Gabbie Watts: Stand-up comedian

friend of mine sent me a post of something Donald Trump put up earlier this week, and I want to read it. Almost every week, 60 minutes, which is being sued for billions of dollars for the fraud they committed in the 2024 presidential election with their interview of failed presidential candidate, Kamala Harris, mentions the name Trump in a derogatory and defamatory way. But this weekend's broadcast tops them all. They did not one, but two major stories on Trump. One having to do with Ukraine, which I say is a war that would never have happened if the 2020 election had not been rigged. In other words, if I were present, and the other story was having to do with Greenland casting our country as led by me falsely and accurately and fraudulently. I'm so honored to be suing 60 minutes CBS fake news of paramount over their fraudulent beyond recognition reporting. They did everything possible to illegally elect Kamala, including completely and corruptly changing major answers to interview questions, but it just didn't work for them. They are not a news source, but a dishonest political operative simply disguises news, and must be responsible for what they have done and are doing. They should lose their license. Hopefully the Federal Community State Cations Commission, as headed by its highly respected chairman, Brendan Carr, will impose a maximum fines and punishment, which is substantial for their unlawful and illegal behavior. CBS is out of control at levels never seen before, and they should pay a big price for this. Make America great again. And as Donald Trump kneels before dictators and curtail's free speech and deports people for the crime of having opinions, we, as a full entity that is America's media, need to fight back. Seriously, we cannot just take the shit and hope he lightens up because he won't. And neither should we. My name is Jeff Perramin. I'm the New York Times bestselling author of 10 books and I hope it's the two writers slinging the egg. The podcast for one writer me talks writing with another writer every single week. And today's guest is Gabby Watts, a fantastic stand-up comedian and on the side podcast producer. This is episode number 411. Let's sling some the egg. Dad, your podcast sucks. And K-pop nation hates you. Gabby, I just want to say, I have been working for, I don't know, six, seven, eight months with you on a podcast series I've been working on. And I'm taking a walk the other day. And somehow it comes up, you do stand-up. And I was like, wait, I didn't know you do stand-up. And then you send me a link and then I do the requisite Google search. And then I see upcoming shows, March 7th and 8th in Pittsburgh, then Nashville, Nashville, Knoxville, New Orleans, Springdale, Arkansas, Cincinnati, Ohio, that you have your own special online. And I'm like, what the fuck? And then I'm listening as I'm walking my dog and I'm laughing so hard as I'm walking my dog. And I had no idea whatsoever. And I actually want to start with this. You work as a podcast producer. Do most people know this double life existence of yours? Yeah, I think most like everybody at my company knows for sure. And I mean, the pandemic obviously, love terrible things happen. But that meant we just started working remote so that I can sort of work from wherever, which has been really helpful. But yeah, they all know that. And I'm also a bit of a clown. I think I've gotten better because at first I think I was more unprofessional. Or sometimes in meetings, I would say maybe something that was a bit too edgy or silly, non-serious. So I've also been able to figure out how to be, you know, because I'm a girl middle manager, you know, so I also have to have that person of like, hey, I'm vaguely professional. I know what I'm doing. Gives instill confidence in people that I'm not just going to be a silly use all the time. Most people do know that. But I think on a lot of like freelance projects sometimes, especially when we're doing shows like ours, which is a very serious topic, you know, it doesn't come up sometimes. But sometimes it is funny to wrestle with the content of my work, which most of it is like true crime or like social justice oriented stuff. And then mix that with my evenings where I'm just making dick jokes and being a clown. When one does stand up, are they presenting the real them? Are they presenting a vision of them? Are they presenting an aspirational vision of them? Like, how do you kind of view that? What are you presenting? Well, I think it's often it's like an exaggeration of certain qualities. Like, I don't think anyone's 100%. I think jokes a lot of times they come from truth, you know, like here's something that happened to me. But then you're going to exaggerate it so that it's more comical or that you're like thinking more deeply about the details of what some like interaction was to make it sillier. Though there are some comics out there who do try to be someone completely different on stage, which, you know, I also don't exactly agree with that. Because I think most, most comedy is personal. There's like a personal element to it. And you are kind of like that. And I would say in my everyday life, I am pretty uh, in appropriate, but I think in the past two years, I've kind of learned how to tone it down so that I'm not just offending people constantly. But I mean, I think I'm pretty, I am, I think one thing I've also tried to change is that I also have, you can tell Rick this as well. I also have like a lot of mental illness. And so I used to have a lot more bits that were just sad where I used to eat a lot of response where people were like, oh, are you poor girl or whatever. But now I kind of, I've taken some of that out just because apparently people want to laugh when they're at comedy shows, which is very weird. So I think there is like, I am like, I that is kind of how I'm like, and I think some of the struggles I've had stand up is also because I think I, I, I'm a bit of a, I'm kind of weird. Um, that's so nice for you to say that I'm normal. That's so nice to do you. But um, I do feel sometimes my the way that I think is a little odd compared to other people. And so sometimes I feel like in my bits, I don't explain myself all the way. Um, I don't know. I do feel like it is reflective of who I am. And some comics are like very serious, you know, um, I don't hang out with those comics, but some of them are very serious people who are just thinking, oh, the form, this is what I got to do. Here's the, I definitely have like an ethical code also for like what to say on stage. But um, I also like, you know, I'm very silly, often like alternative, also doing like weird sort of prop bits, like kind of the bit at the end of the special where I get hummed by the stool, um, you know, doing very sort of silly, like, sort of like, sillier stuff as well. All right. So you mentioned that you have, you have some mental illnesses and you, you put