"Right now on Close Up WithTheHollywoodReporter..." "They need to know that you're pretty enough to put you on the cover of a magazine." " Oh, God." "So I told them they don't want me then." "This is how you put somebody on the cover of a magazine." "You get a ( bleep ) backdrop." "You get a photographer." "You take a picture, and you print ( bleep ) up." "That's how you put somebody on the cover of a magazine." "I had a day early in working on Girls, where I had done so much making out, that I met up with a male friend of mine and then just made out with him, too." "We'llhear from the hilarious women behindTV'sbestcomedies..." "Welcome to Close Up WithTheHollywoodReporter." "I'm Stacey Wilson, Awards Editor." "And I'm Michael O'Connell, Senior Television Writer." "Let's jump right in with the funny ladies of television." "How does each of you balance your needs for your own comedy with political correctness?" "I kind of worry about it a little bit because I deal with, like, virginity and Catholicism" "Do you find the Latino audiences more conservative and sort of what they" "No, no, no." "The Latino audience is all over the place." "I mean, the Latino audience encompasses 50 different countries." "Have you met every single one of them?" "I know every single one of them, and they're related to me." "Yes, okay." "But, no, it encompasses way too many people and so many people of different" " You know, you're talking Mexicans and Puerto Ricans and Dominicans and Cubans, and they're all from different places and speak different languages, and they eat different foods." "So, that's why it's kind of hard to talk about them." "I can only talk about myself." "And it must be hard because you're dealing" "You're not making fun of religion, but you're skewering some of the traditions." "Well..." "Yeah." "It's nice." "It's nice to talk about, you know, things that are controversial." "I really love the fact that I can talk about virginity, and we talked about abortion and about keeping, you know, pro-life and pro-choice." "The really cool thing is that Jenny, my writer, she's brilliant, and she writes in a way that talks about social commentary without making judgment, so that's the fine line." "I have my own beliefs, but I definitely don't put them on anybody else, but it feels like when you're in this position where you're the lead actress in the show, like, your word is bond, and, you know" " You know," "I try to be light because we all have our own journeys, and we all have different religions." "Pink means pregnant." "But I've never had sex!" "( gasping ) Imaculada." "You are imaculada!" "What?" "No, Mom!" "Clearly, she's not a virgin." "Of course I am." "That's a mistake!" " It's not a mistake." " Or it's a hormonal thing!" "Exactly, pregnancy hormones." "I understand that this is unplanned." "Hi, hello." "This is Jane Villanueva." "I need to talk to Dr. Alver because I have a crazy doctor saying that I'm pregnant." "How much does self-deprecation figure into how you connect with people?" "'Cause, Amy, that's sort of your bailiwick." "My what?" "( laughing )" "I think we grew up in different houses." "Um, trademark, I guess." "Oh." "Thank you." "And you've been able to connect with people, and clearly this season on your show you've really ratcheted it up, the, I guess, messaging factor." "Like, how much is" "I mean, the Twelve Angry Men she just did is, like one of-- if you haven't watched it, it's the most important thing that's happened on television in a long time." "It's amazing!" "But it speaks to the power of that self-deprecation." "To tell or sort of shed light on this ugliness about how women are perceived, how important is that to you, and all of you, in your comedy?" "Well, it's definitely very important to me." "It's just" "I just observe people and the people that I'm friends with." "I heard this conversation between two comics that I'm friends with." "They were talking at a party, and they got into a heated debate about whether or not they thought Michelle Williams was hot." "He said," ""I don't even think I'd have sex with her." And I'm, like, looking at them, like" " Really?" "And they're both physically gargoyles." "( laughing )" "Like, I just interrupt them, like, "You guys would both die to ( bleep ) her." "Like, if she asks you to get her a drink, it will be the best day of your life, but there's this deliberation, and then it just made me interested, this strange, like, aggression" "that people have for someone that they don't like." "Watching Cecily do the Correspondents' Dinner, she did such a great job, was so funny" " Amazing." " Yeah." "I just really, like, just enjoyed it, and then right away the news anchors, when they're done, they go back to the news, and they all were deliberating on if they thought she was funny or not." "They're, like, "Now, do we like her?" "Like, are you guys comedy experts?" "Like, was that funny or not?" and just" "So, everybody's like an expert in making these decisions." "I always see women on planes reading, like, a whatever, tabloid, magazine, looking at, like-- circling, like, Britney Spears' cellulite, like-- and they're wildly overweight and, like, have the mom 'do," "and they're like, deciding if they think Britney's a good parent, and it's like people are so angry and love to burn somebody at the stake, so I'll just burn myself." " Yeah, yeah." " Right?" "Wait, but no, for real, though." "Seriously." "Hey." "Do you want a lap dance?" "Thank you." "No." "Yes!" "What are we, at Whole Foods?" "That's what we came here to do, right?" "You're ( bleep ) I'm getting on stage." "I don't even give a ( bleep )." "Yeah." "I'm doing it." "Amy, don't." "Watch this." "You don't even know me at work." " I'm crazy on the weekend." " You can't be up there." "You guys don't even know I'm cool." "Ow!" "Ooh!" "I have this thing I always say, which is not the most modest" "I've ever been, but I'm fine with it, which is people" "Like, you know, you get comments like, "How did she wind up on the cover of a magazine?" "She's literally hideous!"" "I'm like, "Guys, I may not have a perfect body, but I do have a really nice