-Our next guest is a very funny actress and comedian
you know from shows such as "Vice Principals"
and "The Last OG."
She's starring in the second season
of "The Righteous Gemstones."
New episodes are available Sundays on HBO and HBO Max.
Let's take a look.
-BJ, I'm saying something nice right now.
-You're right. I'm sorry.
This is an exciting day. -Mm-hmm.
Let's not ruin it. -The only ones who can ruin it
are the ones who try to hold us back.
Like your family.
-Nobody can hold us back.
Not when I'm wearing this.
-Yeah, boy!
Yeah, shake that cake!
-Please welcome back to the show our friend Edi Patterson.
[ Cheers and applause ]
♪♪
Hi, Edi! -Hi, Seth.
-Welcome back.
Congratulations on season 2. -Thanks.
-Congratulations on your outfits.
You really get to wear some fantastic outfits.
-Yeah, they really go for it with Judy's outfits.
-Do you get excited when you -- -Shout-out to Sarah Trost.
-Sorry. Who's the shout-out to?
-Sarah Trost, our genius of a costume designer.
-Yes, she's done --
Do you get excited when you see the outfits?
-I get really excited because I would say,
9 times out of 10, I've got two categories,
and it's either, like, mm, church chic
or ice skater. [ Laughter ]
Like, what an ice skater would wear to go, like,
"I'm gonna get crazy today."
[ Laughter ] Yeah.
-You talked, last time you were here,
you grew up in Texas, you grew up in a religious family.
-Yeah. -And you did not sort of
suggest to your mom that she watch season 1.
Or, maybe your mom wasn't suggesting it to other people.
-Yeah, my mom was very into it. But she probably,
I said, wasn't telling people at church.
-Okay, gotcha. -Now that's changed.
-Oh, that's great. -Yeah.
And if they're not into it, they can hit the bricks...
-All right.
-...as far as my mom's concerned.
-I'm very happy that your mom is being supportive of this.
-My mom's always been supportive of it.
-Right. -She just knew, like,
"Maybe some people, don't talk to them about it."
[ Laughter ]
But the weird thing is, I just was with her recently,
and everyone she talks to about it and everyone
who's sort of close to us is, like, fully on board.
They're, like, real into the "Gemstones."
They're real into how nasty Judy is.
Even if they're real churchy, they're down to clown.
But the weird thing about going home is, like --
There's -- I don't know.
There can be this aspect of, like, super, super excited
from people, because they know how hard you've worked,
or this weird thing where they're like -- I don't know --
you almost get humbled because they --
I just was there, and this dude we kind of know
from growing up came up to me.
And he was like, "Hmm. Hey, I, uh..."
kind of with a sad voice or disappointed voice --
"...haven't seen you on anything."
[ Laughter ]
"How's -- How's it all going?
I haven't seen you on anything."
And I was like, "Um, it's going great.
I -- yeah, I don't know what to tell you, dude.
I'm mostly just busy working on the show that I'm on
and that I write for.
Sorry I'm not on baseball."
[ Laughter ]
And I'm, like, sitting there, getting pissed,
and I'm thinking like, "Man, I know for a fact
you had a girlfriend -- a grown-woman girlfriend --
who moved out not too long ago,
who took all your furniture while you were somewhere else.
And I know you've been living with one chair
in your house for at least a few months."
[ Laughter ]
"And not because you can't go buy other chairs.
Just because you're that dude.
So, like, don't tell me like,
'I haven't seen you in anything.'"
[ Laughter ]
-"You got to have a second chair before you come to me."
-Yeah. Yeah, for real!
Like, have a second chair before you're going to be
disappointed in my life. [ Laughter ]
-Did you -- Did you find out early
in your life in Texas that comedy was a skill you had?
Were you appreciated?
-Yeah, well, I was definitely appreciated in my house
and then with my friends.
And I would try --
Yeah, I would definitely try things.
I went through definitely a phase where, like,
everything funny to me
was acting like things I'd already seen.
So there's, like, probably a thousand VHS tapes
of me being Pat from "SNL." -Right.
-There's probably a thousand VHS tapes
of me being Fire Marshall Bill and like --
[ Laughter ]
But I would try things I had discovered on my own in my room,
and then I would do them with them.
Like, there's a classic one --
I don't know why I think you can do this, but...
-I don't think I can. I definitely can't.
I don't know why you thought I could.
But tell everybody what you're about to do.
-I can talk with my mouth closed,
and this was a thing I discovered
trying to be funny for my friends.
-Okay. -And it started from, like --
Like, at a slumber party,
screaming so parents couldn't hear.
Like, we're up, screwing around or whatever,
and I screamed into a pillow, and I went,
"Oh, I bet that I could do that inside my mouth.
Oh, and I bet I can say sentences."
[ Laughter ] -Okay. Well, I mean --
I don't know what to tell you other than show us.
