Terry Gross

If you're not familiar with the comedy of my guest, Cristela Alonso, I think the best way of introducing her is with a clip.

But first, I should set it up.

Cristela is Mexican-American, the daughter of Mexican immigrants.

Her mother was living in Texas, undocumented, and pregnant with Cristela, her fourth child, when she left her abusive husband and raised her four children on her own.

Cristela grew up in a Texas border town.

This clip, like much of Cristela's comedy, is autobiographical.

That was from Cristela Alonso's first Netflix comedy special from 2017 called Lower Classy.

It was followed by her 2022 special Middle Classy.

Her new one, Upper Classy, is now streaming on Netflix.

You can tell from the titles that class and money have been defining issues in her life because she grew up in extreme poverty.

For the first seven years of her life, Christella, her mother, and three siblings were squatters in an abandoned diner in Texas with a toilet on the outside.

Christella managed to get into a theater program in high school, win theater awards, study theater in college, but had to put her own dreams and ambitions on hold and quit college twice to care for her mother and help her sister raise her children.

Eventually, Cristela broke through by performing across the country on college campuses.

In 2014, she became the first Latina to create, write, and star in a network TV show.

Her semi-autobiographical sitcom, Cristela, ran for one season on ABC.

Cristela Alonso, welcome to Fresh Air.

It is a pleasure to have you on the show.

It is so good to be here.

Oh, good.

Can we talk about what the clip was about was that half of your family was undocumented?