them in the act and people feel out for you. And it does seem like through the years, the different stand-ups I've known for the most part, carry with them some kind of pain that isn't just, oh, I had a bad day of work. Uh, might be pain of being made fun of for years. It might be pain of some level of mental illness. It might be some pain of whatever. And they seem to almost use comedy as a way of, I don't know if it's pushing it out or dressing it or something. Um, would you say you found that to be true and is that true with yourself? Yeah. I think sometimes stand-up has made me more mentally ill just because it is just going on stage and being judged by people. Um, I think stand-ups are really interesting form of art and sort of writing as well, just because you get immediate feedback on what you do. And it's very severe and you know what the feedback is and you kind of understand it. But I mean, I think also some people in sort of any art creation will, you know, pour their own neuroses or, you know, some people can treat an art practice as like therapeutic. Um, but I think sometimes the longer you do stand up, it's, it's a craft, you know, it's not like I'm not using this as my therapy all the time because, you know, people don't want to hear that or, you know, I want to talk about different subjects. Um, so I think I definitely used to use it more as like my, it was kind of like more raw and maybe just like more mentally ill and I don't know. I think now it's, it's kind of shifted where I'm just like, oh, I need to have jokes that work for people in the suburbs. And like, they often don't want to hear about that. So you also have to like figure out what are like, you know, people in the suburbs, they want to hear about making fun of homeless people. That's what they want. You know, they want you to say men and women are different. You know, they want stuff like that. So you also have to like remember that comedy at the end of the day is again, you want to make people laugh allegedly. It can't just be like, oh, this is my problem that I have. Um, but that's definitely like infused, I think throughout just like how I think and write. Um, so like the guy who shot my, the boy, the special, he, I was like, well, what do you think the common theme of the special was? And he's like, I think it's mental illness, which was funny to me because I didn't even really do that many mental illness bits. I was like, Oh, it's just that apparent. Thanks, Joel. I want to play a clip from that from Boeing right here. And I want to talk to a privilege. But I was at the gas station going to check out and I had a very strange encounter with the cash here. I went up there and before I could say anything, she was like, yeah, a year ago at this very Chevron, I got shot. And yeah, the bullet, it's still in my body. It's in my ass. I know. I was speechless. I'm going to spit the gas out of my mouth. There's great. I had so many questions. I'm like, personal, why do you still work at the place you got shot at? Like, what are you a teacher? I've multiple questions here. Number one, what is the genesis of that little clip that I just played? Like where does that come from? Were you actually at a gas station? Did any of that even happen? Uh, yes. So the genesis of this bit was I was at, I don't think it was a chevron. I can't remember where it was, but with a stand-up, I do a lot of driving. Just sort of, I will drive long distances for showtime at this point. Um, I, I'm actually for stage time. And so I have just been to so many gas stations and one time I went to one where a lady, the cashier, that exact thing happened. I mean, it didn't happen exactly like that, but I, you know, it's just kind of like some small town. I think it was like in the middle of Kentucky or something. And I went in was like paying for my snacks and I think she just like did it, doesn't see that many people every day. So she was kind of one of those, you know, Southern ladies who's like, I'm going to talk to this person for a long time. And she had been shot at that gas station. She did say that the bullet was still in her body. And then she was talking about like all these various surgery she had had to like try to get it out, but then they're like, actually, we shouldn't. Um, but I had tried to incorporate other parts of that conversation to the bit, but I had it. I just, I don't think I was like good enough to finesse it, but what happened? It was more of a hate crime of what happened because there was a white guy. She was also white, but the gas station was owned by an Indian family. And so this white guy had come into the gas station and shot her like, I guess in retaliation of the Indian family who owned this gas station and this like very white town. Um, so that was like really intense, but it was also just like funny kind of like, you know, I was probably like, you know, maybe six hours into a drive or something. I was days and confused and she was just telling me the story. And so that part was true. Um, and then maybe one day when I'm better at comedy and can kind of like make hate crimes funny, you know, I'm not exactly there yet. Um, then maybe I can kind of add that to the bit. But the thing of that joke that I also like is the first sentence, which I also say in the special, which is true of, you know, they have my favorite snacks at gas stations. My favorite snack, of course, is gas. That line works 15% of the time, I would say. Um, it worked at that special because there's a lot of my, you know, weird friends and, you know, family and also like people who know me and then also kind of when it's your own headlining show, it's like, oh, people are coming to see you. So they like what you do. Um, but a lot of people hate that they just like, don't laugh at it at all. But I think that's so funny. Just that that quick line of like, I drink gas and then I kind of like carry that throughout the bit. Like I mentioned it like two other times. There's like the next part of the bit is like, oh, I'm at buckies. They have a lot of gas pumps. So I'm drinking all the gas and it's just fun when you can have like kind of a silly, weird line like that that does work because usually I'll say it first. It doesn't work. But then sometimes I will get laughs at like, and then I spit the gas out of my mouth. Because people are like, oh, I forgot that she mentioned. And oh, she's still drinking gas. Um, because at one point I did want to call the special drinking gas, but then I went with Boeing. Wait. So you have the little bit about, you know, what are you a teacher? And obviously in America, there've been a lot of school shootings. Which, you know, aren't funny. And we went through this. I remember in New York after 9/11 when comedians started telling 9/11 jokes and there's like, uh, how much do you debate lines like that or how much do you caress a line like that? And are is it okay going over just way going over a line in the sort of