face, and that's" " Just so you know!" " But I'm not saying that" "I'm just saying, I'm like, "You don't end up on the cover of magazines with a hideous face." "I objectively don't have one, and they're not putting me on there for their health." "I'm fine to look at." "I didn't blackmail them into..." "No, and I always say that I'm like" "I'd love to see a hideous woman on the cover of a magazine." "It just doesn't happen, so why don't you just, like, check your records?" "I was up for a role, and they were" "You know, and I went in character, like, you know, all focused and whatnot, and they said, "Oh, you know, the director, that's the director's favorite pick." "They absolutely love her, but can she come back in with a little tight, black dress, her face all done real nice," and I was, like, "But that's not the character."" "So then, I was like, "No." "That doesn't even make any sense." "If I come in, that doesn't make any sense." "Why would I do that?"" "And they were like, "'Cause they need to know that you're pretty enough to put you on the cover of a magazine." " Oh, God." " So I told them this." ""They don't want me." "They don't want me then because this is how you put somebody on the cover of a magazine." "You get a ( bleep ) backdrop." "You get a photographer." "You take a picture, and you print the ( bleep )." "That's how you put somebody on the cover of a magazine." " It's true!" " Like, that's actually" "The camera will not break, unless I ( bleep ) break it with my hand." " What if a child sees it?" "( laughing )" "He may go blind, Amy." "I just thought of the worst story, and I'm going to tell the abridged version, but I was testing for a show, network television, went in for the screen test." "It was for a lawyer, Harvard-educated mother ( bleep ) lawyer, okay?" "I wore a skirt suit." "Seemed appropriate." "I had on a heel!" "There were so many discussions about my hair." "They had printed up all these pictures of what they wanted me to look like." "I was, like," ""You realize every picture you found on the Internet is me when I was, I don't know, 15 ( bleep ) years ago." "I'm not going to look like that." "They print them off." "We get there." "Literally sitting in the casting director's office, they had me in and out of the bathroom, trying on clothes for them." "They finally picked a skirt they liked, that is the shortest skirt that I brought." "They get a T-shirt from one of the people in the office, and then the woman is, like, "That, uh, your, your boobs." "They're, like--" And I'm, like, "Yeah, 'cause I didn't bring a bra for this T-shirt." "Like, I've got the different bra for the other things." "She's, like, "Don't worry about it." "What size are you?" "Who wears a 34B?" "!" Screams down the hall." "This is for my audition." " This is chilling." " It is chilling, bone-chilling, and you know, you're in that situation." "You're testing." "Like" "I was so busy thinking about other things, like," "I'm trying to do my best to take care of myself as a human, and somehow auditioned." "And then I remember coming out of my screen test and thinking, like, what did I just allow on myself?" "The other actress turned the corner, and I'm not kidding you, she was dressed to go to a club, and she got the role, and I remember thinking," "Thank God, I didn't get that role because I would've died every week, being tarted up in a way, and it was my last experience doing that." "I was, like, "I'm not doing that." "I'm not doing that," and I haven't done it much in my career, but it was like one of those moments where you're so confused by trying to show up as your best, and you leave there, and you're like, I just let myself" "be humiliated, when I could've gone in there and done a great job acting, which is what I'm paid to do, and then there's wardrobe people that can handle the other side." " Yeah." " Right, right." "But that's, like, part of the biz." "You have a huge platform in the next year and a half, being the Hillary Clinton of SNL." "How are you" "How are you going to approach that?" "Do you feel pressure?" "I do feel immense pressure." "I'm rooting for her, obviously." " I'm rooting for you." " Thank you so much." "Me, too, and I believe you can make it funny while also not compromising our race." "That is the challenge because, once it becomes a comparison, that will be a different story." "Right now the story is just that Hillary is running, and" "What's the secret to doing Hillary?" "What" "When you study her mannerisms-  ( coughing ) - ( laughing )" "No, it's a combination of the people who wrote those cold opens, were Chris Kelly and Sarah Schneider, who are two geniuses, who have" "Everything I've ever been proud of, they've written." "So, I think it's a combination of their take on her that they had, and then I just wanted to play on the inherent contrast between a woman who is so driven and so hardened by her experiences" "and needs this, and the country needs this, and also a little sweetie granny from the Midwest, just the juxtaposition of those two things." "Hello." "I'm Hillary Clinton." "I'm running for president of these United States." "( forced laugh )" "( audience cheering )" "Yeah, but that's not for a long time." "Now it's summer vacation." "Ah." "My last vacation was in 1953." "( audience laughter )" "I played one round of hopscotch with a friend." "I found it tedious." "I mean, why hop when you can march, straight to the White House." "( forced laugh )" "How much input do you have on the characters you play and the image that you want to portray through the show?" "Because people become so identified with" "Now, when I think Justin Bieber, I think of you." "We have a huge impact on it because we participate in the writing of it." "Some" "Occasionally, something will be handed to me." "Actually, Justin Bieber was originally handed to me by" "Amy:" "I was going to say they handed you Justin." "the sketch that Colin Jost wrote, and I was thrilled 'cause I hadn't gotten to play boys before, and now I've made kind of a habit of it, and I'm very grateful that they let me do that." "So, yeah, we really get to decide what