S3 - Ep. 26 - Alison Leiby

Are you leaving? I you wanna way back home?

Either way, we want to be there.

Doesn't matter how much baggage you claim, and give us time and a termino and gay.

We want to send you off in style.

Do you wanna welcome you back home?

Tell us all about it?

We scared her?

Was it fine?

Malcorn?

Do you need to ride?

Do you need to ride?

Do you need to ride? Do you need to ride? Do you need to ride? Do you need to ride?

Ride with Karen and Chris welcome to Do you need a ride?

This is Chris Fairbanks, and this is Karen Kilgar.

Hello, Karen, my friend.

Hello Chris my friend arguing already Yeah, wait.

A minute, you're my friend mine.

I uh, you know, I did the usual this past weekend and went to a four day desert rave.

Oh you know standards, you know, Chris of electronic music and camping.

I had so much fun. I seriously went. I was doing stand up in the comedy venue at this electronic music festival, and I was I I'm not a huge fan of DJ type music, or I thought I wasn't.

Until those drugs kicked in and then boom.

You do make a valid point, but it was just the positive.

Everyone was in a good mood.

It was like, I'm rarely if you grow up going to rock, punk, rock and metal shows, people aren't like spreading love with their.

No, well it's a different agenda.

And there was a lake, so I was able to bring a bar of soap and wash myself off in a lake.

So it was really and were you wearing a barrel the whole weekend or what kind of lifestyle is?

Yeah, but a small one around my neck like a Saint Bernard.

To rescue other tweakers as they freaked out on exactly.

I would just bark at the cops. And there were police there, people just doing.

Light like.

It wasn't a rowdy powder festival. It was like I iri. Everyone was very iri.

It was one pill six hours before type of.

And I loved the music. It was I did not know I'd enjoy it so much, But.

There are cops you love the music I did.

I gave the.

Hook on one of those songs that you heard this weekend.

What's that?

I'm being like a music astle is like name one song off the where it's like name how the tune of any song the entire weekend? Right?

I don't know why.

My whole life, I've been offended by music that doesn't have lyrics or.

Something or beginnings or ends.

Right, there is no beginning or end. They are all linked together.

There's it's just peaks and valleys within. And I loved it.

And there was there was cops that were all very typical mustache share of people, and I.

Eavesdropped as I walked past.

Them, and they were just like, this is actually just everyone's in a good mood. And the other cop was like, yeah, this is actually pretty cool. And one of them was like, bumping his head, that's something I needed to say.

Former Then the.

First one said, I feel like I don't want to kill people at basic traffic stops anymore. Could this be the solution edm this whole time has been the hiding in plain sight solution for police silence.

I felt like they were all confronted in that sweet way.

But I meanwhile, you're not wearing a shirt and you have daisies painted on your chest.

Oh my god, I bought animal ears. What is happening?

Because I brought regular clothes and I'm like, oh, I'm supposed to dress like an animal.

It was just adults playing like kids. So I got these.

Fuzzy animal ears and I wired them all week and I was not gonna let you know about that.

Sorry, what ate you might?

I mean, please, You've just given me the gift of a lifetime. What animal may I ask? There's so many?

It was I guess a zebra bucket hat with cow ears, so kind of a hybrid.

Uh yeah, hybrid within that hat.

Yeah, both were black and white, so I just kind of morphed those animals.

And yeah, it was. It was terrific. I just had a good time.

I'm still feeling great ire vibes.

Did you I'm sorry because we have to introduce our guests forever and we will absolutely get her take.

But can I just ask super quick, yes?

Did you participate in the moment where a DJ played a song and it was like repeating intense beats right until he brings it up to the point and then there's a silence and then and then he.

Drops that beat and everyone goes berserk.

I dyes.

That is when I would woo and start dancing and hug the person next to me, a stranger that was in all vinyl and on stilts. There was a lot of industrial I loved it. I was hugging people.

I mean you were knocking people off their stilts thinking you were giving love and actually killing some circus performers, but.

They would have said thank you. That was the kind of vibe. It was downright therapeutic. I just feel worried for all that there were ground squirrels there. I couldn't stop the whole field. It was a giant campground with a lake, but in the desert, but there was little holes. I thought I was going to roll my ankle in one of these gopher holes, but they were little squirrels. So it's been serene and silent there for years, and then all of a sudden, this base and human like

Yeah, below ground.

It was like the beginning of watership down or I guess the middle of watership down like total animal trauma. But then above ground, if you could just get up there. Yeah, great stuff was happening.

For the fourth day. There was squirrels everywhere that were like, it's not that.

Bad, just tapping your arm for drugs. Okay, okay, let's seario.

I had to tell you. I love why. I'm in a good mood.

I'm so happy, I love this is what we need.

These are the uplift stories that we need right now.

I was nervous to tell you for some reason, I'm a braver now.

It's hard. It's hard to come out of the clubs.

It is my whole life. I refuse to go to a field and have fun. Look at me now, but be a true believer. This is just like you and golf, but just a little more drugs. Yea half a teaspoon more.

Okay.

Our guest today is one of the great stand up comics of our time.

She plays clubs and colleges all over, so many colleges, and these.

Clubs please welcome Alison Levey.

Yay, Oh my god, this is I'm I'm so full of questions already.

Already they shoot like five at Chris, right, now, what do you got?

What did you eat?

And when that's always my question anytime there's like a large all weekend outdoor event, I'm like, what were the meal or snack breaks?

And what were you eating? Was it refrigerated?

Was like?

What was happening From a fiber standpoint, like bathrooms? I know, like it's just it's all I think about every time I see everything.

Every part of that question, including the fiber, was my first concern. On my way up there, I took a you know, a COVID test in the parking lot of ARII. I went inside and I bought a backpack that is a fancy cooler, and I bought way too many groceries.

I brought sandwich better native.

