Episode Seven with David Crabb: Have a purpose

David Crabb is one of the most talented people I know. He’s a host and storyteller for both Risk and The Moth; he’s the writer and star of his acclaimed one-man show, Bad Kid, about growing up Goth and gay in Texas, which is also a best-selling memoir; and he’s currently a member of The Groundling’s, one of America’s premier improv and sketch comedy troupes based in LA. In our conversation, David talks about how and why he makes such hilarious — and compelling — art.

Transcript

Hey there. I’m Tricia Rose Burt, and I want to ask you a question. What creative work are you called to do but are too afraid to try? Are you in IT but dream of doing stand up? A PR exec who longs to write a screenplay? Did you change your priorities and now you want to leave your fully funded PhD/MD program and go to New Mexico and paint? Or maybe you’re like I was in my early career, trapped in a lucrative but soul crushing corporate job, when what I really wanted to do was tell stories on stage. In this podcast, we’ll hear from artists who took unexpected leaps and found the courage to answer their creative call, so we can inspire you to answer yours. This is no time to be timid.

Tricia

Welcome to the show. Today we’re talking with David Crabb, who’s one of the most talented people I know. David is a host and storyteller for both Risk and The Moth. He’s the writer and star of his acclaimed one-man show Bad Kid about growing up Goth and gay in Texas, which is also a best selling memoir. And he’s currently a member of the Groundlings, one of America’s premier improv and sketch comedy troupes based in L.A.. He’s also a prolific writer with several projects in the works. David excels at many things, and one of them is creating characters, which he easily slips into mid-conversation. In the opening moments of our interview will play a clip of him doing just that while shopping with his mother. But the thing David does best is to constantly make art– in good times and in bad. Some of David’s most compelling characters were created during times of grief and during the pandemic. When I asked him what trait helped him sustain his creative life, he said, Purpose. Listen in and let him tell you all about it.

Tricia

Hey, David.

David

Hi, Tricia.

Tricia

I saw on Instagram, footage of you, I think doing your Charles in Charge audition at the the John Casablanca School of Modeling and Acting.

David

It was in a little strip mall, I believe, on Austin Highway and in the strip mall that was located, it was the John Casablanca School of Modeling and Acting, which was a chain. There’s still, I think, three of them. And it was in this strip mall between an H&R BLOCK and a TCBY Yogurt. You know, my parents divorced when I was two, and they were very different people. To me, I’ve never felt like I’m from a unit. They’re these two random people. When I think about, like, having to sit down for Thanksgiving with them and the tension of that, I’m like, how did you get married? How did you make me? But anyway, in spite of that difference, my dad’s, you know, a very sort of Southern pearl button cowboy shirts, loves Merle Haggard, wears Wrangler jeans, you know, drives trucks. My mom is a super progressive little Canadian transplant. For all of their differences, I’m very blessed to have had two parents that let me indulge in any pursuit that sparked interest in me.

Clip

You know, it’s you, you’re so wonderful, so small. I’m going to juze up your hair, I’m going to put on lots of eyeliner and expose your bosom to bring it up in the world. Make you look wonderful. Have you worn platform shoes before because you’re gonna. I didn’t know. I didn’t know when he was born and I don’t know what to say.

David

Drawing was probably the first thing I showed a real inclination for when I was little and I could draw for hours and really well. Like my mom will show me a drawing I made of like my cousin’s bridal picture. I’m like, God, did I do that in middle school? You did this when you were seven. I’m like, whoa! Good for me. I wish I could still draw that way, you know? But by the time I think I got to middle school, I just loved TV and movies. I think ET kind of unlocked something in me, in part because I feel like Elliott, I just that character just felt, you know, for lots of obvious reasons. There were probably early feelings of otherness, queerness. I you know, he had a single mom and kind of a dad who was not there so much because my dad worked on the road was gone a lot. But I loved TV and film and my mom found this youth acting class at John Casablanca’s School of Modeling and Acting on Austin Highway, and she went to sign me up. She called me and they said, Well, we just don’t have enough people right now for the youth class. I’m sorry, but we only have like an adult acting class. And my mom said, okay, that’s fine. You know, of course, this all happened outside my purview. And even though she was planning this, she mentioned a youth class. But I don’t think I got an update. And then I remember when I got there, it was just like spiral perms and Sun-In hair and bouncy, sort of a lot of early twenties actors, a few older people. And I was just there was not another kid in sight.

Tricia

And how old were you?

David

I was probably in that clip, 12, maybe 11, maybe.

