Emma Schwartz, staff writer
Bryn Mawr alumna Kady Ruth Ashcraft is a writer, comedian and filmmaker living in Brooklyn, New York. While at Bryn Mawr, Ashcraft majored in English, was a part of the Lighted Fools, worked in admissions and at Uncommon Grounds Café and took comedy classes at Chicago’s Second City as her own version of study abroad.
Since graduating in 2012, Ashcraft has written and directed films that have have been selected by the New York Television Festival, Women in Comedy Festival and the NYC Pop Up Film Festival, written for publications such as Funny or Die, McSweeney’s, Jezebel, the Hairpin and more, co-created a satirical lifestyle brand called Olive & Lark, been a guest on podcasts such as Las Culturistas and Seek Treatment and participated in a printmaking residency at Paper Machine. Although she doesn’t do many live performances, she is part of what some would call “The Brooklyn Alt Comedy Scene.” When we spoke, Ashcraft discussed the underrated art of nice comedy and indulging in inefficiency.
What’s something that made you laugh recently?
I’m a huge fan of that podcast, Straightiolab. Ayo Edebiri was guest hosting this week, and I was crying on the train listening to them. That was the last thing that really made me have to try and control myself. Another episode that got me recently was Sarah Squirm’s.
You have a very funny, interesting, and specific world of characters in your pieces and I’m just wondering, who are some of your favorite characters you’ve created, and what details make them who they are?
Let’s see, I’d say, in my short film “Ramsey,” Ramsey’s friend Rachel is one of my favorites. She’s played by Edy Modica, who’s…a comedic genius. Everyone I work with is a comedic genius. I just love them all. And then I have a short film, “Affirmations” where Tallie Medel plays this sort of new agey infomercial host. Those two kind of stand out as ones I love. Also, in Ramsey, Pat Regan‘s aggressive, homophobic, anti-woman canvasser is a fun one.
I guess I like these characters where there’s a real tension between how they think they’re coming across and how they’re actually being perceived. Or sometimes there’s no tension because they’re so polar opposites of each other. But I guess that’s sort of fun for me. Like, does this person think they’re coming across really authoritatively and they’re not? Does this person think they have control of the situation and everyone else thinks they’re a joke? That’s a really interesting tension for me to have fun with because I think a lot of comedy comes from that.
I definitely agree. Another thing I love about your videos is that they’re very aesthetically pleasing. Do you ever find it challenging to make things that are artistically appealing while not overly self-serious and still funny? Or do you find that those things aren’t actually at odds with one another?
So in a very practical sense, you can just make something very beautiful, and that is fun. And then, if I’m digging deeper, I think that beauty and humor aren’t at odds with each other if our perspective on that beauty is positioned right. So a beautiful woman on a magazine cover itself isn’t funny, but then humor can come from seeing the high powered fan positioned on her blowing her hair and then the tape holding her face back, and we can peel away at what some of our notions of beauty are.
So there’s that aspect of it. But then there are things that are just genuinely very beautiful, and in order to create or recognize something as beautiful, it’s really vulnerable because you’re just like, ‘isn’t this nice?’ There’s no sarcasm to hide behind it. And I think comedy plays in with that because so much of comedy is experimenting with vulnerability.
How do you think comedy and other art forms can intertwine/overlap?
So comedy is always the ugly stepsister of art. I feel like it isn’t taken as seriously, but that’s also what I think is really exciting. Right now, there’s so much cool, great comedy, and people are expanding the form and making things that are really beautiful and intense and also really funny. I mean, PEN15. That last season finale: I’m sobbing. I’m laughing. I’m like, ‘How do they fit it all in one?’ So I think we have to get rid of this notion that those things can’t coexist. There’s a really great documentary called Beauty is Embarrassing. Admittedly, it’s aged a little weird, but it’s a documentary about the head puppeteer from Pee-wee’s Playhouse. His name is Wayne White, and he talks about how the art world is really afraid of humor, and they look down on it.
I also do a lot of printmaking, and my printmaking has a lot of comedy, and that’s been really fun for me because anything that takes itself as seriously as art should be made fun of.
One thing I was thinking about while listening to you talk is how both comedy and art are about noticing things, and seeing beauty is also about noticing things. It’s so interesting because oftentimes comedy that is thought of as political is very explicitly defined like ‘this is political satire,’ and it’s just sort of a direct way of pointing out things, but I think comedy, and I really see this in your work, points out and notices so many different things at so many different levels.
Totally, and sometimes you can indulge in things just being goofy. Like, sometimes when things are like, ‘Oh, this is a satire of this specifically,’ there’s an efficiency in that, which is really cool, but also, that efficiency is like capitalistic in the sense that every effort needs to have a reward at the end. And something that’s really fun is being like, ‘Oh, I’m just going to make a stop motion video about this feeling that I had’, and that’s a very indulgent thing to do. The studios aren’t calling me up because I made a stop motion video, but it was still so satisfying to make. So I think indulging in those things can be kind of anti-capitalist.