Yeah, I and the ice, of course kept melting, so I kept buying ten dollars bags of ice up there, and it would immediately melt. But I did make all my meals in my tent, which I couldn't stand up in, so I kind of lay on my new air mattress and just make a sandwich on my chest and fell asleep with a couple of sandwiches in my hand. But yeah, I brought a lot of fruit and sandwiches, and it all kind of went bad in my cooler backpack.

So it was yeah, it was It was difficult. It was a vile balance.

I always want something that's been refrigerated, like from myce neck.

I like hummus, I like crackers, I like fruit.

I brought mummus. You know, I brought risk.

Those things require refrigeration. It feels like in the middle of the desert. And also, did you have to buy an entire camping setup just for this I or did they provide you anything.

Sort of No, No, they provide you with, uh, nothing but vibes.

I Uh. I had a.

Tent and I had a backpack, but I kind of had to buy everything else. I got a chair that I could lounge in. Smart I got a very very comfortable mattress that had like memory foam in it and you blow into it.

That was great.

It all.

I kind of like camping now, like if it's comfortable and there's a lake to you know, we all have fear of sand being in our crevasses. I just bought a bunch of stuff and brought a bunch of food, but I threw away more than half of it because the.

Quick follow up questions.

Working in tandem with Allison in this interview, I also am very obsessed with being in a situation like that.

And the bathrooms. Was it porta potties? Was it nightmarish?

Every other version of this festival called Desert Hearts was porta potties. This was the same number of porta potties and an over population of brick and mortar restrooms with flush toilets and outside of them those kind of beach showers, and some people were getting naked effect and no one was scaring. There was there was some nudity morning. I'm like, oh, there's a naked shower. That's how the world should be. And so yes, my tent was very within a one minute walk from a perfect bathroom.

Oh that's terrific. I know, great news for us. You know I'm going to constantly worried about bathroom.

Any other questions I could talk you to into this festival.

Well, how did you what convinced you to go in terms of never having gone to a thing like that before, and then what was your favorite part?

I'm very interested. I am too.

I was going just to do stand up and I thought what fun audiences will be if they're on hallucinogens and I can do my material that just demands someone imagine something. I felt like, this audience will be able to imagine these these these.

Bits I have.

And then once I was there, I was like, Oh, the show was the last thing I cared about. I had so much fun and there was art there, There was theatrics, like everyone that worked there was in some sort of character. Everyone was playing, and it's usually from a distance. I would judge situations like this where people are that carefree and playing, and I loved it. That's what I didn't expect. That is that what you asked me?

I was blown away. It was a talented group of people.

Did people come see comedy at it?

Not?

Really?

That was what I always think about those festivals, and I'm like, of all of the you know, events that you have access to, in my mind, comedy is like the least interesting wise, Yeah.

I know.

So I'm just wondering if or was it just kind of like a one and like, was it like multiple stages that people really had to make that choice or was it like a kind of what's happening from three to four?

So yeah, it was at two and four, Yeah, and the sun was at its peak hottest, and I was never Meanwhile, there's a stage where people are watching waist deep from a nice cool lake. It's like, hey, do you want to come to this hot There was like a saloon where people were doing old timey saloon characters and that's where the comedy was happening. And there was no roof. There was just like slats for what could have been a roof, but the sun was just beaming down.

To the stand up. I'm like, but people did wander.

That way, and was it just you were there other comics?

There were other comics, Alex Super Drennan Davis. Do you know Scout? Oh god, what's her last name? She was so funny, that's.

My new Did she play a ukulele?

Yes?

And she's one of the funniest people I've ever hung out.

I felt like I've known her forever.

She did that last last town. She was on Bridgetown when we did it that last time.

Yes, I have to know her last name now otherwise, okay.

Talk among yours, amongst yourselves, because I'm.

So, is it like, is it like Dorwood?

No?

Yeh, Scott, thank you Scout Derwood?

Right, Okay, I also know a dog named Scout, and I was like, well, now I'm just thinking of that dog.

But I do know who she is, and she's very funny.

But yeah, Brandon and Scout and Alex Hooper was the one that invited us, and the invitation kind of came out of nowhere at the last minute. And I all we did is walk around and tell stories and laugh until we were falling on the ground.

It was just that's something I haven't done for a couple of years.

Yes, I think that's a dream Scenariot. But are you comfortable telling us what drugs you took?

Oh? Sure?

Hey, listening family. I had a very a chocolate bar of mushrooms. Mushroom chocolate bar. You can't taste the mushrooms. A chocolate bar of mushrooms, gross uh, mixed with chocolate, everyone's favorite.

I'm just chewing on it and crying I don't have to eat.

So I had a little tiny uh doses of that throughout the weekend, and and then you know, I brought a little marijuana and uh, and I did a dissolved capsule of ketamine, which is a you know, I thought it was a cat tranquilizer. Apparently it's a horse drank like Elvis used to take. But I swear, and you can judge me. I swear it was like a therapeutic, like I figured some stuff out in my head and my vision got better.

I'm like, oh, my eyes were again.

Is it kind of be used for therapy?

Yes, Karen knows. I've been complaining about look at these ridiculous glasses.

It fixed my eyeballs and it is, yes, Allison, it's used for therapy. And having tiny doses of it, I was like, oh, I get it. I wanted to call my family and have conversations with them in those moments good, Whereas most drugs, you're like, the last thing I want to do is talk to my dad right now.

It was, Yeah, it was very therapeutic. That's it. Those are the drugs. I like it. Thank you. I got a little nervous. I'm not that open with my drug use.

But alson what if we all did this? I was on what's the last uh what would they call it? Like a class felony level drug?

I guess.

I mean, I like I smoke weed, but that's legal here as well as in California right now.

I don't. I guess like it would be like cocaine.

Yeah, probably Like I had some like mushroom chocolates on New Year's of this year.

M hm, which is great, right, You're mostly a marijuana gale. Sure.

