Greg Staffa 0:00

You're listening to the Staffa Corner Podcast, a Staffatarian look at entertainment and life with your host, Greg Staffa. My guest today is the talented comedian Victoria Jackson. She's had a long history of starting that live and even going back as far as Johnny Carson, where she appeared 20 times. Victoria, thanks for joining us today.

Victoria Jackson 0:39

Well, thank you for having me.

Greg Staffa 0:41

So let's start from the very beginning. What got you involved in comedy?

Victoria Jackson 0:45

Hmm. Well, my first rem memory of comedy is I was a gymnast. Can you hear all the banging in the background?

Greg Staffa 0:54

No.

Victoria Jackson 0:55

Okay. I was my dad was a gymnastics coach, and I was working out at Day Junior College on my purple Eatard covered with sweat, doing thousand sit-ups because that's what we did. It was a family business. We competed on the balance beam and the bars and everything, Florex. And I looked around the bleachers, and there was this woman setting up a microphone and doing a sound check. And it was Lily Tomlin. And oh, sorry about the drilling. Ah, you can hear that, right?

Greg Staffa 1:36

I heard a quick stomp. That's it.

Victoria Jackson 1:42

Anyway, so I thought, what is she doing? And she told a joke or something. I went, wait a minute, she's from Laughing. She's gonna do stand-up comedy in front of an audience tonight. And I thought, wow, that is so cool to get paid for making people laugh. And I it just stuck in the back of my head. And I thought, that sounds a lot more fun than doing a thousand sit-ups. And what is the future of a gymnast? All you can be is a coach, there's no future in it. Even if you win the Olympics, you're you get on a you get on a cereal box and then you're coached. That's it. You peak at 15, you know, 14. So then I copied her uh album, her Edith Ann by David's Edith Ann. I'm five and a half years old. I'd never asked to be bored. If I did, Baba would have said no. I copied that for a high school language arts festival, and I won. And I think that was my first taste of comedy.

Greg Staffa 2:47

Wow, you can't go wrong with Lily Tomlin. Several years ago, even before I started doing this, I was an extra on Prairie Home Companion with her and Meryl Streep, and it was a closed set because 99% of the the movie was shot in a theater, and so there's only like 20 of us extras. And so in between takes, Lily and Meryl would just like kind of hang out with us, and just a wonderful, wonderful woman.

Victoria Jackson 3:20

I'm really sorry about that. I'm gonna go to my car so you don't hear noise.

Greg Staffa 3:24

I can edit it out too.

Victoria Jackson 3:27

That's so sweet.

Greg Staffa 3:28

Yeah, the uh sorry about that.

Victoria Jackson 3:36

Hey, you should leave all the noise in. I'll make it like a real interview.

Greg Staffa 3:40

There we go.

Victoria Jackson 3:42

So um, yeah, and then later on, about when I was uh in the eight 1982, I was trying to make up a stand-up comedy routine. Um, I went to the comedy store in LA, I was trying to be an actress. I didn't have an agent or anything, and I on open mic night at one in the morning was my slot. I didn't have any act, and I thought I'll just do Lily Tom and do the damn because that's all I know that's funny. And I did it. There was only three men in the audience, three drunk Japanese businessmen. And and after I finished my three minutes, I was walking out, and Mitzi, the famous owner of the comedy store on sunset, she said, You never do someone else's material, especially if they're alive. And I was like, Oh, I I didn't know, like I didn't know anything, and I was like, Oh, I have to make up my own jokes, okay. So then I started working on that, and and for two years, I every night at the Variety Art Center, I I tried to work on six minutes for Johnny Carson, and finally one night his town scout came in and said, Would you like to be on the tonight show?

Greg Staffa 5:11

Well, and then you went on to do it 19 other times after that. What was that like you went on to do it 19 other times after that? What was that like?

Victoria Jackson 5:21

Well, it was I was so happy Johnny got me because I don't think Letterman got me, uh, but Johnny gave me the okay sign after my first time, and then I knew I would have a career. They said if Johnny likes you, you'll have a career. So um, what was it like? Um, every time I was on, I had to do a pre-interview and try to scrape up something funny about my life to talk about at the panel. And I was uh trying to be an actress, so there was a lot of good stories. Being 20 in Hollywood, and um there I was dating and then married a fire eater. So and he played the piano for me on on Johnny Carson a couple times. So yeah, it was very fun, and I think that's how Lauren Michaels must have seen me, and that's why he gave me an audition for Saturday Night Live.