we're putting on the show." "We don't get to decide what makes it in the show." "Often it gets cut, but we're not often made to do something that we're uncomfortable." " What have you said no to?" "Uh... what have I..." "Tits." "Tits out." "( laughing )" "You look like you have great tits." "Thank you so much." "Uh, there's nothing I've said no to because it's been vetoed already by the people in charge, mercifully, but if it had come to me, I think I would" "I would have stood up for myself." "( laughing )" "We're going to bring you back to Hillary for just a moment." "What would you write for her campaign slogan, and Ellie, I'm wondering" "This is the question screened to me." "Yes!" "I feel like Kimmy Schmidt comes from such a pure place, that, like, what would Kimmy write?" "Well, what I like about Kimmy is that she is very girlishly powerful." "Like, I think that she came from this horrible, unspeakable experience, and she is tough like a young girl might be tough." "Like, she's all pinks and candy and yellow but still very powerful." "So, keeping in mind this girlish sensibility in a campaign slogan for Hillary" "That would fit on a bumper sticker." "On a bumper sticker." "We're looking for 140 characters." "Um... she..." " Snitches got stitches." " Snitches got stitches." "Say that again?" "She said:" "Snitches get stitches." "I think that's good." "( laughing )" "I told you go to go back to Indiana!" "I'm not going back." "I'm not going to give up, and neither are you," "I'm trying to protect you!" "Protect me from what?" "The worst thing that ever happened to me happened in my own front yard." "Life beats you up, Titus." "It doesn't matter if you got took in by a cult, or you've been rejected over and over again at auditions." "Some of which you pay to attend." "You can either curl up in a ball and die, like we thought Cindy did that time, or you can stand up and say, "We're different!" "We're the strong ones, anyou can't break us!"" "I want to hear other slogans." " Yeah." " This is really basic, but it's like:" "You want a president who's given birth." " Yes!" " That's it." "Yes." "You want a president who's pushed a beach ball out of their vagina, and the beach ball turned into Chelsea." "It's like the most amazing work." "Kate, how about you?" "You have a lot invested in this question." "I think it would just be:" "Guys, come on." "( laughing )" "So good." "Blondes have more foreign policy experience?" "Oh!" "She's just knocking them out!" "Go, Lena, go!" "( laughing )" "♪" "♪" "Welcome back to Close Up WithTheHollywoodReporter." "We're getting the inside scoop from TV's buzziest comedy actresses." "Is there something that you would never do for a laugh, a line that you cross that you just refuse to put yourself in a situation to get a laugh?" "I would never ( bleep ) for a laugh." "Like, right?" "Like, I don't care" " I was going to say" "I ( bleep ) ever ( bleep ) someone for money for a laugh." "( laughing )" "So, we're on the same page." "Gina, how about you?" "Is there a line you won't cross?" "No." "I am a brown girl." "I have to cross all the lines." "( laughing )" "No, but I just recently gave birth on screen." "There's a reason why nobody's in the room with you." " Oh, yeah." " Do you know what I'm saying?" "Like, there's a reason why that should be an alone thing." "So, I just gave birth in front of 30 grown men, and a young woman that I met that day was just right there in between my legs, and it was a very interesting experience because she was, like, "So, hi!" "My name's Julie."" "And I was like, "Hey, what's up, Julie?" She's like, "I'm going to be your OB-GYN." I'm like, "Congratulations." "Very excited to have you on the show." "This is going to be so fun,"" "and I'm like, "Okay, let's get rehearsals." "So, Julie, just stand, like, sit right in between her legs,"" "and I have these nice Spanx." "God, I love Spanx, and my big old belly and my legs spread wide open." "I probably should've showered that morning, but I was, like, "Julie, get right up in here." "Get up in here, Julie, and put your arms on my thighs."" "I want you in here." And she had no problem doing that." "And then I was really upset that I decided that was a good idea." "I stopped wearing a nude cover after the first season of Girls." "There's not one guy who works on that show who hasn't seen the literal inside of my vagina." " They can draw your ovaries?" "Yeah, 'cause I used to wear that patch or whatever, and then it always falls off," " What's the patch?" "It's like a nude patch that you glue to your, kind of" "Kind of glue it over your vagina, then kinda take it around and over your butt hole, and it's like they-- Your costume lady has to come in and use different adhesives to make sure it's all sticky," "and then it gets all sweaty in the room, and it always falls off, and someone texted me from set the other day who was doing a sex scene, and I wasn't there, and she was," "like, "The nude cover keeps falling off," and I was like," ""Just throw it away and go for it."" "I want to say something, which is I've never done a sex scene, and I am prudish, I think, and even when I've had to kiss someone in a scene, my mind thinks for the next hour" "See?" " Just wanted to test you." "I know." "Like, I do think we're in love for the next hour." "Like, it's a middle-school frame of mind, but it's like kissing" "How do you get through that, the discomfort of that?" "I don't." "Well, I guess-- What do you do?" "I fall in love for that hour." " I'm getting it's confusing." " It's very confusing." "Whenever anyone says, like, "Oh, sex scenes, it's so mechanical, and it doesn't even feel like anything," No, it feels like someone ( bleep ) you, so, yeah, and kissing them," "and so it's confusing." "I had a day early in working on Girls, where I had kissed two different people during the day at work and done so much making out, that I met up with a male friend of mind and then just made out with him, too." "You were, like, this is what I do?" " This is me!" " It's my life!" "I have to say, for half-hour, there's instructions." "I'm like, close the mouth." "You can