I don't really stray far outside of stuff I can order in the form of a sorbet, which is my new favorite consumption method, really hot sorbet. One of my services like does a bunch of edibles, and they started doing sorbets and they kind of like hit you faster than like a regular edible. It's more like a drink almost, but they're like delicious. I get like the watermelon mint It's really good. Wow. That does sound good.

Yeah, it almost sounds dangerous, like for drouding to be delicious in it.

I know I have to keep like a regular sorbet on hand for like after because I'm like, oh, I could just like swimp eating sorbet and then it's like, this is one hundred milligrams.

It's almost like saves you that it eventually melts and you have to put it away, right, But I just drinking drink it.

Yeah, of course, what about you, Karen?

Yeah, well, I have epilepsy, so I can't do the drugs I used to do. So I haven't done a serious drug aside from.

Weed in a really long time.

And when I was in my twenties and we were doing stuff like mushrooms and stuff, I get acid or whatever. I really I do each one once maybe twice, and I'd be like, that's enough being out of control for me. I'm like a deep down control freak where my mind kind of won't.

Allow a lot.

Like we did acid once and then hosted a Christmas party and so many people were.

Like you were on ASID. I just thought your eyes looked really pretty, look like my pupils are like this big.

I was opening the door like welcome. Everyone was silver dress. Yeah, I was like out of my mind, but there's part of me that like can will never let go. It feels like so I really love that people are like really testing out these the micro versions of things. And kind of like, what's the benefit of You don't have to be tripping so hard that you have to call an ambulance to benefit And like the idea that that's how people are doing it these days makes me really

It was like literally eight hours later.

We were exhausted and dehydrated because we cried out all the liquid in our body, and all we could do was like order a pizza and watch The Godfather. At the end, we were exhausted and we hadn't done anything. We were literally just laughing our asses off and then sobbing hysterically.

That's funny.

For a day, I was watching Scout perform in the Hot saloon and I was laughing so hard that I started tearing up, and then I just was crying.

I didn't so.

I was crying like smoothe transition, Yeah it was.

I kept smiling, but it looked like my eyes were very sad.

Yeah, that's so funny. I wasn't going to blame the drugs and there we go.

Yeah, well there that's how they hit you, right.

I think, did you when Alison, when you did a little bit of mushrooms, did you have any kind of a was yours a?

Did you hallucinate? Did you have emotional waves?

Like?

What was recent time was just like a very very low dose, like micro dosing basically, just like in addition to like smoking weed and drinking campagne and like whatever. So there was kind of nothing that whole night's of blur anyway. But like, I mean, it's been I am not someone who has enjoyed tripping in general. So it was a long I mean really it was like college in my early twenties was the last time I really like tripped and like really did more than what will

I like drinking. That's kind of like my comfort zone.

Yeah, I mean, so I.

Like to just stay in the waters that I know.

And drink that I drink them, and this this festival there was no There was a bar there, like a long, well well done saloon style bar, but no one was really drinking. This was not a drinking festival, so no one was like getting mad or emotional. It made me realize like, oh, booze is maybe the worst drug the one sure yeah, sure, yeah yeah. There was all this micro use of hallucinogen. It's it just makes everyone in a good mood. I was just in a good mood

I love it. I love it.

I love that, I love it, and I love seeing I've seen a couple like because there was a Steve Aoki pizza.

Which made me laugh.

But I was like, I can I only kind of know who that is a little bit. I should watch his videos and watching like it's essentially like watching two thousand really good looking twenty four year olds jump up and down at the same time and like be like life is great.

Majority white.

It's just the weirdest thing that is like has nothing to do with any part of my life. It's so new to me as a old gen xer kind of thing where it's just like I don't think I'll ever do it. It would be cool, but I also I think it's just for other generations. Yea.

Yeah, I was worried I would be the oldest person at this thing, and it was all forty something.

There was old people there.

I was very surprised that it was not a Coachella type crowd.

Yeah, but overall, I'm just like beyond standing around. That's like just not part of my life. It's how much i'm down to like micro dos ketamine and like try and experience music in a different way.

I'm like, I just don't want to stand for an hour and a half, right as a minimum.

And at this thing, we were just wandering to look at the different displays like art installations.

The whole time.

I was I don't even like going to museums, ye walking around looking at stuff I.

Could be at home.

What about a museum where the art isn't in any way as good and the sun's on you the whole time, but it's not that.

Oh well, now I'm really interested. Could I also be dehydrated and dirty?

I would love a museum.

The style of like the conveyor belt sushi, Like I stay in one place and the art comes to me and in some style what I would like to participate.

That's yeah. And then you just turn your face away if you don't like something.

No, sorry, goodbye, fuck you not paying attention because you know well also I think and this is a thing that I have a hard time, like I would if I didn't have a brain disorder, I would absolutely try something like this just in that way of like I absolutely believe and love the idea, Chris, of what you're saying, which is a brand new experience that actually allowed you to enjoy it. There was no they made sure the trappings of things that bum you out when you're on

Funny people standing around having a good time. Like for me, the sun can't be involved dirt like a constancy of dirt, can't be involved, needing to be exposed physically beautiful.

There's a lot of rules with me.

We're just like if I was the kind of girl they could throw on a bikini top and some Jeane shorts and like go to this the desert, it would be a different story for me.

I'm I'm not and you Yes, I wasn't really thriving until the sun went down, and then it felt it felt good like those like bridge Town and those festivals felt that night. But during the day I did a lot of like struggling going to my hot tent, waiting for.

The sun to.

Get a lot of struggling.

Yeah, yeah, which is part probably part of the victory at the end, right you need it's a journey.

Yeah.

I tried just walking around with electrical tape x's on my nips, but I just I went back to the tent.

I'm like, this is not feeling good.

And the zebra cow bucket hat provided no protection.

From the sun. It triples the heat. Actually it traps all of it in your head.

It kept my forehead from getting burnt.

Yes, important, very important, Yes, just that section.

