Chapter 1: What paradoxes define Robby Hoffman's personality?
Kings Network.
She's very busy. We're happy to have her time. Robbie Hoffman is on Hacks, Rooster, HBO. She's got her own special, Robbie Hoffman Wake Up. Everyone says that one is must watch. She's got a podcast, Too Far with Robbie Hoffman. It seems like all of this is too much. You've got too much going on. All your dreams are coming true. It seems like too much.
Not too much at all. I'm not having kids. This is what I do. this is how I toil. Whether you knew the credits or not, I'd still be doing those things. Whether it was fruitful or not, it's kind of what I do, poor or rich or anything, because I just committed to doing it. It's fantastic that you know of all those things now. Obviously, it's a much better way for it working out.
But I think either way, I would have been doing a lot. And in some cases, I argue, when you're not You're doing a lot more before people know what you're doing. You know, when I was doing mics and stuff like that, I would do four or five mics a night sometimes. So in many ways, you're doing less but bigger things.
Well, but you're saying, I have read you say that this is your calling and answering your calling is a nightmare.
So you're going to have to- I don't think people want a call. I mean, maybe if you're like rich or something and you want a calling, you want like a purpose in your life or whatever, it's too easy. I would like to think that maybe the easy life is better. But yeah, doing a calling when you're poor is like- There's no there's no guarantee of payoff.
So versus I could have been an accountant, I could have gotten paid every two weeks. That to me is heaven.
Is it really just safe security? Well, paid two weeks. But heaven for you would not be heaven for you.
But then I found this and I had to I had to grind doing this. And I hate that word, but it's like, you know, you're you're you're extending your poverty for a very long time. It's not fun.
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Chapter 2: How did Robby Hoffman's upbringing influence her comedy career?
And I cried every day. And then when I moved out, I almost never cried again. I barely cry. It's the weirdest thing. It was like immediately free. Yeah, I do. You know, and now it takes something like very, you know, a movie I can cry at or, you know, my grandfather's funeral. May he rest in peace or things like that. But I'm not crying for like no reason.
I used to just cry like and I don't cry at all. You know, it's so funny. My wife says, oh, my God, it breaks her heart when I cry. Like because a few times because she could cry it. Look at this puppy. Oh, babe, they're killing the puppy. She's gone. You know, a lot of people.
Yeah. Yeah.
No, but I'm just saying it's horrible. But I'm saying it's like turn the video off. You know what I mean? It's like I just it takes me a real.
a real thing to cry now but i used to cry this is cry worthy this is not yeah i don't even like choose it but i'm just saying that i used to just go crazy like what was happening though what are the roots of it like clear that you're like yeah i was i was i was suffocating i was in a room with with my other sisters my brothers were extremely loud they were suffocating so it's not no reason you're unhappy no exactly i was extremely distressed
I was extremely distressed.
So much so that in adulthood, your baseline is still nervous.
Yeah, I'm still like nervous, but I'm not distressed. I'm comfortable nervous. It was kind of like on a large scale when COVID happened, all the anxious people go, oh, great. Like we actually calmed down. Like I knew this would happen. I knew it was ending. It's almost like you get a diagnosis. You go, ah, and finally it ended. The worst happened.
You're honestly like, and I feel crazy or I feel some amount of guilt that when the world is quote unquote ending or this, I tend to do well. I sold my first show in COVID. I was on the road. I was starting to really sell tickets.
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Chapter 3: What challenges did Robby face while pursuing her passion in comedy?
You know, maybe I was, you know, young then thinking like waiting for the whisper. Then it's like blaring and the train is like in your apartment. Now I can hear a whisper far away and I do it. Now I'm like, oh yeah, that's the move. My decision making is much better for my life. I remember leaving from Montreal to Toronto. That decision was much easier. As soon as the whisper happened, I did it.