move, make the sounds, no tongue." "I should say-- I should say" "Who gives the instructions, you?" "I do because I had some incidents on Girlfriends." "Really, what happened?" "Where a tongue just, like, jammed in like a lizard out of nowhere, and I was just, like, did you just ( bleep ) put your tongue in my mouth?" "There's no audience here." "I should say multi-cam." "There's no reason." "There's no reason." "We had a guy get too realistically sexual with one of our actors, female actors, early on, and she" " He got too frisky, and she didn't tell me for, like, five months, and I was like, "You've got to say it." "If you see something, say something,"" "but I think she was so early on in the job, that she felt" "And it made me realize." "I was, like, what was happening in the 1940s, like, on casting couches, if--?" "My good friend who's on my show won't tell me that some guy licked her inner thigh, and I..." "Oh, boy!" "That happened to me." "I was filming a movie last summer." "This guy was, like" "Well, I had a bunch of sex scenes in this movie." "They're great." "I've seen an early cut." "Full penetration." "We went for it." "No." "So, this one guy, it was the day we were going to have to make out, and he's, like," ""Do you want our first kiss to be on camera?"" "And I went, "Yeah."" "( laughing )" "What?" "Like, no, come to my trailer, and we'll make out" "Yeah, it was so grotesque, and I'm like, "How do you" "Do you think I cast you 'cause I want to make out with you?" "Like, no." And then, yeah, it was, like, total unnecessary touching, but yeah, I called the director, and I was, like, "Get that guy out of there."" "Well, I think that it's strange." "This will sound totally simplistic, but when you kill someone in a movie, you don't kill them." "So, I'm always confused by" "That's so smart!" "This is very good." "That's very good." "Thanks, guys." "What do you think is funny?" "Like, I'm so curious." "Kate, can you please tell me, where do you think funny comes from?" "There was an episode RuPaul'sDragRace" " Yes." " I love RuPaul's Drag Race!" "Where they had to do stand-up comedy." "I mean, drag queens, they have every skill in the world." "Rita Rudner was helping them with their comedy routines, and she said a quote that I still remember, which was something to the effect of, "There's nothing funny about a confident person who's doing well."" "One of them was sort of, like, bragging and just looked gorgeous and was just sort of saying that they were feeling good." "( laughing )" "And I think, to me, I start from a place of exploiting uh, things in me that I find objectionable and displaying them and celebrating them, and for me that's where I try to get ideas from." "I never have any ( bleep ) idea." "Right." "Never." "Never." "I've seen you have ideas." "Tracee, where do you think it comes from for you?" "I don't know where it comes from for me, but I" "I do think that truth is one of the things, like telling the truth, because I think anyone" "Like, when you get in that position, where you're trying to make people laugh, you're screwed." "But I mean, I don't really know." "I mean, I think it's one of those magic things." "It's elusive." "There's always different kinds of comedy, and it's such a stunning thing, you know." "What makes people laugh is, like, it's, like, delicious, you know, all the different versions of how that comes out." "I love to go to a place of, like, I love physical comedy because I love the idea of liberating myself of what I'm supposed to look like all the time, and what's going to be prettiest on my face and what's going to," "you know, be the most aesthetically pleasing for me." "I feel so much freedom in, like, letting go and being okay with that, and that makes me feel funny." "Well, something I love about all the women at this table is you guys all, all of-- What?" " I was going to say except one." " Except Ellie." "Except, 'cause I have complicated ginger feelings about the oldest one." "No, you're all beautiful." "You're all elegant, but there's a lack of vanity in what you do, and I remember seeing the first episode of Jane The Virgin, where Gina's, like, in this mermaid suit, and she's in this mer" " You can borrow it." "Fine." "Please!" "Thank you!" "And you were just, like, you weren't trying to pose." "You were fully inhabiting the discomfort of the moment, and it was so exciting and refreshing, and to see that in a network, hour-long show, to see this girl who's, like, I'm not going to try to be hot." "This is not going to be the OC version of the mermaid suit." "This is going to be the most stressful mermaid suit in history, and I was like, I am in." "( laughing )" "♪" "♪" "Welcome back to Close Up WithTheHollywoodReporter." "We're getting the inside scoop from TV's buzziest comedy actresses." "What's the most overtly sexist thing that has happened to you in the workplace in Hollywood?" "I literally had a guy who was on my show for a few episodes." "I heard him on his mic saying," ""I hate this job." "I cannot wait to be back on a show where there's a man at the helm."" "I literally heard it on a mic, so it was like," ""I didn't even know this happened anymore."" "Like, I thought he'd just be, like, subtly weird, and then that same guy later came up to me at lunch and said," ""You're really enjoying that buffet, aren't you?"" " No!" " Who the ( bleep ) is this?" "I'll tell you afterwards, the worst person alive, and I hope he watches this, which he won't 'cause he's drunk, and-- ( laughing )" "It's like I'm so sorry." "I want to make amends." "I hope he's in the program and makes amends with me." "Is that Judd Apatow you're talking about?" "It's okay." "You can tell us." "It's okay." "Judd Apatow's the best man in the world." "He's, like" "He would never-- All he would say is, like," ""You are women." "You are deities." "Let me kiss your feet and toes."" " It's true." " Anyone else?" "Overtly sexist experience?" "I think racism usually trumps it." "Yeah." "It's a little easier to spot, I find." "I mean, all the shows that I've been have been run by women." "This is my first experience on Black-ish, where