When Should We Quit? with Abbi Jacobson
November 29, 2022
Glennon Doyle:
Okay. Welcome to, We Can Do Hard Things. Abby and I are really excited.
Abby Wambach:
Yes, we are.
Glennon Doyle:
Abbi Jacobson is a co-creator, co-showrunner, executive producer, and star of the critically acclaimed show A League of Their Own.
Glennon Doyle:
Prior to this, Abbi co-created, wrote, directed, executive produced, and starred for five seasons in Broad City. She is the author of the New York Times bestseller, I Might Regret This, and is currently adapting Go Like This, a short story by Lorrie Moore. Abbi?
Abbi Jacobson:
Oh man, I’m excited to be here.
Abby Wambach:
I mean, seriously, we have been obsessing over you. I have just deep dove in/on Abbi Jacobson.
Abbi Jacobson:
You deep dove?
Abby Wambach:
I dove in, right on in. And we’d never watched Broad City.
Glennon Doyle:
We’re a little old. We just missed… When Broad City was on, I was watching a lot of Wonder Pets! And Blue’s Clues. But we have this one very cool member of our team, only one cool person on our team, Allison. And she-
Abbi Jacobson:
Allison, here we go.
Abby Wambach:
Sorry, Dynna.
Glennon Doyle:
You have been her number one, “We must get Abbi Jacobson.” So I read your entire book this week, we’ve binged Broad City. We can’t stop. We’d already watched A League of Their Own. You are just effing delightful. You are a delightful human being.
Abbi Jacobson:
I don’t know what to say, that means the world from you two. I’m an avid listener.
Glennon Doyle:
No.
Abby Wambach:
That’s so good.
Abbi Jacobson:
Are you kidding? I listen-
Glennon Doyle:
Are you serious?
Abbi Jacobson:
Yeah, this is one of my favorite podcasts. I listen to it all the time. Jodi and I listen to it all the time, separately and together. It’s so good. It’s truly helpful in my existence.
Abby Wambach:
We probably both feel that we’re all friends just based on the work that we’ve done and the work we’ve all consumed from each other’s work. I was like, “I feel like I’m friends with Abbi.”
Glennon Doyle:
I know. We decided-
Abbi Jacobson:
Listen, this is the beginning.
Abby Wambach:
Yes. Okay, good. That was my backdoor way of asking if you want to be real friends.
Glennon Doyle:
Okay, perfect.
Abby Wambach:
In IRL, same amount of syllables as in real life.
Glennon Doyle:
As in real life.
Abby Wambach:
From Broad City.
Glennon Doyle:
Okay. So we might be doing a lot of that, Abbi. We aren’t joking.
Abbi Jacobson:
You know what? That’s so funny. I was like, “Why do I know that line?” It’s been a second for me.
Glennon Doyle:
In your book, I loved it so much, both of us have a lot of things that we relate to you about and differently.
Abbi Jacobson:
Yeah, I feel that as well.
Glennon Doyle:
Yes. So you said that in your 20s, you had dated men but you had never really been in love. And you said you’d gotten to this point where you felt like you just weren’t cut out for love, that you were made of solid rock and that you’d be written about later in life as the woman who never fell in love.
Abbi Jacobson:
Yeah, I really felt that way. I mean, I dated a lot of dudes and I love dudes, but I just was like, “Wait, maybe I’m just not able to connect in that way, at all, I guess?”
Glennon Doyle:
Yeah. This just got me, you said you had an underlying sense of loss within your body for an experience you knew was essential to being alive. Do you even remember that now?
Abbi Jacobson:
A few guys are going in deep, real quick. I’m like, “Whoa.”
Abbi Jacobson:
Yeah. I also wrote that in a very particular time. I wrote it right after I had fallen in love. I had fallen in love and then been heartbroken, so I was writing about this in the aftermath. So I wonder if I had written that before, I don’t know if I’d be able to be that vulnerable about it.
Abbi Jacobson:
But yeah, I do remember feeling like, “What’s wrong with me? Something’s wrong with me.” It’s in everything I make, I think it is also our society keeps putting things in our faces that show us what we’re supposed to be and what society wants us to be. And I think, at least when I grew up, I’m 38, it was rom-coms, very heteronormative. You fall in love, it was very by the book, this is the only way.
Abbi Jacobson:
I just felt like, “I guess, I’m not in this. I don’t know, I’ll find my own,” but I do remember writing that and I was terrified. I mean, the title of the book is called I Might Regret This because I was very terrified of putting any of that out into the world without it being behind Abbi Abrams.
Abbi Jacobson:
It’s way easier for me to put that experience into Abbi Abrams on Broad City, which is the way that I had her sort of ask a woman out was exactly the way I did it. So all these experiences I like to put into shows. So when I was doing the book, I was like, “This is just me putting it out there.” It was very scary. Do you know who was like, “Abbi fucking write this book,” is your bud Sam Irby.
Glennon Doyle:
Oh my God.
Abby Wambach:
No way.
Abbi Jacobson:
We were working on a project forever and she was one of the main people when I was writing that book that was like, “Write the worst stuff you feel. Expose it all.”
Glennon Doyle:
Sit at your typewriter and bleed, Abbi. Bleed, that’s all we want is blood. If you’re not going to bleed, don’t sit down.