whatever, excuse or explanation and look, it's stand up. This is what we do. Yeah. I mean, you definitely have to rest with that with your own, um, you know, values, morals. Weirdly, that joke of my material is one of the most universal, the one that gets the most universal response from various crowds. Like I'll tell it, you know, in a city or kind of more and like a suburban conservative area. And the response of the joke, obviously is groans. Um, there's, and that's, you know, I know that's going to be the response of the joke. Uh, but it's like this, that's what I'm kind of trying to get with it. Um, and also it's kind of interesting because it comes out of. You know, where, but then it's also like making a point. Um, and I do think it's interesting how it's the most universal one where it's like in this country, obviously, people are politicizing everything and school shootings, I think obviously are politicized in terms of gun control and stuff like that. But still, I think everyone does at least agree that school shootings are bad. You know, that is one thing that Americans agree on. Um, but I think it also kind of, I think it's. My goal is always to have a kind of have sillier, uh, bits, but then bring up a point as like a surprise, you know, like, uh, obviously, you know, it's just a sort of a comment on like the prevalence of, you know, gun violence in this country and like how so many people are affected by it. Um, so I think with that one, I will tell it and I don't, I think, um, I'm going to think because I'm like trying to, like sort of remind people about the horrors of America. I feel fine saying it. Um, but the 9/11 stuff is interesting because now in comedy, 9/11 is everywhere. Always the butt of a joke. It's almost, I mean, this is like so sad to say, but it's almost hacked to talk about 9/11 or, um, even sometimes school shootings, just because they happen so much that it was like so much material that people have about them. You feel the same way about Trump is Trump too easy? Trump, um, he's not, I think now it's different just because I think most people on stage, their response is just like, what the fuck is happening? You know, it's, uh, and I mean, I think one thing people struggled with in the 2016 that when he was elected in 2016 for the first time is that people was like, oh, well, you know, the comedy writes itself. You don't even have to say anything because he says something that's crazier than anything that you would write, but that's just like what he's saying as the president. Um, and I think now I've seen several bits where people like comics are going on stage and they're just being just very like existential, very like nihilistic about like, what is going on? Like calm. That like, I don't know. I think obviously I was talking about Trump specifically. In New York, it's fine. Everyone's liberal, but it is hard to like, how can you do a joke about Trump where then if you're having you conservative people in the audience, it's like you just have to come up with like a really clever bit. And also there's so much that's said about him. It's like, how can I have like a specific lens or angle that's different from what like other people have said? You're a kid from Georgia. You graduated from Jewish high school. You went to Princeton. What we getting this right? Uh, oh, and the Westboro Baptist Church came to my school. That was fun. Why did they come to your school? I think it's because yeah, it was just the devils. And so they thought we were devil worshipers. But also we, my high school is very close to the campus of Emory University. So I think the Westboro Baptist Church, they had gone to protest against one of the Jewish fraternities. And then you know, we were just a nice little stop afterwards. You know, just two for one. All right. So you graduated from Princeton 2014. I am genuinely fascinated by your, uh, stand up route. Like what led you to comedy? How did you like when did you first actually think to yourself comedy? This is something for me. Comedy. Oh, what happened is I had a band. So well, what happened? Okay, what happened is after college, I was really depressed, partly because my boyfriend had broken up with me. I was very sad, but I had never really had a, I never really had like an artistic outlet before. Like I had, like played, I played in orchestra. Like I played guitar very badly. Um, but I started writing songs. Just like very sad, like my boyfriend broke up with me and blah, blah, blah. I'm sad kind of songs like that. Um, and then I had a couple different bands and then I had another one that we were together for a few years. Um, but I, in our songs, I think they got a little, uh, so they're kind of more comical, I would say, um, or the ones that people liked were comical. I still had a lot of songs that were just like, I'm sad. I'm sad. Blah, blah, blah. Um, but the ones that were funnier people liked better and the issue with having a band is that there's multiple people in it and you all have different goals and different ambitions and different schedules. And so I found that part of the band, the, the logistics I have a band is kind of difficult. And you can only play, you know, you can only play locally like once a month, uh, for the most part, you know, as usually what venues want, um, and it's hard to tour because everyone has different jobs. Um, and then what happened is I was working in a public radio station at the time and I saw, I was like doing arts programming and I saw a comedian in Atlanta named Lace Larby was teaching in all women's comedy class. And I was like, mm, I want to do that class. So I sneakily thing got her to be on the radio. So I got like her an interview with our host of the show. Um, but it was really just a route for me to then take her comedy class. And so I started doing that and it was, um, so I took a comic class and I mean, I've always been like very sarcastic and dry. So it kind of like made sense in the songs that I was writing. We're also kind of like the, again, the ones people like were like funnier. Um, and so, and also then it was easier just to, you know, just do it all by yourself. It's kind of easier because then you're like, oh, if I want to really go for it, I can where with you, when you have a band, it's like, oh, we all have to kind of like agree on how much time and energy we're spending. Also, I'm not good at singing. That's another big issue with the band. So when did you do your first, I'm going to stand in front of a bunch of people and try and be funny. Do you remember the first actual time you tried? Yeah, it was taking that comedy class, which there, there is a stigma against people who start with comedy classes. They're like, wow, you had to pay your way into comedy. And I'm like, yes, because I was afraid. But so that class was fun because of the very end. Basically, you do a packed out show. You like basically over the weeks of the account class, you learn, be sure