it really is told through a man's point of view." "There are certain moments here and there, that's more that people don't realize the stereotypes that you're perpetuating, but when called on it, they're very happy to open that up." "I'm late." "Uh." "Which is weird, 'cause in my rational mind," "I know there's no way I'm pregnant, but I still get that little, like, flutter of excitement, you know?" "You think it's so funny." "Yeah." "Funny." "It's like that feeling when you're at the top of a roller coaster, and it's like scary, but it's like fun scary 'cause you know you're safe." "I remember when it used to be scary scary, before you got a vasectomy." "Often in comedy, I think the sexist stuff or racist stuff happens behind the scenes, not-- You know, most of us are playing roles, and we're all outspoken women who I would imagine speak up when it's" "The image that we're portraying doesn't have that." "And I love that you started with Mara on Girlfriends, in this environment that was her really trying to, like, change up the paradigm on television, and I think you all contributed to that in the most." "I think so many shows wouldn't exist if you and Mara hadn't made Girlfriends and pushed that as far as you did." "Oh, thanks." "I think Mara was really instrumental in that, and it was really interesting." "I mean, that was the first" "That show ran, we did 173 or 176 episodes or something, and, but to be in an environment where it's run by a woman, four women leads, like-- And that was not my first job," "you know." "I did LyricistLoungeandwhatever, but to have that experience in the beginning sort of gives you a template that you do not walk out into the world and see everywhere, so it changed the expectation that I have for the way things are moving." "Yeah." "I think I've been lucky enough to work on projects where there are women at the helm, and so I can't think of something, luckily, that has been done to me that's overtly sexist, and I think that is because," "well, A, I didn't catch it on walkie, but also it's women running the show, women writing the show, women playing huge parts in the show, so" "But that, of course, is a blessing, probably, something that's come about sort of recently." "It's also one of the things about TV, I have to say." "Like, if you look at the roles that women are able to play on television, sort of the broader spectrum of it, it's really cool." "Well, I was going to ask." "Chris Rock wrote an essay for us a few months ago about" " Is he a woman?" "He is not." "I read that essay." "Yeah, it was a great essay, in which he talked about how you can go to the movies once a week for many months and never really see a black woman on screen in a substantial role." "I think that also goes for Latinos as well." "That's one of the reasons I sobbed so hard during your Golden Globe speech." "I was literally in my chair, like, weeping, because of what that clearly would mean to so many women watching." "I'm curious as to your experience, if you've, you know, auditioned for parts and said, "No, I don't want to play that role," and obviously you're getting into film, too." "What are your experiences now with looking for those roles outside of television, which aren't many?" " There aren't many." " Have you purposely stayed in television because the roles were better for women?" "I don't think any actress would say they purposely stay anywhere." "Well done." "Well said." "Yeah, so I purposely would like to stay in only what I want." "Um, I think, you know, there's a really interesting thing." "It's like the one job where you look at a breakdown, and it specifies the race of what they're going to cast, and now, all ethnicity is-- Black is no longer the cool minority." "It means Indian, Pakistani." "Like, there's a whole array of what goes in that category now." "It's interesting for me 'cause often I will read a breakdown and think, "That's me!"" "But she's not supposed to be black." "Yeah, 100%." "Right?" "I go up for them anyway." "I don't know." "What's your experience with that?" "Yeah, the whole conversation about sexism and racism," "I remove myself instantly, I think, if something's perpetuating a stereotype or whatnot because I think as artists we want to work so bad, that we forget that we own a power of our own, and that we deserve to tell" "stories, and we are deserving of these things." "So, you know, we'll say yes so quickly, and the truth is that the only way to stop stereotypes is to be able to say, you know," ""Wait." "I'm going to bow this out." "I'm going to wait for a journey that suits me more," and that goes for women as well." "It goes for beauty." "Like, Lena, what you've done" "I feel like has made me encompass my skin so much stronger, and that" "But you're so pretty." "Why would you have to?" "( laughing )" "For me, I've always taken the road of, you want the actress that's going to make you the most proud, that's going to really fulfill your role, and if I don't believe in it," "if I don't think that it's contributing to my journey, then I'm not going to give you the 100% you deserve." "I never thought about how it could possibly be until I started having a TV show and we would have auditions, and a lot of the black women auditioning thought that we wanted them to be like a sassy" "For sure, urban, like, let me get it a little more urban." "And we'd be like, "Oh, no." "Just, like, just be funny." "Yeah, just whatever," and I was like, "Oh, that sucks."" "That means that they've gone in a lot of rooms, where they're like, "Mm, can you, like, snap?" or, you know?" "Well, this brings up a good point, and how much responsibility do you feel on your show now, to combat these forces of evil to be inclusive of people of color, to" "Oh." "It's New York." "I just feel like it's not even a thought." "The only thing was, once there was this one scene." "It was so stupid;" "I don't even want to say the premise, and this guy has to come in and steal my bag, and the guy that we cast, he was a black guy, and I was like, "Uh, that sucks." I was, like, embarrassed" "about it, but then I remembered to use a stunt guy, whose