Abbi Jacobson:
Exactly.
Abby Wambach:
Well, do you regret it? I have to ask.
Abbi Jacobson:
No.
Glennon Doyle:
No.
Abby Wambach:
Okay.
Abbi Jacobson:
No, I don’t regret it at all. I was able to tell stories or tell my experiences in the beginning through Broad City, which is very based on me and Ilana, but amplified. And then we were able to sneak in vulnerabilities and personal things.
Abbi Jacobson:
And I think if you watch the whole thing, you see it really starts to get heavier underneath it all. But I find now that that’s sort of all I have is sharing those things, so I don’t regret doing that anymore or I don’t even fear regretting it.
Glennon Doyle:
Do you ever get confused about which one is you? Because for the Pod Squad listening, this is Abbi, but Abbi wrote and played Abbi on Broad City who is Abbi, but more of an amplified exaggerated version of Abbi. So you’ve got Abbi, who is you, real Abbi, and you’ve got Broad City Abbi, you’ve got book Abbi.
Glennon Doyle:
I’m asking this as a person who sometimes gets confused about which…
Abby Wambach:
What is art and what is real?
Glennon Doyle:
What is art? What is real? Which one is real? Is it real if I don’t work it out publicly? How do you figure all that out?
Abbi Jacobson:
I think when we were ending the show, it was Ilana and I both feeling like we needed to know ourselves, know the real Abbi and Ilana. And that was sort of part of why, one, we wanted it to end on a high note where we felt it was really still great and not just keep going for the sake of going, but also because at least I felt like I was definitely a workaholic. I didn’t have a big life-work balance.
Abbi Jacobson:
And I was very confused because I would give so much of myself to Abbi Abrams on the show, even if she’s amplified, but I’m sure you go through and feel this. People who know your work and see you in real life, it’s the most complimentary thing to feel like, “Oh my God, we’re best friends.”
Abbi Jacobson:
They know you, but then it is confusing because while I love sharing and ultimately don’t we all want to be known and seen and heard and understood, I also am like, “Wait, I also need some just me. I’m not fully sharing everything with the world, or else I will go crazy.” It’s very confusing and hard to manage a little bit.
Abby Wambach:
Yeah.
Glennon Doyle:
Yeah. Let’s tell the people how you got to this place. You applied after high school to go to Atlantic Theater Conservancy, which what I understand from your book was a fancy-pants theater place. Is it fancy?
Abbi Jacobson:
It’s like a real deal, dramatic David Mamet and William H. Macy’s school. So it’s like very heady, very theatery. This is clearly proving why I shouldn’t have been there. I’m like, “It’s theatery, serious.”
Glennon Doyle:
What I love is that this was your dream to go there. You go there and then you start to realize, “I don’t know if I feel good here.” You were just terribly uncomfortable?
Abbi Jacobson:
It felt very… Is pretentious the right word? Or highbrow acting, which is what I thought. I went to art school. I studied visual art, so drawing and painting and then I minored in video. I went to a school called MICA, Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore.
Abbi Jacobson:
And while I was doing video/art, I sort of realized I really do want to be an actor. I always wanted to be an actor, but that’s who becomes an actor. I was like, “That’s not a thing.” I would ever do or tell anyone at home that I grew up with, “That’s just not a reality that happens.”
Abbi Jacobson:
Anyway, but then at school I was like, “Let me just apply. This is what I’ve always wanted to do. And I really wanted to go into drama.” You laugh at that. I would love to do some more dramatic whatever, but-
Glennon Doyle:
She still can’t say. She’s an actor and she’s scared to say she wants to be an actor.
Abbi Jacobson:
I always say writer. If someone says what do I do, I say I’m a writer first because most of the things I’ve acted in, I’ve written. But I got in, I went up, I prepared an audition, I went up to New York.
Abbi Jacobson:
And so I was like, “Holy shit, here we go. This is the real deal.” And then the first week was one of the worst weeks of my life. You sign up and you’re so excited for this thing. And it’s just not how my brain operates. It was analyzing scene studies in a way that probably works for a lot of actors. And if you would see what I do now, it totally makes sense that I would not go there. I like being very improvisational and open and figuring it out and not highbrow. I don’t think of myself as highbrow.
Glennon Doyle:
Yeah, not lowbrow, but mediumbrow.
Abbi Jacobson:
No, not lowbrow, but I was miserable. I was like, “Well, I guess I can’t be an actor.” I’m failing at this. I had a breakdown on the street, which I thought also now looking back is sort of a rite of passage living in New York. I think that everybody does that.
Abbi Jacobson:
But yeah, I quit. I had to quit sort of pretty soon in order to get my deposit back and then I felt like a failure. I’d moved to New York, no one in my family had ever left Philadelphia. My brother worked with my dad. I was going to do this thing and then I couldn’t do it. And then I discovered the Upright Citizens Brigade, which that world is totally how my brain works, comedy and improv. And then I sort of just kept going.
Glennon Doyle:
It’s like you queered theater. This is a pattern for you, thank God, because a lot of times we go into the thing, the norm, and then we hate it and don’t feel comfortable there. So we think there’s something wrong with us. We just stay and try to be better and fully die inside. This is why quitting is so fucking important.
Abbi Jacobson:
Yep.
