This is ke Talk. I'm absolutely thrilled that our profile guest this morning is ready and willing and able to talk to us. Domi Moraki joins us this morning. She was at the Give Comedy Festival at the Baxter a few weeks ago and of course brought the house down. And of course, Demy is internationally celebrated. Just to name a few of her many career highlights. She's known, of course for her radio work. She was the first African female stand up comedian to have a special on Netflix
in Netflix Presents Comedians of the World. I Adored as Nonny and Seriously Single, also still currently on Netflix and you can also catch her on Last One Laughing South Africa, hosted by Trevoroa on Amazon. Domi Moraka, good to have you with us on weekend Breakfast.
Hello, Hello, how are ye?
I'm really well. I was trying to work out I was speaking to my producer Vicki earlier and thinking how long ago was it since we last spoke, and I think it was probably about five years ago, So we need to do a bit of a catch up in how life has been treating you in the last five years. The last time I spoke to you you were in the States. But where are you this morning?
From?
Where do you speak to us today? Madam? Please?
I know today I'm in Johanna's birth. I'm so sad because Cape Town spoils me. I moved from from Atlanta and I think I was in Drover for about half a day and I went straight to Cape Town. And the thing about Keith count is, oh, my gosh, like a warm hug. And then you come to drobak warps into shape, yeah and let you sleep. So yeah, I also spoiled drab right now?
How do you deal with the with the travel aspect of your life? Because I are you? Are you quite an internally grounded person? Because you the fact that you move around so much, I would imagine could kind of leave you feeling a bit disoriented. But are you quite great?
Yes? I think when you're a comedian, you become nomadic, so you get you get quite used to it. I mean at the beginning, oh my gosh, it felts like hell. I remember that the most heroin trip was Australia. I to fly between Australia, New Zealand and here, and I had to go to different parts of Australia. I think that was the first time I realized that you can travel within one country and still be in different time zones. Yeah, it's horrible. My legs were spoiling. I My party was
like what I'm really doing? Oh my gosh. It was terrible, and I was trying to call the kids but I was like fixing up the terms to call them. Not it is terrible.
Yeah, yeah, difficult stuff, difficult stuff, but you settled into it. So when you look back over your career, do you have the highlights that you know when we get sent bios for guests and they say, and she's done this, and she's done this, and she's done this. These are
all the kind of things that people might pinpoint. But for you, I'm wondering if if the highlights necessarily match those bullet points that get sent out on a bio, or are there kind of smaller, more personal moments that you've had over the years that you kind of hold a little bit closer to your heart and think, oh, that was a really great show, or meeting that person or that fan really held something special for me.
Yeah, so I think that's what people would know about. I mean, I remember doing an event for all mutual and Grapa. Michelle was the keynote speaker and I had to do I was in seeing and I did a bit of comedy upfront and I brought it onto stadium. As she walked off stage, she came to me because we're sitting at the front, and she held my hands as she said, my darling, you're extraordinary and it meant everything to me to hear that from Macgretha Michelle. It
meant everything. My first one. I meant sure that I did at god of She was also really huge for me, firstly because I had every race in that room. That room was full. I didn't know I could throw a room by myself, and it was. Man. I couldn't help but cry at the end of that show because I could not be incredibly blessed I am, but also to
have a mixed audience like that. And the same thing happened again when I was in Queenstown, and I remember the lady who ran that room came to me and said, do you know that the last time we had a room this fall and b this next was when we had a musician, a conmemboration musician. She mentioned, I think it may have been put Garren or someone and she said, that was the last time we sold a room like this.
It was so full that we get extra chase, you know, and put them out, And I thought, this is so cool. So even when I hear you mentioned the stuff I've done, it reminds me of how much I like to beat myself up and feel so irrelevant. And then when you do interviews like these and people speak about what you tell you go, You've done so much. But because you spend so much germ on Instagram and other people are doing, we forget what read done. And sometimes you forget that
people are doing stuff it's already done. Yeah, who were my? What am I doing? Meanwhile, Babe, you've shuttered ceiling?