name is actually Muhammad Ali." "( laughing )" "It was like, "Oh, no." "He can do flips and stuff,"" "and that's why, but I feel like we just use the best, funniest people that I'm aware of anyway." "I think you guys have done an amazing job of that." "There was a lot of dialogue around race on Girls when it first came out, and I-- Really, it was an educational, painful process for me because I had been thinking so much about sort of representing weirdo girls" "and chubby girls, and strange half-Jews that I hadn't forgotten that there was an entire world of women who were being under-served, and so I think that was a very intense, complex and ultimately super important experience for me to witness" "and then become a part of that conversation about race on television, and I always say, like, even when there were moments where I felt defensive, I tried to stop and examine that and realize that, like, it is our job as creators" "to represent more than our own experience and to represent more than just what we've seen, and it ultimately made the show better and made me stronger as a feminist and as an activist and as a thinker, and I feel so much gratitude for the people" "who sort of brought that conversation up and talked me through it in a generous and informative way." "I'm actually not a child." "I have way more experience with this stuff than you do." "Oh, really?" "Yes, really." "I was in a relationship with a gay man." "We broke up, and I've been navigating the choppy waters ever since." "You're a child, basically, okay?" "I bet you didn't even bring your wallet, did you?" "Am I right?" "Did you bring your wallet here?" " I brought my wallet here." " Oh?" "Let me see it then." "No." "I'm not going to show you my wallet for this stupid game." "Let me see your wallet, if you're such a grown-up." "I came right from the gym." "( laughing )" "Their experience, though, is what we need more of in our culture, where your response to it," "I think we're so quick to vilify and say that people are wrong or bad, instead of we all have these huge blind spots because we're human beings, and I think that's part of what you were able to do," "is take a blind spot and not let it take you down, and actually learn from it and open up your experience and then allow yourself to expose that to other people, but that's not always the journey of what happens." "I do have to say, like, one of the things I hate the most is, like, I feel like the comedy community is so defensive and that there's such a sense that, like, you're not coming for our guys!" "That people are unwilling to learn." "Like, two years ago, there was a big issue with Daniel Tosh and rape jokes, and what does that mean?" "And the fact that there couldn't be a civil conversation within the comedy community, 'cause, like," "I'm a sexual assault survivor." "I would love to sit down and have a totally humane, non-judgmental conversation with a male comedian who makes rape jokes, but there doesn't seem to be room for that." "Well, it's a scary thing." "I think that's part of what's happening in our culture around race, too." "It's so complex, it's more than just one thing." "It's not race." "It's socio-economic." "It's one's personal experience." "It's your own wounds." "It's what you're going through, and then you" "And it's also what the industry has found financially beneficial, you know?" "Like, this one format has worked so well, and they're going to put their money behind what works." "So, when we show them that other stories work, that they're not different, that they are human stories, that Black-ish and Jane The Virgin and Fresh Off The Boat and all these other shows" "Shonda Rhimes owning the entire television Thursday." "( laughing )" "Nobody touches Thursday, you know, and I think that when you start having the conversation of, let's show them that this is a good investment, let's show them that there is finances here, it's not" "about race." "Fine, there's money in Jane The Virgin." "Let's put money in more Latinos." "Let's put money in more, you know, African-Americans." "Let's put money in the new whatever it's going to be, 'cause I think that when you vilify it, then people shut down." "People close off." "They don't want to talk about it, and then you're also not leaving room for growth." "I think it's very easy to go to the, like, "Why don't we see more Latinos?"" "Well, Latinos can get unified and start watching their selves on television." "Well, that's right." "It's so great when Black-ish and Jane The Virgin do, do so well." "You are demonstrating to the people who make shows, "Oh, this does well, so we can make more of them."" " Exactly." "We are so obsessed with the one-two that you guys pulled on Kimmy, where you thought she was going to, like, go off with that handsome British guy." "Yeah, yeah!" "And then you realize, like, she loves her ESL Asian friend." "That was my favorite." "Always go with Dong." "What kind of feedback did you get about that storyline, 'cause I actually had a couple of Asian friends, they had some sort of split opinions about it." "I know there was some criticism about how race is dealt with on our show, and then I think maybe it was stereotypical." "I mean, we played into some of the stereotypes." "I'm not in" "I'll shut up." "I'm saying I'm not in the writer's room, but also I think that, like you said, Kimmy doesn't end up with the white man." "She ends up with the Asian Dong, so" "( laughing )" "I'm really sexually attracted to Dong, so that just, like, erases any critical distance for me because he's gorgeous." "( laughing )" "♪" "♪" "Welcome back to Close Up WithTheHollywoodReporter." "We're sitting down with the funny ladies behind TV's best comedies." "When it was leaked, the amount that I was paid for my book, there was, like, 39,000 articles that were, like," "Does Lena Dunham deserve her book advance?" "and I was" " God!" "So rude." " How much did you get?" "A bunch, but" "You could, like, buy a car." "( laughing )" "A bunch, but then you know it gets given to everybody, then I give a lot of it to charity." " Always." " Most to charity." "But there was