I didn't wait for it to be blaring at me anymore. I can hear myself a lot more clearly. But in the beginning, it was very long to make those decisions. I don't have short answers for how long was I doing that. I always, and I tell people this, I kept my job. I was not in a position to just do stand-up. I don't know how people do that. I kept my job. I then left the accounting job.
I went into sales and different jobs that were slightly more flexible, but still really not. And I would just like at the end of the day of work, I would change into jeans and And I would do stand up. And I just never left until I got like a more stable job in a creative space. And that's how I ended up as a writer's assistant for a kid's show.
Because that was the first job that I got that was longer than three weeks. Because there were writing jobs that kind of came up that like I could maybe like I had at this point in stand up could have it. But they were like two week rooms, three weeks. I'm like, I'm not leaving. My salaried, you know, $32,500 a year job, Canadian, so maybe $25,000 a year, for three weeks.
Like, I just can't do that. But this one was, like, a year. And I said, a year might be enough time for me to really, like— Pursue it. Yeah. Like, OK, a year.
Make a break for it.
And then I ended up being there three and a half years winning an Emmy for it. And it was like my film school was unbelievable. But I did wait a long time. I said, you know, I wasn't able to take the opportunities as young as some of my counterparts.
There was lovely poetry in what you just said of now I can hear a whisper from a distance. Like there's great learning and what it is that you're describing there. Can you give me the latest example of how discerning your decision making is becoming when it comes to intuition that you can see something from far away? It's faint, but you're like, yeah, I need to have that now.
I recognize this feeling.
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Chapter 4: How did Robby Hoffman develop her self-confidence despite anxiety?
To me, an allowance was being gay. But then it doesn't mean, you know, I still have to work and study. Then you have to do really well in school. You can't just be some gay...
bang so in my head i'm like the parent the parent in you uh tolerate i'm yeah this is good we'll do this we'll be supportive about this but you're not going to just it's not a free for all you're not reckless like yeah you have to either do school you have to work you have to do something right
You know, I always, I feel like that with God, too. Like, I don't know how religious or not, you know, I feel there's a sense of something, but I don't know what or if it's involved or anything. I definitely don't think it, you know, we know everything. But I feel like if there is a God, I just, like, lay low.
Like, he's already letting me be gay and live this life, and what am I, a professional clown? Like, okay, I can, you know, then I have to do everything else kosher. You know, be a good person, give to charity, like, to help out, like... I like to I like to like not go. I like to balance everything out. Like, OK, you're doing an unorthodox, but but here you're going to, you know, be good.
You can't have you can't just be reckless free for all.
The money thing is quite the trauma, right?
Huge.
Like, is there a way to explain to me in adulthood the damage that it's done? Because I don't know. When the fear is of not having money, there are almost no fears that match that.
Right. It's like health. Like I consider financial health and health. I can explain it because I think it's collectively we have money trauma. I mean, I think, yeah, capitalism and money systems just in general are extremely traumatizing and they benefit, you know, a few built on the backs of many. It's extremely scary. It's it's the whole system is terrifying. And it collapses often.
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Chapter 5: What is Robby's perspective on the concept of a 'calling'?
How does it come to be that John Mulaney is directing one of your specials?
I'm so glad you asked, and I've been clarifying this wherever I go. He called me. Okay? This was one of those, when you want those moments of the tide shifting and things turning around. Mulaney tracked down my number and called me and begged me to direct the special. He had an overall deal or something with Netflix, and he decided... like a saint just to throw his weight behind me.
That is the kind of help that I, that's the kind of, yeah. And he just said, like, he was a fan. He found out about me. And, um, Yeah. And he just said like, I'm going to, and he did, he threw his weight behind me and I told him, you know, I was, he did every, all I had to do was a great hour of standup comedy, which I knew I could do.
And I was not going to, I said, I'm going to give you the greatest hour. You do what you do. You get into that office and whatever and shake whoever. And I will, all you have to do is turn the camera on. I'll be ready. And we tag teamed it and we got it the fuck done. Unbelievable.
