's doing. And
there's a later part in that same um talk where
she switches into a poetry mode where she's actually, um,
I don't know what the verb is. I was going
to say reciting, and that's so wrong. Embodying embodying, yeah,
doing poetry. But you can even hear it in that
clip that there's there's a way that she uses her

(47:51):
body in connection with her voice that just feels like
she's under herself. She's not beside herself, she's not next
to you, she's not running after she is in it.
She embodies the poem, right, she is the embodiment of
the poll where she it's almost like she offers her
body in service of the community. So it's sort of yeah,

(48:12):
it's a bit of the vessel imagery or emissary. Yeah,
that's right. I mean it's not the same style as
a conversational style. And you know, I've I listen to
some clips of her and conversation too, and it's kind
of cool to to see, you know. Obviously, she's a
great reminder that all of us have different modes, you know,
And I'm not saying that that one mode is one
that you know, any of us should sort of steal,

(48:33):
period or steal for the wrong mode or take the
wrong lessons from. But to see somebody knowing that what
they're talking about is big, and that they're taking the
breath to support that big of a thought and thus
teaching us that that thought is as big as it
is is a real lesson. So thank you for bringing

(48:55):
her in. Thank you for talking to me, Sarah and
all of the people they wrote with you. Um, you're
a wonder. Thank you so much for letting me just
meander all over the places to be here. Thank you.
Thank you to Sarah Jones for joining me. You can

(49:17):
find out more about her in the show notes or
on our website Permission to Speak pod dot com. There's
also a super cool bit of bonus content this week
on our Instagram feed at Permission to Speak Pod, where
Sarah talks about the secret of playing cool when you
meet your heroes. It's really really special and real. Um.

(49:38):
Please also send me d M s or voice memos
to at Permissions beat Pot on Instagram or the website
and let me know what is going on with your voice.
I would be thrilled to answer to the next mail
bag episode. Also tell me what kind of guests you'd
like me to have on and also what kind of
questions you would like me to ask upcoming guests. I
am so truly here for you, I especially I feel

(50:01):
like during these wild and rather unsettling times, if we
can think really intentionally about how our communication allows us
to be more vulnerable and more heart forward with the
people in our lives, that is something we should be doing.
And even more than any of that, I would so
love for you to just tell me what you need

(50:22):
from me. If I can provide it, I will thank
you as well to Sophie Lichterman and the team at
I Heeart Radio, my family and cohort and all of you.
We're recording this podcast at various locations around Los Angeles
on land that is the historic gathering place for the
Tongva indigenous tribe, and you can visit us D A
C dot us to learn more about honoring Native land.

(50:45):
Permission to Speak is a production of I Heart Radio
and Double Vision Executive produced by Katherine Burke Canton and
Mark Canton. For more podcasts from my heart Radio, listen
on the I heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
you get your favorite shows.

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