Latest / I Choose Me with Jennie Garth / Wendi McClendon-Covey on Boundaries, Burnout and SAYING NO

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Wendi McClendon-Covey on Boundaries, Burnout and SAYING NO · I Choose Me with Jennie Garth

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: You're listening to I Choose Me with Jenny Garland.
• 0:08
  Speaker 2: Welcome to I Choose Me.
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: Okay, I'm sitting down with the hilarious and endlessly talented
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: Wendy McClendon-Covey. You know her from Bridesmaids.
• 0:21
  Speaker 2: How about that?
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: Maybe The Goldbergs. And now the hit NBC mockumentary, St.
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: Dennis Medical.
• 0:30
  Speaker 2: It's so good.
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: Wendy is a delight. She is warm and wise and wonderful,
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: and I cannot wait for this conversation. Hi.
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: How are you feeling today, Wendy McClendon-Covey?
• 0:45
  Speaker 3: I'm feeling great. You are? How are you feeling?
• 0:49
  Speaker 2: You know what?
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: I'm feeling a little jet-lagged, but it's okay.
• 0:53
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: It'll right itself.
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: You're feeling good? Is that the honest answer, or would
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: you tell me if you weren't?
• 1:00
  Speaker 4: No.
• 1:01
  Speaker 3: Yes, it's an honest answer.
• 1:03
  Speaker 2: Because you know how people are always good. People always
• 1:06
  Speaker 2: are like, how are you? Say, oh, I'm fine.
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: I'm good.
• 1:09
  Speaker 2: But you're really not.
• 1:10
  Speaker 3: Yeah, exactly. Because what are you going to do? Just
• 1:13
  Speaker 3: launch into misery. Like most of the time, people don't
• 1:16
  Speaker 3: really care when they ask you that. So you just
• 1:20
  Speaker 3: have to find and on to the next subject.
• 1:22
  Speaker 4: Right.
• 1:23
  Speaker 2: Put it on them. How are you?
• 1:25
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 1:27
  Speaker 2: That's what you did. I love that. Good job.
• 1:30
  Speaker 4: Good job.
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: Oh my gosh. Okay. So St.
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: Dennis Medical is really funny. I remember when the show
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: started showing like commercials that it was coming out and
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: I was really excited for it because I saw your
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: beautiful face and I thought, oh, well, this is probably
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: definitely going to work because you're just so talented.
• 1:51
  Speaker 3: Oh, thank you.
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: And you guys are coming back for season three.
• 1:54
  Speaker 3: Season three comes out on November 2nd.
• 1:57
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 1:58
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: Man, I know how uncertain this industry that we are
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: in can be is. So I'm just so thrilled for
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: you that you have, you know, another season pick up.
• 2:11
  Speaker 2: So congrats.
• 2:13
  Speaker 3: Thank you. Yeah, we're in the middle of that now.
• 2:15
  Speaker 3: And for some reason, we're on a month long hiatus
• 2:19
  Speaker 3: for September.
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: Interesting.
• 2:21
  Speaker 3: Which drives me nuts. It's better for me to have
• 2:24
  Speaker 3: something to do all the time. Better for my mental health.
• 2:30
  Speaker 3: Do you like to stay busy? I need to stay busy. Yeah. Yeah.
• 2:36
  Speaker 3: I have to have tasks, you know. But yeah, so
• 2:41
  Speaker 3: we're on hiatus right now. And we're lucky because we're
• 2:46
  Speaker 3: one of the only shows that's getting like a full
• 2:49
  Speaker 3: season order.
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: Whoa.
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: Okay.
• 2:52
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: That is wonderful because... And that's rare, right?
• 2:56
  Speaker 3: These days? Yeah. And you remember, it used to be
• 2:58
  Speaker 3: like 24 episodes minimum. Oh, my God.
• 3:01
  Speaker 2: We used to get pick up for 33.
• 3:02
  Speaker 3: What? Yeah.
• 3:05
  Speaker 2: Back in the 90s, that's how they did it.
• 3:07
  Speaker 3: Holy cow.
• 3:09
  Speaker 2: Can you imagine?
• 3:11
  Speaker 3: I really can't. Because 24, like your body just shuts down.
• 3:15
  Speaker 3: But 33, damn. I know.
• 3:19
  Speaker 2: It's not that way now.