Glennon Doyle:
Because I was reading that part of the book when you were in that theater thing and thinking, “Oh, when you follow your own self, you end up with Broad City.”
Abbi Jacobson:
Exactly, because I met Ilana in an improv practice group, which I really don’t want to go into the specifics of improv. Whenever I go into it, I’m like, “People are falling asleep.” This is so-
Glennon Doyle:
But can you do it a little bit?
Abbi Jacobson:
It’s just specific. It’s almost like a cult. It’s just this world that a lot of people that find it, I met D’Arcy doing improv and Ilana and I met in this practice group. It’s basically this space, it was a black box theater that was under a supermarket called Gristedes. It’s in the basement of a supermarket. And it was the most special place I had found in New York City where every night, after I worked at Anthropologie, just like Abbi did on Bro City and at the Rockefeller Center one. I can’t believe they let me shoot there after all those years.
Abbi Jacobson:
But anyway, I walked in and there’s a palpable energy. People are going on stage with nothing, getting a suggestion from the audience. And together, however many people are on stage, whether it’s three or eight, they’re making something. That to me is a fully the opposite of Atlantic, which was analyzing a sentence for an hour versus what could happen, the possibilities, trying and failing. People you would bomb so hard and then someone would save you. It just was this teamwork. Actually, it was so not a queer, there were not that many queer people, but it felt so queery.
Glennon Doyle:
Yeah, that’s what I mean, queer sexually.
Abbi Jacobson:
No, but it is the queer world of acting. It’s not outcast, but a little. It is the weirdos.
Abby Wambach:
I just want to say because I’m kind of a leader in what I used to do. The definition of quitting for me, it’s like pivoting. You went to this place, you’re like, “Oh, nope,” you had a full-body no. And it gave you the chance to pivot and experience something different with Upright Citizens Brigade.
Abby Wambach:
And I think that to me, that is the really important lesson here that a lot of us find ourselves doing things that we’re like, “This is just a full-body no,” that doesn’t mean necessarily you’re a failure. It just means that that shit’s not for you and it’s opening up this other door over here. So don’t forget to pivot, that’s what you did.
Abbi Jacobson:
I love that because I’ve never thought about it that way. I’ve always felt like I quit this thing that was so hard, but it was just a pivot. I feel like if most people look back on those quitting moments, it really just pivoted them into the next, the right thing or closer to the right thing.
Glennon Doyle:
And sister’s not here to be the nerd. Sister’s not here-
Abbi Jacobson:
I know, I’m very, you have to tell sister that I’m such a fan and all that.
Glennon Doyle:
Oh, she would want me to remind us all what is the origin of the word quit is quietus, which originally meant to set ourselves free.
Abby Wambach:
Yes.
Glennon Doyle:
Okay. It only got the negative connotation during the industrial revolution when they wanted us all to become robots. So it used to be a very powerful, freeing, like badass’ quit because no, that’s not for me.
Abby Wambach:
And having the full-body no experiences is sometimes more important than full-body yeses because it’s knowing what you don’t want is information. It has nothing to do with failure. I can totally relate to leaving your family, you’re taking this big risk, you’re going outside of the family norm. And so what are they all going to think when I say I’m quitting this place?
Glennon Doyle:
Well, and relationally, some people could be in a heterosexual marriage for 14 years.
Abby Wambach:
Who’s that?
Abbi Jacobson:
Some people.
Glennon Doyle:
I should just be trying harder. It’s something wrong with me.
Abbi Jacobson:
It is so interesting to recognize there are those moments where in your full body, you feel a thing. But I mean, to not act on that is wild.
Glennon Doyle:
It’s so wild.
Abby Wambach:
I think it must be really interesting for you too as an actor to really love this improv thing. I want you to tell me more about what it is in your body on that stage because guess what, we’re all doing this weird improv thing of life.
Glennon Doyle:
All the time. So when you said it’s a bible of values?
Abby Wambach:
Yes.
Abbi Jacobson:
I haven’t done it in a while and I was just talking to D’Arcy about wanting to do it. D’Arcy Carden, who I’m talking about, wanting to do it again because she’s so good. And there’s still a little bit of a hesitancy because I was never “successful” at improv in that theater. And that’s why Ilana and I made Broad City.
Abbi Jacobson:
But I think I am successful at improv in my work, which bringing the values and that kind of experimentation into Broad City and then into League. It’s the most terrifying thing. I would equate it maybe with where you’re meeting someone new where you have to remind yourself that being nervous is good, being nervous is actually being excited, being nervous is excitement. You know what I mean? You have to shift it where you’re like, “This is good, these are good feelings. I can do this.”
Abbi Jacobson:
And so it’s like a nervous is mix with a will to be confident. It’s a teeny microcosm I think for living life, which is I have to put myself out there, try. There’s going to be all these other people I have to try and trust as much as I can and help and support. And hopefully, they’re going to do that for me. And there’s going to be super highs and there’s going to be super bad lows and then the lights will go out and we’ll get to do it again.
Glennon Doyle:
What does using the top of your intelligence mean? In the book, you said this is an improv thing. And also, don’t think?