how to do like five minutes of stand up, which when you have a tight five, it's hard. That's hard. That's hard to get to a tight five. And I would say the five that I had, then there, I don't think there was actually any juxtaposition them. It was actually quite bad. But you had the first experience was having this like 200 person crowd. And so you're like, wow, I'm so amazing at comedy. And then after that, I started doing open mics, which are absolutely horrendous. It's because you got to get there like, you know, in Atlanta, at least most of the mics are like, you have to, you know, sign up for them in advance. And so it's like, you'll be sign up at like 730 shows at eight. But often there's only 20 spots. And there's a lot more comedians. So you'll show up at seven instead, but there will already be 10 people there. And so it's kind of like, there's not enough. There's too many comedians basically and not enough stage time. And so then you're just there for such a long time. And then it's like comedians mostly watching your jokes and comics have seen so many jokes that they're not going to be impressed by what you're saying. And I honestly think it's amazing that anyone keeps doing stand up because you have to do so many of those where you're just talking to silence. And then you just, you're like, was any of that good? Like, how do I make anything good? You know, um, I mean, I don't want to interrupt you. What does it feel like I'm actually being serious when you are talking to silence? When you're trying to tell jokes, you're trying to do a bit and just silence. Oh, it's terrible. It's so bad. It's, but it's, um, I think what you have to learn as a stand up is not placing your worth as a person on your talent at stand up comedy. Are your ability to do a good job? Uh, it is bad. And I think a lot of times what you'll do an earlier in stand up is you'll spiral on stage. And you can see it some, some people, it takes them a while to spiral. Um, but sometimes you just, I, I used to spiral immediately where then I would just like keep talking faster or just like trying to go to other jokes or then just becoming even like less coherent because I was nervous or something and then just like getting off stage early. It's like, you have three minutes, but I'm like, I'm a minute and a half in and like run off the stage basically. But the great thing about stand up is no longer, no matter how long you've been doing it, you still get to bomb. That's one, like I bombed. I did, I opened. There's a new, so helium is one of the chain comedy clubs. And there's one that recently opened in Atlanta. And I was hosting for this comic, Kaelin Palufo, who's amazing. And I was hosting. So I did 10 minutes. And the first show of the weekend was 10 minutes of silence. And I was doing my best, bits. I was like, these are like the cleaner ones because usually you want to be like cleaner as a host. So people feel more welcomed into the fold or whatever. But I was, I got absolutely nothing from these people. And I was like, well, I guess I just, I've been doing this for seven years. I guess I just don't know anything about stand up. I guess I don't know what's happening. But then when Katelyn went on, she's really good crowd work. And what she found was that half the audience was like a family of Germans. And Germans, the stereotype about them is they don't laugh that much. And so it was just, but it was weird because it was like in Alpharetta, which is like 30 minutes away from Atlanta, like outside the city. I was like, why is there a family of Germans here? What's going on? Would you have been better served if you had known there was a family of Germans there? Could you have on the fly adapted what you were saying? That's a great question. And probably they would have gotten the same set. Well, I think what the difference was I would have probably done some different bits because I was trying to appeal to a suburban Atlanta crowd, which is where I do jokes like about driving and traffic. And you know, maybe the gas station want to talk about the gas station buckies, you know, usually suburban people love that stuff. The Germans, they don't even know what buckies it is. Wait, so it's so interesting to me because one thing I realized early on, journalistically and mainly book wise is like, I don't write for an audience. Like I never think like, oh, our leaker fans going to find this blank are so and so like, I usually think if I find it entertaining, I'm going to be people will find it entertaining. I find it interesting. People will find it interesting. But you're saying as a stand up, you feel like you have to sort of adjust and adapt to the environment that you are performing. Yes. So interesting. Well, it depends. It depends. I think like when you're working at stand up, there's sort of like two things you want to keep in mind. I think one of them is you want to have a unique voice to distinguish you from like other comics. The problem with having a unique voice though is that you have to be able to translate that voice to people who are different from you so that they can also be like invited into the fold of your like unique perspective. But at the same time, you also want to figure out how to just make people laugh. And you want to make sure that you can have some sort of like universalness to what you're saying. So that you're not alienating certain people, especially when you're like in the beginning stages of stand up because that's the only way you're going to get work for the most part is shows at clubs, you have a host, you have a feature, and then you have the headliner. Headliner is once you get to that level, you're very good. You figured out your voice. You figured out how to like invite people into your jokes. And you can kind of be more unique because people are coming to see you, you specifically, or sometimes they're just coming to see a comedy club and comedy club audiences are kind of, I don't really like their vibe as much. It's kind of more like broy, I would say. But you just have to be able to like, yeah, you have to be unique, but then also be able to get people to understand what you're saying. There's a clip I've seen, there are clip many clips I've seen of guys like Eminem and Nas, different hip-hop artists. And they're always this like idea comes into my head. I pull out a notebook, blah, blah, blah, blah. Your special boy is 37 minutes and 58 seconds. That's a long stretch of comedy. And it's filled with stuff. Like, are you, is that a compilation of a million moments in your life of you having a thought in your head, writing it down and then cobbling it together? Like, how do you actually cobble together a comedy special stretch? Yeah, I think, well, some of the jokes in there are the jokes I wrote in the first like two months of doing stand up. For example, one line that I've used in almost every set is I didn't realize I was a lesbian until two years from now, which that