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: It's like, oh, we'll pick up four more maybe.
• 3:22
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: See how that goes.
• 3:23
  Speaker 3: Yeah, we'll give you 10 and then we'll be off
• 3:26
  Speaker 3: for five years. It's so.
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: I don't know what's happening to our industry, but you're
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: still killing it.
• 3:33
  Speaker 2: So that's all I really care about.
• 3:34
  Speaker 3: Well, thanks. Yeah, knock on wood, man. How do you.
• 3:37
  Speaker 2: Okay, I love doing comedy.
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: I never thought I was a comedic actress until I
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: tried it on a sitcom and I really fell in
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: love with it. And I know it takes a lot
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: more endurance.
• 3:50
  Speaker 3: It takes.
• 3:52
  Speaker 2: Being funny is... takes a lot of energy.
• 3:55
  Speaker 3: Yes.
• 3:55
  Speaker 2: How do you muster that up every day?
• 3:57
  Speaker 3: Well, you have to let yourself be the butt of
• 4:00
  Speaker 3: the joke. And that is hard for a lot of people.
• 4:03
  Speaker 3: Is it hard for you? You have to let yourself
• 4:05
  Speaker 3: get vulnerable and you have to, you know, it's hard to,
• 4:11
  Speaker 3: it's hard to be vulnerable like that and, and let
• 4:14
  Speaker 3: yourself look stupid in real life. But for me, I
• 4:19
  Speaker 3: find it fun on a show, you know, and comedy
• 4:23
  Speaker 3: just comes from like trying to fix something that went
• 4:26
  Speaker 3: wrong and making it worse. So yeah, that's enervating. That's
• 4:32
  Speaker 3: enervating to keep making things worse and worse. But I
• 4:36
  Speaker 3: do get a kick out of it. I do get
• 4:38
  Speaker 3: a kick out of it. So I'm so glad. Yeah.
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 4:41
  Speaker 2: It's fun.
• 4:42
  Speaker 3: It's fun.
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: What are you enjoying the most about this job right
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: now at this stage of your life? Like, Because you
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: had success early on, but you had major success later
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: in your career. Yeah.
• 4:55
  Speaker 2: Than a lot of people, I would say. Yeah.
• 4:58
  Speaker 3: I didn't really get going in earnest in this career
• 5:01
  Speaker 3: until I was about 32. And once I hit my 40s,
• 5:05
  Speaker 3: it was off to the races. And that is not
• 5:08
  Speaker 3: the case a lot of times. But I had a
• 5:11
  Speaker 3: lot of big success when I hit 40 and beyond.
• 5:15
  Speaker 3: And like in my 50s, it's been pretty good. I
• 5:19
  Speaker 3: love doing this particular job because I get to channel
• 5:24
  Speaker 3: so many women that I worked with when I was
• 5:27
  Speaker 3: working regular jobs. Because as much as people in the industry,
• 5:35
  Speaker 3: like they always want, when you're pitching a show, they
• 5:37
  Speaker 3: always want people to be good at their jobs, right?
• 5:41
  Speaker 3: But the reality is most people are just kind of
• 5:44
  Speaker 3: okay at their jobs.
• 5:46
  Speaker 2: What kind of jobs are we talking?
• 5:48
  Speaker 3: Well, I worked in retail for a long time.
• 5:52
  Speaker 2: What store?
• 5:53
  Speaker 3: I worked in a jewelry store. So I sold like
• 5:56
  Speaker 3: wedding sets and tennis bracelets and watches and things like that.
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: Okay, that makes sense because you have really pretty hands.
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: Always your hands look pretty.
• 6:04
  Speaker 3: Thank you very much.
• 6:05
  Speaker 2: Thank you.
• 6:06
  Speaker 3: Yes, I do love trying on rings. It does agree
• 6:09
  Speaker 3: with me.
• 6:10
  Speaker 2: So customer front.
• 6:12
  Speaker 3: Yeah. And then I worked at this terrible hotel near Disneyland.
• 6:17
  Speaker 5: Okay.
• 6:18
  Speaker 3: It was a Ramada, Jenny.
• 6:20
  Speaker 2: No, no, no.
• 6:20
  Speaker 3: Yes, it was.
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: Okay.
• 6:22
  Speaker 2: No offense.
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: But a Ramada by Disneyland, I can only imagine.
