The Comedians with Disabilities Act

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LINDSEY WELLS, HOST: From KVMR and in partnership with FREED, this is Disability Rap. 

NINA G: We want disabled people to feel that their experiences are being embraced because I think sometimes there might be a tendency for disabled comics to feed into the ableism. 

WELLS: Today, The Comedians with Disabilities Act, who are performing in Grass Valley next month.

NINA G: We talk about sex. I think that's important for us to address and talk about and be able to express ourselves in a way that is natural to us. 

WELLS: That's all coming up on Disability Rap. Stay tuned. 

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WELLS: Welcome to Disability Rap. I'm Lindsey Wells. Today we are joined by Nina G. a comedian who performs with the Comedians with Disabilities Act. She is an author who has written three books, including Once Upon An Accommodation: A Book About Learning Disabilities, and she just recently debuted at number one on two major streaming sites with her solo comedy album, Stutterer Interrupted. Nina has been an advocate for people with disabilities for over 20 years. She has been on many talk shows, radio broadcasts, and podcasts. I have some exciting news, FREED is hosting a fundraiser October 16th at the Center for the Arts in Downtown Grass Valley. 

As I mentioned, Nina is part of a troop called Comedians with Disabilities Act. They will be performing that night. To purchase tickets to the show, go to FREED's website, freed.org. Comedians with Disabilities Act was founded in 2010 to highlight the comedic styles of comedians who have disabilities. Nina G. joined the troop in 2016. The troop had toured and performed over 20 shows that bring awareness and laughter to audiences. Nina G, welcome to Disability Rap. 

NINA G: Hi. Thank you so much for having me here. 

WELLS: I want to begin by asking you what drew you to comedy. 

NINA G: Oh, what drew me to comedy? Everything. When I was a kid, that was the thing that I loved the most. The women I looked up to were people like Gilda Radner. I don't know if her because you're young. 

WELLS: Yes, I do. 

NINA G: She was one of my idols. I was big on Saturday Night Live. Then just when I was little, little, little, that's when Steve Martin became super famous for his standup and I connected there. It's just something that I've always had since I was five years old and it develo-- I think having dyslexia and stuttering, I wasn't good in school, especially went to Catholic school in the 1980s. I always say, "You shouldn't pity me for having a disability, but you can pity me for going to Catholic school in the 1980s with a disability because that sucked." 

Even though school didn't feel good, it felt good to know there weren't kids staying up until 1:30 AM to watch Late Night with David Letterman to see who the newest standup comic was, and I was. I felt like I was smarter than everybody else, which culminated. During the pandemic, I wrote a book about Bay Area Stand-Up Comedy: A Humorous History, it's called. It's been there my whole life. When I was 11, I was like, "I think I want to do standup." That was all through middle school in high school. 

I never thought someone who stuttered could be a standup comic because it was the '80s and I didn't see anybody who sounded like me in comedy, especially a woman, because at that point I hadn't even seen a actual woman who stuttered on TV or on the radio or anything like that. Dream dies, picked it back up when I was 35 or 36 in 2010, and been doing it ever since. 

WELLS: That's amazing. You answered my second question, but you mentioned Steve Martin and Gilda Radner, who I adore, so that's amazing. Who else were your favorite people in comedy? 

NINA G: There's just so many that I could name throughout different phases of my life. When I was in middle school, early high school, I was all about Emo Philips, and that was the first person who I wrote a fan letter to. He is very weird, but really talented writer. He still does it in his now 70s. Loved him. Then more into the 2000s, people like Chris Rock who talked about racism. 

I liked Richard Pryor when I was a kid. My mom and dad didn't have any filter on what I watched. My mom brought me to the movie theater to see Richard Pryor live at the Sunset Strip so I learned all about freebasing and all these things that most nine-year-olds did not know about. Learning about the world through standup was so helpful because I wasn't always able to access the same material as everybody else with my dyslexia. Standup was a way for me to understand different issues, different topics like racism. That's why I really like it, especially as a disabled comic, because when I went into it, I was like, "Oh, there's all these Black American comics who are talking about these issues. What if I talked about disability in that same way?" Black comedy had a really big influence on me in that way. 