Abbi Jacobson:
Yes. So the don’t thinking is the UCB method of one of their slogans, which means you work like Abby, I would imagine it’s exactly equivalent I think to being an athlete where you work out and you train and you practice and you get your muscles, and the team is so used to working together so that when you go out into the field, you’re not thinking. You’re just doing and you’re operating and you know each other and trust each other. And to get in your head, I imagine while you’re playing would be the worst thing.
Abby Wambach:
Yep. The commitment to letting what should unfold, letting that actually unfold while also putting your own energy and spin into it. I bet that that’s a lot like improv.
Abbi Jacobson:
Yeah. I mean, you’re still obviously making choices and decisions on the fly, but you’ve worked enough. And with improv, you practice that skill set to kind of get to a point when you go on stage for a show, you’re sort of not thinking and just trusting that your choices will work or they’ll fail or they’ll be what they are. There’s nothing like it, that hour or however long it is, you’re almost high. Not that I’ve ever done anything that would be… I’m kidding.
Glennon Doyle:
No. In the book, it was so funny to me because you have this one part that’s all about improv and the magic of it and just don’t overthink and all the things. And then right afterwards, you’re talking about how you used to go to a bar afterwards and then you were so self-conscious and you couldn’t talk to anybody. And with the book, I’m like, “Abbi, just improv.”
Abbi Jacobson:
But that’s the thing where it was this thing I found that the goal was to be all I wanted to be in real life and I wish I could be confident and trust myself more and be open. And I think over here, I was seeing all these people doing that. I was so in awe of it, and so I sort of did it as much as I could. And I guess I felt that high over here because I am very insecure and naturally… Yeah, I just am that. It’s a good thing for someone like me to get into or to find.
Abby Wambach:
I can also-
Glennon Doyle:
Improv. It’s the opposite of everything.
Abby Wambach:
Yeah. I think that just watching Broad City too, I can see the parts of the scenes where you and Ilana are just going into it. Not only is it funny, but it’s like I can feel that magic when I’m watching even on something that’s been edited and produced like a television show.
Abbi Jacobson:
Not all improv when you go to watch it is as good as it feels to do it.
Glennon Doyle:
Okay.
Abbi Jacobson:
Yeah. Most of it is what you saw where we were making fun of it and everyone that made Broad City, we all met doing improv, but it is also terrible. And so the improv you saw in the show is very much not using the top of your intelligence. When you sort of go low, go blue quickly-
Glennon Doyle:
What does that mean, go blue quickly?
Abbi Jacobson:
It’s coming out and being like, “Someone is going to correct me.” It’s almost like being gross and-
Abby Wambach:
Crude and perverted.
Abbi Jacobson:
Crude, yes. Did you just search that?
Abby Wambach:
No.
Abbi Jacobson:
I was like, “Someone texted that?” Yes, it’s crude and perverted, which sometimes you can get there in an intelligent way, but sometimes it’s this going for the easy what you think will make people laugh because it’s really about someone walking out and saying and trying something being a character and the yes ending is acknowledging their choice and not negating it and adding to it. And so sometimes using the top of your intelligence is you know these things. So inform the scene with all the things you know and don’t go.
Abby Wambach:
Yes. This is basically the difference between Glennon’s humor and my humor. I go blue because I’m just searching for a laugh, I don’t even care how I get there. And Glennon goes and tries to use the highest of intelligence. That’s good.
Glennon Doyle:
Oh thanks, babe.
Abbi Jacobson:
Listen, Broad City is half. It’s both so I’m not above going blue.
Glennon Doyle:
So we talked about this morning and I love this so much because the queering of the theater gave us all of the Abbi magic. Broad City with A League of Their Own, which I can’t wait to talk about in a minute. And you queered your love life. You’re engaged to a woman now, we’ll get to that too. Yay, this is so exciting. Okay.
Abbi Jacobson:
She’s so excited I’m doing this. She was like…
Glennon Doyle:
There was a moment where you were dating this first person who you were in love with long ago and you had never tucked in your shirt before.
Abbi Jacobson:
Yeah.
Glennon Doyle:
This is the biggest deal, okay?
Abby Wambach:
It’s a total lesson.
Glennon Doyle:
The queering of the clothes, okay? Why did you not tuck your shirt in ever, first of all?
Abbi Jacobson:
I think I didn’t tuck in my shirt… I never really thought this was a queer thing. This is more of in line with my insecurity and not being confident with my body and all this.
Glennon Doyle:
When I say queer in all of these ways, all I mean is being yourself.
Abbi Jacobson:
Yes. And she was like, “You would look so good. Why don’t you tuck in your shirt? Because tucking in your shirt, you see more of your body.” And I was always pulling it out and very insecure. And then I tried it and I was like, “Wait, I do really like the way I look and I like the way I feel.” And I think it was partially about how I felt in that moment too with her and all that. I’d probably tuck my shirt in a couple times but maybe not felt like that was a thing that looked good on me or that I felt confident in.
Glennon Doyle:
So when you broke up, you said to her one of the last things I-
Abbi Jacobson:
You’re really bringing this up.
Glennon Doyle:
I just think it’s so important.
Abbi Jacobson:
I know.
Glennon Doyle:
And then I want you to tell, Abby, your story about shirts. One of the last things I said to her was, “You changed my life. You taught me how to tuck in my shirt,” which obviously didn’t just mean you taught me how to tuck in my shirt. So what did you mean?
