Sam Jay has arrived. The comedian’s comedian who plays Mo, the wisecracking, tell-it-like-it-is bestie to Jonah Hill’s Ezra in You People, may only have a handful of on-screen moments in the delirious, cringe-inducing new rom-com, but she makes every single one of them count.
A former Saturday Night Live writer, the celebrated stand-up may already be familiar to Netflix viewers from her turn in the 2018 special The Comedy Lineup and her own 2020 hour-long special 3 In the Morning. But in Kenya Barris’ You People — her first foray into major feature films, by the way — one would never guess that she wasn’t already a seasoned pro. Over and over again, she delivers knockout monologues that feel off the cuff. And her ease, timing, and ability to steal the spotlight from the film’s cast of comedy all-stars (Eddie Murphy, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, the list goes on…) is one the movie’s most delicious surprises. That’s why Sam Jay feels like You People’s stealth MVP.
“I didn’t know I was the scene-stealer,” she tells Tudum. Perhaps that’s because Mo, with her easy charm and disarming humor, turns out to be a lot like Jay herself. “I’m that friend that people come to for advice, and I’m going to give it to you straight.”
Don’t get it twisted, though. Jay admits that her introduction to acting in big-time movies filled her with more than a little anxiety, even if her handful of moments in You People seem effortless. “It definitely was scary,” she says, “because all these big players were in the movie.”
Whatever jitters she was feeling don’t show. And given that many of the biggest laughs she receives were the result of an improvisational, on-the-spot riff, Jay most definitely proves to audiences — and to herself — that she’s the real deal. “I got to work with some of the best in the business. I grew a lot.”
While viewers will see Jay absolutely crush her role with her cutting lines and signature delivery, her biggest hope is that folks walk away from You People recognizing its larger themes of acceptance and love. “I hope people leave a little changed,” she says. “A little different than when they walked in. A little more perspective. A little more empathetic, a little more understanding.”
No doubt they will while also coming away knowing that they saw a comedy superstar in the making. Here, Sam Jay breaks down six indelible moments from the film.
Mo on Black Lives Matter and Barack Obama
The very first scene of You People sets the tone for both the movie and Mo’s zany, she-did-not-just-say-that commentary. Mo and Ezra (Hill) are in the studio, spittin’ hot takes on their podcast, and Mo says that the reason the Black Lives Matter movement got so popular is because it had the same branding as Cuties and kale. Then she takes that outrageous observation a step further by suggesting that Barack Obama is a figure whose appeal stems from the fact that he can be whoever we want him to be — and that her version of Obama “does gay stuff,” but only when he’s had a little bit of coke.
Jay says director Barris cut her loose and told her, “‘You can just flow on Obama or whatever.’ Me and Jonah were just going back and forth being silly. I just started saying stuff. There was improv going on. I didn’t know what was going to stay or go. And then when I saw the locked cut, I was like, ‘Oh, man, they kept all this Obama stuff!’”
Ezra tells Mo he’s feeling a Black girl.
When Ezra reveals that he’s met Amira (Lauren London), Mo is shocked to learn that she’s Black. And she makes her surprise very clear, telling him, “If this girl is what you say she is, then I’m pretty sure she smells like cocoa butter and expectations.”
“That was a risk,” says Jay. “We were going back and forth. It was like, ‘Oh, you dating, like, a Black girl Black girl?’ And he was like, ‘What is that supposed to mean?’ And I was like, ‘You’d only date Black girls who like, bathe with crystals.’ But to play off that line, the cocoa butter and expectations [came in].”
Mo checks Ezra on his naivete.
It’s not necessarily a funny moment, but it’s certainly one that marks a turning point for the film’s hero, Ezra. Mo tells him that Black people and white people can never be cool. The exchange comes when Ezra is engulfed in the obstacles they’re facing as an interracial couple — obstacles he hadn’t considered as much as he probably should have. Mo’s input is tough and intense, but it’s also probably what he needs to hear as she makes crystal clear what Ezra’s up against.
“I just kind of felt like the character was at a place where she needed to draw a line for this dude,” says Jay. “Like, you’re being naive just thinking you can walk into this situation and everything’s just good. And at some core level, there might be a part of this relationship that will never be 100 percent cool. And you need to face that. It was just trying to give Ezra a reality check.”
Mo clowns Ezra’s engagement ring in the harshest way ever.
When Ezra comes to Mo proudly announcing that he’s about to put a ring on it, Mo swiftly bursts his bubble with a fierce read for the ages. “You’re about to ask their only adult daughter to marry you with this baby-ass ring?” she says. Ezra feebly counters that he planned to tell Amira’s family this was his grandmother’s ring that she managed to save from the Holocaust, prompting Mo to drag him even further. “It’s not a Holocaust box,” she says.
“Kenya was just like, ‘Can you riff off the ring?’” Jay says. “And we started this thread of how to make it look more Holocaust. We were just having fun. We were like, ‘You gotta put it in the dirt. Burn the edges. So it looks like it was taken out of an escape unit. Bend it a little bit.’ [Me and Jonah] had met briefly before, at an SNL after-party. The chemistry built over time. We would talk a lot between takes [on You People], and he was just so open and cool. That allowed me to be more comfortable with him on camera.
Mo reveals a kink on the way to Vegas, and meets Amira’s dad.
Arguably Mo’s funniest scene comes when Ezra and Mo are on a plane headed to Las Vegas for Ezra’s bachelor party and Mo says she wants to “do Molly and lick a stripper's toes.” Moments later, Amira’s dad (Murphy) plops down in their row, and introduces himself to Mo, thinking Mo is a guy. “My name’s Mo, and I have titties,” she retorts.
“Molly and [the] stripper’s toes sounded Vegas-y,” Jay says. “It was completely off the top of my head. Like, ‘I need to say something wild right here.’ I hate Vegas. Seriously, it’s like the worst people on the planet — this vortex of people — coming together to be bad. I do not have a good time there. I don’t gamble. It’s bad. It’s not good.” As for working with Murphy, Jay says, “I was like, ‘Damn, I’m in a scene with Eddie. I gotta give something.’ So I just threw it out while we were rehearsing. He was like, ‘Yo, I liked that. Do that again, I got something for that.’ [That was] freaking validating. Like ‘Yes! I got one!’ I think that’s all you want. Like, the whole movie. I was like, ‘I just gotta get one.’”
Mo comments on her seating arrangement at the rehearsal dinner.
In a brief moment filled with riotous cameos, Jay shines yet again when, at Ezra and Amira’s rehearsal dinner, Mo uses her toast to complain about where she’s been seated. “[Ezra] didn’t think to sit me on the Black side.”
“Kenya, in all his glory, at the very last minute said, ‘We’re gonna turn the camera on you and get your speech,’ and walked away,” Jay says. “I was like, ‘What speech?!’ Because there was nothing written. I was like, ‘What the fuck? What am I supposed to do right now?’ But I was really feeling that way the whole day. Because I play Jonah’s best friend the entire movie, I am not around Black people. So this was like the first day all the Black people came to set. Mike Epps. Kym [Whitley]. Yung Miami. La La [Anthony]. And they’re all together all day, like commiserating and being Black. And I was just with Jonah. So when we got to the table scene, I was already like, ‘Dang, this is hella awkward, because I’m the only Black person sitting on this side.’ And at this point, I don’t even think [the Black guest stars] know why I’m in this fucking movie. I’m like, ‘This is awkward.’ So I just kind of leaned into what I was already feeling.”