I love this story because I had friends, I had a friend who just told me about going camping and being in the desert and experiencing some kind of creepy racist people that were like shooting guns and with Confederate

Yeah, there was no one like that at this festival.

And if they were, they were cause playing like they weren't that person and convincingly like everyone was. And in the middle of the night I saw a giant I an eagle, a bird with an eight foot wingspan, fly out of a tree. And that was sort of a religious experiment, experience experiment.

Yeah, no, son, so many things. I loved it.

No birds of prey for you, Allison, I'm not into birds. Can I relay like a horrifying story too about birds?

Right now?

I have like many horrifying stories that I like to talk about with birds, but there's just one that's pretty recent.

I I live in New York, and I have a terrace. That's the whole thing. It's like horrifying.

Ah No, So I have like a little I have like a little little terrasts out there. So I have like a big glass door and a big glass window that like goes out to it, and behind my apartment there's this giant tree that a lot of birds like to live in. I came home, I like ran out, got coffee, and came back. One day there was a huge oily mark of a bird. It had hit my door. It was like you could make out the feathers. Okay,

Up or down.

And I was just sitting watching TV and all sudden I saw a bird like flying directly and it hit the window and like flew away, and the scream I let out it wasn't even like the shriek that you would expect in a moment of terror, Like it was this like eh, and then I just started ye like fuck fu fuck it like it flew away and it was fine, I think, But I just so I bought a plastic owl and now that's out there and just some sparkly pinwheels to go in my plants, and I was like that's supposed to help.

But yeah, the tree.

Is blooming again, hence like the sound of my voice and my allergy is going crazy and I'm just like living in terror that they're that they're plotting something over there.

They are they are city birds. Hell yeah, city birds.

They're so gross, Like yeah, no, I no, thanks, are you guys bird people?

Uh?

I don't I I don't think I'm a bird person. I do appreciate when there's a the largest bird I've ever seen, yes, in a tree and I maybe it was a raven.

It was by himself. This was at like two in the morning.

Too, it was so dark and uh so I like mysterious uh birds.

But yeah, I'm not Like my mom was a bird watcher.

She like had the memorized and would go with her friends and they had binoculars like it was.

I respect that so much more than the people who are like, I'll put this one in my house like those are.

I was that was gonna be My point is I think that's the line. The line of demarcation is no birds in the house, because they're also like folklore wise, it's bad luck to have birds in your house. So it must be the idea that you the print was on the outside, that's great because that's bird like there's no.

No, it wasn't trying to escape because I had it here. It wasn't your weren't trying to make it your pet.

And it's like the point of birds is they get to go do a thing we can't do, like keeping them in our house to fucking sit around and watch Netflix is kind of shitty.

If you think, no, it's terrible, it's yeah, I would say inhumane, but.

In avian I don't know. But it's anti bird.

It's it's directly anti bird for sure. Also, I think like city birds, you know what I mean, Like you're you're getting a lot of pigeon, You're getting a lot of like kind of agro dirty birds grow dirty.

Don't forget oily oily blown away by how oily?

It was just a greasy oily.

It's like kind of you know when you wake up sometimes in the morning and you put on like too much like face stuff the night before, like too much serum and oil. And I got to wash this pillowcase tonight, like I had that vibe to it.

Yeah, yeah, City birds, How is New York right now?

How are things interesting? We've got an we've got a new shitty mare and that guys bring that swag all over the streets doing nothing and uh yeah, I'm you know, thriving in my glasshouse. Birds.

You are currently doing a one woman show about abortion about abortion.

What a smooth transition, right right, Let's just let's die do it.

Yeah, I am doing my one I hate the phrase one Woman Show, even though like there's nothing wrong with it, that's my own personal bias.

My solo sit. It's very nineteen ninety four.

Yeah, I imagine I should be like in a black box theater, smoking in a beret or something like that, and that's like not so in a perfect world, that's what it would be.

You'd be. It's the whole.

I think there's a David Teldrey of standing on a ladder, Standing on a ladder.

But I started writing it a couple of years ago, and it's just about my experience of having an abortion and a latent life abortion at that at thirty five, and you know, and then yesterday the news broke that that right is going to be gone. And it has been an intense twenty four hours.

Yeah.

I met yeah, but yeah at the Cherry Lane Theater, which is like New York's oldest off Broadway theater and it's been the home of so many like brilliant, great people.

And then I'm up there and I'm.

Like, my abortion just psychotic, but is wonderful and like a treat to be there.

Well, I bet you, like in a time like this, it hopefully what I would hope is that people are going to go watch it for the very reason of this is a thing we never discussed. This is the thing that's supposed to be a woman's problem. This is that thing that's like let them deal with it. Meanwhile, men are the cause. Men are half of it. They're fucking getting away with you know, like just not participating in this at all.

It's totally ridiculous. So I love that. You know, it's like not easy.

I'm sure to continue a conversation people don't necessarily want to have, but I bet you they will start to want to.

Yeah.

I mean, like the whole like kind of conceit of the show is I only really talk about my abortion for like eight minutes of the hour, which is about how long it takes to have an abortion. But it's more just about like what it's like to be a woman and how we conflate like motherhood and female identity and like you're either a mother or you're not a mother, and like men don't have to live under that binary.

Oh my god, ah lost a headphone? M just like gesturing too much?

Is my one woman's showness coming out at me over here?

Big hands, big hands and arms. Let them see you in the back row.

But the whole thing, the whole point of the show is like I'm not telling you to go do anything except for like just talk about abortion more. Ask questions, or talk about this show, or talk about yours, talk about someone's like and that's still the thrust of the show. And everyone's like, are you going to change it, you know, to be more political, And I'm like.

It's already inherently very political.

Yeah, you were being political when no one was being political.

Yeah, you don't have to change anything.

Yeah, I'm like, it's already a show about abortion. I think it's like pretty on topic for what we're doing.

Don't worry about it. I think that.

So there was like some guy, some like right wing guy who called himself a playwright, wrote like a response play to it, but here's show.