David

And, you know, my mom was also very much into just like throwing me in the deep end, you know, like she always kind of had that kind of like faith in me. And I remember even at 11 just feeling, because when you get a lot of young people who want to entertain and be actors and be seen, I just remember the amount of flirting and girls sitting on guys laps and I was like, What is this crazy energy? I just want to be Elliott from ET! But there was a very lovely teacher in the class and, you know, it was only maybe like three weekends, I think. And at the end you each had to do a scene like you got, you know, set up with a partner. And I remember I got set up with kind of like the young, the young buck of the class. He was like 23, 24, and all the girls like, drooled over him. And he was really just like good natured and sporty. And me and him got assigned a scene from Charles in Charge, a sitcom with Scott Baio, and I knew it well. I watched it. I mean, it’s weird to think of it now as an old show because I think it was only just barely off the air if it was when we did the scene in 1980, whatever that was. And yeah, that clip, we all got a VHS tape of it. My mom still has it. I digitized it a few years ago. The way they filmed it, there were two cameras in the room. So you each get just a fixed tripod camera on you, your performance. And I’m just sitting there with my little chubby cheeks and I’m a little I think I have slightly bleached those puffy ’80s bangs. And we just did our scene and I was a boy just trying to talk to Scott Baio about girls and why they’re so elusive and interesting. And it’s fun to watch that because, you know, I really like that show, Succession. Culkin’s performance on that is so great. And I recently saw a clip of him in an interview showing, he was like ten. And all those isms are there. It’s like watching, like all those great things he does playing the brother on Succession. He is doing those things with his eyes and his mouth and his shoulders. He seems like he’s almost mocking the adult, interviewing him in a little bit of a way. And I watched that and I thought, Oh, cool. And it made me actually look at that clip. That clip is what made me be like, I have that Charles in charge clip somewhere. And I watched it and it was really interesting to be like, Oh, I, I see those those things that I’m going to do later, right? They’re not quite there. And right now they’re kind of instinct and behavior more than facets of behavior I think about actively. But yeah, I’m always so thankful my mom threw me into that class. It was insane.

Tricia

Well, it’s interesting because I found a poster of myself that I made. I went to go see Mama several years ago, and I found this poster that said, Please come see me in a play Thursday at 1 p.m.. Thank you, Tricia Rose Burt. And maybe I did it when I was 10. And I thought, nothing has changed. I am still trying to get people to see me in a play.

David

Come to my show.

Tricia

I can use the same poster, just kind of do a different date, you know, just like, put it up. It’s interesting, you know, how that’s that’s just in there. You know, the seeds are in there. Yeah. The desire what the what we’re going to capitalize on later. Okay, So how soon after the acting class did you did you decide to go Goth? Because you’re not Goth in that.

David

I feel like becoming Goth for me was really connected you know, really to coming to terms with being gay, You know, I mean, I, I kind of, you know, and everyone has their own journey. I mean my best friend from college was this was this guy and he said, and you see pictures of him where you would meet him and there’s no doubt he’s gay. And he was like, oh, I was three years old and my dad started calling me sugar. Right? So everyone has their own journey. Some people know right out of the gate. For me, I think maybe around that time I started to suspect something was different. But I think by the time I was, you know, 14, I was like, Oh, yikes. You know, and and it was real enough and scary enough that it it didn’t even it didn’t even occur to me that I could be gay. I just thought, well this is this barnacle I have. This is a cross to bear, and I’ll just never be me. And that was a very real thought. I thought. Oh, wow. That and then, you know, and sometimes it was sad, but other times it was like, Oh, I guess I’ll just.I’ll find a way to not be who I am. Yes. I mean, maybe not in those words, but I was like, okay. There’s work arounds. And then, you know, freshman year of high school, just some people started cropping up that caught my eye, just some a flash of black against a locker, you know, a combat boot with a cigaret snarling in the parking lot. And I was like, I don’t know what that is, but they seem like they feel the way I know I feel inside, but don’t think I can be. It was almost like the manifestation of like the truth I was telling myself I would never be able to live and I would just sort of, you know, put a put a face on. They for whatever reason, not that they were all gay, but that was like, oh, they’re getting to be mad about how I feel and can’t be mad. And I started to meet some of them and I started to discover their music and their culture. And I love The Cure and Depeche Mode and it all just clicked. And probably within six months, this is when I was maybe about almost 16. I mean, I was, you know.

Tricia

Yeah.