works all the time. I wrote that yeah, second month of comedy. It's annoying that it's like, wow, it was my best sentence, you know, two months in. I think kind of like where you start with stand up helps you figure out what you would want to your longer narrative to be because you just start writing. And you're like, well, what topics am I writing about? Oh, I'm writing about, you know, these three things. Maybe that will help me limit my writing to like, I should like have other things that thematically make sense with this. But really, it's kind of like, I just had so many scattered bits because I kind of started more doing one-liners. And often other people, they'll either start with like one-liners or people will start with stories that don't have enough punches in them, basically. I'm not saying they're good one-liners, but they're there. So I think most of the bits in there are just like the things that I wrote, I wrote over like six years. Like there's a joke in there about, you know, making fun of like pro-life billboards. That was one I probably wrote maybe like three months before the special, but it was ended up being, it's ended up being one of my like better jokes and also one that weirdly works in different crowds because I've even got pro-lifers to laugh at it before. Wow, incredible. But I think it's mostly, it's all cobbled together. It's kind of like a puzzle. You have all these, you know, I have so many bits that are like 15 seconds or like 30 seconds and I have some bits where it's like, oh, this one's two and a half minutes. So it's kind of like, how do you puzzle them together and make it put it in the right order so that because sometimes you'll have jokes where the punch line is a reveal, you know. And so you don't want to like reveal that information before that you might have in another joke. So then you want to put that later. So it's kind of like you just have this, I for me, I just had this big bag of jokes. I shove them all together, see what makes the most sense. And then, you know, try actually like running it. So I probably ran it maybe like get 15, 10, 15 times before I recorded. And there are some things that I took out, some things that I added. Are you running in your house doing it to yourself, doing it to yourself, doing it to yourself over and over again until you have it down? This was like, I would actually go places and like do shows. But I am also constantly talking to myself. And like I used to just, I have like probably thousands and thousands of voice memos of me just talking to myself about stuff or I do a lot of like voice to text, just like talking about random stuff. So yeah, I mean, I would say my writing process in terms of like actually getting the special together is I didn't like have a theme in mind. It's just the themes that I happen to write on presented themselves to me and then I figure out how to put them all together. Wait, wait, I want to play a snippet. It's about the pro life billboard scale, which I was talking about. Oh, nice. Or Florida recently because my life is amazing and I saw the craziest pro life billboard. It was such a strange sign. I was like, what? Basically, it's an abortion, one death, one lifetime of regret, very dramatic, right? Very, very, very dramatic. But then it was in the font comic sense. It's like it's hard to tell you seriously when you're writing in clown font. So like, why do I have been winged things? You know, I feel like pro life, if you want to use comic sense, you have to say something a little sillier. So it's not like so like, you know, there's like not cognitive dissidents between the two things. And pro life is here tonight. I have some ideas of some alternative slogans you could do maybe in comic sense. Okay. So you know, you'd say like, oh girl, you know, you can't even decide where you want to go to dinner tonight to stay at home half of the baby. Well, fun, a little flirting. Be like, oh girl, you like Papa John's now. It's your turn to deliver. Fine, fine. And be like, oh, be a knocked up guy. You feel a knock down. Too bad. It's great. And I wonder, is that is the genesis you actually are driving in Florida and see the billboard? Do you just know they exist? How does that whole thing come into your head and wind up on paper and then wind up on a stage? Yeah. So that also actually happened. I had done some shows in the Panama City, B.H. Not to brag about my career. And I saw, yeah, I think I was driving then to Texas, which is very far away from Florida. Actually. I just drive too long of distances sometimes. But yeah, I did literally see a pro life billboard that was in Comic Sans and said abortion, one death, one lifetime of regret. And I immediately just saw, I was like, what the heck? Like that. It's so crazy. You're using Comic Sans, which is a unit. I feel like most people universally know that that's a silly font. Though I have discovered some people don't know anything about fonts. And that's the great thing about this country is a lot of people don't know what you know. So usually that's the only time where people will sometimes be a little confused. And again, I think it was actually an edition of Pensacola and some people didn't know what Comic Sans was. And I was like, but your billboards right there. What I'm talking about is so close. So yeah, I saw that billboard. I thought it was very funny. I think I posted like a story on Instagram about it and like several people also laughed at it. So I was like, oh, well, this is, that means people relate to this. And then I was just, again, I tried to come up. I came up with like the Papa John's one and the pro choy. The first two lines pretty fast, but it took me maybe like a month to figure out that last line of two bad whore. Or it's like being knocked up, like knocked down two bad whore. Because I would just need like a third, third one that really popped. And that one always works because everyone hates women. So that's also what I've learned from Sam Depp a lot of the time. But I don't know. Or just it kind of, it's just like so it comes out of nowhere as well. So people find it like, you know, kind of fun. So yeah, that was a real thing that happened. Well, yeah, I know I am really, really interested in this like again, it's a long stretch of you standing on a stage in front of a crowd of people. Do you know every line that's coming? Is it memorized in the way one memorizes a script? Or is there a lot of adjusting on the fly, mixing and matching? Oh, this isn't working. I'm going to go here. Is that actually as it's rolling along go? By the time it was for that special, it was mostly, you know, a monologue, a script. Though I often, the way that I actually write on paper often doesn't look like what I actually say. Because I think there is something about thinking while writing and sitting down versus thinking while you're talking to somebody. And like I feel the better writer you become, the more you can be like, oh, I