There’s Always Room For Joy: Padma Laskhmi, Punkie Johnson and W. Kamau Bell

At Liberty

News

4.8 • 585 Ratings

🗓️ 4 November 2024

⏱️ 33 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

You may recognize W. Kamau Bell from his multi-Emmy award-winning docuseries United Shades of America, or from his Substack Who’s With Me, or from his commercials for the ACLU. If you're a long-time ACLU supporter, you'll know Bell has worked with us for more than a decade as our Artist Ambassador for Racial Justice. We're excited to have him as our interim host for our At Liberty podcast, where he will host conversations with leaders, legal experts, artists, and storytellers dedicated to the fight for civil rights and civil liberties. In this episode, Emmy-nominated producer, television host, food expert, New York Times best-selling author and ACLU Artist Ambassador for Immigrants’ Rights and Women’s Rights PADMA LAKSHMI joins us with her good friend, comedian and former Saturday Night Live castmember PUNKIE JOHNSON, to discuss the intersection of identity, comedy...and voting. Known for her critically-acclaimed and Emmy-nominated Hulu series “Taste the Nation”, and as host and executive producer for 19 seasons of Bravo’s two-time Emmy-winning series “Top Chef,” Padma tells us how she is exploring stand-up comedy as a storyteller, her meet-cute with Punkie over tacos at Questlove’s house, and why reproductive freedom and immigrants’ rights can also be fought for on the comedy stage. For her part, Punkie talks about what it was like to be on SNL, why she needed to leave, and her text thread with friends asking all the questions about politics she didn’t understand. Through it all, they also talk about joy, which we are looking to bring you on this day before the election.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey everybody, it's me, W. Camel Bell. I'm the new interim host of the ACLU's podcast at Liberty.
0:07.9	So subscribe now, listen. We have great conversations. Let's have some joy.
0:18.6	I'm super excited about this conversation.
0:22.3	Tomorrow is Election Day.
0:27.6	I know everybody out there is tense and obviously for obvious reasons, tense for different reasons.
0:36.8	Anyway, today, the ACLU podcast at Liberty, I'm going to take it in a little bit of a different direction because we're just going to have some joy.
0:41.3	Before we go into the election tomorrow, let's experience some joy. So I brought two of the most joyful people that I know, Podmalakshmi and Punky Johnson.
0:48.5	And also, did you know their friends?
0:50.2	I didn't know their friends.
0:51.5	Apparently they're friends.
0:53.0	Today, I'll be speaking with Emmy-nominated, producer, television host, food expert, and New York Times best-selling author, as well as one of Time Magazine's 100 most influential people. No, I don't check to see if I'm on that list every morning comes out. Padma Lakshmi. She is the creator of the critically acclaimed and Emmy-nominated Hulu series, Taste the Nation,
1:12.3	and Padma served as host and executive producer for 19 season of Bravo's two-time Emmy-winning
1:18.3	series Top Chef.
1:19.8	I really have two Emmys.
1:20.8	She is also the co-founder of the Endometriosis Foundation of America, and just like me, is an ACLU artist ambassador.
1:30.8	Her specialty is immigrant rights and women's rights.
1:34.7	And in 2023, she also graced the pages of Sports Illustrated magazine's swimsuit edition
1:40.3	and the Pirelli calendar.
1:42.9	But that's not all.
1:43.8	I'm also speaking with comedian and writer
1:46.3	and New Orleans native, Punky Johnson. I'm a huge fan of Punky, known her for years. You know her
1:52.6	best from S&L, which she joined in 2020, which is a weird time to join as she'll talk about.
	...

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