Chelsea Peretti Has Enough on Her Plate
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Breakfast at Little Dom’s is doing nothing to assuage Chelsea Peretti’s current frustration with Los Angeles. We’re discussing how inescapable the entertainment industry can be in a booth branded with a dedicatory plaque to Jon Hamm. One table over, Oscar-winning director Chloé Zhao is taking a meeting and, on the other side of the window, a man walking his dog is starting to look a little familiar. “To make good art, you need to live your life, but most people here are just working and working out,” says Peretti, turning her attention to the man outside. “I’m pretty sure that’s Max Minghella. What a town, huh?”
Peretti’s geographic misgivings, all of them delivered in a deadpan familiar to any of her viewers, listeners or followers, are not entirely serious. Just one day after her 46th birthday, the Bay Area native is the first to acknowledge the milestones her adopted home has fostered. It’s where the writer and comic entered the mainstream, via sitcom Brooklyn Nine-Nine, and met her husband, filmmaker Jordan Peele. It’s where they’re raising their son and she wrote and directed her first film, First Time Female Director — the bulk of which was shot at Burbank’s Colony Theatre. It’s also where she’s making a concerted effort to mix things up, recently relaunching her call-in podcast and pursuing an eclectic mix of distractions. “I’m really trying to branch out,” she says. “I started doing pottery. I’m going to escape rooms. I’m playing Taboo. Anything to just shake up my brain so that life isn’t all about entertainment.”
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With First Time Female Director hitting The Roku Channel on March 8, Peretti officially rips off the filmmaker Band-Aid. And while she may not be sure what’s next — a TV series, another movie or, less likely, a return to stand-up — she does know she wants it to be funny.
Is it true that you tried to get out of directing First Time Female Director?
I did try to back out of it — not once the ball was rolling, but when we were initially thinking about attaching me. I thought, “Is this stupid to direct my first movie that I wrote and also am acting in?” I could have been fine with someone else directing it, too. But my agent at the time, Sharon Jackson, and [producer] Amy Poehler were basically like, “No.”
Having accomplished two firsts, do you want to make another movie, or is it on to something else?
This is cheesy, but I just really love comedy. I want to explore it in every form that it exists — except maybe stand-up, which I feel like I’ve had my fill of. I want to make a TV show. I want to make another movie. But, at the same time, the whole comedy movie landscape is pretty dire. You’re signing up for a pretty heartbreaking situation. Kids don’t go to the theater. Laugh-out-loud comedies aren’t considered prestigious by Hollywood. I hear so many stories about people, real celebrities, who can’t get projects made. I just feel lucky to have completed a film that has a home.
Why aren’t you interested in stand-up anymore?
I could do another tour at some point or make another special, but my passion is comedy and not the medium. I don’t even watch stand-up specials much. There are very few people, even if they’re hilarious, that I want to watch for an hour straight.
Talk to me about you return to podcasting. Call Chelsea Peretti made you a bit of a pioneer in 2012 but you quit in 2020 just when podcasters started getting nine-figure deals. Now that the podcasting industry is in crisis, you’re back.
That is 100 percent true. Well, I was not in the mental head space during the pandemic. My son was three and had an attention span of five minutes. I was stressed and arguably didn’t handle it how maybe I would now — knowing what I’ve learned. Now that life is back a bit, I was thinking about how touring stand-up and having a podcast are both ways to be funny and interact with your fanbase. One is super easy… and one is really hard. (Laughs.) I just decided it suited my lifestyle to do it again. And I do love not knowing what people are calling in for. I enjoy the adrenaline.
Do you feel a pressure to maintain some type of regular engagement with your fan base?
Yeah, I do, but I try to avoid it. On Instagram, for example, everyone’s like, “The algorithm wants this! The algorithm wants that.” It’s not where I want to be creating from. I always felt like I could game social media, and I don’t feel like that anymore. These algorithms make it so unnatural that people are just churning out content for the sake of making content. It’s a hamster wheel.
During a recent episode of your podcast, you brought up a potential crusade to remove the thousands of barrels of toxic chemicals that have been dumped off the coast of Catalina Island, and I genuinely could not tell if you were joking or not.
I want to get a Pulitzer, and I want this be my Erin Brockovich moment. No, I’m joking. But I do think it’s horrific. I can’t believe that there’s barrels of DDT just hanging out over there. I recently went to Catalina for the first time. It’s cute. I was interested in hearing about the indigenous history, so I did a nature tour… but it was all about the Wrigley family.