know how to write exactly in my voice. But often I'll come up with like loose premises and like punchlines and then later figure out how they actually all go together. And I think, you know, people often to jokes. Once you run them enough in front of various crowds, you know how they're going to react to it. You know, like, I mean, I think sometimes in stand-up, it does make you, I don't know if this is like makes you stereotype people more, but you know, you can be in certain rooms where it's like, I know this room is going to react this way to this joke. I know this room of like a different type of people are going to like react to this. Or it's like, there's more men in this crowd. So this is how they're going to, there's more women. This is how they're going to react, which you know, sometimes it obviously isn't always true. But I think any sort of responses I have to audiences, I at that point with this set specifically because I had run it so many times, I knew what people were going to do. And so I didn't really, most of it is stuff that I've said exactly before. You know, I've said that whole thing the same way, but you have to always, how do you say in a way where it seems like it's the first time you're saying it? And I think that's what, you know, the challenge of stand-up is is because people want it to be organic. That's why often you'll go to shows and weirdly, I mean, I don't, people have their various opinions on crowd work, you know, where you like ask the crowd questions. But sometimes that stuff gets the most laughs just because it feels the most surprising. Or it's like in the moment, it's so full of being like self-aware moments. People love that. That's kind of like what crowd work is. But you want to make your, you know, your pre-rated jokes sound like you're saying it for the first time. I'm, I'm about to start working on a book and it's a memoir of my, the beginning of my career where I was a fuck up reporter in Nashville. And. >> Ice. >> Yeah, no one's going to buy it, but it's like a password. I want to do it and I got to deal for it so I'm doing it. And when I was in Nashville and I was a young, in-verginal guy, I was, I'll just say, I might have enjoyed looking at pictures of the country singer Tanya Tucker. And I'm going to write about that in my book, which for me is like embarrassing and mortifying. Like, I jerk off to Tanya Tucker, you know, right? No, that's fun. I think you should be empowered. >> Sure. Well, the funny thing is I do find that stuff really empowering like because everyone has jerked off to someone. You know what I mean? Like, that's the whole thing. Everyone is jerked off to someone. And you know, everyone knows they have. And I was, is that the title of the book? >> Holy shit. My question for you are, I keep thinking about like my mom reading that though or like different people in my life reading it and the mortification of that. And I wonder like you perform this recipe. And it's like, could be crass and it's raunchy and it's about you and your sexuality and blah, blah, blah, blah. Did you have to reach a point where you were comfortable with the idea of, I don't know, my family, my fifth grade teacher might be there, my son. So watching me spew this all. >> Well, I do find it embarrassing sometimes still when my, my mom doesn't come to my sets anymore because she's seen some of them. And that's fine. I need to one day write a set for my mom. That is a goal. But I think, you know, I used to be kind of more embarrassed with my friends and family. But I've never actually felt that embarrassed about that stuff because I've always been kind of crass in my everyday life. I've always said kind of the awkward thing because I think I've always like deep down just like wanted to like incite something in people. Or sometimes I think I exist in a world that is like stand up based. So I don't even notice when things like I think maybe that's one of my faults with stand up is that I sometimes don't notice that certain topics will be hard for people to like digest. Or I'm like, yeah, you guys don't talk about gang bangs. Like what? That not in your everyday life. Sometimes I forget that people don't think this evenly. Sometimes they're, but like, you know, I used to be more embarrassed about it. But now I also realize, you know, a lot of these jokes are exaggerations. As I was saying, there's truth in them, but they're not 100% true. I think I've actually become less vulnerable on stage, even though it is like raunchy and all of this. I actually don't really, I'm like, this isn't actually who I am all the time, you know. So I do think there's a separation. I think my family also realizes more now that my family has had to like get used to me, like saying all this stuff and being crazy on the internet. Sometimes I think they've also, you know, picked that up more of like, oh, I'm not saying the truth on stage. You know, I'm trying to say something. It's comedy, you know, it's like, it's kind of like different. The ones that I always, like my dad's come to a few more shows recently. And I think he's enjoyed them. But the things that are more difficult would be like, you know, I have a lot of various issues with my dad and I have some jokes like daddy joke, daddy issues jokes or whatever. And I haven't ever done those in front of him. Well, I have at some point I have done songs or things about him in front of him and it's always been so that's been so uncomfortable. And I think the reason that's uncomfortable is because he and I have never actually like resolved those issues. You know, it's like, I am saying this because there's a lot of people who talk about like their daddy issues. on stage like this comic Beth's telling her dad is like an actor in Orlando, Florida. And so obviously, and he does the sign spinning stuff. So obviously she has a lot of jokes about him and him being an absent father. But you know, it seems like she kind of has, she and her dad have kind of like come to a better place in their relationship where I'm still like working on that with my dad. So then when I do the jokes, I'm like, like we still have something to resolve. So it's like not all the way funny yet, you know? It's actually really interesting because I've got to tell me this, but like everyone around us, if you're sort of a writer or you're doing things creative is winds up their potential father for being part of whatever we're doing, right? Like I write a memoir about Nashville. I'm going to write about my mom and my dad and maybe the way they treated me and maybe it's not flattering. And they're not necessarily signing up for that. Like your dad did not sign up being whatever he was as a dad didn't sign up for being part of your bit. But to me, it's kind of like, well, sorry. Well, you also then have to take ownership of your own story. But I think also keep in mind that you know, you are not always the victim. You know, you also have to process your