They do you do you suffer from imposter syndrome?
Like?
Yeah, and how do you deal with that? Because I mean, I think we all do, and I.
Was.
I've spoken about it on the show an awful lot about imposter syndrome, and for some reason, it seems to affect us as women of color more and I'm not quite sure what. I am quite sure why, But what what do you do with that? What do you do with that voice? When it's loud well, first day I go on Instagram, Yeah, no, for sure.
But I have a five minute journal, which I was very better at keeping up with, but now it's got I've gotten much much better at it, and I actually go through it because I've found that because I started it a few years ago, when I revisited at the first time, because I'm on my second one, the first one, actually get to see the stuff I'd achieved, because you know, you feel it in in the morning, you know, talking about the stuff you'd like to achieve, and then your
affirmations that at the end you get to say what you got to achieve that day. So when I revisit them and I get to read about the stuff I'd achieved on different days, I've blown away and it kind of starts chipping away at that voice. But sometimes I even go, why is that big day? Because sometimes that voice is there because you actually haven't been doing the work on you. You haven't been nice to you, you haven't done anything for you. So it also helps me realize when I've neglected myself.
When you look back where you've come from and terms of the comedy scene in South Africa and you look at the comedy landscape now, not just here but across the continent, I suppose globally as well. How do you see it having changed since you kind of first put foot on the comedy stage.
It's a lot more accessible. I love that now anyone who goes I want to try comedy has a lot more opportunity to try in terms of club availability, language, and yeah, like I said, accessibility and seeing more people who look like you're doing it because for me, I feel like when I started doing comedy, there were a
lot of male, white males, black male doing it. Yeah, I was hardly seeing white female or black female doing it, you know, So just watching it grow like that, and in terms of NAC I don't think I'd seen anyone doing comedy in the next and so watching it grow from that perspective was just It's just been crazy in terms of black females, the black female voice, and now watching it become more and more diverse has just been exciting.
And I remember having this conversation actually I think it was with Celia, and we're talking about how if we didn't get it right, I don't think it would have grown so much for the women because you need to get it right for it to grow for other women. When I think about Male Jones in Cape Town, I think about Tracy Class. I'm like, if those people were not getting it right, it would not have grown for
the other women. And when you think about the African continent, people people like the Goop, like funny Face from Ghana. You think about what's his name from Nigeria. There's a from Nigeria who even came to South Africa and he even takes when he's his great coming from South Africa, he takes with him to London and to Nigeria and across the continent. But the Internet has also helped with these comedians again get showcased everywhere, you know what I mean.
My issue is, you know the inter comedians, don't get me wrong, That's what I would introduced comedians. Yeah, kind of a camera. I'm thinking about stand up comedians specifically. So yeah, I think accessibility is really is what's helped us. You know.
I you your book came out in Oh gosh was it twenty twenty eighteen twenty nineteen, and you mentioned journaling there. I loved your book. I absolutely loved it. It's still on my shelf in my office. At home and I mean you you write beautifully. Is it something that you would Is there is there room for more writing in your life? Another books?
Yes, once, once I can find support group of procrastinators, but it's probably someone's trying to start one and they're procrastinating. But I loved you know what I loved about writing that book is I was like, because I never said of a team suicide, and I think I was hearing about a lot of suicides at the time. And I wrote that book because I was saying, man, yes, we all go through a lot. But I don't feel like when people see us and I was so called great lives,
they know about how much we go through. They just see the great, filtered stuff. They don't get to see that we all have a struggle. And I just want everyone to just keep pushing, just keep pushing. And I would love to write again, because again, I've been pushing through a lot, and I meet too many young ladies who, man, they want it now, they want it instantly, and when you tell them how much they have to work, they look at you like, why are you trying to make
it hard for me just because you're already there. You try to make it look like it's so hard, and I'm going, I'm not saying it's hard, but I'm saying, put in some work make it worth it. So I really I would really love to write more. But also what kills the about myself purpose. One of my uncles was like, you you are too honest. So I'm like, but that's what people need meet the vulnerability.