David

This bird, this crow, this raven, this dark creature of the night has flown. And, you know, when you become Goth, you know, you become I mean, you know, the thing that they say about Goth kids is that they’re super you know, they’re antisocial. I mean, I love Goth kids because even though it meant that once I was a Goth, it was a projection of like not doing things that I’ve been doing up to that point, like performing and acting. Internally in our world, I mean, they were clowns like the Goths are the clowns of the alt kid world. Like for all the black lipstick and dog collars. Like they’re the funnest. I mean, I had so much fun with those people.

Tricia

I will say when I read your book, Bad Kid, and I know you now as an adult, right? But I read your book, which is amazing. I encourage all of our listeners to get to look at Bad Kid, listen to it on Audible, buy the book, whatever you need to do to get this information about David’s life in his memoir. But I was just worried about you. Like, I wouldn’t have known how to live one day of that life, much less as many days as you did. It was just so different. But the otherness I got, like the whole idea of being other, I got I mean, I can remember going to art school and never felt like I fit in. And I went to art school at 33 and realized, Oh, I fit in here because no one fits in here. We’re not supposed to fit in in art school. We’re actually supposed to just be our own who we are. I’m like, Yeah, I’m finally in the right place. But literally, I read your book and it was just so combination of so funny, so nervous making, so moving. I mean, it was everything kind of all at once. But I can remember like when I first time I saw afterwards, I wanted to touch you to make sure you. Are you okay?

David

I have had people who’ve been reading my book take a moment to hug me. Hey, can I hug? Like, you know, I’ve been. And it’s kind of that thing. I mean, you know this Tricia, because we we teach this. And in the world of spoken word nonfiction storytelling, there’s that thing about telling the story from the place it happened. And it’s that great. It’s that great thing that I love so much. And you do it, too, when you’re in the middle of a story about will, will or will or won’t, my parachute open. And you can tell the audience is thinking as you stand there in front of them, I hope they make it. You know, it’s I love that. I mean, I love that about like about like watching a storyteller. So it’s a fascinating. Thing to me.

Tricia

It was true, you had every one of us going, oh, my God, is he going to be okay? And I know that, you know, I’ve taught with you. I know you’re okay, but I’m like, Oh, dear God, is he all right, you know?

David

Well, I mean there might be some doctor somewhere that, based on the things I inhaled and smoke, like, actually, David’s not all right, but he’s doing the best that he can.

Tricia

It worked in your favor. If there are any kids, do not do this at home. But it did work in your favor.

David

It did.

Clip

I had never seen kids like this before. They were wearing smeared makeup and they had crazy styled hair and long draping black clothes. If you’ve never seen Goth kids in a warm weather climate, there’s nothing sadder. It’s just…

Clip

Well, I’ll be. They look like superheroes. Going to a funeral.

Tricia

So I was reading The New York Times review of your show and it said, What distinguishes the show is not its plot or its theme, but its vivid characters. And you have amazing characters that you create. Like, I am madly in love with Rodney Bobbins. I’ve been in love with Rodney Bobbins. This is for our listeners — first if you are not following David on Instagram, do it now. David Crabbe with two bees because you have to watch Rodney Bobbins. I mean, he’s just the most incredible realtor.

Clip

Hi, my name is Rodney Bob and I am the realtor to the stars at least in the East L.A. girl. If you want to see some place, bitch, I got the keys, too. Let’s go. Oh these milky, creamy, wet tiles I came in and I said, Honey, these tires are wet. They are not wet. They are just shimmery, glossy. They are dry as hell. They are so cool and comfortable. I wish you here just put the flesh of your face on the side of it with me like this. I love this kitchen. C’mon!.

David

Oh, honey. Rodney, Rodney Bobbins is always here to get you any of the audio bits, little tidbits, bits and bobs that you need. Honey, you just reach out, girl. I got you, Darlene. I love you, Minerva.

Tricia

It’s those keys. When you take those keys out and they just start shakin.

David

Oh, the keys. They’re getting longer and longer.

Tricia

Where did these characters come from? And by is it just Byron, Byron, at Sephora?

David

Bryon.

Tricia

Bryon. That’s it. I knew I wasn’t getting right.

David

It’s Bryon and dare you call him Brian, he will make sure. It’s Bryon.

Clip

Oh, okay. FYI. This product is intended for someone whose face has less character than. You’re, what, 43? I’m 35. We’ll help you find this. I don’t know. Was it La la? Brasie rosecia? Looks like Bo Derek stung by a lot of bees. Rene looks like Wednesday Addams with the hunchback. Yeah. No, Cora. Wonky eye, blue eye shadow like one of those deep sea bioluminescent fish.

