Julia Sweeney

All that stuff, but I couldn't believe anymore.

So then I had to live in a world without God.

And actually, I think that's a more beautiful world, and it's a more realistic world, and I think it's a truer world.

That being said, I've rejoined the Catholic Church.

And the music, come on, it can't be beat.

Julia Sweeney is a writer, a performer, and an actor whose career has taken a path that very few people could have predicted.

She first came to fame as a cast member on Saturday Night Live, where she created one of the most memorable and complicated characters of that era.

She has also appeared in the Hulu series Shrill, the Showtime series Work in Progress, the Starz series American Gods, and had a recurring role on Frasier.

Her performance work has broadened through a series of one-woman shows where she has shared her crises, contradictions and questions and created an utterly original form of storytelling that blends wit and humor with intelligence and inquiry.

Her work has been performed on stages across the country, adapted into books and films and has helped redefine how personal narrative is performed.

Julia Sweeney, welcome to Design Matters.

Thanks for having me.

Julia, is it true you wanted to be a nun growing up simply because you liked their outfits?

Well, that's partly a joke.

I actually like their lifestyle as well.

Oh, interesting.

So you like that whole celibate, praying to God kind of— Well, not the celibate part.

But I went to all-girls Catholic school, and the nuns were absolutely the feminists in my particular environment.

They were women who had chosen not to marry—

to devote themselves to education.