Greg Staffa 6:15

Wow. And so you know, I mean, uh I it sounds easy looking back on it, but it sounds like once you realize you had to do your own jokes, you kind of had a real I mean, compared to other up-and-coming comics, I'm sure you had some ups and downs, but it sounds like you kind of knew what you wanted and jumped into it and just remained focused and got what you wanted.

Victoria Jackson 6:37

Is that it does look like that. Looking back, it it it does look like that. My dad said I was a Christian raised in a Christian home, but my dad said Christianity and show business don't mix very well. But if that's what you want to do, give it a hundred percent. So I did. I gave it a hundred and fifty percent for about ten years, and then I will really long to have a a husband and children. So, like the cliche, I kind of put that on the back burner to have kids, you know.

Greg Staffa 7:14

Now looking back at what you're doing, I mean that's a that's an insightful thing, and growing up in a Catholic family, I can see a parent saying that that you know, that jolt comedy and and don't mix. So looking back, was he I mean, there is that path you can go down, but at the same time, there's lots of comedians that didn't go that that route of being vulgar, and I mean even your material, I don't I can't recall much of anything, you know, outlandish that is so was he right or was he an element of right, or looking back on his words, what do you think about that?

Victoria Jackson 7:49

Oh good question. Um well uh they uh they can't they can X. It's because if you're a woman in your 20s and you want to be an actress, they're gonna want you to be naked. Uh especially nowadays. When in the 80s, I you know, I turned down a couple roles for that. Um and they and nowadays, oh my goodness, all the streaming stuff, most of it is not biblical, most of it's kind of satanic. So if I was 20 now, I'd it'd be super hard to find a role in acting. In stand-up, you can say whatever you want, which is the beauty of it. And there are comedians who are clean. I'm clean, I don't say bad words. Stand up, you can be clean. Acting, it's challenging because they either want you to be naked or do something compromising to your faith. Because I've thought about it a lot. You know, stories are more interesting when there's bad guys and good guys. If everybody's good, it's kind of a boring story, right? So, but in the olden days in the black and white movies, they had bad guys and good guys, they didn't show any nudity or say bad words, right?

Greg Staffa 9:07

True.

Victoria Jackson 9:08

So it can be done, and it is being done, and there are great things being done.

Greg Staffa 9:14

But I also look at, you know, going back to your laugh or not laughing days, candid camera days, you know, the kind of humor that was drawn from back then. You know, you you weren't poking fun at people, you were laughing with people. And I almost wondered, could you know the some of the stuff that you did on candid camera be done today just because that's not what audience was.

Victoria Jackson 9:36

I was bad about the candid camera thing. So our big treat was going to my grandmother's and watching her TV once a week. And when my parents went on a date, I remember candid camera as like it was magical to us just because you know TV was magical. But um, I felt bad being on it because they had me playing a doctor and I was tricking people, and they were real people, and they were really being tricked, and I felt bad about it, but I also felt bad like when I wore a fat suit on Saturday Night Live to do an impression of someone. Nowadays I don't have to wear a fat suit, I'm fat, but in those days I thought that was kind of mean, and so on the one hand, flattery, I mean, um what do they say? Uh if you do an impression of someone, it's the highest form of flattery. That's the word for that. Um but on the other hand, I don't know, there's a fine line.

Greg Staffa 10:42

So you didn't like your candy camera days.

Victoria Jackson 10:45

Oh, I was only on that once or twice, and it was super fun because it was an acting challenge. I was like, Can I really pull this off? Can I really play a doctor who knows nothing? And have the people, you know, like I would hit their knee with that little hammer thing, or no, I put the the the thing on their chest to hear their heartbeat, and I'd talk into I don't know, I'd put it on there, I I don't know. I see uh it was an acting challenge, it was very exciting, but I kind of felt bad about it.

Greg Staffa 11:17

I mean, I guess uh I I can see how you would feel bad about it, but at the same time, I look at some of the prank stuff that are being done today where you're going over the top to either scare someone or make them feel uncomfortable, and I think back then, well, there's an element of what you're talking about. I think it's much more wholesome, and I think I miss a little bit of uh it's okay to laugh at ourselves once in a while, and so yeah, I think I don't like pranks.

Victoria Jackson 11:45

I don't like pranks, I don't think they're funny. I I I just watched pranked once.

Greg Staffa 11:50

Well, what happened to you?