• 6:26
  Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah.
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 6:28
  Speaker 3: It was like, it was like a trucker hotel.
• 6:33
  Speaker 2: My kind of place.
• 6:35
  Speaker 3: And the thing was, is that like my, my boss,
• 6:38
  Speaker 3: I loved her so much, but she was barely hanging on.
• 6:41
  Speaker 3: to her sanity and barely hanging on to this job
• 6:44
  Speaker 3: she was really in over her head. So I take
• 6:47
  Speaker 3: a lot of that and I channel it into Joyce.
• 6:50
  Speaker 3: And I think it works very well because Joyce is
• 6:53
  Speaker 3: trying to push this hospital uphill. She's always begging for money.
• 6:58
  Speaker 3: She thought she was getting into this for the right reasons.
• 7:00
  Speaker 3: I think a lot of healthcare people, healthcare workers, and
• 7:04
  Speaker 3: God love them, they're doing things that none of us
• 7:07
  Speaker 3: have the stomach to do. But What Joyce did was
• 7:12
  Speaker 3: she stopped being an oncologist so she could be a
• 7:14
  Speaker 3: hospital administrator. Okay. And talk about being in over your head.
• 7:19
  Speaker 3: And then what's she going to do? Leave? She can't.
• 7:21
  Speaker 3: She's still paying off her student loans.
• 7:24
  Speaker 4: You know?
• 7:25
  Speaker 3: So that's a fun balance.
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 7:28
  Speaker 3: To play.
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: I can tell. It sounds really fun because there's so
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: much you can do with that. You've said that you
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: credit your creativity and your sort of improvisational skills. to
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: having lots of free time when you were a kid
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: and playing outside and being with your sister, right? Yeah.
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: And just making shit up.
• 7:48
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: Like fun things to do out of nothing. That's just
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: the best childhood imaginable. What do you think growing up
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: that way sort of taught you about yourself and now
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: finding yourself in this industry where you kind of are
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: just making stuff up to find comedy?
• 8:06
  Speaker 3: Yeah. I think.
• 8:09
  Speaker 3: Gosh, I look back on my childhood all the time,
• 8:13
  Speaker 3: and I'm so grateful that it was the way it was.
• 8:16
  Speaker 3: It was a free-range childhood. And over the summers, our
• 8:20
  Speaker 3: grandparents would watch us. We had a clubhouse. We had
• 8:24
  Speaker 3: trunks full of costumes. We had a typewriter, so we
• 8:27
  Speaker 3: would make our own catalogs of stupid clothes that we
• 8:33
  Speaker 3: invent or whatever. We'd have parades. We just had time
• 8:37
  Speaker 3: to take something... stupid and make something out of it.
• 8:42
  Speaker 3: So that has served me well because that's what improv
• 8:47
  Speaker 3: is just taking on a character and, and speaking as them.
• 8:51
  Speaker 3: And kids are really good at that. Yeah. Kids are
• 8:54
  Speaker 3: great with that. And at some point we kind of
• 8:57
  Speaker 3: have it drummed out of us that like, Oh, stop
• 8:59
  Speaker 3: doing that. Stop doing that. But we all have imaginations and,
• 9:05
  Speaker 3: And we've all kind of gone on this journey before
• 9:09
  Speaker 3: of like trying to pull something creative out of ourselves. And,
• 9:12
  Speaker 3: you know, I've noticed a lot of times on sets.
• 9:16
  Speaker 3: When say you're in an office, you're playing that you're
• 9:20
  Speaker 3: in an office, sometimes you're people don't know what to do. Like, well,
• 9:24
  Speaker 3: what do I do? I work in an office. What
• 9:26
  Speaker 3: does that mean? Well, what do you mean? You don't
• 9:29
  Speaker 3: know what that means. You shuffle papers, you file files,
• 9:31
  Speaker 3: you answer the phone. Exactly. You answer the phone. Like
• 9:35
  Speaker 3: I remember working in an office and I had my,
• 9:38
  Speaker 3: my regimen every day. I'd sit down, I'd arrange my
• 9:41
  Speaker 3: desk just so that I'd put on my lotion, my
• 9:44
  Speaker 3: cucumber melon lotion. And then I'd start looking up, you know,
• 9:48
  Speaker 3: the receipts for the night or whatever. But like, You're
• 9:51
  Speaker 3: always doing something.
