The star of romantic comedy Obvious Child , the Sundance darling about to hit theaters, opens up about her anxieties and what really went wrong on Saturday Night Live .
Photograph by Jessica Chou for BuzzFeed
Jenny Slate sat on a couch in her cozy Los Feliz bungalow and nervously tucked, untucked, and retucked pieces of hair behind her ears while a photographer tried to position her.
"I'm sorry," Slate said, laughing. "I'm really fidgety. I feel like I have 50 hairstyles a day." Her two small dogs, Reggie and Arthur, sat dutifully next to her on the couch. "I fidget and change my outfit a lot. It's really a way of keeping myself comfortable."
She's not just fidgety with her hair, though. She often interrupts her own thoughts with other thoughts, or breaks mid-sentence to address one of her dogs. ("Arthur, stop!" was a common theme.) For someone as accomplished as Slate — the Sundance film Obvious Child, in which she stars, hits theaters June 6, and she recently booked a recurring role on FX's new summer comedy Married — she's surprisingly anxious.
That restlessness and pressure to be in constant motion are possibly why Slate has been so successful as an actress. It's been two years since the 32-year-old comedian moved from Brooklyn to Los Angeles, but in those years a lot has happened for her, career-wise. She's had recurring roles as morally reprehensible rich girl Mona Lisa on NBC's Parks and Recreation, no-nonsense Sarah on House of Lies, and hilariously on-point reality star-publicist Liz B. on The Kroll Show, and also lent her voice to Fox's subversive animated comedy Bob's Burgers.
"I have a big thing about needing to know that I belong — in my group of friends, in my family, in my industry," Slate said of moving to Los Angeles. "And so being here and being able to work more, because there are more jobs, tightened my grip — my control grip — and so my anxiety became less. I became happier and then I could do more."
Before moving to Los Angeles, Slate was most often referred to as being "best known for saying the f-word on Saturday Night Live." It's what reporters misguidedly attribute as the reason she was let go from the show. (More on that later.)
But her latest role in Obvious Child, which critics are saying deserves a "deserves a universal round of applause," as Donna — a twentysomething comedian who gets pregnant after a drunken one-night stand — could be the mark of not just a significant change in her career, but one in her own confidence as a performer. It could be the role that takes her from being the girl who said "fuck" on SNL, to being the next Kristen Wiig.
Photograph by Jessica Chou for BuzzFeed
Despite her omnipresent anxiety, Slate is a person who was practically born to play the starring role. She grew up in Milton, Mass., in what she described as a "giant haunted house." She's the middle daughter to two artists — her father an award-winning poet, her mother a potter.
"My parents really encouraged us to be creative," she said. Sun poured through the bay windows of her living room and highlighted an etched glass image of a chicken that leaned against a wall. Her husband, filmmaker Dean Fleischer-Camp, made it for their first Valentine's Day, a nod to a nickname he gave her. "There were shitloads of art projects going on all the time."
Slate described herself as a "classic middle" child. "I need a lot of attention," she said. "Very performative." While her older and younger sister chose different career paths, one an educator and one a nurse practitioner, Slate seemed to know from a young age what her life would entail.
"I always loved to sing and was very, very loud," she said. "I wanted to be a movie star, like Judy Garland."
Along with being a classic middle child, she was also a classic overachiever. In high school, she performed in plays, was the class president, and sang in an a capella group. Between her junior and senior year, she attended the Cherubs program at Northwestern — a competitive pre-college preparatory summer program — and was eventually accepted into Columbia University for undergrad.
"I wanted to be in New York because I wanted to be on SNL. I spent a lot of time wanting to be on Saturday Night Live as a kid. That's what I wanted," she said wistfully. "I went to a competitive private school, and it was in my mind-set that I wanted to be an Ivy Leaguer."
Rather than attend an acting conservatory, Slate chose to study English and comparative literature. "My parents put such a focus on being an educated woman, and being educated in many different ways."
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