Yeah, but he like purchased a.

Ticket and came and saw it like him and his wife for a partner or something like that. And I'm like, well, you already like gave me the money, like I don't know what you So he wanted to like put up I like I saw this on.

I had no idea.

My publicist told made them like Fox News like ran a little story online. But he like was doing some play that's supposed to be like the truth about abortion and it's just the incredibly gruesome court transcripts from like a guy who performed abortions, but like was doing some not great stuff and so he just like the play was just reading these like really gruesome transcripts and the theater was like, oh yeah, no, we're not doing this, like this is not safe, this is not And now

And did he say he wrote his play as a response to your show.

I think that the intention.

I don't know if he didn't write it like after he had seen it, just because that was scared. But I think it's I know, it's like you went home and wrote something. But I think he knew it was like obviously it had been publicized before I opened the show, so I think he like saw it was coming and was like, I'm going to do a the other side, the right side to this, and it's like, actually you can.

It's like horrific and no one wants to see that.

Well, and also it's just this very narrow propaganda service to a thing that's not actually addressing what the point of this medical procedure is about is for. And it's actually that thing of that idea where it's like, well, you can keep on talking about it's this is like, of course a Twitter quote that I read this morning, so now I'm the expert on yes, of course you

Yeah, you don't even get time off to have the baby from your job, Like you have to be.

A work unless you have the best job, or you know, your job unionizes and you have.

Right, which you probably got because of other privilege. So yeah, it's just it's a cool cycle that we built into our culture. It's Oh, but this guy complained that I didn't talk about abortion enough of the show, the guy who wrote the other But.

He's like fucking critic.

He's like, it's just anecdotals. She doesn't talk about it at all, And I'm like, aren't you mad, Like, isn't that the thing that you should be happy about that it like doesn't have more.

He wanted to hear the gruesome medical details. That's yeah, he likes to sink his teeth into definitely.

Gross.

Well, it's crazy, he's to they're actually also trying to regulate how you do your abortion story personally.

All of it needs to be controlled.

Police, the creative body, you fucking piece of shit.

That was so good. Police, and you've been doing it. You're in like you're uh, you've been doing it several weeks now, right, you're not.

Even I have the middle of week two. Oh wow. So really still like I knew that, like we were going to overturn Rev. Wade. I think we all know that. That was like, that's the decision that's coming.

And I was just like, well, that'll happen in June and maybe it'll still be running or maybe not, like I might have to kind of address that or deal with it. And then like the eighth show, it like, yeah happened, and I was like, God, damn it, Like I can't not acknowledge, like the elephant in the room.

Yeah.

But at the same time, I'm like, I wrote this thing, and I spent a really long time writing it. I want to keep doing it the way I would like to.

Has the show changed as because of that or just not yet.

It's only really been one performance so far that has happened in this light. But if anything, I think it kind of drives home that it's like on the right course because it's just this kind of like gentle personal story and.

You know, with Roe v.

Wade overturning, there is like I do talk about my mom and her relationship to abortion, and that's kind of like the twist of the show and it is relevant to the news sadly.

Yeah, what an important time to be doing this show.

I know, all I wanted to do was like do stupid jokes, and now I'm like, oh god, damn it. I'm like I don't want that. I want zero responsibility on comedy. Like, I don't know why I set off to do this. All I want to do is write stupid jokes about plant stores. Yeah, but maybe the I don't know.

It's like exactly the way you're envisioning, kind of talking about a thing that people literally can't talk about at all. Yeah, you're talking about it for eight minutes. It makes Fox News. I mean, all of this is important. It's it doesn't have to be some sort of perfect legislative anything. It's your art. It's your fucking opinion, and that's the point overall, Like that in and of itself, you're killing it.

Yes, yeah I did. I mean that's why there's a yep, you great.

But yeah, it's been it's been going really well. It's been really fun and exciting and people are very It's like every single show at least one person dms me afterwards, and it's like I had an abortion, and I'm like, I love that.

I love the people like.

Want feel compelled to tell me that no one has to. There's no pressure to.

I'm not checking on the way out, and it's like, end you did you have one?

But it is that kind of thing where it's like it's so highly sensitive and yet insanely commonplace, Like there's such a culture a lie about it, where it's this kind of like the forbidden thing that happens to fallen women or something. It's like, hey, guess what, it's twenty twenty two. Probably everybody you know has had some interaction with this situation, with this medical procedure.

Let's get honest.

Let's be yeah, one in three or one in four women, depending on the statistic you read, like, it's a lot of fucking people. Like, it's just a lot of people. It's hard to believe that those would all be you know, poor eighteen year olds who like never got their shit toget Like, no, it's all kinds of different, you know people.

So it's just a it's a good fun show.

The thing that I kept retweeting, and then I'm like, I'm just all the people I'm talking to agree with me, and probably we know this. Yeah, it's like this seven or eight out of ten Americans' support abortion, like the vast majority, So we are absolutely What we're really talking about in terms of what's happening with legislation is we're talking about fascism setting its teeth right into this country.

Used to prosecute witches. Like, what in the.

Living fuck are we allowing to happen with this minority right?

That's going insane. It's crazy.

It's so crazy, it feels it truly feels like not being on this planet. I'm like, this can't be real, this can't be really what's happening in the United States, But here we are in hell.

Yeah, it's true. Hi welcome. Hey, Hi, welcome. We can I recommend Chris's EDM festival.

Right The alternatives are like a beautiful EDM festival for everyone, micro dos and ketymine and exploring the way that they love each other, or just complete restriction of people's reproductive that's America right now.

Sorry, not people's just women.

Men.

Men are absolutely whatever they want all the time.

Please, and we'll make more pills to make it so that the older you get.

The more women you can fucket.

I know it's a different topic if I could give it, because I have a question.

Karen.

You just said that you were before we got on, that you're new to kombucha. What flavors like? I know that you just took a sip of one. What flavor is like? Working for you? I have some thoughts. You have no right to ask me this. I think the Supreme Court told me that you have no privacy anymore.

