What's the most bizarre or unintentionally funny feedback you've read or heard about yourself?
ALLISON JANNEY "I went to a bar one night — this is back in the beginning days of The West Wing — and a bartender said, "I don't mean to insult you, but you look just like Allison Janney." And I said, "Now tell me why would that be an insult, I'm curious." He said, "Well, you're just a lot prettier than she is." And I said, "Well, I am her, and my drinks will be free for the rest of the evening." (Laughter.)"
NIECY NASH "When I was doing Reno 911!, we got to create the characters we played. They said, "What would you like?" And I said, "Baby hair and a big booty." People who were fond of "a lot down in the dirty South," as we call it, would come up and go, "Heyyy," and then they'd look for it, but I was wearing a prosthetic bottom on the show. So some people were disappointed, some thought I lost weight and some were like, "Hey, what's going on, you look so much smaller in real life — TV makes you look huge!""
GINA RODRIGUEZ "And now everybody's injecting cement into their booties …"
NASH "I was early! (Laughs.)"
RODRIGUEZ "When I was 16, I had a big booty, and then I grew up, and now everybody is trying to get booties like the Kardashians, and I'm like, "Wait, I had it all along." But hey, I'm glad it's trendy now. (Laughter.) Because I play a virgin on TV, what I get is people desiring to tell me their specific sexual orientation or if they're currently having sex or if they are themselves a virgin."
ILANA GLAZER "People go to touch me a lot. They think I want to have sex with them, I guess, because my character is horny. I'm like, "Whaaaat?" (Laughter.)"
How do you generally respond to fans?
NASH "I fall into the category of being an approachable celebrity; people feel like they know me. I was at a restaurant recently where there was another celebrity, not so approachable, and people were like, "Oh my God, she ate a fry, she ate a fry!" They were in a panic, clutching their pearls, looking from afar. Meanwhile, my table was Grand Central Station. "Hey, Niecy, girl, say hi to my son!" (Laughter.)"
RACHEL BLOOM "I have boundary issues in that I have none. So sometimes when people recognize me from the show, I geek out over them geeking out about me to the point where they have to walk away."
What's the most overtly sexist thing that's happened to you in this business?
BLOOM "It's the type of roles you're auditioning for, and you see the difference between the way female characters and male characters are written. I think it takes a woman to write a woman well, and I know that's a gross generalization."
GLAZER "Because Abbi [Jacobson] and I are women and we're young, there's some subtle sexism. Especially [from] crew guys. Recently, this guy was calling us "ladybugs" and "love bugs." We're like, "We have a show — you are helping run the promo for the show that we created!""
TOMLIN "I was a big hit on Laugh-In. Everywhere you go, people are putting napkins on their heads and blowing raspberries. So naturally, my next step was to get TV specials. My first special got a huge rating, but the network didn't like the show. They just thought I was oddball. And I said, "Well, I'll do another show, but I don't want a partner." They said, "Well, you've got to have somebody who we can talk to." That's how bad it was. I talked with every top producer in the variety business, from Norman Lear to Grant Tinker, and I finally decided Grant Tinker would be the most open. And I was going along, doing the show and preparing sketches, and I was going to sit and watch something I wasn't in and comment on it and Grant said to me, bless his heart (patting the THR moderator's hand), "You go on home, we'll take care of things.""
GLAZER "The pat! So bad."
BLOOM "It's like when someone gives you pity eyes. Just that air of, "Oh honey, you're so cute." Ahh."
Read the full roundtable at The Hollywood Reporter.
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