Abbi Jacobson:
Did you finish League?
Glennon Doyle:
Yeah.
Abbi Jacobson:
I think that’s the last thing Carson said.
Glennon Doyle:
Yes.
Abby Wambach:
Mm-hmm.
Abbi Jacobson:
And I can’t help but bring humor into any situation. That was a devastating moment and it meant so much more. That relationship did fully change my life and gave me the confidence like knowing I was queer, which took me so long. It gave me such a different confidence in everything. And the shirt-tuck just felt really a part of it even though it was the smallest thing.
Glennon Doyle:
Yes. It always is the smallest thing.
Abbi Jacobson:
And then I really did see myself, I really did feel so different. Let me hear this shirt story.
Abby Wambach:
Yeah, I had the opposite situation. So in college, in the late ’90s, I came from an all-girls Catholic high school, went to college. And my first girlfriend in college, she just says to me, “Why don’t you try untucking your shirt?” And I was like, “Huh?” Because this is-
Abbi Jacobson:
Wait, this is so funny. Were you-
Glennon Doyle:
Because her mom dressed her like Talbots, she went to a Catholic school. She was like her queer Abby Wambach self tucking her shirt in.
Abbi Jacobson:
Wow.
Abby Wambach:
But I think the bigger point to this story, truly, is this idea. And I don’t mean to genderize it or talk about guys and women in relationships versus two women, but I do think that this is one of the things about being in a relationship with somebody who can truly be honest with you because they are experiencing what you’re experiencing in so many ways of this world.
And so the way that my girlfriend, at the time, and the way that your ex was able to express this information was able to be understood and realized and then put into action in a way that is actually life-changing.
Glennon Doyle:
It’s so beautiful though because it’s not about the tucking. Some people need to untuck, some people need tuck. It’s just everybody needs to be seen.
Abbi Jacobson:
I honestly don’t feel like I was walking through the world hiding this thing. I don’t know, I’m truly like, “What was happening?” I went to arts, I don’t know what was going on. Blinders, I don’t know. But it felt like she was saying, “You’re hiding this. You’re hiding your body and you don’t need to, you’re not revealing this part or something.”
Glennon Doyle:
You’re hiding and yours was hiding. The closest I’ve come to that moment because I’ve still don’t know how to dress in a way that makes me feel like I have no idea. I always feel like I’m wearing a costume no matter what.
Glennon Doyle:
I don’t know how to match my insides to my outsides with clothes. But I used to come home every day and the second I’d get in the door, I’d like peel off my skin-tight pants and take off my shoes and my heels and take out the things for my hair, all this shit. And I said to you one day, “Do you want to go get cozy?” And you said, “Oh, I live cozy.” And I was like, “What the fuck? You can live cozy?”
Abbi Jacobson:
Wow, that’s wild. Glennon, I’m like you where I’m like, “I got to go change to go watch TV.”
Glennon Doyle:
Exactly, me too. And she’s like, “Why would you wear something out in the world that is less comfortable than the thing you would… Why would you ever do that?”
Abby Wambach:
Yep.
Abbi Jacobson:
Wait, I feel like I want for you to find clothes that make you feel more you. There should be someone you can go to.
Glennon Doyle:
Abbi, all I do is change from costume-to-costume.
Abbi Jacobson:
Do you want me to take you out?
Glennon Doyle:
Yes. There’s my girl boss suit outfit.
Abbi Jacobson:
But what if you went to a department store, just tried random stuff on just to see? Worst-case scenario, you are back where you started.
Glennon Doyle:
I think I need to do that.
Abbi Jacobson:
I don’t know.
Abby Wambach:
I mean, you put on three to four outfits a day.
Glennon Doyle:
Because I’m constantly trying to figure out what is it? I’d grew up all this horrible tight stuff that was just about the way that I appear and not how I feel.
Abby Wambach:
Some of it, it’s like also armor in a way.
Glennon Doyle:
You can see the tucking really did a number on us. Okay.
Abbi Jacobson:
That’s so fascinating that yours was the complete opposite but did the same thing. I love that.
Abby Wambach:
Yes, yeah.
Glennon Doyle:
We need to talk about Ilana and Broad City because we can’t do that without getting to A League of Their Own. I just freaking love the… Are you and Ilana still as close as you used to be with this?
Abbi Jacobson:
Yeah, but I don’t see her as much. I still go back and forth to New York a lot, but she’s in New York and I’m more in LA now.
Glennon Doyle:
Okay. So you two just improv, you leave your fancy school, you go to improv. You’re not completely led in the boys’ club at improv, right? So you and Ilana just decide to make a fricking show? How did this happen?
Abby Wambach:
Yeah.
Abbi Jacobson:
We were on a practice team, which is what the community kind of does where you practice one night a week with a coach, doing improv and then we would host shows at a little teeny theater called Under St. Marks. You’d team up with a couple other teams and you’d have a night of it. You’d give the audience shots of a terrible thing to get them to come. It was just a such a fun community of all these people trying to do this.
Abbi Jacobson:
And we were the only two girls on our team and we were just really good friends for two years doing that. She’s just so unique and different than anyone I’d met or especially any of my other female friends that I had known from high school or college. The dynamic that you see on Broad City was just always that and then amplified, but we just cracked each other up.