Another thing I like to make in my comedy is the feeling of niceness, which is seen as a not very intense emotion and art is like supposed to be full of intense emotions, and things are supposed to disgust you or outrage you or you become obsessed over. There’s this pattern of really strong language that I think social media helps amplify, and in order to get noticed in the worlds that we’re in, it helps to be extreme. But I like the feeling of niceness, or pleasantness, and I like to think sometimes my work is trying to examine that but also just revel in that. And also, those feelings of niceness and pleasantness don’t happen accidentally. They’re very curated on my part of like, ‘what would be something that feels very lovely and sweet?’ I don’t know how much you want, but I can get into it.
Go for it.
Yeah. Cool. I came up through UCB, rest in peace, and in comedy, the format of a comedy sketch is very masculine. It is almost like, what’s the word I’m trying to look for? It’s linear, and it’s projectile…. It’s ejaculatory. Like funny, funnier, funniest, funniest! That’s how you’re told to write sketches. It’s how you’re told to do punch lines. It’s how you’re taught to do your standup sets. It’s like, your closer is your biggest laugh, and it’s literally this ejaculation at the end of it.
Absolutely. Another thing I love about your work is the way you explore capitalism. In what ways do you think comedy is a good way to comment on and/or process living under capitalism?
First of all, thank you. I hope I’m wrong, but I don’t think capitalism is going anywhere anytime soon, so you gotta make do with the insanity of it. Being sold things is so funny. I think it’s seeing the farce of being sold things. Especially in this era we’re in right now where we’re just being sold so many emotions or being sold ‘this is how you should be feeling about yourself.’ In my stop motion video ‘On My Cardboard Phone,’ part of that was talking about the Parade underwear. You gotta think about the meeting at Parade that was like, ‘OK, there’s this group of people who are really active online, and they’re all sort of narcissists, and we can definitely get them to pose in our underwear for zero dollars if we just send them underwear.’
…[W]ith the Parade underwear, I remember thinking both ‘this is stupid that everyone was being sent underwear’, and I was pissed that I wasn’t being sent underwear. I was like, ‘guess I’m not cool enough’. And then being like, ‘Kady, you would not pose in your underwear and put it on Instagram.’ That’s just not my personal wheelhouse. I felt the range of those emotions, and then it’s like, ‘what does it mean to have cool underwear?’ So I’d say my main reason is not something overtly political. It’s more just to protect my own sanity and also dissect how affected I am by it too.
I want to ask, what would the “comedy world” look like in your dream world? What would you keep about the way it is now, and what would you change?
Ooh, that’s a good question. I mean, admittedly, especially because of the pandemic, I’m not going to as many live shows and stuff, and I’m definitely more involved with, like, the comedy film world, so that’s not always as social as the comedy world, but, I think there are some friend groups within the comedy scene that are so good at going to everyone’s shows, hyping up their friends, and I wish there was more of that. I think a comedy world where people are just generous with their time and their ideas is a really beautiful thing…This is said a lot, but there’s not a limited amount of seats at the table. Every year there’s a new platform that opens up or you can do your own show or whatever it is. So I think my ideal comedy would just be banishing that lie that there’s a finite amount of opportunities. And also, there’s an infinite amount of ways to express your comedy. That’s something I thought about a lot when I was doing this artist’s residency in New Orleans last month where I was doing a lot of letterpress printing and pressure printing and stuff. For so long, I beat myself up about not being great at being on stage or being like, ‘Oh, standup is not my thing. I have to be good at stand up.’ And it’s like, ‘No, I could be good at collages.’ It’s just about remembering and reminding myself of the abundance of time and art and humor.
Well, you’re definitely embodying that generosity by taking the time to meet with me today. I very much appreciate it. Lastly, a few names have already come up, but who are some of your favorite comedians right now?
Everyone that I said earlier- so funny. I listen to Straightiolab every week. That is my current podcast obsession. I just think they’re [Sam Taggart & George Civeris] the funniest people. Let’s see, my friend Alise Morales, I just love her stuff. I love her podcast. My friend Milly Tamarez. She just makes me laugh so hard. Her Twitter is so good. She has this Steve Harvey show where she dresses up as Steve Harvey. It’s so dumb, and I mean that in the best way possible. She’s brilliant. And then Kati Skelton. Her short films are just so dark and funny, and they have such a grasp of tone, so anything she puts out, I’m just like, ‘This is perfect.’
Find more of Kady Ruth Ashcraft’s work by following her on Instagram (@kadyrabbits) where she posts updates about her work or by checking out her Vimeo. You can also find her reporting work at Jezebel.
This interview was conducted in February, 2022, and our conversation has been edited for length and clarity.