• 9:53
  Speaker 4: Now, granted, a lot of times when you work in
• 9:55
  Speaker 4: an office, you're just trying to drag out the day.
• 9:57
  Speaker 2: Get the hours over.
• 10:01
  Speaker 3: You're just trying to make it to lunch without being
• 10:04
  Speaker 3: totally bored. But, you know, because I got to do that,
• 10:08
  Speaker 3: I'm able to fill the space. When I take on
• 10:13
  Speaker 3: these characters, I can at least like. Imagine, you know. Yeah,
• 10:18
  Speaker 3: I can incredibly work in a restaurant or a kitchen
• 10:23
  Speaker 3: or a bar or something like that. You know what
• 10:25
  Speaker 3: I mean? Because I just I got to pretend to
• 10:27
  Speaker 3: do those things. That's all it is, is pretending and
• 10:31
  Speaker 3: make believe. Right.
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: And continuing to do them, even though you were having
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: success in your career and getting jobs, but you.
• 10:37
  Speaker 2: Kept your backup job, I heard.
• 10:39
  Speaker 3: I did. I kept that job.
• 10:40
  Speaker 2: Smart lady. very practical of you.
• 10:43
  Speaker 5: Yeah yeah you gotta have your income coming in I'm
• 10:47
  Speaker 5: sorry you I mean yeah yeah this is a flaky
• 10:49
  Speaker 5: business so I kept my my side job until 2013
• 10:54
  Speaker 5: when I got.
• 10:55
  Speaker 3: The Goldbergs and then it was impossible to do both
• 10:59
  Speaker 3: so um but it it worked out and I'm glad
• 11:03
  Speaker 3: I did that because it um you know I was
• 11:05
  Speaker 3: editing a social work journal and social workers do not
• 11:10
  Speaker 3: have it easy so reading their stories kind of kept
• 11:16
  Speaker 3: things in check for me. Like, look at you, you
• 11:19
  Speaker 3: get to go do these crazy make them ups and
• 11:22
  Speaker 3: people pay you. These are people who are fighting the
• 11:25
  Speaker 3: good fight every day and they make so little money,
• 11:29
  Speaker 3: but they're doing things for the right reasons.
• 11:32
  Speaker 4: You shut up forever and don't act like, you know, any,
• 11:36
  Speaker 4: anything about this is hard.
• 11:37
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 11:38
  Speaker 2: You know, No, it's so true. I mean, it puts
• 11:40
  Speaker 2: it in perspective.
• 11:42
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: You have to take the time, though, to put it
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: into perspective. Otherwise, you might just lose, you know, your
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: sense of gratitude.
• 11:52
  Speaker 2: Exactly.
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: One thing we talk about all the time on this
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: podcast is that true confidence isn't about being perfect. It's
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: about owning who you are unapologetically. And that is exactly
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: what Wendy McClendon Covey exudes. That is just who she is.
• 12:15
  Speaker 2: And you know what?
• 12:16
  Speaker 1: We all deserve to choose ourselves. And I really do
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: believe that sometimes that starts with something as simple as
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: getting dressed in the morning, deciding what you want to wear,
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: how you want to show up.
• 12:30
  Speaker 3: To the world.
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: And that is why I created Me by Jenny Garth.
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: Our designs are here to help women feel confident, comfortable,
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: and effortlessly stylish at every stage of life, no matter
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: how old you are or how young you are. So
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: if you're ready to refresh your wardrobe like I know
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: you need to, because I always need to too, head
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: over to QVC.com and explore Me by Jenny Garth. Just
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: type it into the search bar. Check out our newest
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: collections and styling tips by following us on Instagram at
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: me by Jenny Garth.
• 13:08
  Speaker 2: I hope you love it.
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: So choosing the practical way of doing things, keeping your
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: jobs until you got, you know, set up enough. Do
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: you think that sort of shaped you for the career
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: that you've now built?
• 13:24
  Speaker 3: I think so because, you know, it's never... smart to
• 13:29
  Speaker 3: put all your eggs in one basket.
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 13:33
  Speaker 3: For me, I never wanted to be one of those people,
• 13:38
  Speaker 3: not that there's anything wrong with it, but I never
• 13:40
  Speaker 3: wanted to hate acting. And sometimes when you are feeling
• 13:46
  Speaker 3: stuck and you feel like you have to just take
• 13:48
  Speaker 3: the next job, regardless of whether you even want it.