these huge dialogues, "Is she worth it?"" "I'd say, like, a week and a half later, it comes out what Aziz Ansari's making on his book." " No one said a thing." " And no one says ( bleep ) damn word, and I'm like, he's a great comedian." "I love what he does" " But come on." "But the idea was, like, I'm not coming from nowhere." "I was, like, I'm a professional writer." "I do this for a job." "People are also more interested in you than Aziz Ansari, like, no offense to him." "I'm really interested in Aziz Ansari, sexually." "( laughing )" "What do you do, personally, when people come back at you about something?" "What do you do to console and soothe yourself?" "Because it's a hard part of this, especially if you're in comedy." "You're going to step on some toes at some point." "Totally." "I try to look at it and go, ke" "'Cause there have there been times where I've said something that I've thought about, and I'd be, like, that wasn't as funny as it could've been." "I didn't need to say that, and then if that's how I feel, I'll issue a tweet that says," ""Hey, guys." "I thought about it, and you're right."" "But a lot of times I thought about it, and they're not right." "What was the time that you had those thoughts after you posted something?" "One time, someone was like, "Why do you get naked on TV so much?"" "And I wrote back, like, "I don't know, lady." "Ask my uncle."" "And then all these girls were, like, "I was molested." "I love your show, but I don't need to read this."" "And I was like, you know what?" "As a sexual assault survivor, as someone who gets it, who needed that Catskills joke?" "I apologize." " I love that joke." "I'm so glad, but then, like, with the stuff around my book and negative attention directed towards my family for content in the book, and at that point what I said was," ""I'm sorry if this was triggering for anybody,"" "which I am, 'cause the idea of, like, there's things that trigger me, and I don't want to make anyone else feel that way, but at the same time I have to share my truth" "and share my reality and do it as best as I can, so it's about that line of going, like, I am sorry to the people who read this and felt pain." "I'm not sorry to the people who are trying to, like, make this a part of their political agenda and be, like, "She likes abortion!" "She likes Hillary Clinton, and she molests babies!"" "I can't go there with you, and I feel incredibly lucky that I have so many supportive friends." "I mean, Amy was amazing throughout the entire thing." "She texts with me every day, and was, like, really talked me off a ledge." "I was, like," ""My back's gone out." "I can't walk down the street." "I'm gonna go to jail!"" "I think you handled it so, so well." "What's the best advice that you've gotten in navigating situations like that, and then just working in comedy and fronting these television shows?" "I think you need your support systems, first of all, like your real friends that will be, like," ""You're fine," and that you can trust." "Professionally, though, like, who's your go-to?" "I don't trust any professional." "Wait, what do you mean by professional?" "You mean like your therapist?" "Like a fellow actor, a comedian, a producer." " Or agent." " I feel like it's helpful, actually, to go to someone who's totally out of the business." "Yeah." "I would never ask anyone in the business." "Agents and managers are not for that." "No, they also-- I mean, with exception," "I think that you need someone out of the field completely because this is not always the real world." "Like, you need to be with someone who is" "And also, usually I think the thing that's happening is internal." "It's not necessarily my response to the circumstances of what's happening, business-wise." "It's like this is what's come up for me, personally, that's freaking me out." " 100%." "Yeah." "As long as the people you care and love believe what you're saying is true to yourself because that was such a thing." "You can see it from the outside, and I've had this, like, some things where I've gotten death threats and whatever, but you're, like," ""This will blow over." They're, like, "Okay, who do we hate today?" "Okay, we all hate this girl,"" "uh, on a slow news day, and then you just, like," ""Okay, everybody just tire yourselves out running around, screaming, and then it will be the next thing."" "And the next day, you're on the red carpet, in front of Kim and Kanye, and everyone thinks you're the most brilliant person alive." "But when you said about, like, bringing up personal stuff, like when there was attention around the sexual assault chapter in my book." "The big issue for me wasn't what was happening in the real world, and how I was going to navigate it." "It was what it brought up for me about my own assault and how am I going to deal with this, and how am I going to continue on through the world when this kind of pain rears its head again, and who am I" "going to talk to?" "And that was when, as you said, your support systems and your family, and I do recommend that everybody have a good therapist." "That's when those people are going to help you because the news cycle will lose interest in you in two days, but you're still living with the PTSD and the pain and the feeling that you were revictimized and reviolated." " Revived that old wound, yeah." " Yeah." "And that's, you know-- All of us, if you're" "The comedy that you do, or the work that we do, whatever, but as a woman, one of the things that does come on the outside of that is the comments around you physically and all of those kinds of things that come up, that's it's" "I mean, I think across the board in our industry now, that's just like the norm." "It's like our culture thinks it's okay to talk about things of people that it's, like, just none of your business." "Like, why are you asking me about that?" "Why are you talking about that?" "Why is somebody making a comment about where my boobs are placed on my body?" "Like, what all these different kinds of things, that you do take that stuff home, personally." "That really makes me think of the Wanda Sykes joke." "I