You're like, actually, I have it right here.

Alito says that you have to report every beverage that you have to me. So I'll do a wide swath answer and the narrow Yeah. So I'm just trying to stop, Like, how can I stop making bad decisions? In the moment because I'm only ever at my house working and stressing out essentially, like how do people do it and do it so well here and here in Los Angeles without only eating like fucking nettles all day long, because that's what it seems like to me.

Yeah.

So I was reading stuff about like the gut biome and all that stuff, and like, just if the aim is like trying to get a healthy gut biome going, because I know, I like, my big thing is sugar, So if you have a ton of sugar in your system, you crave more sugar.

So it's just right.

So it's just the trying to remove some stuff and then trying to like clean it out. I don't know, And that's the long answer. The short answer is like all my beautiful yoga friends always have one of these in their hands, so I'm like, fine, that'll be my thing too, because I don't know.

I don't know.

Yeah, I'm trying to kick or at least like reduce my diet coke cabit, which is uh, I would say, out of control. We have like palettes of diet coke at the theater, just like under every piece of furniture in the green Room because like we can't, and like everybody that is working almost with me similarly is addicted.

And I'm like, guys, we got to do something.

This can't go on, and yet I've done nothing, but like I try and use like kombucha as like oh, when you're craving something like that, like maybe the answer is something more like kombucha, and I like it. I act like it's Dray now and like one of them just like changes everything and it's not the case at all.

It's not the case at all.

But like, so this one's golden Pineapple, which I just kind of was like, oh, that seems like I would like it at least more than whatever. The last one I had it was Chris was did we do a dinar that day? I know, I recorded a podcast where I took a sip and went, oh, today's the day this kombucha expires. And it was like, whatever I'm doing this is not responsible and I could actually be causing a whole new set of problems with like rotten fermented mushroom drink.

It's just having you more positive bacteria. It's fine, I think. So it's the good kind of.

It didn't taste I know that's the hard thing. Abou kba.

It's actually kind of hard to know when it's gone because it's like slimy and weird. Yeah, yeah, I kind of stick with just like the lemon ginger varieties. I find the other stuff gets real sweet for me and like I'm not if it's not chemicals, like I just want like water or sparkling water.

Yes, my answer is the ginger aid.

I like the the health Aid, don't.

They're all so expensive and stupid.

But it's the the squatter sized bottle, like the the like. It's like shorter like and like wider. It's like a barrel that perhaps the Saint Bernard would have around his neck. And uh, they do a good lemon ginger and a cayenne cleanse, which I always like, this is medicine and it's like it's not.

It's truly just a drink.

But sure, you want to hurt yourself while you're drinking, just go for it.

It's going to be painful, but it's gonna be paid. I thought you were describing. One time during the during quarantine, I ordered two bottles of kombucha, but I didn't look at how big they were, and I get and I was just like, I don't need I barely drink the ones I buy, Like, how am I going to ever finish? It was so hilarious. They were in my refrigerator for a very long time.

The one brand does like truly growler sized bottles, and like, to me, I'm like, the appeal is when you first open it and it's super fizzy because it's for me, a soda replacement. So yeah, the idea of having a big one that you're drinking like over the course of several days or the week, I just am like by the end, like I'm like, uh uh, it's so flat. It's already not great. I mean I drink them all the time, but yes.

And do you think, like do you see improvements in any areas?

Do you think?

I think I do think that it does, like do some gut and digestion regulation. It's like hard to say if it does a ton, because I feel like usually when I get a kombucha, either I'm like trying to solve a problem.

Or like.

I'm like do this, We'll do it.

Or I'm like already kind of on a little like healthy kick where I'm like I had a green juice, I had a salad, I'm getting a kombucha, Like I'm trying to be a different person. So it's like hard to measure if those are like effective, don't there's no control, so but I think I do think that there's like some even if there's just like placebo effect, like mental benefits of like I'm making good choices and therefore, like remember they used to have those commercials that was a

I do think that there's like a real that is a real thing.

So like if I have a kombucha, maybe I'm less likely to have a tall boy.

Diet is just a step in the momentum. I yes, When I live with Tigs, she was always had probiotics, which is an intense version of what kombucha does, like refrigerated bacteria that you take as a supplement. And because she always had gut problems totally, and like after I had surgery and your whole body needs to reline its stomach, I took those probiotics and they I felt great, like I could tell my system. You would think I'd learn

I mean, I'm very fascinated by the gut, the gut mind right, that whole discovery where it's like that's what instinct is and all these things. But our guts are all fucked up because we're eating crazy man made corn and shit whatever.

Whatever is the blame. I don't die made that up.

I love it.

This is why I'm I have to be gluten free. Just weird, made up shit. But it's like that idea that if we if I could, because a couple of times I've quit sugar, quit flour, feel amazing. The difference is amazing. Whatever, and it's just like, but it doesn't matter because it's so hard to stay on.

Yeah, someone's gonna bring pizza.

Yep, yeah, and I'm going to dive into it like Scrooge McDuck.

You gotta yeah, yeah, Monday to Wednesday, it's easy to have those kinds of diets.

Yeah yeah.

Thursday rolls around and you're like, well now I'm out.

Now we're back to the great mac and cheese for quandary, which is like it's just don't order it now.

I got into such a thing during like the beginning of the pandemic, where like because every time I ordered out it was very specifically a treat because otherwise I cooked everything, and I was just like once a week or once every other week. You like support a restaurant and you order and get whatever you want, and now like that's how I order food. And I'm like, okay, but like now this is like just a regular dinner. But like you just don't have time to cook, Like you don't need to order cake.

It's just not part of the meal.

Trying to support this subway, this struggling cheesecake factory. Yes, please buy one of our cheesecakes and keep us in business.

Okay, I have yes, I mean I'm just trying to be a good person. Fine with me, I do love that.