WELLS: Richard Pryor, Steve Martin, Gilda Radner, how did they impact your style? 

NINA G: Gilda and Penny Marshall were the two women who I think had the biggest impact on my femininity, and in Penny Marshall being Laverne on Laverne & Shirley, and just who you could be as a woman, but still be weird. Also, ethnic. I am Italian American and Penny Marshall is Italian and Gilda is Jewish Lithuanian. Just having a different model for what a woman is than the Christie Brinkleys or the Cindy Crawfords who were the women when I was coming up. 

WELLS: You too were with the Comedians with Disabilities Act. Can I ask you how the group came about? 

NINA G: Yes. It actually started even earlier, I think in 2011. I didn't start it. I joined it. I was lucky enough to join it. It was started by Michael O'Connell who was from the Sacramento area. He had MD. He passed away I think in 16-ish or around there. That's when I had to take the reins for it to live on, which was really, really hard because it was hard to do standup and do shows on disability without him because it would make me miss him. 

I had friends who are now in the troop who really encouraged me. Like Mean Dave, who's going to be on the Grass Valley Show, he really encouraged me to keep it going at times when I was just like, "Michael is gone. I can't." He really got me to do that. I think in Michael's name-- Michael used a wheelchair. The thing is, people are like, "Oh, you're such an inspiration because you are disabled." Once someone told me that, and they're like, "Oh, you're such an inspiration. If I talked like you, I wouldn't talk at all." Not a compliment. No. Michael inspired comedy clubs to get a rap and that is the inspiration that I love, is that when people change what they're doing to make it more inclusive and more accessible. 

That's been a core thing that we've done, like we won't play a club that doesn't have an accessible bathroom. We've gotten an accessible bathroom put in at the Elks Club in Butte, Montana because we were like, "We're not playing you unless we get an accessible bathroom." I wasn't able to make that show, but I heard that they were drilling in the grab bars right before the show. It was right in the brink of time. 

There's a great Woodhouse Brewery in Santa Cruz who actually got us a ramp and put up a ramp on their stage so that Jade Theriault. so that she could perform there. It's great when we don't have to advocate when there are clubs like Deaf Puppies and Alameda Comedy Club who already have a ramp. It's part of our goal that we don't always talk about that isn't on the stage with us but we want it to be seamless. 

WELLS: That inspiration comment gets me every time. I think I'm like, "Thank you but no." That impact that you brought up about you taking the reins and as a woman, what impact do you think you're leading on now with, what's the word I want to use, with leading the troupe. How do you lead the troupe as a woman, and how has that changed the style of comedy in your opinion? 

NINA G: I think I'm like the soccer mom of the group. It's more like I'm a mom than anything else because I'll text everyone like, "Okay, we're doing a show on this day. Everybody in?" Then yes, yes, and then I coordinate. There's just all those skills that women have. I just make sure everybody gets to where they need to go on that day, and they get paid because the other thing is that I believe that disabled comics should get paid what they're worth, and disabled people don't get paid and comics don't get paid. I'm up against a couple of barriers there. That is the other thing is that I expect us to be paid and paid well. 

WELLS: Can you tell a little bit about your disability and how it impacts your comedic style? 

NINA G: I have dyslexia and I also stutter. My stuttering is a big part of my act. It's funny because my dyslexia impacts me more in the world than my stutter but people don't see it. I have a hard time bringing that in. I think there's some emotional barriers to me talking about it and doing jokes about it. I'm always trying to work it in, but it doesn't always happen. 

With the stutter, the world-- Anyone with a disability knows this, that the world just gives you punchlines all the time. A lot of times I'm like, "Oh, I just report what happens in my life and that's all I need to do." I would love to really sit down and craft a joke about my stutter that I don't really need to. 

WELLS: You don't really have to. Oh, I totally get that. As a person with a disability myself, I come up with some funny anecdotes, but I don't have a comedy show to share that. 

NINA G: That is the thing. When I would get my microaggressions before comedy, I would get so upset. I would get so mad when that woman told me you're such an inspiration, if I talked like you, I wouldn't talk at all. I didn't do a good comeback. I didn't do this, I didn't do that. I would sit in bed and be like, "I'm mad." 

