-My next guest created, writes,
and stars in the Emmy-nominated series
"A Black Lady Sketch Show."
Season two premieres Friday on HBO and HBO Max.
Everyone, please welcome Robin Thede!
[ Cheers and applause ]
Yeah! Come on. Welcome back!
-Thank you so much. Thank you so much.
I know today is a wild day, in many ways.
So, hey, to all my friends. -Yeah.
-All The Roots over there.
Questlove hit some weird drum riff when you were intro'ing me.
Appreciate that. [ Laughter ]
♪♪
There it is. -Yeah.
Robin, I want to get into all things sketch
and talk to you about your show, but first,
I'd love to know your thoughts
and how are you processing all this?
-I am yet to process everything, I think.
You know, I'm -- Today is not a day
that I'm ready to yet say I'm hopeful.
It's a day that we're getting a sliver of justice
with the Derek Chauvin guilty
on all three counts case -- verdict.
But nothing will ever make it right for George Floyd's family.
But, you know, it was so interesting
to hear you and Jane talking about all of this.
And her years and years of activism and service,
and she's right -- we have a long way to go, right?
But I truly hope this can be a corner
that helps this country turn. You know?
And that we start to dig in and really do the hard work.
-Yeah. Me too. -I really do.
-Thank you. [ Cheers and applause ]
I want to talk to you about this
because last time you came on,
we talked about "A Black Lady Sketch Show,"
and it went on to get three Emmy nominations!
[ Cheers and applause ] That's major!
And -- -What were they thinking?
What were they thinking?! -No, come on, you're fantastic.
-They checked the wrong box. Oh, it was good times.
-Robin, it's not just your cast that's made up of Black women,
but your staff and your crew are all Black women.
Can you explain why that's important to you?
-I love it so much. You know, in our writers' room,
which is all Black women, our cast is all Black women,
our directors, our editors, we get to really have
this amazing experience of not having
to explain ourselves before we do our jokes,
of not having to, you know --
You know, you don't have to say,
"Okay, there's this singer named Patti LaBelle."
It's like, "Yeah, yeah, we know that."
[ Both laugh ] So we get to just make
these sort of free, magical, joy-filled sketches.
And season two, which comes out on Friday --
[ Cheers and applause ] -I know, by the way.
-Yes! We're so excited.
It's full of all this Black-lady joy.
And I think that's what we really need right now.
-Has this past year -- Obviously, it must have affected
the writing on this show.
-For me, you know, we started season two, two weeks after --
just after I saw you last.
Two weeks after that, we started writing season two.
And then, we were ready to shoot in March,
and five days before we were going to shoot, March of 2020,
we got shut down, as the whole industry did.
So, for me, it was like, "Okay. Well, this is a time to reset.
A time to relax." I'm very busy,
and all of a sudden, I had nothing to do so --
I really became more of myself, and I wanted to feature that
on this year's show and on this season.
So I would love to show you some pictures of kind of
how I incorporated that in the show.
-Yeah, explain -- -I first started out -- yeah.
Do you have one of those? Oh, okay. Yeah.
-This is Selena? -That's my actual hairline.
This is a wig. [ Laughter ]
But, you know, during quarantine, I was like,
"Let me just embrace my natural hairline."
So I did that. -So that's your actual hairline?
Starts... -Yeah, starts around here.
-Yeah, okay, wow. Amazing.
How about this character?
-Oh, yeah, this is Chris.
This is me when I don't shave.
And, you know, all of quarantine I did not shave my facial hair.
-Can you grow a beard?
-Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's very easy.
It connects, too. Mine goes all the way around.
I was really, really excited to just embrace my natural self.
And then, you know, here's the thing.
This is a little sensitive, but I actually --
I actually don't -- I don't want to offend people
with the size of my actual boobs.
Like, this is all taped down.
But normally, I have a gigantic bosom that I did grow.
Yeah, there it is! That's just my natural --
-This is your natural -- This is you being you.
So this season, you're definitely being more you
in all of these three characters.
I saw, by the way, the trailer for your show.
It was on HBO after something I was watching.
And, honestly, this is -- if you get three
Emmy nominations for last season, get ready.
'Cause this looks great, pal.
Congratulations on this. It's really, really funny.
[ Cheers and applause ]
-Thank you. I'm so excited about it.
It really is good. In all seriousness --
And it's so good to see you, by the way.
I'm so devastated I'm not there with you guys.
-I know. -It's -- I-I-I miss you.
-I know. I appreciate you coming on.
-Yes, of course. But the season is --
If season one was here, season two is --
I mean, it's wild. It's wild.
We really do want people to feel joyous and to be able
to take those 30 minutes and really just turn off
all the noise of the outside world
and just laugh and feel that joy.
-Yeah. I know there's billboards all over --
on buses and everything here in New York.
And you must be psyched about that,
to see all the work you put into it,
and you go, "Yes!" -I love it.
So, yes. On buses in New York,
we're getting pictures from billboards all over the country.
And then, I saw one very disrespectful billboard
where a tree was really hating on the show.
And it just said, "A Lady Sketch Show,"
which was very rude. -Yeah.
There you go, yeah. So the tree blocked --
[ Laughter ] -Yeah.
-So, yeah, that is disrespectful.
That tree should be removed. -[ Laughs ]
-And planted somewhere else,
in front of a different billboard.
-Yeah! Exactly. [ Laughter ]
Go cover up somebody else's show.
Do you know how hard we worked? -Yeah, come on, exactly.
This is Robin Thede here. Yeah.
Pal, I want to show everyone a clip from the show.
Here's Robin Thede in the new season of
"A Black Lady Sketch Show." Take a look.
-Is everything okay, baby?
-Yes.
-Oh, my God. You married Omarion?
You knew he was my top choice!
Wait a minute. Omarion.
Two kids. Mansion.
Don't tell me you a Video Vixen? -Video Vixen.
God dammit! -Yeah.
-[ Sobbing ] Those were all my good choices.
You stole my life!
You were supposed to be with me, Omarion!
[ Energy crackling ] Ohh.
-Damn. -Damn.
[ Scoffs ] You didn't think that
you would be able to touch me, did you?
-[ Groans ]
-I know all about your little MASH game,
Selena Duplass from sixth grade, and I'm thrilled to be in this
paid-off house with this perfectly symmetrical woman
and our Rhodes Scholar children.
[ Cheers and applause ] -Robin Thede, everybody!
Season two of "A Black Lady Sketch Show"
premieres Friday on HBO and HBO Max!