Tricia

You know, it’s so funny because as you were just talking to me about, like gravitating towards Goth and becoming Goth, you know? My instinct for a minute was to say, you know, I think that was maybe the start of my interesting characters in a lot of way. Like I’ve always and this is another way where I’m really so much like my mom is that I’m really interested in the brightest kookiest bauble in the room. Like I’ve always been fascinated by the outlier, like the person who is a character in their life. And, you know, part of it was like, sure, I was gravitating towards goth kids and, you know, at a pretty traditional Texas high school that was what stuck out. But really going back, you know, my mom worked, you know, and she was a single mom who held down like lots of jobs in a mall. And, you know, growing up with a single mom as an only child of any brothers or sisters and I think I’ve been like finding families or people of interest for a really long time. The mall was like, really where it started. You know, the mall was like heaven to me. We’d go in if I got to go to work with her on the weekends or I like feigned that I had a fever on a Monday, you know? You know, nine years old, going to Windsor Park Mall with like the big fountain, Janet Jackson blasting from the speakers. Air conditioned, cool and comfortable shop after shop that sold niche things. You know, like the the super like Black fashion store that was like the place I mean, I know this sounds crazy, but I was like, you know, in San Antonio, Texas, in that year, I was like, oh, that’s where Black people work and shop and I can go and hang out there. And then the place next to that was the corn dog place, where it was just all teenagers with attitudes who thought I was funny. So they’d give me like corn dog drippings in a basket with powdered sugar. Disgusting, but delicious then. And then there was, you know, the crazy people. There were these like there was like a country store. Like it was almost like the mall was this crazy archetypal place where I got to expose myself to different things. There was a pet store where I remember I would go there and they knew me that different people call me Little Man, Little David. And it was like the mall was an interesting place where I could go and see all these different people. And I’m a big together alone person. And I think that also comes from that. Like, I love going on a gig alone for like two nights to a city or town I’ve never been. Going to a hotel and then just leaving the hotel. And sometimes I use Google Maps to find the cafe or the interesting bar because I’m kind of a snob about cocktails and coffee and I will shape my experience. It feels like I’m doing a kind of really joyful research.

Tricia

Yes, that’s what’s going to say, Yeah, yeah.

Clip

And I don’t I wouldn’t say that I’m like walking around with like, a private detective, you know, Colombo jacket with, like, a pen, like taking notes because I do know creative character building performers who do that. I don’t do that necessarily, but like, little sketch ideas, little things people say, like, I love that. And I think the mall was a part of that when I was little. Being a goth kid was further exploration of that when I got older, you know? And then for me, my art school experience started when I was 22. I moved to Detroit to go to a two year master’s program in art. And that was really, I think, the first time where I got to execute, I got to see yet another interesting group of people from a region of the country I’d never lived. Detroit was like such a far cry from growing up in Texas and art people like I was the baby. I was the youngest person. I was the only person at the school that had come straight from undergrad and they treated me like the baby, but in a sweet way, like people took care of me and, you know, to all of a sudden being in an art program with some people were five, ten, 15 years older than me getting their masters. It just felt like another whole level of like, Oh, well, this is a whole other world. But, but in terms of the stuff I started to make, that was the first place where a mentor or an educator said, not in a photography way, which is what I went to college for, not in a fine art visual way, but in a performative way, where a mentor said to me, Have you thought of using your body and voice to execute these ideas. Basically, he was like, You should make video art. And do this thing that you do that I see you do casually all the time that makes people laugh and have conversations, and that is your art. Have you thought about that? And that happened there.

Tricia

Wow, you know, So you went there in there for photography and visual work?

David

Yeah. The school is called Cranbrook Academy of Art. It’s a little school. It’s a two year program, 140 students at a time, ten departments. And they’re famous for for this. And, you know, you get there because you do beautiful fibers work. You get to the fibers department, the teacher looks at the work and says, you know what? You should do ceramics. Like, I mean, that’s kind of a joke about Cranbrook. But when I got there very quickly, I think I maybe first semester I did middling kind of like I was trying to be a thing I saw. I looked at the work of the people around me and I saw much more sort of minimalism or much more sort of political commentary. And I think I for about a semester I dabbled in that and my professor Carl Toth, after that semester, Carl was like, You know, I see you. You’re your points of interest, aren’t art. Your points of interest are Kids in the Hall. Your points of interest are British comedy. Your points of interest are like it seems like you’re interested in spoofing, like veins of other of other creation. Like you’re, you know a lot about the music industry and fashion industry. And so why aren’t those things. And I see you, you know, and he was like, and I see you at dinner and you’re doing voices and you’re making people laugh like, have you thought of? And he was the first and he was the first person where it was almost like someone saying, like, you realize the thing that you do naturally can be the thing that you do creatively.