The thing I actually always say to myself is like, it'll be a restaurant that's completely serves other stuff, But then if you go into the sides area, everybody's got a mac and cheese, some kind of fancy version of mac and cheese, where I'm like, well, I haven't had this kind yet, and I absolutely the voice is trying to convince actual me like that I've I've never tried mac and cheese where it's like, you know what this is gonna be. It's very simple.

Yes, it is not.

Even like cage By.

There's this vegan place by my oh house and they serve like fried mac and cheese balls, but it's not real cheese.

So I juggled them into my mouth like it's the end of the world.

Yes, the like trick that I play on myself when things are plant based or whatever, other like what seemingly is healthy from a dietary standpoint, I'm just like, like an impossible burger, like is so good in so many ways for all the things that does, but like it's super high in fat and sodium in the way that beef is.

Like not solved.

Yeah, yeah, right, So it's just so like again with like vegan food too. Like I remember my friend used to live near a place in Chelsea and we would get there like vegan blt which was like chabbata bread and like a big piece of fried tofu.

And then tempe bacon and this.

Like Chipotle like vegan aoli, and we were just like, oh my god, this is so great and it's healthy, and they're like, well, it's not healthy. I mean it's side. There's like multiple fried things on that sandwich. They're just not like animals.

Yeah, yeah, it's ye hard, one thing at a time.

It's because diet coke is the same way where and I do that anytime I have an office job, diet coke becomes a huge problem or like a huge sorry that.

That dog's just going to bark. I mean that's just like he's just gonna bark.

I doubt on the mic. It's just zoom.

Barks, zoom barks.

It's like my dog knows like a certain amount of time passes and he's like enough with the door being closed, Like if you're not going to have me in your life, then you're gonna remember that I'm out here by myself, Frank, Okay, I.

Just wanted to know you were okay in there, just checking on you one last mark.

He's like, I'm sorry you're on a call. I didn't really know. I'm just oh, oh oh, my mistakes.

But I'm just gonna say it is weird how addictive diet coke can be in that way where getting me through It's like the gap between eleven and one thirty, then the gap between three and five, then the gap between where then then you go to a restaurant's like, oh, fountain diet coke. Like I've never had a diet coke before.

R Right, It's like I send to a restaurant that has a fountain machine before, like I know what it tastes like, It's okay to not get like to I get in phases where like especially like when I'm in jobs or going to a place every day for something.

I mean, I randomly had a desk at this action sports show I was working on, and they there was a red Bull tiny dorm sized refrigerator next to my desk, and I would just without even thinking about it, I would just reach over and I probably had five or six a day art palpitations and I was getting arthritic. I really think it was the my joints hurt crack, another red Bull crack.

I've never been a red Bull person, and I'm like, I get on a hot I'm like, I'm like, I've never had those drinks. It's like I am mainlining six diet cokes during the day. There is no there is no high horse to climb on right right, But for some reason like get that, but I have never It's just a different chemical.

I like other.

Chemicals and I don't.

I it just happened to be within literally within arms reach, and I'm like, well, I got to keep working.

I'll have one of these jittery SODA's.

At my last like.

In person fancy like TV job I was. My office was like directly across from the kitchen, and they stocked like it was an Amazon show. They stocked fucking everything for us, probably shipped via Amazon. It was probably just a cycle of closed loop uh profit. But it was like so like every time I got up to go to the bathroom, I was in the kitchen like it was just where I was, and so I was like, oh, well, there's like stuff here, there's and they would get everything

Was this.

Miss Masel, the marvelous Miss Masel show. I really loved that show. You wrote on it and you're like a producer of it, right, Yeah.

I was a co producer last year for season four and then was writing on it for three and four and it was very, very fun. I such a huge loss when we went to Zoom rooms. I really missed room snacks.

The snacks.

I thought, you're gonna be like the Camra dree No no, no no.

The access to unlimited free treats. That would be the thing.

You know, you know what gets me every time those fucking why do they need to put famously amus cookies in those little chip bags?

Like no one needs that.

I know, every time I look at it, I'd be like, fine, but I swear to God, I don't really want this, but like that is the most satisfying in terms of a snack. Yes, useless slash satisfying office snack.

They had like a bodega's amount of food in our kitchen, Like it was just like every and they would be like, oh, we're trying this new, like like popcorn, and we've got this new Like it was just like you know, obviously there was no end to the budget for that show,

And there was there was snack runners on hand.

Yes truly, I know. I was like this is too much.

This is too we're living We're living in in Caligula's cancel here.

It's just you're just typing and someone's shoving it in your mouth.

Yah ooh a seven layered fudge bar. Like, yes, there's it is. The more successful the show, the more intense the craft Service gets because they have the money and some people of the time, and it's just like, this is your I'll never forget. My friend this was I think late nineties, got cast on a show and it was on the Warner Brothers lot and I went.

To watch and ninety watch them, yeah exactly.

And she walked up to the craft service and there was a what looked like a big mechanics you know, almost like this big cabinet but of drawers but like silver and tall and roller wheels. And when she opened the drawers, each drawer individually, it was filled with different types of candy bars. And I was just like, this is what it's like. Like the five year old in me is like, we have to get a TV show job.

Immediately, yes, And like I had come to Masel from like almost exclusively Comedy Central jobs, so where they're like you're gonna get one goldfish packet. You all share it and say thank you, and they're like and not just bankrupted viacom so.

But please pass the goldfish.

So like I was already like wow, like and we're you know, like you're getting lunch.

There's like so many snacks.

And then like I had net like once we went into production and there was crafty. The first day there was a fucking raw bar. Oh shit, I got like a lobster tale.

Yeah.

I think that that was public. I feel like I posted photos of it. Whatever, who cares? I don't work there anymore.

Well, and also that's no, that is what starts to happen because everybody's making more money. Yeah, and then that's part of the flex of we actually did the thing everyone's trying to do and failing out, which is get a show to go for more than one season.