What was that phone call like? What do you remember about the details?
Well, initially it was a text. Hi, it's John Mulaney. This is what I said. I can bring it up, actually. Bear with me.
No, take your time. You're giving us the exclusive. I'm giving you really the exclusive. Nobody has seen this.
And this is asked about a lot. So let me scroll up. We text a lot now, as you can imagine. I'm sure there's a way to go to the top. Take your time.
We have all the time. You're unspooling the exclusive. They're not going to cut anything.
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Chapter 6: How has Robby navigated her relationships with family and friends?
ambitions in any way, shape or form, it's very difficult. Now, for most people, fear is warranted. If you're poor, you can't just, you might, other systems have made it so it is, you are punished for asking for more and doing more. So there's a lot of nuances.
I'm just talking in particular, the people who maybe have cushy, you know, I had friends who went into finance, obviously, and you know, what are you doing? And And kind of judging me. I'm talking about that particular subset. Not people who have to work and we've been beaten down to the point that we do have to work.
It's not bravado when you say to John Mulaney, right? You're scared, you're terrified, but you're saying, and you're not going to have to worry about that hour because that hour is going to kill. No, he knows. I'm going to show up.
He shows up for me. I am there for you. I will not... You know, I grew up without a father. I'm always looking for people to be proud of me. And I want to make him proud. Like, I don't want him to think he put his weight behind something. Like, I'm going to show up.
It's like I'm saying, like when I had those, when I was working 35 hours at the cafe at Java U, and then I would have to ask the school for extra $250 a month, $250 a month, you know, part of my subsidy, whatever. But I would say, look, I'm doing this 35 hours. Like I'm not, I'm not like just like sure. I'm not like, like just freeloading. Like I'm contributing to the maximum I could contribute.
I'm doing 35 hours part-time work a week, which is almost full-time. And, and, and I'm asking for you for 5%. So if, if John gives me even 10%, I'm going to give a hundred and fifty. Like I'm like, and he gave a hundred. I am, you know, I, I just, I show up.
You say you don't have a relationship with your father. Do you have any kind of relationship with the idea of father? Like, do you know how it is you've been imprinted by all of that? Like you just mentioned an example. Do you feel like you've got a good governance over knowing? how it shaped you to not have a father?
Yeah, I feel I'm half of my father. And I knew my father. We don't have a relationship now, but he was very funny, very charismatic. He got sick and all this stuff, but... He, he, I, I've always felt a connection with him and I have a relationship with him in ways that I can. It's not ideal. You know, I drive an old Porsche. People are shocked when they see my car. I bought, I have a 2001.
I got it for $10,000 because I traded my old car for $18,000. That car I got, I was traded for $13,000 to $6,000. You could see all the progression of my cars. And I've been working up to this car. This is my Grail car. And I love the car because my father always liked Porsche. Something I know about him. He, at one point, was able to get one for, I don't know, some amount of time.
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Chapter 7: What insights does Robby share about writing for children's television?
It wasn't fixing. It was like, oh, we lived in hell. It was a dump. It was a shithole. What do you want from me? That was it.
Well, you just said you hated them.
Of course I hated them. I was a teenage girl who hated her brothers. I mean, I feel like it's like mandatory. Mandatory.
Also mandatory. Hacks and Rooster on HBO. Robbie Hoffman, Wake Up is a must watch. What an interview with this guy. Too far with Robbie Hoffman.
Patreon only, the too far.
Thank you, Robbie. A delight to see all of your success and a delight to talk to you.
Thank you so much, Robbie Hoffman on Instagram. What an interview. Thank you for having me.
What an interview. Right? What about her? Oh, wow. A hug. A first closing hug. We've never had a closing hug before. He smells good. Yes. Tell the viewers that. Thank you. Tell all the viewers. Tell the world he smells good.
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