Abbi Jacobson:
And then two years after doing this improv team, we sort of realized, “What if we made something? We cannot get on the UCB stage. We’re both trying to audition for commercials, trying to become actors, nothing. What if we make these little vignettes?”
Abbi Jacobson:
And so we had a web series called Broad City for two years. So we started that in 2009 and did 35 web episodes for two years. And then at the end of it, we had gotten this manager and she was like, “What if, let’s pitch it as a show?” And we somehow threw this crazy series of events, got Amy Poehler to be in the finale of the web episode, which was just wild in itself. That alone, we could have been like, “We’re done. We did it.” And then once we sent it to her, we said, “We’re going to LA to pitch this as a show. Would you ever want to be an executive producer on it?” And she said yes.
Glennon Doyle:
She said yes and?
Abbi Jacobson:
Yes, and let’s do it.
Glennon Doyle:
Amazing.
Abbi Jacobson:
Yeah, crazy.
Glennon Doyle:
She’s a big part of the Upright Citizens Brigade.
Abbi Jacobson:
She was one of the owners, yeah.
Abby Wambach:
No way.
Glennon Doyle:
So this is freaking-
Abby Wambach:
Amy produced Broad City, right?
Abbi Jacobson:
Yeah.
Glennon Doyle:
She saw the magic.
Abby Wambach:
Amy is the best.
Abbi Jacobson:
So it’s so ironic we couldn’t get on stage there at the place that she own, but she was not there day-to-day. And then we ended up going totally around. She ended up making a show that was farther away from anything we thought where our dream was, and then we made that. So it was also quite a learning curve, taking these little vignettes, which were scenes, very short into a TV version.
Abby Wambach:
For the parents out there who have teenagers and 20-something-year-old kids right now, it is a good peak into their kind of sense of humor or sense of themselves. I’m telling you it made me know my kids experience a little bit better.
Abbi Jacobson:
I love that. I think we maybe are outdated. The kids now I think we’re different than we were. Do you know what I mean?
Abby Wambach:
Yeah.
Abbi Jacobson:
Season one came out when I was 30.
Abby Wambach:
Oh wow.
Glennon Doyle:
How old are you?
Abbi Jacobson:
I’m 38. I was playing 25 and Ilana was playing 21, she’s four years younger.
Glennon Doyle:
It’s very much us though to just discover something that for you was a decade ago. That is very on-brand for us.
Abbi Jacobson:
I think it makes sense. It has a pocket. It was not ever massive.
Glennon Doyle:
Well, speaking of what’s been massive, we just interviewed Geena Davis last week.
Abbi Jacobson:
Oh, you did?
Glennon Doyle:
Yeah. A League of Their Own, your version is unbelievable and incredible. And I don’t know if version is the right word.
Abbi Jacobson:
I caught a reimagining. I don’t feel like we’re not adapting. That was a big thing that people were like, “Oh, you’re going to ruin our movie.” They’re so different, I think, so it’s like a reimagining.
Glennon Doyle:
Totally different. And also, all the good stuff that people were probably afraid of losing is all still there. A League of Their Own as an idea, as the first movie viewer was really important to both of us for different reasons. Why was it important to you? What about that story felt important to you?
Abbi Jacobson:
So that film came out in ’92. I think it was one of the first films I saw in the theater.
Abby Wambach:
Oh, cool.
Abbi Jacobson:
And I played a lot of sports as a kid. Soccer was my main sport, not softball, but I did play softball. For me it was, well, one, seeing women playing professional sports even though they were in skirts. Just seeing that on screen and seeing the ensemble of women, that group playing together and hanging out and being funny, I don’t think I’d seen that on screen.
Abbi Jacobson:
And I think that and Mighty Ducks were my big…
Abby Wambach:
Me too.
Abbi Jacobson:
But Mighty Ducks, there was the one girl that’s hiding that she’s a girl. And I just felt very connected to it. I was pretty young, but I think I was like, “That’s us, me and my teams. That’s the one movie we get in that way.” And even though they were way older, but I loved it. I did not sense as a child the queer undertone at all. It is a kind of an iconically queer film, but not queer at all at the same time.
Glennon Doyle:
Yeah. What is that? Because all the things that are queer, but not queer, are the things that my whole life I’ve been like, “Huh.” I love that thing, but I don’t know why is A League of their Own so queer? I mean, you queered it now. It’s like-
Abby Wambach:
Yeah, the film to the reimagine.
Glennon Doyle:
Everything has been manifested in the reimagine.
Abby Wambach:
Well, because the storyline of the film is a bunch of women that are doing something that has only been allowed and allotted for men. And because of the concept that all of the players were over in war, it’s like the thing you’re not supposed to touch. But when you watch something like that and you are that, you’re like, “That’s it. That’s what I want to do.” It opens up a different door that never was there before.
Glennon Doyle:
And the relationships between the women.
Abby Wambach:
Yeah, that-
Abbi Jacobson:
Wait, I’m curious what you felt from it.
Glennon Doyle:
Well, first of all, I’ve never played a sport. I mean, I tried to play lacrosse but it wasn’t great. It wasn’t good.
Abbi Jacobson:
I love that that was the one you went for.
Glennon Doyle:
Well, it was brand new in our high school. So it was like if you didn’t make any other team.