always think about it, where she says, "Women will always be evaluated on how they look." Like, a woman could cure cancer, and they'd be, like, "But did you see her?"" "You know?" "It's just..." "Wanda Sykes, speaking of which, is part of the hottest couple in the entertainment industry." "I want to see a sex tape of Wanda Sykes and her French wife so bad." "So bad." "( laughing )" "♪" "♪" "Welcome back to Close Up WithTheHollywoodReporter." "We're getting into it with your favorite funny ladies." "So, we would love to know what has been your most mortifying moment ever as a performer?" "I will begin." "I, um, was invited to do stand-up comedy for the booker of the then prestigious Aspen Comedy Festival." "I was told that I had to bring 10 people." "I couldn't wrangle 10 people, so I had to pay $40 for each of the seven people I couldn't wrangle." "The three people who came were men from my Ventel marketing job." "Okay." "And then I did my stand-up." "It was supposed to be five minutes." "I did a tight two and a half." "The woman afterwards, I said," ""What did you think?" She said, "There was not enough for me to judge, but what I did see I didn't like."" " No!" " I went to a Starbucks after and cried for 15 minutes, then the men texted me and said," ""Where are you?" "Would you like to get a drink?"" "I said, "No, I'm going home." They said, "Please."" "They texted me an address." "I went." "It was a Hooters." "I spent my night at the Hooters." "That's, that's amazing." "But look at you now!" "Now I go to Hooters on the Rhine." "( laughing )" "Who can top that?" "I think that's the saddest thing I've ever heard." "Amy, I'm sure you have a sadder story." "It's the most embarrassing or the saddest?" "Mortifying, something you look back on in horror." "Okay." "I was opening for Dave Attell at an improv in Washington, DC, and I was walking past the White House, feeling, like, wow, I'm really getting everything I can out of this life, and this woman came up to me," "and she was, like, "What do you do?" and so I'm like" ""She recognizes me," and this is like, there's nothing to recognize me from." ""I'm a comedian." She goes, "Oh." That's just like her lead question." "She's, like, "These people are on hunger strike," and there was 40 people at a hunger strike outside the White House, and she was, like," ""They're so hungry." There's a podium, and people come and read to them and stuff." "And so, I called some friends, and I was, like, "I should not do this, right?"" "Jim Norton, the comedian, was, like, "You gotta take the gig."" "( laughing )" "So I sat there and tried to write hunger strike jokes, and so I went up, and no one laughed." "Like, if they laughed, it was, like-- Like, they're hungry!" "They're very hungry." "And I tried to make jokes, like, "You're lucky Gallagher isn't here." "That would be inappropriate."" "Nothing." "I got nothing." "And then, yeah, and I" "You know, of course bombed and then went home." "They put a video of it online, and then people told me after the fact that they were a known terrorist organization." "No!" "Making people laugh is what I can do to give back." "And then finally, perhaps our most important question." "Oh, yes." "Uh, what is your humblebrag?" "Obviously you guys are in a place of fame and repute, and there have got to be moments where something pretty luxurious is happening, and you're, like, "Mm." Do you have a humblebrag?" "A humblebrag?" "Let's say, rest in peace, Harris Wittels, creator of the humblebrag." "Pour a little for Harris." "Yes." "So, good." "Like, the other day my sister was, like," ""What's the most romantic thing you've ever done for a boyfriend?" I was like, "I threw him this really great surprise party when he got nominated for a Grammy,"" "and she looked at me, and she was, like, "You suck."" "( laughing )" "And I do feel really good." "Like, I always thought that I would continue to date men who lived in vans, and like the fact that I can say I went to the Grammys with my boyfriend, and he acknowledged me is amazing." "Gina, what's yours?" "Uh, I gave my grandmother a fat ( bleep ) check." "( cheering ) That's so cool!" " That's great." " And she spent it on crack." "( laughing )" " Lena!" "That's amazing." "Did she sob?" "Actually, it's like a wild ghetto, too, because I was, like, "Grandma, come with me to the bathroom," 'cause there was a lot of people in my apartment, and it's really small, so it was like, "Grandma, come on." "Come with me this way," and she was, like, "Ay, okay, pues,"" "and she, like, follows me, and then I close the door, and I was like, I folded it up, and I was, like, "Here." "This is for you, Grandma," and she's like, "Ah." "No puedo."" "It's like, "No, I can't." And I was like, "No, Grandma, just take it, just take it." She opens it, and she sees the amount, and she goes, "Ay,pues!"andshe putsit" "in her pocket, and Alleluia!" "( laughing )" "I don't want your $5, and she was like, but I'll take this." "That's so good." "I was making a pilot a couple of years ago, and I tripped over some sort of gear in the middle of the parking lot, like some set person had set out some, I don't know their names," "and I tripped" " Uh-oh!" "There we go!" "Like, some oxygen stealer on set." "But this is where I'm a monster, and I tripped over it, and I said, "Someone needs to move that!" And it was horrifying, what came out." "Like, nobody needed to move it." "I actually think they did need to move it." "And the humblebrag question just became us being, like, "Here's when I was the worst person alive."" "I have a problem, which is I have the jappiest mom in the world, so it's like there's nobody" "Keep in mind who my mom is." "I know." "My mom would move us from hotel room to hotel room, being, like, "There's a light draft," you know?" "I mean," "I probably can't hold a candle, too full, although I would say my mom is maybe like the Jewish Diana Ross." "( laughing )" "Ladies, I'm sorry to tell you we must wrap." "No!" "I know." "I know." "We've learned a lot, and well done, everyone." "Thank you all." " I think we all deserve a round of applause." " Great job, you guys." "♪"