Victoria Jackson 11:53

Well, let's see, Dick Clark's son, Rack, Richard Alan Clark or something like that, he had a show. I don't know if it was bloopers and practical jokes, I forget, but my husband and at the time and him tricked me, and it was the scariest thing. I was sitting in a house that was for sale, and my husband kept saying, Sit in that chair, and I said, I don't want to sit down, and I was being tricked. I was thinking that my ex-husband was uh he was in real estate. I always thought he was selling this house, but it was all rigged, so if I sat down, the chair would collapse, and there were mirrors everywhere, and I was talking into the mirror and I was saying, Man, I'm so stressed out at Saturday Night Live. I need a nanny, but I don't trust anyone. And oh, look at me, I look horrible. I need to sleep more. I was like telling all my private problems into this two-way whatever mirror. Oh wow, and then I completely didn't know there was people behind it, and then when they came out from behind the walls smiling and laughing, it was like the floor underneath me like disappeared, and I was I was like falling down a dark hole. Like, what is going on? Like, what's reality? It was so scary, and then they said I didn't react enough to the surprise, and they wanted me to redo the ending and look surprised. And I was like, What? So I don't like pranks.

Greg Staffa 13:28

So Saturday Night Live, 10 uh nine episodes was it?

Victoria Jackson 13:33

Oh my goodness, I never counted. Uh six six seasons.

Greg Staffa 13:38

Yeah, looks like 109 episodes. What was that? I mean, I've heard it's very competitive, just not only just against other people, but just against yourself. I mean, what was that like to kind of stay competitive and beyond that?

Victoria Jackson 13:56

Well, very stressful, very exciting. We I didn't realize till after I left the show and I heard Dana Carvey's interviews, he was afraid of being fired all the time, too. I was like, I didn't know everyone was feeling like that, even Dan at the start of our cast. I, you know, but it was we were always afraid of being fired, always competing for airtime. But maybe that makes you better, you know, competition. But I have such great memories of the show, and it was very exciting. I didn't sleep for like the whole six years.

Greg Staffa 14:33

Wow. It sounds like a creative environment, but not a healthy mental environment. What would you do to relieve some of that? Or what hobbies or things did you do to kind of decompress from that pressure? I mean, it just has to be an endless amount of week in, week out pressure.

Victoria Jackson 14:49

I don't know. Heavy drugs. I don't know. Um, at the time I had a baby, and so I was rushing home so I wouldn't miss her first steps or her first words. So that was more stress. I was the breadwinner because my husband didn't make money, so that was another stress. I don't know. I think marry a rich man. I think if you are independently wealthy, it's easier to be in the arts because you don't have to worry about paying the rent.

Greg Staffa 15:20

Gives you more chance to be creative versus I don't know.

Victoria Jackson 15:24

Maybe it's a rich man's hobby.

Greg Staffa 15:27

What do you do now? Just day to day just to entertain yourselves. What is your relaxation?

Victoria Jackson 15:32

Well, I just made an album. I wrote 18 original new songs since I moved to Nashville. We moved here to follow our grandchildren. I play with my grandchildren who sing and harmonize and tap dance, and they're my pride and joy. And my daughter is a writer and a speaker of Christian literature. I do a lot of Bible studies, I do stand-up comedy still. I have a gig this month uh in Nashville, and then I have a movie. I got an offer in April. I last year I did about three movies and two music videos. Um, so I still do acting. Oh, and I wrote a movie for my first time with Thor Ramsey, and we got China Phillips and Billy Baldwin to sign on to star in it with me and Thor. And um, we're looking for funding now, so that's a new adventure for me. I've never done that before.

Greg Staffa 16:34

Oh, congratulations!

Victoria Jackson 16:36

Thanks. But my new album is called When I Get to Nashville, and it has songs about my challenging marriage to my high school sweetheart, who I got reunited with, and have been married to 31 years, and we're total opposites. And uh, so it's about that. How do you undo I do? Oh yeah, uh, songs like that. And when I get to Nashville, I'm gonna knock them dead. I'll be the only country singing star who can sing standing on her head. I'll play my ukulele at the Alfrey and make their hearts stand still. I'm gonna be a country star when I get to Nashville. Hey, everybody needs a gimmick. Dolly Parton has a gimmick, she has two gimmicks. Uh-uh, I'll have three because I can do a handstand. Uh, if Dolly Parton did a handstand, she'd suffocate herself. But I'm bummed. So um in my album I have songs like that, and then I have um stand-up comedy at the end. And uh my plumber's looking at me right now because he finished his job. He was putting in a new gold uh marble sink in my guest bathroom.