Abbi Jacobson:
Gotcha, okay.
Glennon Doyle:
Our house, Abby and I, just got teepeed last night because our kid is in a sport. So their team came, and teepeed their house and I was so excited and Abby was like, “Why are you so excited?” And I was like, “Because I wasn’t relevant enough in high school to ever…”
Abby Wambach:
Get teepeed.
Glennon Doyle:
I took pictures yesterday morning, outside of my house, having been teepeed because it felt like such a high school moment.
Abbi Jacobson:
That’s so funny.
Glennon Doyle:
Anyway, I’d never been part of a team before.
Abbi Jacobson:
You’re not taking it down.
Glennon Doyle:
No, God. It’s proof that I’ve arrived.
Abbi Jacobson:
Yeah.
Abby Wambach:
I took it down.
Glennon Doyle:
I know. I was a kid who was very isolated, all I did was read. I didn’t have a lot of friendships or I didn’t have any relationship with boys that weren’t, I just was always performing. I wasn’t worried about how I felt. I was worried about how I looked. I wasn’t worried about my body for appearing a certain way.
Glennon Doyle:
And so watching athletes, I feel the same way when I first met Abby and started following the national team. And I would get emotional, cry watching them play soccer because I was like, “Oh, these are a bunch of women who believe in something together. This has nothing to do with men. This is their own a league of their own, I guess.” There was just something like another planet. It was another planet to me that I had always been yearning for but had never been part of.
Abby Wambach:
Yeah. And I think that movie for me was just like, I had been dreaming of this idea of something and it was in my head. That was it. And then there was this movie that put my dream into a context that made me be able to see it for the first time.
Abby Wambach:
And talking to Geena, it was just so lovely to be able to express that to her. Because at the time, this is ’92, when I first watch it and it comes out, there is no such thing as women’s professional soccer. You go down the road for years and that’s when our women’s Olympic team was in the Olympics for the first time. They win gold in the ’99, it was a few years later.
Abby Wambach:
So it is important for people to see shit in order to become it. It’s not a 100% necessary because there are pioneers, but to me, that’s what it was. It was like this thing that I could see that then I could attach my dreams to in some ways.
Glennon Doyle:
And now, you put Carson and it feels like, I don’t know, it’s really important. It feels really important to me. I love her, I love the journey. Again, there’s so much of you. Am I right about that? How do you do this? How do you write this? How did it happen?
Abbi Jacobson:
I guess, I also get nervous. You’ll do a super cut of how many times I say I’m nervous.
Glennon Doyle:
Same.
Abby Wambach:
I’m nervous, I’m nervous, I’m nervous.
Abbi Jacobson:
Yeah, I’m nervous. I think I always felt with Carson, I didn’t sign on to act in it for a long time because I wanted to make sure… I don’t know, I was always writing it with Will Graham. I wanted to make sure that I loved it and it felt… I don’t know, I also was scared. This journey has been terrifying. It’s people’s favorite movie. It is a big, big one to touch.
Abby Wambach:
Reimagine.
Abbi Jacobson:
Yes, to reimagine. But I feel like with Carson, there’s a lot of me in Carson and then also a lot that’s not, but I think I liked adding that personalness to it. And I also, listen, I want to do roles that aren’t so much like me, but I feel like the show as a whole is a little bit of a Trojan horse of some of the bigger things we are saying with it.
Abbi Jacobson:
So you’re coming into it and with me running and it’s very funny, but also it’s like about real things. The one thing I think I am confident is my relatability. And I even feel weird saying that.
Abby Wambach:
Own it, sister, you are.
Glennon Doyle:
It’s so relatable to consider yourself relatable.
Abbi Jacobson:
I feel this way in a very approachable, relatable character to be following this intense journey that’s going to turn her life completely upside down.
Glennon Doyle:
As you and Will were doing this, what was your dream for it? How would it change things or people?
Abbi Jacobson:
I think because we made it, so much of this was over COVID, which was a terrifying time that we’re still in.
Glennon Doyle:
Yeah, we’re still in.
Abbi Jacobson:
Ultimately, I want people to feel things when they’re watching anything I make. So they’re laughing, they’re feeling connected to it, they’re feeling emotional maybe when that’s happening. But I think bigger picture, my goal was always sort of for people to feel seen and less alone. It’s the same with Broad City, just League is a little bit more stories to be seen and heard and felt connected to.
Abbi Jacobson:
And to feel less alone and to feel like, “Oh, that’s me and my friends. And if I don’t have that team yet, or if I don’t have that best friend yet, they’re out there.” There are those people, I don’t know. And for now, I can watch the show and feel it.
Glennon Doyle:
It’s a double thing with League. In Broad City, it feels very like the human condition is seen. I feel like the human condition is being seen and celebrated and we can all just laugh. And League feels like there is that, but it’s also really important sort of the race. The real story is also being seen, the struggles of these women.
Abby Wambach:
The full stories are being honored, which doesn’t happen.
Abbi Jacobson:
We got a chance to talk to Penny Marshall before she passed away, which was incredible. And just to go into that a little bit more is that there’s a scene in the film where there’s a foul ball and a Black woman picks it up and chucks it back to Geena Davis. And there’s no dialogue. If you blink, you miss this scene. And the audience is supposed to feel like, “Wow, she’s incredible, she’s got a great arm.” She’s clearly not allowed to be on the team because she’s Black and it’s 1943.