I agree, I agree, and then the acting work.
I think.
In fact, the last time that we spoke it was when Seriously Single had just come out, and I remember feeling like it was just so refreshing. You were so brilliant and it you were so funny. It was just I just I just loved it, and it kind of spurred a lot of other locally produced like brilliant comedy, relatable kind of you know that that Joe Burg scene, young Single, you know all of that stuff that that is so relatable to so many of us. Are you are you looking? Can we expect to see you in
anything soon? Would you ever write anything?
Like?
I could see you writing like a like a sitcomy type thing, so like, you know, like a comedy drama y thing.
Ever, keen, So my I've had I've heard quite a long journey had sitcom in this country. I think it's almost every come I've written a little bit nominated for us after I was one. So in terms of film, I started writing and I had no idea how hard film is. So funny enough, I had written Miss Education. I was part of the writing team of Mys Education in Netflix. So I'm definitely polishing my writing and I probably will have something come out in the next couple
of years. But in terms of my acting, I mean when I went to VIS I went to vis University because I wanted to become a writer. But when I got there, I encountered other crafts that I fell in love with, namely the writing and the stand up and you know, theater directing. So I will definitely definitely be doing more work and writing. I think right now my focus is in so much on the comedy. And I did The Honeymoon as well, which is on Amazon Prime,
and that was also fun. And I think I'm trying to get to a point where I can do something straight, you know, because I did a drama called Diagon City and I was I was a killer in a like a hip woman. There's a brief rule that oh my gosh, the way you tuit it, I was like, I want one more person to try to trust me, love to let me audition for that. Do you know what I mean?
I think it's a South African thing. I mean, you spend a lot of time in the stage. Do you think it's a South African thing that we are a lot more open? I think you know, I grew up in the UK, and I don't think there is open there in terms of allowing creatives to be diverse in their output. I mean, you've done radio, you've done TV, you've written. Do you think that that's South African thing that we are because we have to we have to be able to do whatever comes and whatever we might
want to do. Do you think that's a South African thing? I just don't think that people are as open to creatives being diverse in our aparts of the world.
I think, well, in America, I'm seeing it more and more. I don't know if it's because right now, like cost of living is really high, so everybody has at least
two three jobs. I'm seeing it in the arts. The only difference I suppose is here you don't already have to be established to be able to do it because of what I've seen is the guys who already established are able to do it more easily, but the guys who aren't will struggle, you know, yeah, because everybody you have to have an agent for those things if you're trying to do them properly. Like I don't think Steve have you right, but I know he's the one who does the radio and the TV on such a high
scale and the comedy you know. Yeah, and one decides as well as her writing agent and the active agent because they have an agent for everything every Yeah, which is funny because I was like, oh my gosh, you know South Africa, that's how always that's bad. And I'm saying that everybody else is doing it like that now because I have a writing agent, as a voiceover agent and actually agent, and a comedy agent and a manager.
So sure, because we need especial list in every field. Otherwise, what's the point You're gonna have somebody booking for something you don't understand. When you're underpaid or you're underrepresented, you want somebody who's an expert in their field, do you know what I mean? Yeah?
Yeah, to me, it's always lovely to speak to you. I feel like it's cannot possibly been five year insidince we last spoke, but it is. You can currently catch tom at on net No, Amazon, Last One Laughing soth Africa, hosted by Trevor Noa. The Honeymoon on Amazon and Netflix presents comedians of the World, which I think you can still find on there, and also seriously single. It's been an absolute pleasure and I always love chatting to you, Tomi Marak. Thank you so much for joining us.
Thank you so much, keep going. I be in September. I'll be filming stuff