I made an agreement with myself that I would say something in the moment so that it didn't feel that way when I was in bed. Then starting stand-up, it gave me that opportunity to talk about that stuff. Even if I don't say it in the moment, I eventually say it on stage. 

WELLS: That punch line or that comeback in that moment, we don't always think of that. That's so great that you can do that. Can you tell me one of your favorite jokes that we can share on the radio? 

NINA G: I'll do a really easy one and it's on the topic that we've been talking about because so many of mine are not PG. You guys will have to come and check out our shows, especially the one in Grass Valley. Okay. How many disabled people does it take to screw in a light bulb? 

WELLS: How many? 

NINA G: One to screw it in and five abled-body people to say, "You are such an inspiration." 

WELLS: Not only is that funny, but that's a fact. With a person with a disability, we get that every day all day long. 

NINA G: Every day, all day long. 

WELLS: How does comedy help to explain the disability experience to people without disabilities? 

NINA G: I think it's important both to reflect people's experience. We want disabled people to feel that their experiences are being embraced because I think sometimes there might be a tendency for disabled comics to feed into the ableism, and everybody who performs with us, that is not the case. They really challenged some of that. I got such a great compliment the other day. 

I had a birthday show a week ago and my friend Enotch was on the show. Enotch has raging ADHD and it was the first time that he performed with us. He said that before he got on, he cried a little bit. It was because it was the first time he felt that his ADHD wasn't being tolerated, that it was believed, and that it was being embraced and reflected. To create an environment where people can feel that, I think is so important. 

With that being said, non-disabled people, able-bodied people, whatever you want to call them, they learn part of our experiences in a way that is engaging. The thing is, like we have six core comics who are in the troupe. Each of them has a different disability, a different experience in the world, different sexual orientations, different ethnicities. I feel like someone may be able to connect with somebody in the lineup. Also, they're all some of the best comics I know. Since I am a comedy snob, you're not going to get anybody who halfway does their comedy. 

WELLS: I've had the experience of going to a comedy show for my brother who's also a comic, and he made fun of me the whole time, which is fine. Have you ever experienced a heckler in the crowd? 

NINA G: Oh yes. 

WELLS: Yes? Can you explain that experience? 

NINA G: I just had one last night. I did all of my stuttering jokes, all of them, okay? Because I feel like I have to prove it, because people think I'm faking it. One of my jokes is like, because what helps comedy timely more than a stutter? Why would you put that in there? If I was faking it, I'd be the Meryl Streep of stuttering. There was over 55 group there because they have a community. It was in the city of Manteca at Deaf Cook Puppies. There's this group that always comes there and they always come to shows and they're really supportive of the club and the club loves them. One of the ladies, he was second row said loudly, "I think she's faking it" after I did all my, I'm not picking at jokes. 

I approached that and we talked about how she was loud and I was like, "I live in a 55 and over community and I know everybody is hard of hearing or they're talking to someone who was hard of hearing. You are all loud. All of you are loud." We talked about that and it led to something about sex. It turned into some nonsense, which was super fun, and we were all on board, and it was all out of love. 

The thing is I think a lot of times, because we have been bullied, we have had these situations where people are just really intrusive, but if I'm on stage, I feel I have the responsibility to walk people through that process. If they're not getting it, then I can really tell them what I think, but I think from a heckler point of view, as a disabled woman, I've been heckled since I was eight. You're going to have to come at me with something really good and none of them do. I feel I have a black belt in being heckled. It's like sometimes if somebody has a black belt, they're walking around hoping that someone attacks them so then they can do all their moves on them. That's what I do. 

WELLS: It's worked for you so far. 

NINA G: Yes. 

WELLS: Following up with that, as a person with a disability, how has the comedy circuit been accepting of you? 

NINA G: Sometimes I think comics think that my stuttering is a gimmick, and I've heard people say that about other disabled comics and these are people who were super famous and they're doing awesome and they're doing great, but they're like, "Oh, in spite of him being a gimmick, he's actually funny." I heard someone say that about someone who could buy and sell all of us. That I don't like to hear because I'm sure they think that of me. I'm sure that there are some people who think that. There are also others who can see past that and see my jokes and see the other things I talk about and see that 80% of the time, I am doing really well on stage. 80% of the time, I'm doing better than a lot of other comics. Tat is what I hope they see. 