Early in your career, you spent time in a lot of major writers rooms — The Sarah Silverman Program, Parks and Recreation. Did you like working in that environment?
I loved writers rooms. Have you ever taken a Myers-Briggs test? All these things are flawed and probably wrong, but I was very much between thinking and feeling and between introvert and extrovert. Knowing that helped me a lot in understanding why I’m often torn about things. What I loved about writers rooms was that I was coming from stand-up, being a lone wolf, and rooms are so collaborative. I love riffing off ideas with people. And Mike Schur, who was running the Parks room, is so silly and giggly and made it such a fun environment.
He’s also so cerebral. Did you read his book about morality?
I need to read that. People send their books and I’m like, “Sorry, I barely can read.” And I never listen to podcasts.
OK, you’ve now vetoed books, podcasts and stand-up specials. What culture are you engaging with?
Listen, I really don’t know! (Laughs.) Weird, fear-based deep dives on the internet and, like it or not, reality TV. I just started watching Love Is Blind and I’ve seen every Love Island. I’m also very into female-led British comedy shows. I want to watch more movies. I did see Saltburn. (Eyes widen.) But, honestly, life was hard before I had a child. I’m overwhelmed by what is expected of adults. Having a career and trying to be in shape in this godforsaken, Ozempic-run town? That’s time-consuming.
You went straight from the Parks room to starring in Brooklyn Nine-Nine. Was that your crash course in Hollywood?
On Brooklyn Nine-Nine, I was very green. Everything was a learning curve for me, because no one really explains anything to you in Hollywood — how to do any of it. You’re just suddenly there and thinking on your feet. Now that I’ve had time to reflect on everything, I actually can’t believe I was on that show. I feel overcome with gratitude about it all. And, going back to writers rooms, I learned so much from [Brooklyn Nine-Nine co-creators] Mike [Schur] and Dan [Goor] about how to structure comedy and how to make shows.
Like what?
Mike was such a good model for me with notes. He always said, “If there’s a note, there’s something behind it. Even if you’re not addressing it exactly how it’s laid out, address it in some way.” I thought that was such a good attitude, because a lot of people are just like, “The suits have notes and they’re evil!”
How do you negotiate your creative life with your marriage? Jordan makes a cameo in the movie, but do you have guardrails about when and how you bounce ideas off each other?
We talk a lot about creative stuff, but I do err on the side of boundaries around collaborating with family. We’re definitely sounding boards. But, as with self-discovery, I think marriage is a process of rediscovery all the time. Jordan has had this massive ascension. We had a child. Then, there was this massive pandemic. We’re constantly evolving both as individuals and together. My grandparents were married over 50 years, and they’re my idols in that sense. I spent so many holidays with them growing up, and their home was this happy place. That’s what I want to create and emulate, but in my own way.
Your brother, Jonah, co-founded The Huffington Post and BuzzFeed. You’ve both had incredible success in different fields, so much that I half-assumed you were nepo babies. But you’re not! What does your family think of how far you’ve both gone?
My brother and I went our own ways and had our own successes, and we’re wary of partnering on things because of that. It’s funny you bring up nepotism. My dad was a criminal defense attorney, and my mom was a teacher. I’m very proud of that. And I’m not going to say I grew up broke. We lived comfortably. They’re retired now, but I just think that their jobs were meaningful. (Starts to cry.) I’m PMS-ing. (Laughs.)
My one goal coming here was to not make you cry like that reporter who had you talking about your late co-star Andre Braugher on a recent red carpet.
Oh, I felt bad about that. After I talked about it on Seth Meyers, some people picked it up and said it was a “nightmare interview.” The nightmare for me was that my emotions came out, because I am an emotional person. The journalist didn’t ask about Andre. I was just so taken off guard when I brought up Andre that I started crying.
Why is it a nightmare for your emotions to come out?
Sometimes I just think the people who succeed in this business — like on a massive, monstrous level — are a different species than me. I can’t suppress my emotions and be a robot 24/7, which is sort of what’s required of these massive celebrities. Anyway, I hope that journalist didn’t think I was calling him an asshole.
Well, we can clarify that. Anything else you want to put out there?
I want to repair that bridge, get a Pulitzer Prize, my own run on Broadway and to be on The White Lotus.
This story first appeared in the Feb. 28 issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. Click here to subscribe.
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