own flaws because I was like, at some point I was like, screw stand up. I don't want to do this anymore. So then I was trying to like write a book or something about like my, like I had dated one woman and I was kind of like writing about it was like a really, she was really, the quite mean to me. So it was a really bad experience. But then when I was writing it, I was like, Oh, no, I realized I was also doing all these things that were bad because I think I was finally able to be in a place where I was being truthful about my own faults. Right. So you know, how fun writing a memoir seems really painful. Yeah, I'm not quite. Yeah, I don't. Well, can't be where we're writing a two book. I was thinking about this and I was wondering about this like you're you. And again, I go online, I look at your schedule, your standup schedule and one not that exciting city after another not that exciting city. You're driving there. You're driving price six, seven, eight, nine, 10 hours to get to these places. Yeah, buckies is great. But how many buckies can you go to? Probably many. Well, you know, they're every like 300 miles. So there's really not that many of them. I do love buckies, I gotta say. Ultimately, why do it? All right. So they laugh and then you move to the next city. You not make your shit load of money. Then you laugh. They laugh and you move to the next city. Like what is it about it that has you doing it? Oh, I think I have a great void inside of me that needs to be filled by knowing that I'm making something that's worthwhile. Like I think. Yeah, because I used to do before I started playing music. That was what music used to be for me. I always felt, well, here's, okay, what happened was my sophomore year of college. I had this huge panic attack while watching the first hunger games movie. And so I had, it was like my first one ever. And then I fell into this like, I couldn't ever stop like thinking about death. It was just, I was just very existential. And I was kind of like that for a few years. And then I started like making music. And it was really bad, such bad stuff. And but it did make me kind of feel like excited to like get up in the morning to like, oh, I could write a sad song today or something. And I think comedy has done that to even a bigger extent where I'm just like, oh, I really, it just kind of creating stuff is very fulfilling. You know, it's kind of like I, I am trying to work hard. It's trying to put all my thoughts together. I'm like spending time like working on this. And it's also created at this point, stand up is like such a big part of my life that all, but I was a, you know, probably like 50, maybe like even 60% of my friends that I spend time with are comics. I mean, probably 95% of the people I'm around are comedians. It's just sort of like the language that I understand the world through or the lens that I look at stuff through except when we're doing, you know, really depressing, true crime podcast during my job. But it's kind of like, yeah, the lens of how I like see things. And I think it's just, it's made me, yeah, I don't have that huge void of just being like, what's, what's the point of all this stuff? I think that nice thing about having like an art practice of any sort, which I always encourage people like, yeah, make terrible art, like just make something. I think it's just a great way to like figure out who you are. And I think that's maybe one of the unique things about what humans do is that we make art stuff. I mean, I think some chimps also make art, but like we do it. And I think it's just like such an important part of like being human is doing that. And then also, yeah, I just need external validation. And I just have, I crave the reason, I think I'm in an interesting spot because I have a full time job that allows me to like go to places. I'm very lucky to have, you know, be able to like pursue stand up while having a job. But I think what I do, I just crave to one day, like just do an hour of stand up that is awesome. You know, that's just like people go to the show and they're like, wow, that was a really great transformative experience. Or even just like that really made me feel good for like an hour. And you know, because when you see good art, you just like, oh, yeah, that was, there is something better than like what we have. So that's kind of my goal. And so even though the money sucks and sometimes it's Arkansas, even though Arkansas, I actually like Arkansas a lot now. You know, I think it's, it's to have that goal of like, I just want to be able to entertain people for a whole hour. And it's awesome. It's kind of like what keeps me going. And once I reach an hour, I'm going to be like, well, what do I do now? When you, when you're at a show and you're, you're on a lineup with other performers and you see like someone who just kills it, just absolutely kills it is fantastic. In your body, what percentage is joy and what percentage is jealousy? Oh, I'm a very petty bit or jealous person. So usually I despise them. I mean, if it's a professional, obviously, who's like awesome and they've been doing it for longer than me and have like worked harder than me, I'm like, yes, that's great. But I do struggle a lot with like amongst my peers, you know, when people are successful, I'm just like, God damn it. I wanted to have, you know, but I'm working on that on the inside, you know, like I feel like I always get, it's also especially being a woman. I think sometimes I judge other women more than I do men, which is like this internalized misogyny that I'm like, that I despise. Or maybe it's also sometimes I don't even listen to men when they're on stage because I'm uninterested in them. So I'm always like, I always have like another woman that I'm like measuring myself against, which is not healthy. But I have gotten better now when people have an accomplishment. I'm like, that's great. You worked hard. You deserve it. Also so much of this industry, most of it is, well, I would say most of it, a lot of it is luck, a lot of it's hard work. And then a lot of it is like being hot still, unfortunately, even within comedy. Being physically hot. Yeah, being physically. That's interesting. I wouldn't think in comedy that would make a difference. In fact, I want to core things about comedy is you just see the different sizes, shapes, a lot of that. It seems like that wouldn't be a factor at all. Yeah, I think it's less than acting in other fields. But there is still especially with women, there is that. And also the weird thing about, you can do a whole episode about women in comedy and how it's, I think people will also just, I've always wanted to do jokes about when I'm going to talk about gaining weight or if you ever put yourself down physically, people feel bad for you as a woman. But dudes do that joke like that all the time and people love it. And I'm like, that's so unfair. You know, it's like myself hatred is just like a normal