• 13:53
  Speaker 3: I didn't want, it to be like that. So I
• 13:55
  Speaker 3: felt like, no, we gotta be, we've gotta be prudent
• 13:59
  Speaker 3: about this. We've gotta be smart and we've gotta thread
• 14:02
  Speaker 3: the needle a certain way so that when I am working,
• 14:07
  Speaker 3: I know this is gonna be stable for the most part.
• 14:12
  Speaker 2: Does that make sense? As stable as it can be.
• 14:13
  Speaker 3: Yeah, as stable as it can be. Like I never
• 14:16
  Speaker 3: wanna have to, I just don't wanna have to take
• 14:20
  Speaker 3: something that I don't wanna take.
• 14:22
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that is a blessing.
• 14:23
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 14:24
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 14:24
  Speaker 3: Yeah. I've been pretty lucky.
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: That is great for you. So you started at Groundlings,
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: which is pretty cool.
• 14:33
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: You were in there playing makeup with Kristen Wiig and
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: Melissa McCarthy, just to name a couple.
• 14:40
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: What did those early days teach you? Because was that
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: your first time doing improv?
• 14:47
  Speaker 3: That was my first time doing improv. And it was
• 14:50
  Speaker 3: I got started with them while I was working at
• 14:53
  Speaker 3: the shitty hotel in Anaheim.
• 14:55
  Speaker 2: Perfect.
• 14:56
  Speaker 3: So my my friend who had been my friend since
• 14:59
  Speaker 3: junior high, I'm still we're still good friends. But she
• 15:02
  Speaker 3: and I were working in the back office of this
• 15:04
  Speaker 3: hotel and thinking like, this cannot be our lives. Please, God, no,
• 15:11
  Speaker 3: there has to be something else. So we had gone
• 15:14
  Speaker 3: to see some shows at the Groundlings and thought, oh,
• 15:16
  Speaker 3: my God, this is the greatest thing in the world.
• 15:18
  Speaker 3: What if we did this? What if we tried to
• 15:21
  Speaker 3: do this? So it took me years to pick up
• 15:25
  Speaker 3: the phone and sign up for classes. I actually made
• 15:28
  Speaker 3: her do it for me because my hand was shaking
• 15:30
  Speaker 3: so bad. Why was I nervous to just call?
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: Because that's scary to go on a stage and put yourself.
• 15:38
  Speaker 2: Out there like that.
• 15:38
  Speaker 3: Put yourself out there, yeah.
• 15:41
  Speaker 2: And look like an idiot. Most of the time. Yeah.
• 15:45
  Speaker 3: But then once you look like an idiot, it never
• 15:47
  Speaker 3: feels as bad.
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: No, it makes you less afraid of ever being an idiot.
• 15:53
  Speaker 2: It's perfectly okay to be an idiot.
• 15:56
  Speaker 3: It's important to do that. Like just jump off the
• 15:59
  Speaker 3: diving board. The tricks your mind plays on you that
• 16:06
  Speaker 3: makes it so bad. But once you do it, it's like, ah,
• 16:08
  Speaker 3: I survived. I wasn't that bad. you know, but we
• 16:13
  Speaker 3: were such nerds. And we were taking this class that
• 16:17
  Speaker 3: was only on Saturdays. And sometimes we would get so
• 16:20
  Speaker 3: nervous driving up there from Long Beach, where I still live.
• 16:24
  Speaker 3: We would drive all the way up there and drive
• 16:26
  Speaker 3: right past it and just go home.
• 16:30
  Speaker 2: But that's a good two hours right there.
• 16:32
  Speaker 3: Yeah, exactly. But we kept going. And at one point,
• 16:36
  Speaker 3: she was told to repeat a level. And I kept
• 16:39
  Speaker 3: going and she just stopped, which is You know, a
• 16:42
  Speaker 3: travesty for the world. She should have stayed with it.
• 16:45
  Speaker 3: But I stayed and things kind of just started snowballing
• 16:49
  Speaker 3: from there. And, you know, I've been pretty lucky since.
• 16:52
  Speaker 2: So great. Such a great success story.
• 17:01
  Speaker 3: Okay.
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: You have this incredible sort of sense of yourself that
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: it just kind of exudes.