I think that I have something more to prove, but the people who I consistently work with, I really appreciate because they're just not seeing the stutter. It's hard because if I have a seven-minute set at a comedy club, I'm going to talk about stuttering. I have to get people past that point. A shorter set, it is harder to prove myself in other ways, but if they think that it's a gimmick or if they think this or that, screw them. The comedians with disabilities act is doing really well. 

WELLS: That's good to hear. You think in 2024 we could move past, "I'm excited about our fundraiser on October 16th and what can we expect at the comedian disabilities event we're hosting in Grass Valley next month?" 

NINA G: I think you guys are going to love it because it's me, it's Mean Dave, it's Loren Kraut and our headliner is Michael Beers who's coming out just for this from Oklahoma. He is a disability advocate who's worked for the Center for Independent Living in Montana in Missoula for years and years and years and years and now he's in Oklahoma because he found love and moved there. We're just all really good. I think everyone's going to have a lot of fun. I think that if you haven't seen us, you have to come and see us, and that's disabled, non-disabled, everybody. 

WELLS: I mentioned at the top that you have been an advocate for a long time. Can you explain how you weave your advocacy in with your comedy? 

NINA G: I think with the comedy troupe playing venues that are only accessible, there's that part, but then there is the advocacy in what we say. I think a big part of that is talking very truthfully about our disabilities. I think that is a thread that we all have. For me personally, I don't talk about my disability in a way that is derogatory toward me. I'll make fun of my nose. I have a good-size Italian nose. My mom told me I had a small Italian nose and I was like, "Mom, doesn't really help." 

I'll talk about that. I'll talk about body acceptance of a woman who is now in her 50s, but I will be very careful about my stutter and how I present that because I don't want people to feel comfortable making fun of it. Last night, it was so great because I hosted the show at Deaf Puppies. I hate hosting because I screw up on everybody's name because of my dyslexia, but there was a guy, his name is Travis Ne-Ne-Nelson. I said the name like that, but I started to stutter on it and then I looked around and it was a natural stutter, and then I said his name. The audience waited for me to stutter through his name. I was like, "Oh, this is what I want. This is how I want the world to be." I was like, "Oh, I got this audience to this place." It just made me so happy to stutter on an end in that way. 

WELLS: That's great. To have that audience that was compassionate and understanding, that's what you really want, but hecklers are fun too because you can play off of it and make it really fun. 

NINA G: Maybe if I didn't get hurt and handle that, we might not have gotten to the place where they totally accepted me stuttering on this end name. As an entity, that's where we move to. 

WELLS: I think that is so great. Because you have been an advocate, a comedian, say to a young comic that has the dreams that you did early on, what would you tell them while they're just starting? 

NINA G: I think that they have to develop their own voice. I am an advocate, but early on, I realized that I would be an advocate whether or not I was a comic, I would be an advocate if I was a scientist. I'm not a scientist, but whatever job I would be in, I would be an advocate, because that's one of those core things in me, but not everyone's like that. 

Also, I think that it's like Josh Blue. He talks about his disability, but I have the sense that he'd much rather talk about weed and that's cool. I think part of the freedom is not to have to talk about their disability, but we're not there yet. We are not there yet. Our representation in the media sucks. When is a person with an apparent disability going to have a Netflix special? When is there going to be a showcase of disabled comics, like, "Hey, I am ready to go." I got the comics. Talk to me Netflix because I am set. When is that going to happen and that's where we need to go next. 

WELLS: I think you'd be great on Netflix. I'd watch your special. 

NINA G: I do have a special coming out soon. It's going to be on Amazon Prime. It is self-produced. My great friend Gina Chin-Davis was the director. She also stutters. This is a collaboration of two stuttering women which is a very big deal. It'll be out there but we had to go through a lot to get there. We're not backed by the media giants. 