Greg Staffa 17:52

Oh wow. Can you get going then?

Victoria Jackson 17:54

Or oh, well, can we put a pause for one second?

Greg Staffa 17:58

Sure.

Victoria Jackson 17:59

Okay.

Greg Staffa 18:16

So looking back, right now we're facing a lot of cancel cultures. People are going back to things that comedians said, you know, 20, 30, 40 years ago and going after them for that. Is that something that you see as a concern with any of your material, or has it affected how you write new material? Do you have to kind of second guess yourself at each moment and wonder how could this be spun, twisted, or manipulated?

Victoria Jackson 18:43

Wow, you have great questions. I believe in freedom of speech, even for people I don't agree with, or who are filthy or or who are angry, like George Carlin. And if he wants to go curse somewhere, and people want to listen to him, it's a free country. I love freedom. Um I don't have anything I'm ashamed of in the past since I was raised in the Bible. They always well, there's a couple things I regret uh that I've done in my career, but I can't see how I could have done it differently at the moment. Um, I nothing I've said in stand-up, uh well, I do regret one joke I said about the shape of Florida. I didn't have to go there. But anyway, I changed it to saying uh that the shape of Florida looks like a skin tag um to make it cleaner. But anyway, um where was uh no, I have nothing to regret about that.

Greg Staffa 19:48

Do you think that I can hear you?

Victoria Jackson 19:53

My I found a picture. My grandfather my great-grandfather was my dad was in Vaudeville, but my great-grandfather played the ukulele on trains from Chicago to Florida, and he worked with some guys in Blackface, and um that's not allowed now, and Ted Danson got in trouble for it. And but um I just think it's so funny how the times change, and so I guess it wasn't offensive then or something, and but I don't have anything in my repertoire that I would need to change, and you know, when Julia Sweeney did Pat, uh, and and the joke was we couldn't tell if it's a man or a woman, that was before it's time, and everyone thought it was hilarious. I don't know if she could do that now. I don't think she's allowed, so that's interesting. Um, but I think people should have freedom to express themselves, and um yeah.

Greg Staffa 20:56

Do you think it's fair? I mean, you think some of it's fair game that we're going back, or because it was a different time, we should look at it as those times in context of that that period.

Victoria Jackson 21:06

We should look at it in context, like what people wore was different, their hair was different. You know, I'm watching the crown, and the British people have those ridiculous white wigs they put on when they go to court or parliament. Do they still do that? Just to look like the olden days? I don't know. It's all fascinating. But men are we change our society, it changes, but the heart of man never changes. Uh, we all want love, we all love truth, you know, and we all wonder why we're here and if there's really a God and where we're going when we die. So those things never change, but the clothes and stuff like that changes.

Greg Staffa 21:56

So you're getting ready to do you said you have a show this month. What would happen if a young gymnastics young young woman in gymnastics comes to your show much like you did years ago and wanted to become a comedian? What advice would you give her?

Victoria Jackson 22:13

Wow, that's a great you have great questions. Um oh by the way, my mom's from Minnesota. Oh, she would yeah, she was born in um St. James. No, St. Cloud. No, I think it was St. I forget. She grew up in Wyndham.

Greg Staffa 22:31

Okay. I mean St. Cloud.

Victoria Jackson 22:34

I was gonna uh answer your question about what would I say to a young person. I have a friend who is now 21 and she's on the verge of her career. She's a beautiful, super talented singer, actress, and we were just talking the other day about her new hit song. She has this song, I know it'll be a hit, but there's one line in it that could be kind of edgy for a Christian, not edgy for a normal person. And we talked about it for hours and hours, her and her parents and me. And I don't know, it's tough, it's hard, it's kind of between you and God.

Greg Staffa 23:18

So I I mean I fully believe that you have to do what you feel comfortable doing, and you can always say no, and it might set you back, but you never know what that sets you back to do something else. And that might you know, turning something down might open the door to another opportunity where you are more comfortable. But it's it's hard watching some of these people these days get get canceled for stuff that you did 40 years ago. It's like, God, how would they how would I even know? I mean, back then it was acceptable, like the Pat thing. You know, back then that was a that was acceptable as a skit that turned into a movie. I mean and nowadays just oh my god, if someone did that.

Victoria Jackson 23:58

But she's not canceled. I think people are getting canceled for being conservatives. I know that because it's happened to me.

