The more you can do the better. Always write your own stuff. Most people aren't interested in writing for you. Beeleedat.

Logic

Half your age +7. That's the formula I use.

I guess the most detail I can go into with recounting my life would be, I'm having fun. I believe art is using shock and awe to give you a slice or microcosm of what life is. My albums are what life seems like to me:fair, unfair, whatever. I don't want to be a "rap star". I want people to be me for however long the album is when they listen to it. There are a lot of questions on the EP and Culdesac that you should be asking yourself/I ask myself. But....yeah.

Like working with your grandpa. You have to yell a lot, lot of stories about the good old days, but you love him in the end.

James Murphy, James Brown, Prince, The Neptunes.

Chris Rock, Louis CK, Patton Oswalt, Eddie Murphy.

Tina Fey had probably the biggest influence on me other than my parents. She's just not afraid. I loved watching her work cause she was so brave. I was really scared when I got to 30 Rock, she was like "I don't give a fuck. Be you. If it's funny, it's in the script." and And watching 30 Rock, there's so much Tina there that it made me see how I should start being me more too. Started putting out more music and started not being as afraid to be me. Tina is a true gangsta. She don't give a FUUUUUUUCCCCKKKKKK. I put her against any chick in the game. EDIT: "Against ANYONE in the game." She'd destory anything. If she started rapping, I'd quit. I don't want that.

I put stuff in my act about that because it is how I process or deal with something — I felt like it was out of my nature to not talk about it. But ironically, I had to force myself. It would make my hands shake and I would often put one hand in my armpit. I had a lot of support. I had loved ones say, “It was difficult to watch, but I’m glad you’re okay talking about it.” Then I went to a healing-trauma program in Tennessee called Onsite and worked through a lot of this. You don’t leave these places cured, you just take steps in the right direction. But one of the takeaways was: Some things are sacred. Your life doesn’t have to be an open book. It just took someone telling me, “You don’t hav...[Read more]

I’m 100 percent okay with it. For a while it was like, I don’t want to be a Moth person. Not like that’s bad, but the Moth is usually looking for one-offs from humans that have one incredible, life-changing story. But comedy’s evolved and there’s something for everybody, and more than ever, my people kind of find me. Of course, in a comedy club, you have a lot of seats to fill. I’m popular in some markets more than others, and so I can feel when it’s like 30-70, 50-50, 80-20 my people.

I don’t know if I necessarily felt voiceless at the time, but in some ways I was. With my stepmother, I couldn’t go, “Hey, are you drinking and driving right now? What’s in the cup?” I’m just buckled in the backseat, making my sisters laugh by fake-humping her from behind. Was it my way of processing it? I think so. Things with her were awkward, and I usually search for times where I was put in a weird position and try to make it funny.

People do ask you to tell jokes when you are a comedian. They are either dumb or hostile. Or dumb and hostile. I usually just assume they mean well but are dumb. But when you tell them a joke they don't laugh which is infuriating.

Tell your life stories and add the jokes in. You will be original. All you have in stand up is you and the way you view things.

In The Heat of The Night, On the Waterfront, Millers Crossing, The Roaring Twenties, Midnight Cowboy, The Heartbreak Kid (the original) and more..

I don't know what constitutes a "genius" but Norm Macdonald is as funny and brilliant as anyone in comedy that's a given. If anyone is a genius he would fall into that category, though. I would have him on the show in a heartbeat.

I think comedians dating other comedians is great. But not if one is a hack and one is good. Or if they have a kid who's a hack.

My advice is when you move to a new area, put a rolled up newspaper under your shirt, knock on your neighbors doors and when they open it let them see the bulge under your shirt and tell them "this is what's up now". Then wink and snap your fingers and walk away.

I like to read funny books. I said Confederacy already but Don Quixote is funny and Lolita is funny. Just read Richard Price The Whites (not funny) but it was great.

I didn’t get to do a gig because I got fired, and it kind of ruined me because I am a perfectionist overachiever. But they told me, ‘We were thinking you’d be more like Bill Cosby.’ Um, I’m 25 and white…and a girl. They just kept asking for a rewrite of my transcript, and I would edit out things that they considered dirty and then edit more things they considered dirty, and then finally, on my last draft–it was a high tea, and I wrote this joke: “Ladies, we’re here to eat some tiny sandwiches. Just sit back, relax and take comfort in knowing that the crock pot’s off, your sister’s at home and the kids are dead. You shouldn’t have left them with your sister.” And then they wrote back, ‘Yeah, ...[Read more]

Growing up, I was a huge Jim Carrey and Robin Williams fan, so I knew the whole Mrs. Doubtfire movie, and definitely all of Ace Ventura. So those were my life. I would say those two–I just really wanted to be funny, so I would often impersonate them.