Tricia

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Tricia

When did you do the first person narrative stuff? How did that start appealing to you? If you’ve done all this character work, or beginning to do all this character work. How did you get drawn into the first person world?

David

Well, after I left Detroit, I moved straight to New York and I immediately, like, signed up for classes at Upright Citizens Brigade doing like some improv and things like that. And I found a home pretty quickly at a theater company called Axis Theater. So like the best times of my life, favorite work in my life, I made there. You know, it’s a it’s a black box, a beautiful black box theater in the West Village. The founder of the company is also the writer and director. I would say the bulk of the work that happens there, but it was very communal. It was we really made these things together and I loved acting there. But I think there was a part of me that was maybe that grad school professor voice in my head who was kind of wanting more of me. So my instinct, along with my friend Cami Camacho, who I went to grad school with and lived in New York, we wanted to do some standup and we talked about it and we literally were like, Let’s Google standup classes. We live in New York, and when we looked up the standup classes, we just saw a lot of stuff we didn’t want to be a part of. A lot of the jokes, a lot of the themes, they seem really bland. They seemed very male, they seemed very white. There wasn’t a lot of commentary. And I was like, I don’t want to do that. But we found a storytelling class taught by Kevin Allison and Michelle Wasson. We took it. We loved it. I pretty quickly after that, started working with Risk, telling at Risk all the time. Cami and I started our own storytelling show called Ask Me Stories that ran for a few years in New York, and then I started going to The Moth and the first Moth I went to, I think I won. The host was, Peter Aguerra hosted at Southpaw, and I told the story that to me just seemed like so and it was just so silly and like not it wasn’t a Moth story, but like Southpaw was a wild venue and Peter Aguerra kept it wild and raucous and loud and very rock and roll. And then I started working more with The Moth and doing more Moth Slams, and they started having me host the Moth Slam, which if you don’t know what it is, it’s, it’s sort of a quote unquote competitive storytelling slam that takes a lot of places around the city. And then I just got really, really involved in storytelling. And I’d always been a storyteller. I mean, you know, the storytelling in and of itself is what made my mom sign me up for the class. It’s what made my professor say have you though of taking videos, right? But I was like, again, it was like one of those beautiful things of like, Oh, you just slide a stage under me doing this thing I do in my life. And it suddenly is a form, you know, like I always think through art, I’m kind of looking for family in a way too right? The family of a theater company, the family of a bunch of art school geeks and a frozen, you know, ass of Michigan in the dead of winter. Right? And and I found a family with The Moth too and hosting with them doing some teaching with them so that all kind of got I arrived essentially at a point where I wanted to do a solo show. It just felt like it was a natural recipe. Like Axis Theater said, Well, if you had a solo show, you know, pitch it to us, you know, like I got the idea that there’d be some support there. A dear, my best, best friend in New York was Josh MATTHEWS. He’s a clown, like classically trained clown. He just said to me, you know, you’re telling all these great stories at The Moth about you being this like goth kid in Texas, like, why don’t we just build a show out of that again? It was kind of one of those, like, the most obvious answer yeah, is the thing. So we just started building this show, and in large part it was from stories at places like The Moth and Risk gave me the opportunity and the container to make in the first place, right? Like I had 5 to 10 minutes, it’s going to be a chapter. So then we started to slide those pearls on the chain figure out where the pearls were missing and then mounted the show at Axis Theater. I want to say the first time in 2012 and had a lovely little run, and it went well enough that the powers that be at Axis, Randy Sharp and Brian Barnhart, who were, you know, make all the decisions there, they were like, you know, why don’t we give you a run? And it was really lovely of them. I was like, What do you mean, didn’t I do a run? And they’re like, No, like a real run. Like, not like two or three weekends, like 6 to 8 weeks, and we’ll put some press behind it. And, and it was, it was a real gift. Like, I’m, I’m lucky I had that community behind me to support something that really was quite singular in terms of it was just me up there and my friend Josh being a clown he was really the person that made it more, you know, in my mind I was like, Oh, it’s like, it’s like The moth or Risk but for 70 minutes he’s like, No, no, no, my friend, there’s going to be dance routines. You’re going to do all those funny voices. You’re not going to be standing in a mic, We’re going to get you a lav. And I was like, What’s a lav? You know, like, I was so, so was kind of in a way, a thing that I felt like I’d been doing the whole time, my whole life had always been kind of doing that. That recipe was there, but everything kind of came together and the stars aligned for it to exist in this form. So Bad Kid ran there, and that second time, that Bad Kid, which is the name of the show, ran the New York Times came.