-I thought you could do this. -I definitely can't do --
-But it's just that I can --
I can really just, like, say...
[ Laughter ]
I can say anything that I would normally say.
[ Laughter ]
But it's -- it's creepy because it's almost like
there's someone inside of me.
[ Laughter ]
[ Cheers and applause ] -That's...
I mean...
That was exactly what you said you were gonna do,
and I still couldn't expect it to be like that.
-Yeah, it's confusing. It's weird.
-Mm -- Mm-mm...
-You got to get some air in there, yeah.
-Mm -- Mm. Nope.
[ Laughter ]
That was -- That was almost a level of some --
like, a trait somebody might have in a horror film.
You -- But you were --
Who introduced you to horror?
Because I know that was something you love.
-My dad loved horror movies. -Okay.
-And as a result, my sister and I loved horror movies.
-That's great. -Yeah. Way too young.
-Okay. -Like, really young.
Like...probably saw "The Shining" when I was 8.
-Yeah, that's too young. -But like --
My brain was so weirdly altered from it
that when normal things would happen in real life,
I would think,
"Oh, something supernatural's happening -- to me."
-Okay. -"This is happening."
-This is something that would happen to you at what ages?
-Like -- Oh, the one I'm thinking of
right now, I was probably 17. -Okay.
-Not a child. -Okay, gotcha.
-Like -- A child but not a child.
Closer to an adult.
But I was at my grandmom's in La Grange, Texas.
And I had gone for a run. It was just getting dusk.
And, like, at the top of every hill where she lived,
there was a light.
And so you could see something far away on the hill,
but when you ran, you couldn't see it.
Anyway, out for a run.
I see this shape coming over the road.
I'm like, "Oh, okay. Yeah, cool, somebody running."
And then I turn back around,
and it's exponentially closer than it was.
Like, way closer than a human being could be.
-Yeah. -But my brain,
because of horror movies, goes, "Demon. Get inside."
Fully thought it was a demon.
Ran to my grandmom's house.
Locked the door.
She had these sort of, like, full windows in the front,
like, floor-to-ceiling windows in the front
and those vertical blinds.
And I remember crouching on the floor, shaking,
looking out the blinds, waiting for a demon
to come past on the road.
And my mom and my grandmom were like,
"What are you doing on the ground?"
And I'm like, "Oh, it's not a big deal.
I just -- I don't want to talk about it right now."
And so I'm looking, looking.
The weirdest thing is, I fully thought a demon would come by,
and it was some dude on a 10-speed, like,
doing that with no hands.
[ Laughter ]
Going faster than a human would. -Yeah, yeah.
With a bike, you would go faster, yeah.
-The first earthquake I ever experienced in L.A.,
I really thought, "Here we go -- dimensional shift."
[ Laughter ]
'Cause the floor was, like, rolling, and I'm like,
"Okay, it's happening. This is, like,
dimensional shift, Rapture, one of those, okay."
[ Laughter ]
-Then are you deeply relieved when you find out
that it's something like an earthquake?
-Always! -Okay, good.
-Yes. -There's no part of you
that's a little bummed it wasn't a demon?
-No, I don't want it. -Okay, gotcha.
-No, I don't -- I don't want it. -That is good to hear.
-Yeah, I don't want it. I do not want it.
-You seem like you're a little on the fence.
-No, I'm not on the fence!
I'm thinking about this time that I woke up in the night
and looked to the side of my bed --
Wow. We're really getting into it now --
and there was, like, a shape by my bed.
-Uh-huh. -Like, a very dark shape.
And I was half asleep. In my brain, I went, "Scare it."
[ Laughter ]
And so from the depths of my sleep, I went, "Ooohhhh!"
Like, really, really deep. And Dan, my husband, goes,
"Um... What's happening?"
And I was like, "There was this thing.
I had to scare it -- I had to scare it back to Hell,"
or, you know, whatever.
So we're laying there, it's silent,
and Dan goes, "Um, why'd you scream so deep like that?"
[ Laughter ]
And then, I'm kind of scared that he's saying that,
'cause I don't totally know how I sounded.
And he's like, "Yeah, it was really, really deep."
And I was like, "Well, I was trying to scare it.
I don't -- I don't know."
And then, beat, beat, beat, he goes,
"It sounded kind of like you were possessed."
[ Laughter ] And I'm like, "Great, dude!"
-Well, I mean, no offense, but I feel like
Dan had the scarier night.
[ Laughter ] -Okay, fair, fair, fair.
-Hey, thank you so much for being here.
Congrats again. -Thanks.
-Edi Patterson, everybody.
New episodes of "The Righteous Gemstones."
Will you actually say it real quick?
-Yeah, of course. -Will you say that
they're available Sundays on HBO and HBO Max
with your mouth closed? -Yes.
Available Sundays on HBO and HBO Max.
[ Laughter ]
We'll be right back with more "Late Night"!