Culture
Talking Podcasting, Radio, and Marietta with Paula Poundstone
By: Emily Votaw
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Paula Poundstone has been a successful comedian for decades, diligently working her way up through nightclubs and comedy clubs throughout the ’70s until she was discovered by Robin Williams, who had her on an episode of Saturday Night Live that he hosted in 1984. From there, Poundstone began appearing on various talk shows, and soon had several TV writing gigs under her belt.
She was a prominent part of The Tonight Show‘s coverage of the 1992 Presidential campaign, and has been a reoccurring panelist on NPR’s Wait Wait… Don’t Tell Me for years. Last year, Poundstone made her podcasting debut with Live From the Poundstone Institute, which was discontinued “due to lack of funding,” in favor of Nobody Listens to Paula Poundstone, a podcast that features Poundstone alongside co-host Adam Febler, who Poundstone describes as a “real-life puppy dog.”
“I started in Boston in ’79 with a pretty misogynist group of guys, and the sense of humor they used on stage — and it went over very well with the audience, by the way — was generally pretty sexist. I definitely had an uphill battle for myself, but, you know, I almost never thought about it, because the truth was there was nothing I could do about it,” said Poundstone when asked about advice she would have for aspiring female comedians.
“What I needed to do was work on my act. I needed to get better and better and better at what I did. (…) The truth is, I can’t make someone hire me — what I figured out when I was pretty young and I think it worked pretty well was to work until I am undeniable, and then the people who don’t hire me just look stupid,” she said. “That’s what I did, I really did just put my head down and work and I think it worked well and that way, the focus was on the part that I was in control of.”
Poundstone will perform at the Peoples Bank Theatre on Saturday, August 25, and tickets are on sale now, for $22-$38.