Abbi Jacobson:
We are getting all of that information from this one little moment and then nothing. And so that league, the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League, was this incredible opportunity. This door that opened for white women and white-passing women, which is my character. That door opens and we’re seeing half of our reimagining is showing that.
Abbi Jacobson:
And we’re also exploring the white-passing women and what it was like for Latino women, Esti and Lupe, those characters are dealing with this whole other experience of what it’s like to be sort of burying who they are to be able to play on this team. And so the film only really explores this incredible league for some women, but what about the rest of the athletes that were incredible?
Abbi Jacobson:
Hundreds and thousands of women of color played baseball. And so we really took in the pilot that we’re nodding to that scene. So Max who’s played by Chanté Adams, that throw happens and the show is half my world and half Max’s World. And what happens when that door closes for women of color who were incredible athletes and her character is inspired by three women who played in the Negro Leagues, Connie Morgan, Toni Stone, and Mamie “Peanut” Johnson. I knew about Toni Stone before we started, but this show had a heavy research element. There’s a researcher on full-time, which believe it or not, Broad City, we did not have that.
Glennon Doyle:
I’m shocked.
Abbi Jacobson:
Yeah, you’re shocked. I didn’t know about Connie and Mamie and/or Billy Harris who was the Jackie Robinson of softball and all these leagues. And it’s like, “Right, of course, but we know the one movie with the white women playing.” And so it was so important for us to show as many experiences as we could.
Abbi Jacobson:
And listen, there are a lot more experiences we’re not able to showcase. But for us, so far, these were the stories we were so excited to share and we felt like they really weren’t in the film.
Abbi Jacobson:
In ’92, there are some different stories that Hollywood was showcasing and I think we have an opportunity here to show a lot more. And that also obviously includes, it’s such a show. A lot of the women on this league were queer and that’s not in the film at all. And that was really important for us to show.
Abby Wambach:
It’s so good.
Glennon Doyle:
It’s the power and the necessity of reimagining. This is what it is. Why does A League of Their Own need to be reimagined? Well, it did need to be reimagined and hopefully in 20 years, 25 years-
Abby Wambach:
There will be another reimagining.
Glennon Doyle:
Some little one will come around and the consciousness will be so different that it will need to be reimagined again. That’s the power of evolution and consciousness raising and the art needs to reflect our raised consciousness. And that’s what you did and it’s beautiful.
Abbi Jacobson:
Can I ask you guys a question about this?
Glennon Doyle:
Yes.
Abbi Jacobson:
Because I’ve been talking about the show for a while and I go all over the place with talking about this. But Abby, you had said that content and seeing this is so important. Stuff can happen without these stories being shown to us in film and TV or whatever, but it does have a huge impact.
Abbi Jacobson:
And I think there is queer content more than ever being put into the world. And I think it’s essential to know it’s queer content and I also, there’s a part of me that hates so much that it’s like the queer show. It makes me insane. Do you feel that way? I guess, when we get to a point where it’s not labeled in that way, that’s it. That’s the point.
Abby Wambach:
That’s 20 years down the road, or 10 years.
Glennon Doyle:
But that’s because there are people who have to live in both spaces. There are people who are forward-thinking, who are already driven mad by the fact that we have to label stuff queer now because they can see a true more beautiful world where that’s not going to be a thing anymore at all. And they want to start living it now, which I also feel is super, super important.
Glennon Doyle:
I love in Schitt’s Creek where Dan Levy, there was no homophobia, there was nothing in the town. And he was like, “Well, we did that so that we could show the way it should be and the way it will be eventually because does art imitate life? Does life imitate art? If life imitates art, then we need to be the ones who are showing this is how it will be. Let’s encourage the world to recreate that.”
Glennon Doyle:
So I don’t know, little things are so… In Broad City when Ilana was like, “I’m going to a straight wedding this weekend.”
Abby Wambach:
I love that. I mean, I looked at you, I was like…
Glennon Doyle:
You’re like, “Ah!”
Abby Wambach:
Straight wedding, so good.
Abbi Jacobson:
Yes. This is a thing in scripts that I do. People often put, if they’re going to state someone’s race, a character’s race, if you read a lot of scripts, you notice that white is never…
Abby Wambach:
It’s the default.
Abbi Jacobson:
The industry operates on a default so that white is never included. But any other race, if it’s specified, is included and then you’re like, “Wait, you’re either using all of them or that’s just like an inherently fucked up way of operating.”
Abby Wambach:
That’s right.
Glennon Doyle:
And that’s so beautiful. It’s just the little ways that you can do that. Sometimes it takes somebody to say straight wedding to be like, “Yeah, why are we all shit?” So Abbi, we love you.
Abby Wambach:
Thank you for this.
Glennon Doyle:
Just please keep all of your vulnerability and all of your magic, who you are comes through in every single thing that you do.
Abbi Jacobson:
I can’t handle it, that means the world to me. Thank you, I feel very honored to be on here with you two.
Glennon Doyle:
Same.
Abby Wambach:
What a good conversation. We love you, keep fucking kicking ass.
Glennon Doyle:
Yes. And we love you, Pod Squad. See you back here next time.