It's it's the.

Reward, yes, which is all anybody could possibly dream of right now. I can't imagine working on something that goes more than ten episodes.

Yeah, it's like huge accomplishment, just like even doing my like theater show.

I'm like, this is like more viable than any television show that I worked in in late night cable, like yeah, it's so crazy.

Oh TV so crazy? What is TV anymore?

I know, so you but you don't work there. Now, you're like you're back trotting the boards. You're trying to break into Broadway.

Yes, I'm trying to.

I'm I'd love to be the lead in Hamilton if they would just give me the show I never sees.

Just start wearing a powdered wig.

Yes, that's a good idea. I should just start wearing a powdered wig. Just manifest. Oh my god, add a powdered wig. This is how your show's going to change this week. And people keep asking, but everything else stays exactly the same. They're like, she made some interesting artistic choices, almost exclusively the powdered.

Wig, never addressing it. No, that's hilarious.

Yeah, but I'm not.

I just did a season of teenage Euthanasia Alyssa Nutting and Alison Leavy cartoon on Adult Swim. Just writing on that, and now I'm just kind of like diving back into like performance mode while I do this for a while, which is kind of like a nice change of pace from zoom rooms, which have been obviously I mean, I'm sure like everyone's going to get COVID now, so like there's that, but you know whatever, we'll figure it out.

Yeah, it's been a nice little vacation in between variants.

Yeah, yes, yes, we get to take our breaks.

Yeah.

Have you missed live performance so much? I had missed it so much. I really like there was a period of time where I was like, I guess I could like live without that, like it's kind of nice to just be home. But then like I got antsy, like week three of Lockdown and was like this is absolute pure hell. And then like and it's been like kind of learning you know, I guess what people call.

Balance in your life. I've learned a little bit about it.

So like I've been like, oh, I don't have to say yes to like a bar show in Brooklyn on a Monday at ten. I don't have to say yes to that, like yeah, or Brooklyn Bushwick. I live in Brooklyn, but you know somewhere else. Yeah, that you can just kind of be like, oh, I'm going to perform on my terms, which like feels and now I'm like doing this show like it's seven shows a week, it's six nights, and I'm just like, Wow, this is a real job, isn't it. This is not just like fuck around comedy.

Yeah, that's great.

Yeah, I'm always I've always said I need to learn to start saying no to shit. But but I almost said no to this life changing festival and I'm glad.

Yeah.

So I don't know when to say yes or no. Yes, you do.

You just have to do it decision by decision.

That's right.

You can't know it all in one moment, and also you can be wrong. So I think it's like it's that thing where I love the idea that you get to do, Allison, like a stand up theater show, because it's a it's it's almost like a refinement of something you've already crafted and worked on for a long time. And it is that thing of just like, what are all the different versions of the thing I do that I can explore? Because that's the to me, that's like really satisfying. And I just to me, I just fucking

You get there and you're like this asshole, what's his name again? You know it's always.

And then you're like, hey, man, how's it going. He's like you know, and I'm like, god, this sucks. So it's just like me and my little crew, and you know, it's a nice and then we drink all of the diet coke and then I go on stage and I'm just like, hi on diet coke, and it's loveless.

It's all on your term.

You're staring into that Broadway mirror with the light bulbs all around, just staring into your own face, drinking diet drinking diet.

Coke and looking myself in the eye and being like, it's okay, it's good for you.

There. We're diets in it.

And then slowly you lower the powdered wig onto your head and you're like and I'm ready.

For and they're like Alison five, and you're like, thank you five.

And then and then you start rapping. I could read an abortion rap show. I'd really be making hope.

At the end of this there's at least a couple hip hop numbers.

Yeah, I would expect that by the end of six weeks, I'll have a handful of those.

It'd be weird if I didn't.

You please please allow for the ten minute freestyle a portion of the end of your show, so you can build that act.

Take suggestions and your show. I don't think we've said the name of your show yet.

Oh God, it's called oh God, a show about abortion, would say, I love that. It used to when I was just running it around town, like at Union Hall and just kind of like at other spots in New York. I used to call it, oh God, an Hour about Abortion because it was an hour show, and the idea, of course, with the tone of the title being like, oh God, no one wants to hear this, and then it's like kind of a very light touch, right.

Well, it's disarming to name it that. It's it's it's attractive to name it that.

And then when it went to the theater, I was like, oh God, are they going to make me change the title? Because like that's a big word to put on the front of a marquee and everything, like oh god, yeah and uh and they were like, yeah, there's a word we need to change. And I was like, here we go, abortion camp be in it. And they were like, so the word hour. And I was like that's the problem. You're like, get it.

I don't care call it a show.

I don't in at seventy five minutes.

They were like, hour is just very stand upy, and we want to make sure that this is not like exhaustive to the stand up round.

And I was like, I was like an abortion. They were like, yay, that's great. I was like, phew, that's awesome. Yeah, well go if.

You are in the New York or Tri state area, please go to the Cherry Orchard Theater.

Cherry Lane, Cherry Cherry Lane, The.

Orchard is a play that would be at Cherry and ords have lanes of trees.

Oh all right, cool, yeah, that's right, yeah, cheer.

I was reaching.

And you're running through just.

Because this might sure it's it's already opened obviously through June fourth for now, and then you know a fingers crossed for an extension or a second run or something like that, so amazing. I'm sure this will be still topical every single day, so hopefully people will come see it.

Yeah. Well awesome, it was great to talk to you.

This was so much fun. Microke together in.

The Yeah, Crystal find is a field.

I'm telling you I want to do ketamine with everyone.

I have a cheetah print hat with bunny ears. Should I bring it?

Yeah?

If you choose your animal and let's go to a field. Perfect you've been listening to Do you Need a Ride?

Yan A? This has been an exactly Write.

Production produced by Casey O'Brien.

Mixed by John Bradley.

Artwork by Chris Fairbanks.

Theme song by Karen Kilgarriff.

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