• 17:08
  Speaker 2: Like, you know who you are. And especially... in.
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: An industry that's constantly telling women to fit a certain mold,
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: you refuse.
• 17:21
  Speaker 2: I know the whole thing, your.
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: Bridesmaids, co-stars got all dressed up and went to the
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: Oscars and you were in bed recovering from what I
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: call an I choose me moment.
• 17:32
  Speaker 5: Yes.
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: A very important one to you. I love it so much.
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: I want to know about Leading up to the decision, because,
• 17:41
  Speaker 1: you know, that was a big decision for you. I
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: want to know what was going on in your head
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: before you made that decision.
• 17:49
  Speaker 3: Before I decided to get my face messed with or
• 17:54
  Speaker 3: before I went to, before I declined to go to
• 17:57
  Speaker 3: the Oscars.
• 17:58
  Speaker 2: So before you made the decision to get the operation.
• 18:00
  Speaker 3: Yeah. I, you know, I'll be 57 next month. So
• 18:05
  Speaker 3: it's not like I.
• 18:06
  Speaker 2: You look like you're 42.
• 18:08
  Speaker 3: You're very nice.
• 18:09
  Speaker 2: Give me that doctor's number.
• 18:13
  Speaker 3: But I had been looking at myself on St. Dennis
• 18:18
  Speaker 3: and especially doing ADR. And for those at home, additional
• 18:23
  Speaker 3: dialogue recording. Okay. So that means when you go in,
• 18:25
  Speaker 3: you look at yourself on a giant screen. Nothing has
• 18:29
  Speaker 3: been color corrected. So you look like a nightmare. And
• 18:34
  Speaker 3: your face is as big as it can be. And
• 18:37
  Speaker 3: I couldn't stand what I looked like. And I said,
• 18:40
  Speaker 3: you know what? I don't need to look younger. I
• 18:45
  Speaker 3: just don't want to look like I'm melting from the
• 18:48
  Speaker 3: jaw down. Like I can't stand it. I deserve to
• 18:52
  Speaker 3: do something about this. And I don't care what anybody thinks.
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: And you just knew that it was right for you.
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: Do you think that you maybe made that decision? I mean,
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: it had to have entered your mind, like. you know,
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: what the industry tells us as women we're supposed to
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: look like and how, you know, it's kind of like
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: an occupational hazard that we have to age gracefully, perfectly,
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: and still, you know, get up and look great for
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: TV or whatever work we're doing. I mean, you had
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: to have felt that conflict inside too.
• 19:27
  Speaker 3: I did too.
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: Because don't you want to just like be like our
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: moms and just age?
• 19:31
  Speaker 3: Yeah. I wish I could go one day without hating
• 19:36
  Speaker 3: how I look.
• 19:37
  Speaker 2: Okay. I want that for you.
• 19:40
  Speaker 3: I want that for all of us. I know. But
• 19:42
  Speaker 3: the thing is, is that, you know, being in this industry,
• 19:48
  Speaker 3: we have to look at ourselves online. all the freaking
• 19:50
  Speaker 3: time and we have to read the comments.
• 19:54
  Speaker 2: Oh, it's hard.
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: It would be one thing if only other people were
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: looking at us and we didn't have to look at ourselves.
• 20:00
  Speaker 3: Exactly. I can't stand looking at pictures of myself.
• 20:04
  Speaker 2: I don't want to.
• 20:05
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 20:05
  Speaker 2: Nobody wants to see that.
• 20:07
  Speaker 3: Yeah. And, I've gotten the whole rap from certain people about, well,
• 20:15
  Speaker 3: you should just age gracefully. Okay. Well, here's the thing,
• 20:21
  Speaker 3: Debbie Downer. I don't find aging gracefully to mean that
• 20:29
  Speaker 3: I get to make fun of myself for the rest
• 20:32
  Speaker 3: of my life. Like a lot of women turn themselves
• 20:35
  Speaker 3: into an unfunny comedy routine that they keep doing. Until,
• 20:41
  Speaker 3: you know, they're in the grave. Is that aging gracefully?
• 20:45
  Speaker 3: Because I think that's stinky. The people in my family
• 20:48
  Speaker 3: live until their early hundreds. So what am I going
• 20:51
  Speaker 3: to do? I'm 57.