Clip

If you bring home anyone Anyone and your stepfather and I will love them if you do. They could be black or Asian or Latino or. Or handicapped. Yeah. Your stepfather will build a ramp into this house if that’s what it takes for you to get the love you deserve.

David

I still remember walking through Greenpoint the day that I got a phone call from Brian Barnhart of Axis Theater saying, David, you’re a New York Times critics pick. You’re on the front page of the art section of The New York Times, like, No, no, no. I remember I corrected him like that. Like, no. And he was like, David, no, I’m holding the paper. And and it was amazing. And then that review kind of just changed the trajectory of what would happen with that show after in terms of the book and whatnot.

Tricia

Okay. So I’m going to ask you this question now because this is what this Season two is about in the podcast is what it takes to sustain a creative life.

David

Mm hmm.

Tricia

And so what do you think got you from the John Casablanca School of Acting and Modeling to being a New York Times critic’s pick? Like, what was the thing in David Crabb that kept you going to be able to accomplish that?

David

I love homework. I mean, like, you know, I feel like I’m a in a lot of ways a solo artist, but I thrive so much on having a mentor, a due date, a director, even sometimes a producer. I really thrive off feeling like because I have these ideas that live in me and I know I’ll go crazy if they don’t get out. But sometimes I move really fast. I have never been diagnosed with any kind of ADHD or anything like that, but I feel like if I wanted to do the legwork, I could. And I need buckets. I need containers. I, you know, in New York, not so much here because working with the Groundlings now, in and of itself is its own kind of, you know, structure, due date, creative family. But there were times, at least in New York, when I felt like I’m going to sign up to put up a solo show in this East Village festival by this date. And I did it not knowing what I was going to do because I knew that I would go crazy if I didn’t have something to work towards because I knew I wanted to do a show where I would be catering and it would be kind of about health insurance and being a working artist. Those are the only ideas I have right now, but I know I feel so passionate about them. Well, hell, if I know that on August 24th at under St Mark’s, I’ve got to do a show about this, I will build it. For me, there’s always this sense of, you know, it’s like if you build it, they will come and but it’s almost like, no, if you force yourself to make them come, you will build it. Yeah, we talked earlier about, you know, this is a good example because you were there when my little white dog, Charlie White Paw was very sick with a brain tumor. And we, we, we crowdfunded for him. He had six months of grueling treatment. And it it really, in the end didn’t work. And it was a really terrible dark time for me. It was a terrible financial time. It was a terrible emotional time. It was horrible. And I remember right after he died, we we had to leave the house because as our dog was dying, we were also kind of getting evicted and having our lease broken by these people. And it was just so much to bear. And when we moved to this new house, I don’t know what to do with all of this. And at the time I had been developing this character name Aunt Patty, and she’s just an older Southern woman who talks like this and bless her heart and she she is kind of racist in that way that she doesn’t know she is versus other you know, she she just has these and she’s based on so many women that I know and love and love me in my youth.  And I, for some reason feel like she speaks to my dog died, I’m in this miserable place and for the first time in our lives, Jack and I, because I was teaching at Occidental, we had one year in this beautiful faculty house that had a green yard and literally a white picket fence, and I was like, Jack, I’m going to do a show here. And he was like, What do you mean, in the house? I’m going to make an Eventbrite invitation. It’s going to be a boutique theater experience. Ten people can come at a time. I don’t know what’s going to happen. And I built probably the weirdest thing I’ve ever done where I performed this show about like grieving and loss. And the first half was storytelling for people in my living room, half of whom I usually didn’t know we made them drinks. We had just gotten a new puppy that was there. They’d pet him. They got to know him. Some of them held him as I talked about my dog dying and crying in front of them. And then at intermission I went to the bedroom. I became my Aunt Patty full Texas southern coals, drag head to toe, And then I came out and I performed the second half of the show, which is kind of a commentary on the first because she talked about me a lot, like I wasn’t me.

