Nicole Byer will always remember the racism she witnessed whereas on the highway as a comic.
The “Nailed It!” host had loads of tales to share about her early days as a struggling Black comedian however, whereas speaking to Jesse Tyler Ferguson on Tuesday’s episode of his “Dinner’s on Me” podcast, Byer recalled one specific evening in Appleton, Wisconsin, standing out.
“I really hated it there,” she revealed. “I was like, ‘The vibes fucking sucked. Bad vibes!’”
Byer recalled studying that Appleton was a “sundown town,” a neighborhood the place Black individuals are allowed to work or journey by through the day however had been implicitly or explicitly advised to go away by sundown.
“During my show, I had a white host, a Black featurer [or opener], and the crowds were so unruly,” she mentioned Tuesday. “And at one point, my Black featurer was onstage and … a guy in the crowd was like, ‘Smile, we can’t see you!’ And I was like, ‘What the fuck?’ What?”
“I walked out on the floor and looked at a server and I was like, ‘You’re not gonna say anything?’” Byer continued. “And she was like, ‘What?’ And I was like, ‘Oh my god.’ So I refused to do meet-and-greets, even though it was sold with the tickets.”
The actor recalled telling her agent she’s “just not meeting these people” because of the comment, and mentioned the obtrusive lack of repercussions “blew my mind.” Byer added that although she assumed there have been additionally “nice people” within the crowd, “I will never go back to Appleton.”
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Along with internet hosting Netlflix’s “Nailed It!” since 2018 and co-hosting TBS’s “Wipeout” alongside John Cena since 2018, Byer hosts 4 common podcasts and starred in a critically acclaimed comedy this yr.
The comedian has needed to endure a plethora of racist nonsense in her profession, nonetheless.
The comic revealed a viral social media thread in 2018 in regards to the slew of the way wherein Black individuals are handled unfairly, and later revealed in 2022 that a casting director as soon as advised her to “be Blacker” — however not “too Black” — throughout an audition.
“It is scary,” Byer advised Ferguson in regards to the Appleton incident. “That shit sucks.”
