There’s something special about getting two stand-up comedians together to talk about their creative processes, and it’s an even more momentous occasion when those entertainers are superstars like Wanda Sykes and Taylor Tomlinson. “I just want to make it clear, and you can put this in there, me talking to Wanda Sykes about how we do stand-up is so silly. No offense, Netflix,” says Tomlinson. “Please make it clear to the readers, I'm not sitting here going, ‘We do this.’ This is so lopsided.” Sykes, who calls herself a “Taylor fan,” pushes back quickly. “You’re so sweet to say that, but we absolutely should be having this conversation together. We’re peers. Come on.”
Lucky for us, their conversation unpacked how they stay true to themselves in their stand-up, what it’s like testing material on the road, and what they remember about their first specials in honor of their latest, Taylor Tomlinson: Prodigal Daughter and Wanda Sykes: Legacy. “My first [special], I was working at The Chris Rock Show at the time as a writer,” says Sykes. “I just remember Chris telling me, ‘Look, it’s a half hour, but it’s a special, so just make it special. Don’t go do a set. Do a special.’”
Wanda Sykes
Both of you do comedy that’s so personal, but you’re also entertaining a room of people. How do you wrap your heads around staying true to your perspectives while entertaining an audience?
Wanda Sykes: It has to feel right for me. It’s like, I have to be enjoying this. I can’t go onstage and … do this material because I know this audience is going to enjoy it but I disagree with it. It can’t work like that. Then you’re making me have a job, and I don’t want a job.
Taylor Tomlinson: I agree with that. I also think that I’ve definitely done material onstage, and it worked, and then the second I did it, I was like, “Oh, I’m not ready to talk about this yet.” Sometimes I find out I’m not ready to talk about something as I’m doing it. And then I just go, “OK, well, those 3,000 people know a lot about me now, and I hope nobody filmed it.”
Sykes: Sometimes something will hit you, and you open it up, and you start talking about it, and then you go, “Nah, I can’t put that out there.” Especially now I have kids. I have some hysterical stuff about my kids, but I go, “I can’t put that out there.” It’s their life, and I can’t do that.
You had close connections with the venues for your respective specials. How did you land on those spaces to mark this moment in your careers?
Tomlinson: I wanted to film in a church because the subject matter was about religion and my relationship to growing up in church and the fact that I started in churches and how I’ve come around to thinking that’s a funny, interesting way to start. For a long time, I felt really embarrassed that that’s how I started, and it made me feel like I wasn’t, like, a real comic or something. And so to get to a place now where I’m like, “OK, you’ve been doing this for 15 years, it seems like you’re a comedian now,” but it took me so long to feel that way that I think I had to get to this place to feel like, OK, I can talk about that and appreciate it.
Sykes: I wanted to make this special special. And I kept thinking about different cities. My producing partner, Page Hurwitz, she said, “You should go back to your alma mater. Go do it at Hampton.” And I thought about it. I’m like, “That’s huge and daunting.” It’s the HBCU, and Ogden Hall has all this legacy. At one point, we couldn’t wear jeans in there. Once I got to campus, the school went nuts. It was a great weekend. It turned out to be everything that I wanted it to be. We got the kids involved, we had the students shadowing the department heads, and everybody was blown away with how great they were [doing as] PAs and all.
Taylor Tomlinson
The art of stand-up is unique in that it’s a constant feedback loop every night of a tour. How would you describe your relationship to each audience, and how does that impact your material?
Tomlinson: That’s what I like so much about touring: I think it gives you a lot of confidence when you do get to a place where you record it because you’ve done it for years at that point. So you’re like, OK, I’ve taken these jokes all over the world and done them many, many, many times, and they worked in a lot of different places in front of a lot of different audiences. Before my first special, no one was coming to see me on purpose. Now people come to see me on purpose, for the most part, which is such a gift.
Sykes We know when something’s funny. We’ve been doing this long enough to know if a concept is funny, but the hard part is conveying that to the audience. Because it might be a piece of information that we have that makes it funny, but we haven’t given it to them yet. So it’s like, why aren’t y’all laughing at this? I know this is funny. Then one night you’ll stumble on it. It’s like, hey, they laughed at that, and you’ve got to go back and listen, which I hate doing. I hate listening to my shows. I actually work with someone who will go through my shows and tell me, “Oh, you said it this way, and that’s why it worked that time.” It’s a science, really. And we do listen, because that’s our indicator if something’s working or not — the level of the audience and the laugh.
What’s it like being in a community with other comedians?
Tomlinson The thing I love about stand-up is it kind of doesn’t matter what level you’re at. I think that if two standups run into each other at an airport, you can talk for five hours. It’s like having this sort of shorthand shared language, but it is smart to back up and … just remind yourself that’s Wanda Sykes and you’re you and keep working really hard.
Sykes I love that there’s young voices and people are coming up because, like you said, we’re all doing the same job. It’s the same. It’s not like, “I’m the supervisor. I’ve been promoted.” No, it’s the same. It’s all entry-level positions. I just love that we are in this business and especially seeing more women in this business. So yeah, I don’t look at it as you’re here, I’m there, whatever. We’re all doing the same damn job.