Clip

Jello — oh, I’ll make a mold I can make jello molds. Sometimes I like the savory ones. I float, carrots and cauliflower, in there just, no flavored jello, clear as a window. Delicious. The nicest interest you have with Salisbury steak. It’s Wonderful. It’s divine, really. And I don’t know why no one talks about savory jello any more.

David

I probably ran that, sold it out, whatever that means, because there’s only ten people at a time over the course of three months. I don’t know if I’d ever do it again. And when I look back at it, it feels like someone else did it, like someone a little bit crazy and unhinged that didn’t know what to do. But I still talk to people about that show that came to it. And I know that, like I, I made the bucket for the thing. And because I made the bucket and the bucket was empty, I filled it just in time. And I kind of feel like that’s what I mean about this idea of as a performer and a theatrical, theatrically inclined performer. I have to make an audience sometimes. You know, the pandemic. Rodney Bobbins was born out of the pandemic. I was like, We can’t go anywhere. I was like, Babe, Oh, and I’m immunosuppressed. Sidebar. So when we were in lockdown, we were really in LA in lockdown. I’m on a drug called Remicade. They got to find out about a year after the pandemic wasn’t as bad, but it was a bad recipe for me that first year. Do not go anywhere. Do not leave your house. So, Marjorie Taylor Greene, that’s just me in a wig, stomping around the backyard of my house, riffing on my phone. Rodney Bobbins is just right. So it’s kind of like finding if you find the audience or the place or the location for the thing, even if you don’t know exactly what the thing is yet, at least for me, that’s a recipe for making that thing like I’ll do the work.

Tricia

Well, this is what’s so interesting because it’s it’s just almost counterintuitive. There’s so many people are saying, I’m not — I have to have it done before I then commit to doing it. And you’re like, Let me just commit to doing it and then I’ll figure out how to do it, which is I mean, that’s a that is having a comfort level with risk that not a lot of people can have. But I totally get it.

David

I know that one, the problem I don’t have is I am not for lack of ideas, but I know I need structure. I need, again, the location, the date, the commitment. Because it will it will force me to focus in ways that sometimes I don’t.

Tricia

Yes. Yeah.

David

I just did the Groundlings Sunday Company for a year and a half. I put up a sketch show with 13 other people. It was grueling and it was incredible and it was amazing. And I met my favorite people my whole life I met doing that. I’m so happy I did it. And I became a Grounding. And it that has ended now a little, you know, I guess it ended about three months ago.

Tricia

That the Sunday afternoon.

David

The Sunday Company Groundlings and I’m not doing that. I’ll do the next Groundlings show that’s coming in about a month, and I will be honest, it has been having that structure taken away that so many people and trust me, I get the flip side of it too. Thank God that’s over. Got pitching every Wednesday, pitching ideas to one team, building a show, finding the costume, writing the script, casting it by Sunday, having that location, that bucket gone. It has been one of the biggest challenges of my creative life, like, you know, of being like, Wow, I got to make that bucket again for myself. Like, I got to make that container because I have all these ideas now and where do I hone then? Talking to you about this is so great because it’s reminding me about how I work. Like, Oh God, I got to do this. Yeah, You know.

Tricia

You wrote a lovely Instagram post and I think this has something to do also with what it takes to sustain a creative life. You had shown us a vision board that you had made months before. Yeah, right. A vision board you had created months before you started working with the Groundlings Sunday Company, which was some time ago. And you said that Jack, your husband, came in and was waving the paper saying, you know, you made it. You’ve found this crumpled up piece of paper and that you had referred to it off and on over the course of those years, like you’ve referred to it, and gotten inspiration for some of your characters from it. But I like it, you said “it made me smile to think about the crazy end times place I was we all were the time I made this vision board versus where I am now and how nice it is to have heroes even when the world is ending. Especially when the world is ending. So thanks to all those weirdos who have inspired me, etc.” So I like that idea of going, You can be in a place that’s so dark and then go, Oh, wait a second. All these things I didn’t even think about or didn’t couldn’t imagine coming together actually have. So again, what is the thing that made you go from that place of total darkness to keeping you going? I mean, I understand the bucket idea, but is there was there something else that kept you going? And from the dark time to getting to this lighter time?