thing that I wish we were, like people wouldn't feel bad for us just because our whole worth is our appearance or whatever. So that's annoying. Do you think it's easier being a male and entering comedy than a female? Yes. 100%. I think it's slightly better now. But I think it's, it's also still very much a male-dominated space. Like I think on, if you look at like the specials that come out on Netflix and Hulu, I think you'll see like slightly sometimes more diversity because they're like, you know, feeling certain quotas. But I also just in general, if you go to an open mic, it's going to be like 90% men. It's just so many, so many little guys out at the open mics. And then sometimes it is interesting because another thing that happens being a woman as people won't find you as funny just because I think they're, you're talking about women topics. Where it's like, no, this is just my life. This is just like, it's like, dude, if you guys had periods, you'd be talking about them all the time constantly. Totally. Um, I'm required to ask a final question on this podcast. And with journalists and especially sports writers, I always ask, what is the lowest, what's the worst competition you've had as a sports writer, et cetera? I'm going to ask you, what is your lowest moment as a stand up? Like what was the worst moment in your stand up career? Oh, worst moment. Well, this one isn't, I'm going to, okay, this one was a reflective moment that I had in the past year, which was, I actually, I love performing in this one town in West Virginia called Morgan Town, which I think that's like the University of West Virginia is there. Is that a university? I think so. And so it's a lovely town. I have performed there twice now in the second time. Awesome. First time I did a show at a, I, I, I, they got, I flew there with one of my friends, St. Petersburg, rented a car, went to this festival. And it was not great. We don't, one of the shows we did was at this place called The Pistbox, which was a house venue that literally smelt of piss, you know, it was kind of like a punk house. You walked in, there was like litter boxes everywhere. There was like, uh, from the ceiling, like the, the smoke detector had been like ripped out of the ceiling and was just like dangling there. And it was like, everything was sticky. Everything that was like supposed to be kind of like a white kind of like, uh, like kitchen counter sink was yellow. It was all, and then also around the perimeter, there's only one bathroom, but they said, yeah, around the perimeter. It's also a piss box because everyone pisses around outside. So it was a very, um, disgusting place. And my friend and I had spent probably like $600 to like, because it was like flights, uh, uh, uh, car rental, uh, and like an Airbnb. We had spent a lot of money to be there. Um, and then it was like this show in this venue. And then there is no audience. The only audience was kind of like the other comics on the show. And maybe a few other comics in the area. And it was just one of those moments where, yeah, you aren't, you ask yourself, I'm like, what the fuck am I doing? You know, like the show ended up being like very silly and fun, but it was just like, it was like, is this, is this what it's going to be? Is it am I going to just be going to the piss box all the time? Like what should I be doing some, like my skin is worse now. Like I had to, I had to also, I literally had to wash my clothes after we left just from like the ambiance of piss. And so it was just this moment of being, I think especially they're being in my 30s now, where I'm like, maybe when I was 24, this would have been, like, yeah, this was worth it, but it was, it was just very much like, they're like, what the hell am I doing with my life kind of thing? But since then, the Pants Box has been condemned. So RIP Pists Box. So yeah, that was a, that was a low moment. But I just want to say Morgantown other great venues can be terrific. Because you get paid to appear at the Pist Box. No, wow. But the one thing that was sort of the benefit of it was that then my friend and I were doing shows in Pittsburgh with a comedian, like a headliner, Beth Sellingwood also mentioned earlier, we got to open for her in Pittsburgh and got paid to do that. So that was kind of like tag putting that along with these West Virginia shows made it kind of worth it. And also like Beth Selling's one of my favorite comedians. And she's also just a really nice person. So that was great. But still, yeah, kind of, it was like this, this high of like being on her shows in this low of like, bang, I really, I really, I really paid money to perform basically at this place called the Pist Box. It would have been awesome though if the Pist Box saw T-shirts. And you had that. They did have T-shirts, but they had run out because yeah, I really wanted a Pist Box shirt. The one advantage of it too was that I was at, I was an AMC Stubbs A-List member, not to burn back, love AMC, how obviously have that been about it. And at the Pist Box, I was really sad when Dune came out. I really wanted to get their popcorn buckets where it was like the sandworm. And it looks like, a lot of people compared them to like kind of looking like fleshlights, but it was just like a sandworm. It looked crazy. But when I got to AMC because I saw it on a Saturday, it came out on a Thursday. And I was like, can I get the Dune popcorn bucket? They're just like, we ran out of those immediately you silly goose. So I was like, so, but they had one at the Pist Box because the guy who run, who owned it, he worked at AMC just so he could steal merchandise from them. So I got to hold, I didn't get to keep it, but I did get to hold the sandworm popcorn bucket. So at least that. I lost. How these that? Unfortunately, your clothing still smells like Pist. That is exactly. Yeah, I had to burn it actually. Well, Gabby, I just want to know of all the producers I've ever worked with, who tell really funny jokes about their landing strips, you are my favorite by fall. Wow. Thank you. I know that category is, there's so many people in that case. So, um, well, I hope you don't like this, like, I hope we can, we can still have a professional production relationship. No, I'm your biggest fan. I'm telling you, I'm and I'm not just saying this. I swear to God, I'm saying this on this podcast on the record. Rick and I oftentimes we talk after meetings. We are huge Gabby Watts fans. So that's wonderful. You're awesome. Like you're great. Thank you. Well, I like you guys too a little bit. I want to thank today's guest, Gabby Watts, for joining me on Two Riders, Slinging Yang. Follow Gabby on Instagram @ga888BBIEWATS and visit our website at GabbyWATS.com. If you have a chance and enjoy Two Riders, Slinging Yang, please go to the vehicle of your choice. I'll leave a nice review. I'd be really appreciative. Music is by the great MCY-Dow. Thanks again for joining me. Remember, keep riding.