• 20:52
  Speaker 4: So the next, you know, 40 years, I'm going to
• 20:56
  Speaker 4: be like, oh, here.
• 20:57
  Speaker 3: Comes droopy dog. You know, here I am with my saggy,
• 21:04
  Speaker 3: jowly face.
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: No.
• 21:06
  Speaker 3: No. I get to do what I want. And so
• 21:09
  Speaker 3: I did it. And I've never been more happy with
• 21:12
  Speaker 3: a decision. I just don't care what anybody says about
• 21:16
  Speaker 3: it because I'm so happy with it. I don't think
• 21:19
  Speaker 3: I look younger. I just look like my neck isn't
• 21:22
  Speaker 3: about to escape from my body.
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: But I love it that you are talking about doing
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: something just for yourself because of how you felt when
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: you looked at you.
• 21:33
  Speaker 2: And did it come.
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: To your mind, like, I've got to stay hireable, like,
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: I've got to give the people what they want, you know,
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: all that conflicting messaging that goes on?
• 21:44
  Speaker 3: Well, luckily for me, I'm a character actress. And when
• 21:50
  Speaker 3: I came on the scene, I was playing Deputy Clementine Johnson,
• 21:55
  Speaker 3: who was a small-time... slut you know so much like
• 21:59
  Speaker 3: it's not like I burst onto the scene being gorgeous
• 22:03
  Speaker 3: no one's ever thought of me like that I thought of.
• 22:05
  Speaker 2: You as gorgeous playing that character.
• 22:08
  Speaker 3: Well she's real specific she was hot she's real specific
• 22:12
  Speaker 3: you know um never fit into her outfits no I
• 22:16
  Speaker 3: loved it nosaging out but that's a specific lady and
• 22:21
  Speaker 3: we all know that lady we all have her as
• 22:23
  Speaker 3: an aunt Like, hey, I wore these size six pants
• 22:27
  Speaker 3: in high school. If I can get them on my body,
• 22:30
  Speaker 3: I'm wearing them. I don't care if I'm, you know,
• 22:33
  Speaker 3: bulging out. It doesn't matter. You know, that that was
• 22:37
  Speaker 3: Clemmie's mindset. But basically, like I never played great beauties.
• 22:42
  Speaker 3: So that was fine. I can get as fat and
• 22:45
  Speaker 3: ugly as I want and I'll still work. You know,
• 22:48
  Speaker 3: I went through full menopause. On the Goldbergs. And boy,
• 22:51
  Speaker 3: did I get to hear about it from Twitter. Oh
• 22:54
  Speaker 3: my God, drink some water. Why are you so puffy? Like,
• 22:59
  Speaker 3: you know, and these are women saying that. So the
• 23:02
  Speaker 3: thing is, is no one's ever going to be happy
• 23:05
  Speaker 3: with you. And yet they're not thinking about you that much.
• 23:10
  Speaker 2: Just in that moment. Yeah, exactly. And the most important
• 23:13
  Speaker 2: thing is that you are thinking about you.
• 23:16
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 23:17
  Speaker 2: You love what you see in the mirror.
• 23:19
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: Whether you've gotten a little work done or not, who cares?
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: But I just love that you were like, yeah, I
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: didn't go to the Oscars because I was in bed
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: with that thing around your neck.
• 23:30
  Speaker 3: Yeah. And also, they didn't ask us to go to
• 23:34
  Speaker 3: like three weeks prior.
• 23:36
  Speaker 2: You already had it scheduled.
• 23:38
  Speaker 3: You know how hard that is to get a dress
• 23:41
  Speaker 3: in that amount of time.
• 23:42
  Speaker 4: Okay.
• 23:42
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 23:44
  Speaker 2: That's last minute, Larry, invitation. I don't care for that.
• 23:47
  Speaker 3: And you know what? Skip me. It's okay.
• 23:49
  Speaker 2: If it's happening, it'll happen again, maybe.
• 23:51
  Speaker 3: Who knows? It'll happen again if it's supposed to. And
• 23:54
  Speaker 3: if not, that's fine too.
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: I can't get enough of listening to you and taking
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: in your energy and your wisdom. Thank you so much.
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: There's more of this great conversation. Part two with Wendy
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: McClendon Covey is coming soon. And if you haven't already,
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: please subscribe to this podcast so you never miss an episode.