WELLS: Can you explain your process and how you get ready for each show? Do you have to amp yourself up or do you just go out there and say, "I've got this." How do you? 

NINA G: Naps, lots of naps. Naps are important. Naps and diet Cokes are part of the formula. This is what I wanted to talk about for this answer, before the pandemic, I would doubt myself every single time I went on stage. This was because I waited so long to get on stage. Every single time I would be like, "I don't deserve to be up here." It's like the imposter syndrome thing. After the pandemic, I did a show and I looked around. It wasn't going well but in my head I thought, "Oh, I'm so lucky I get to be here." Which was just a very small shift from, "I don't deserve to be here," to "I'm lucky I'm here." Now still, external locus of control, it's like I'm lucky, it's not that, "Oh, I deserve to be here and I'm so good at this." No, but it was still a little tweak in my head that I feel very fortunate to be there and I want to do my best. 

WELLS: You mentioned the Pandemic. Did you do Zoom comedy shows? How did you get through that? 

NINA G: Oh, yes, yes, yes. We did lots of Zoom comedy shows. Me and Mean Dave who's going to be on the show in Grass Valley started doing a show in Tell, Show with comics. It's not that they were performing but they would show something that meant a lot to them and talk about it. That is one way that we got through it. That was really fun but also we still do Zoom stuff. We do a lot of corporate gigs online. 

Lindsay WELLS: That's good to know. I've got a question for you. How do you think the adult nature of the show works surround out the public perception of people with disabilities? Do you ever get negative feedback from the audience because of that? 

NINA G: We talk about adult things and oftentimes in adult language. I think it's really important that we-- What I always say is it's really hard to talk about the disability experience without saying the F word. The world's given us a lot to use that word and I feel I'm entitled to it. 

[laughter] 

NINA G: Maybe stop doing all this stuff and I don't have to say it but until that time comes. Yes, when we do a corporate event, we of course clean it up but when I perform, I like to say the things that I want to say. Also disabled people have sex and we talk about sex and there's sex. I think that's important for us to address and talk about and be able to express ourselves in a way that is natural to us. Now, the thing is in my everyday life I say the F word all day long. 

I told you I was influenced by Richard Pryor at a very early age. That is what's going on inside of me, but I, of course blunt it at certain times. It's really nice to come out and speak the way that I want to speak and use the words that I want to use, especially as someone with dyslexia words don't always come easy to me. When I have the right word, I'm very happy to use it especially if it works with the timing of my joke. 

WELLS: That brings me up to one more follow up question. I was wondering, Richard Pryor had no filter and you said you have to clean it up for corporate events. In that moment do you ever feel like, "Oh, I want to use that language. I want to get my point across and not have to worry about what I need to be rated PG." Can you tell me how you come to that conclusion what show you're going to be putting on? 

NINA G: I've been in professional settings where I have to contain myself and then I can go-- Like when I used to work at this one place, I would contain myself in a meeting but then I would go to my boss's office and my boss Ned at the time, he was Italian and Irish and from New York. I could just let my mouth go and say whatever I wanted to say. I'm so thankful for that in the workplace. If you pay me enough, I won't say it. It's basically that. That is what they get. Sometimes you really want to say it but time and a place, time and a place. 

WELLS: Thank you Nina G. We really appreciate it. 

NINA G: Thank you guys. I'm so excited for Grass Valley. Oh my God. It's going to be such a great show. 

WELLS: That was my conversation with Nina G. a comedian with Comedians with Disabilities Act. As I mentioned at the top of the show, the Comedians with Disabilities Act will be reforming right here in downtown Grass Valley at the Center for the Arts on Wednesday, October 16th at 7:00 PM as a fundraiser for FREED. To purchase tickets to the show go to FREED's website freed.org.

And that does it for the show Disability Rap is produced and edited by Carl Sigmond and Courtney Williams. You can go to our website disabilityrap.org to listen to past shows, read transcripts and subscribe to the Disability Rap podcast. You can also subscribe to our podcast by searching Disability Rap on any of the major podcast platforms. We are brought to you by KVMR in partnership with FREED and we're distributed by PRX the Public Radio Exchange. I'm Lindsey Wells for another edition of Disability Rap. 

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