Gina Yashere brings the outsider in
The Daily Show’s Brexpert comes to town to share her views for JFL 42
Gina Yashere knows who’s boss. She is. The British comedian comes back to town for JFL 42, and continues to ride a wave of success as she constantly tours the world, creating and selling her own comedy specials and recently joined the The Daily Showas the comedy program’s resident Brexpert.
Caught on the treadmill at her hotel in Birmingham, Ala., Yashere is almost perfectly built to take on identity politics, just because she comes from so many backgrounds.
She’s Black, from Britain, emigrated to America, lives in Brooklyn and is a lesbian. She says she’s always reading audiences to figure out the best tack to take.
“I do constantly, and I work with all kinds of crowds. I’m in Alabama right now, so it’s a very Christian. I’m an outsider, so I can say things about Americans that they may not take from somebody who’s American,” she says.
“I don’t come out and say, ‘Oh, Americans are so vicious,’ I come at it from a point of naiveté almost. I go, ‘I’ve been here a little while, and I’ve noticed this, that’s weird,’ and I do it in that way, so they can go, ‘Oh that’s right, we are that way.’ I don’t do it in a way that I’m preaching that ‘you people are so stupid.’ You’ve got to find that balance. You don’t want people to feel bombarded, or abused, or belittled, which is why I come at it that way.”
For a long time she admits that she just had to explain to Americans that there were Black people in Britain.
“With American audiences, I do have to explain that yes, I am British, because the view that they’ve had of the Brits is very white. So I’m constantly explaining that Britain is like the States, there is a large range of people from all over.”
That’s one reason why she loves working in Canada and has become a
“You can’t deny it. The president is a racist. But I don’t talk about (U.S. President Donald) Trump that much.” GINA YASHERE
regular at Montreal’s Just for Laughs and on JFL Tours.
“I love Canada. Love the audiences, they are way more worldly, they’ve travelled more. They got a broader world view then your bigger neighbours to the south.”
That works for Yashere’s comedy, which is observational about her life, and covers all sorts of topics, such as her travels, like a bit about a building with “four floors of whores in Singapore” or dealing with something like sleep apnea, which she describes as “her neck trying to kill the rest of me.”
She joined The Daily Show this past March, as the show’s Brexpert, but clarifies that it is definitely not a fulltime gig.
“It’s great. I’m a freelancer,” she says. “I come in, I do a bit, and then I bounce, because I’m constantly touring, and I don’t want to give that up.”
Similar to Louis C.K., Yashere has taken the comedy business into her own hands, creating comedy specials and then selling them herself. Although she objects to calling it C.K.’s model, as she started doing it years ago.
“I was doing that before Louis C.K. Everybody knows more about him because he’s famous. I was selling stuff on my website back when I was in England,” she says. “It was a case of me believing in myself, and I was ready to make a special and none of those guys, HBO, Netflix was coming to offer me a special, so I’m going to make my own special. I paid for the shoot, got the theatre, sold it out and did everything, and then once it was made I sold it.”
She sold her first special to Showtime and her most recent one to comedy streaming site Seeso.
As for race, Yashere doesn’t shy away from topics, and while she says she has seen and felt things change as an immigrant in America, she also doesn’t make U.S. President Donald Trump a huge part of her act.
“There’s been a shift in atmosphere, and it has happened in Britain with the whole Brexit thing. I’m not saying racism isn’t there, it’s always been there, it just been bubbling under the surface. But now, the tides have been pulled back, and the we’re seeing the filth underneath the water. In the U.S. too, people are more outwardly racist now, because those feelings they had to keep hidden for a long time have now been validated by this man.
“You can’t deny it. The president is a racist. But I don’t talk about Trump that much. I think I mention him once in my hour set. Because we’re constantly being bombarded by him and he’s plain evil, and sometimes you want to escape it. I’ve had people come up to me after shows, and say ‘I’m so glad you didn’t talk all about Trump in your set. I came to escape it.’ I think we’re feeding him because we’re constantly talking about him, that’s what he wants. That attention, and I don’t want to give it to him.”