David

The idea I mean, if I’m really going to think about what keeps me going, I think just the idea that, like, no matter what’s going on and hopefully going to be able to make people laugh again, even the stuff I love, like Depeche Mode, which is a very dark, serious new wave band, I’ve written three or four sketches, inspired them that are hilarious to me. Like I can’t help but find like the laughter and the spoof and the parody and everything I enjoy. I mean, it’s funny you talked about it. You were a Goth kid, but you’re so funny. Goth is, that’s hilarious to me. Like, yeah, who I was. And those even then was hilarious to me. So I think there’s this idea whether I’m self-isolating in a little cabin like John Travolta and the boy in the bubble, because we’re all going to die and it’s a thousand degrees and California’s burning down, which is where I was in 2020. There’s this idea that even if I’m stomping around as Marjorie Taylor Greene and I’m not laying hands on any other physical body, that I’m making someone laugh. And that makes me. So happy because I’m not a big laugher. When you get my goat, you know I’m loud and I talk like a hyena. But like I think really hard about even when I’m enjoying something, sometimes I’m like, Oh, that’s really funny. It’s super internal, so I know what it means when something can get me and I don’t know it’s coming and I like it. It just lights me up and like, my husband will be like, God, you really laughed at that. And like, even that feels like, Oh, I did, I did. It’s like it’s a gift to really laugh at something. So the idea that I can be a part of doing that for anyone in the world, really, I think that’s a big part of it. Whether I’m telling the story on stage, you know, And the Groundlings, for example, is about comedy. You’re not going to see a sketch show so that you can laugh your ass off and then cry. But even when I’m doing sketch, I try to just sneak a little bit of that in a lot. And I think that’s what I when I discovered storytelling, what I loved about it was that you can make someone laugh so hard, but you can tuck in that emotion and those real stakes and that real love. Like you can laugh about my crazy leprechaun Newfoundland mom for 8 minutes, but if I can get you at the last minute to be like, Oof, I’m going to call my mom. To me, that’s the thing. And even though I love making people laugh, it’s that merging. It’s that’s there’s something in the heart as well behind it. So I think in a subconscious way, it’s not like I wake up and I was like, Today’s going to be hard, but I got to make someone laugh. Like, I think it’s just part of my part of my being. But you know, damn you on this podcast, now I’m thinking about it. So I think that’s really it, may be.

Tricia

And you do it incredibly well. Thank you so much, David. I really appreciate it.

David

Thank you so much. This is so fun. I miss you. I hope to see you again soon in real life.

Tricia

Yeah. We need to share a stage soon and just at least have a cup of coffee. That would be fantastic.

David

I’d love that. 

Tricia

Oh, my gosh. I just need an I.V. drip of David Crabbe. His energy, his thoughtfulness, his perspective on making art just fills my creative well. And here are some questions he prompted me to think about. First, what interest you? Are you like David, and are fascinated by the outlier. The brightest kookiest bobble in the room? Or does something else appeal? Second, can the thing that you do naturally be the thing that you do creatively? And last, have you thought about the purpose behind your work? Is it to make people laugh? To put more beauty in the world? To make sure you stay sane? Follow David on Instagram @thedaviddrabb. That’s with two B’s and on YouTube @David Crabb. If you’re in L.A., go see him as part of The Groundlings Main Company and keep an eye out for him as a host and storyteller for The Moth and Risk. And if you haven’t had a chance to download the No Time to be Timid manifesto yet, make sure to visit my website triciaroseburt.com. And while you’re there, please reach out and give us some feedback about the show. We’d love to hear your thoughts. And if you’re looking to find the purpose behind your work or need a creative jumpstart or maybe a community to create with, join me at my No Time to Be Timid retreat November 10th through the 12th at the beautiful Cranberry Meadow Farm Inn in Peterborough, New Hampshire. It’s an intimate gathering of eight like minded women in various stages of their creative journeys who are eager to integrate more creativity into their lives. For more information, check out my website triciaroseburt.com and click on No Time to Be Timid. Then email me or schedule a conversation to make sure it’s the right fit for you. Join us for episode eight, when our guest will be Steve Young, a writer for the David Letterman Show for 25 years and the star of the award winning documentary Bathtubs over Broadway. It’s the moving story of Steve’s deep dive into the world of industrial musicals. And if you haven’t seen it, watch it now. It’s on Apple TV. And remember, this is no time to be timid. No Time to Be timid is written and produced by me, Tricia Rose Burt. Our episodes are produced and scored by Adam Arnone of Echo Finch, and our theme music is Twist and Turns by the Paul Dunlea Group. If you like what you hear, please subscribe to the show, spread the word, and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you listen. No Time to be Timid is a presentation of I Will Be Good Productions.