Greg Staffa 24:06

We're just so divided now, and that's why I wanted to start off the conversation talking about the I Miss America video that you were in. I was just wondering how much of that can you relate to with some of that lyrics and stuff like that of just how how divided we've become.

Victoria Jackson 24:23

I thought that was a very clever video and song by Mason Douglas because it really it it uh I I didn't think it was uh it criticized either side. It was pretty tame. You know.

Greg Staffa 24:42

I think it's we become so divided that we quickly blame the other side without realizing how our side might have contributed to stuff. And so you're right, I think it was a very everyone's involved, and we all need to come together and and fix this.

Victoria Jackson 24:56

And I think we need God, we need God back. Because, you know, back in the in the day when America was united, maybe World War II or something, people had morals. Uh people most people agreed that the Ten Commandments were a good guide for society, and nowadays it seems like relativism, secular Marxism, uh breaking up families and saying whatever feels good to you is your truth. That I think that's destroying everything.

Greg Staffa 25:35

Is that one of the big reasons that you're not in Hollywood? I mean, other than following the grandkids, is that your is Nashville your refuge from that?

Victoria Jackson 25:44

Well, we're in Nashville to be near our daughters and granddaughters, but it is, I do think Hollywood would be impossible for me to have a career in right now. Luckily, you don't have to live in Hollywood to have a career anymore because there's so many channels, so many streaming channels, and there's so many now there's Christian movies, there's like lots of content being made everywhere. But um, yeah, I mean I the shows that I've been watching on Netflix, I would never audition for. I I would feel I I don't know, I I shouldn't be watching them probably.

Greg Staffa 26:22

Is that something that you might be interested in producing some stuff?

Victoria Jackson 26:26

Well, that's why I wrote this movie uh with Thor Ramsey And it's gonna it's not about it's not a preachy, it's not you know, a Christian movie, but it's just not dirty. And um So that I guess I'm I'm fighting the battle in my own little corner of the world.

Greg Staffa 26:49

How much does that stuff go into any auditions or roles that you're offered? I mean, it sounds like the last few roles you've gotten were more or less handed to you or written to you in mind. How much of that goes into your decision of whether to take it or not?

Victoria Jackson 27:04

Well, I'm reading a script right now, and they want me to be 10 years older, which is fine with me, and it's funny and it's dark. I love dark comedy, and so far there's nothing horrible in it, like you know, and um I'm gonna finish reading it today and tell them yes or no. Um uh my roles last year, I played a comedic uh high school principal, super fun, in that movie called Into the Spotlight, and then I played um a screaming, ranting liberal activist in the movie Jingle Smells, and it wasn't written for me, but it was perfect for me. And uh and so because I'm not a liberal, but I listen to their I listen to their talking points, and so I got to kind of make fun of it.

Greg Staffa 28:04

Final question I like to ask celebrities, so much of you is based on what you've done. You know, it's it's Victoria Jackson, SNL star, you know, stuff that you might have done 20, 30 years ago. When you get up in the morning and look in the mirror, who do you see?

Victoria Jackson 28:23

What a great question! You're amazing. I look in the mirror and I say, Vicki, should you take that new pill all the people are losing weight on? That that diabetes pill? Well, it would be nice to lose 40 pounds in six months, but but what if it messes with my health because it's something about insulin? And then I go, Picky, you should call your doctor and ask her. And then I go, I don't like my doctor, and then I go, Oh, that's too much trouble. What am I gonna eat for breakfast? And then I go on the uh on my laptop, and then suddenly it's nighttime.

Greg Staffa 29:10

That's a quick day you got there. Well, I sincerely appreciate you coming on um despite all the hurdles and everything like that. Uh, you can catch her in the latest music video, I Miss America, with Mason Douglas, but also her new CD when I get to Nashville, and then hopefully within a couple of years we'll have your sequel, I've gotten to Nashville.

Victoria Jackson 29:33

Oh, thank you. How about leaving Nashville? Like leaving Las Vegas.

Greg Staffa 29:38

Yeah, we don't want to leave Nashville, that's where your family is now.

Victoria Jackson 29:41

I don't want to leave. It could be called staying in Nashville, stuck in Nashville. Oh yeah, you're a good interviewer. I enjoyed this a lot.

Greg Staffa 29:52

Well, I appreciate it and appreciate your time. And I'll link to your CD and your um your webpage there, and uh wish you all the best of luck.

Victoria Jackson 30:02

Thank you so much.

Greg Staffa 30:04

Thank you, and thank you for coming on. That does it for this episode. Thank you for listening to the Staff of Corner.