Comedian Sam Jay Isn’t Afraid of Getting Canceled
Notes from America with Kai Wright
WNYC Studios
4.4 • 1.5K Ratings
🗓️ 15 June 2023
⏱️ 19 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
At least not anymore. That confidence comes from her purpose, her identities, and how comedy has evolved from the sitcoms she used to watch as a kid.
Our former intern Vanessa Handy was watching reruns of Good Times with her family. It made her realize how important comedy was growing up – especially sitcoms centering Black families. So she called up Sam Jay to talk about comedy of the past, and what the future looks like to one comic who’s forging it. As you can guess, that comedy is tied to the identities we hold true for ourselves, and the universal identities that connect us to each other.
Plus, hear Kai try to sing the Good Times theme song. It’s good times. (ba-dum tss)
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“Notes from America” airs live on Sunday evenings at 6pm ET. The podcast episodes are lightly edited from our live broadcasts. Tune into the show on Sunday nights via the stream on notesfromamerica.org or on WNYC’s YouTube channel.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | It's Notes from America, I'm Kai Wright, and I am joined by our show's former intern, |
| 0:21.0 | Vanessa Handy. |
| 0:22.0 | Hey, Vanessa. |
| 0:23.0 | Hey, Kai. |
| 0:24.0 | So, you are here to make fun of your elders, no? |
| 0:29.0 | A little bit, you know, something like that. |
| 0:32.0 | Okay. |
| 0:33.0 | So, a few months ago, I was at my mom's house in my childhood home, sitting on her bed while I watched her braid my aunt's hair. |
| 0:41.0 | And to pass the time, we were marathoning reruns of good times. |
| 0:45.0 | Good times, as in JJ, and, you know, little Janet Jackson, and all of that. |
| 0:51.0 | Yes. |
| 0:52.0 | And honestly, between the hair braiding and the reruns, I mean, I can't think of a more black center. |
| 0:57.0 | Truly. |
| 0:58.0 | Yeah. |
| 0:59.0 | And so, we sat there laughing at JJ's questionable choices in sleepwear. |
| 1:04.0 | But it shocked me that after every episode, even after all of these years, they barely knew the words to the speaking of song. |
| 1:12.0 | I mean, every time a new episode would start, they were silent until this one line kicked in. |
| 1:19.0 | It's the part that goes, keep in your head. |
| 1:23.0 | Keep in your head of a water. |
| 1:26.0 | Make it a wave, we do care. |
| 1:28.0 | Tip-a-rare layoffs. |
| 1:30.0 | Good times. |
... |
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