Comedian Joel Kim Booster on ‘Bad Dates’ and Why He’s a ‘Rude Little Pig’
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From KQED.

From KQED in San Francisco, I'm Nina Kim. Coming up on Forum, you might have seen comedian and actor Joel Kim Booster in the Maya Rudolph series, Loot, or in Fire Island, his Pride and Prejudice adaptation set in the gay vacation spot. Booster's latest project is hosting the podcast Bad Dates, where comedians share their worst dating stories. So, want to get Booster's advice on how to have better dates? Or hear why his latest comedy special is called Rude Little Pig? ♪

You guys are obsessed with me. What do you want, a medal? Joel Kim Booster in studio after this news.

Welcome to Forum. I'm Mina Kim. L.A.-based comedian Joel Kim Booster says San Francisco is where his shows will regularly sell out without him needing to beg people to buy tickets, telling The Chronicle, "...this is where Asian people are, where gay people are, and where gay Asian people are. It's a Venn diagram full of people who historically have not seen themselves represented in comedy spaces."

The writer and star of the film Fire Island, who plays Nicholas in Loot, will be at SF Sketch Fest this weekend with a stand-up special, Rude Little Pig, and a live taping of his new podcast, Bad Dates. But!

He's with Forum right now, and we are so happy to have him. Joel Kim Booster, welcome. Thank you so much for having me. This is such a huge, weird, full-circle moment for me. I was telling you before we got on air, when I was first dating my partner when he lived in San Francisco, I would come up and visit, and his alarm would go off at 9 a.m.

and play the 9 a.m. forum, but I would lay in bed and wait because I'm a creative, so I don't have to get out of bed. And I would sit and listen to your hour of forum every trip that I would come. And it's so strange when I got this ask because...

for me, you are such an integral part of the tapestry of the first three months that we were dating because it was just like the routine. I would fly up to San Francisco to visit him. I would stay with him and then listen to Mina Kim before I got out of bed. That is so crazy and amazing to me. I still cannot believe it even though you're trying to tell me again that this is true for you. It means...

It really means a lot. And it, you know, that, and also that San Francisco where I am is, is such a special place for you and your fiance, right? This is where you first met. Yeah. Well, we technically met in Mexico, but he was living here at the time and I was living in LA. So this is where you had your first date. Yes. And so after we met in Mexico, I, I like really, I, I told my friend the second day we met in Mexico, um,

I'm going to marry this man. And they all thought I was crazy, which is a crazy thing to say. Um, but I knew, and, um, it took him a little bit longer to catch up to me, but, um, no. So almost immediately I would start to find excuses to get to San Francisco to see him. And, um,

Yeah, and those trips, that's where I fell in love with the KQED Forum. And you would come up here and you would make

meet and grow this incredible relationship with this person. And now you are hosting a podcast called Bad Dates. So is it that you feel like you have a new perspective on dating now that you're engaged? Congratulations on the podcast. Thank you so much. You know, it's not necessarily that I have a new perspective on it. I think I've always had...

a real fascination with human relationships and our quest for love. And I think that, like, I certainly, you know, spent most of my 20s wishing for my rom-com moment to come, and it never did. It was terrible. I found Tating to be...

so awful for the most part that I quit. I mean, I quit by the time I was like 28 to 33 when I met my partner. And I, I was just like, I swore off dating because it was so bad. And so, and especially in cities like New York,

where it's just a revolving door of people looking for the next best thing, you know? And so I got really frustrated with it and, and sort of swore off dating until literally didn't date a single person until I met my partner, my current partner. Um,

Um, and for me, um, a lot of it was like, I, I would talk to a lot of my friends who were like, yeah, I'm, I'm dating this guy. And, you know, I don't really, I'm not sure how I feel about him, but I'll give him until the third or fourth date to decide. And for me, that was always so crazy because I was like,

If I don't know within the first couple of moments of meeting a person that this person is someone that's drawing me and that the energy is correct, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, I'm not going to waste my time

like hoping that feelings will appear by the fourth date you know like i need there to be a baseline like gut like feeling in in my soul that like this is this person could be the one um within 15 minutes of meeting them uh or i just like i don't i don't see the point like i i was

Dating is such a time suck. And to want to date someone that you are not sure you like always felt so crazy to me. And it's why there are so many bad date stories. It's because these people are forcing themselves out into the trenches to try and find someone, anyone. And they are willing to put up, I think, with so much nonsense with

before they are willing to break up with that person or stop seeing that person. And that wouldn't put a lot of pressure on that first date. First dates are pretty hard, right? No, but the thing is, is like the stakes don't have to be that high. I think like, you know, you go on the first date and you don't put a lot of pressure on it. You just let and see how it flows and see how the connection actually like sort of naturally develops. And if there's nothing there, if you gut check it at the end of the first date,

and you felt nothing,

then I don't think a second or third date is going to be the thing that makes you like fall in love with this person. That's, and I, listen, I've said this before and I've gotten lambasted and people have been like, listen, if I took your advice, I'd never would have been with my wife of 15 years. It's a slow burn. Like obviously friendships can develop and then, you know, you know, slowly turn into relationships, et cetera, et cetera. But I, the fundamental thing for me is,

is if you are struggling to relate to a person or find a connection with a person,

I don't think you're going to find that connection on the third or fourth date after struggling through the first two, you know? And so I just, I want to free people from that because we're all so busy. We're working in ourselves into the grave. We are, you know, we have jobs and 15 side hustles and we're all trying to, you know, survive in this economy. And I just feel like,

you know, a date is a big time commitment. And so save it for the people that you at least have that spark for, you know? I heard you on the Modern Love podcast talking about campsite rules. Yes. What are those? Campsite rules for me, it's, I don't know if Dan Savage created the term, but it was popularized by Dan Savage. And it's basically this idea that like when you enter into a relationship with someone, um,

You want to leave them better than you found them, a la a campsite. And I think like I've always taken that to heart where it's like, I don't want to leave this person a mess, you know, for the next person to come in and clean up. And so I think like a lot of that has to do with, you know, being communicative and expressing like, hey, you know, like here's a note, right?

So, you know, you don't continue to do this behavior. Or after the breakup, just like sort of teaching them and explaining to them and giving them, you know, advice and stuff like that. And I mean, listen, this, I'll be frank, this happens to me a lot in a hookup space where I'll be hooking up with someone who's maybe a little bit younger than me and maybe doesn't know the ins and outs of that experience. And I...

I am very much in the camp of like, no, you stop that person and say, this isn't how you have sex. You are making a mistake. And I want to make sure that the next person you have sex with has a better experience than I did. And so here's an idea. Get lube.

And I think that is just simple little adjustments that you can give people will make their next experience with a different person so much better. And so I think that's the gist of campsite rules. Yeah. So let me see if listeners have any bad date stories they want to share or dating advice that they would like from the one and only Joel Kimball.

Of course, you can also ask about Joel's work or tell us if it's had an impact on you. That number is 866-733-6786, 866-733-6786.

So then this at SketchFest this weekend, you're going to be doing a live taping of the podcast. Of Bad Dates, yeah. Of Bad Dates, which will include people like Peaches Christ. Yes. So tell me about this live taping that you're doing. It's really exciting. It's the first live show that I will have been...

have done as the host of this podcast. There have been two other hosts of the podcast that have done live shows. And so this is really exciting for me to be able to get out there and engage with a live audience. I think that's where I thrive the most. I, you know, don't get me wrong. I love, I love my podcast. I love my podcast. I love podcasting as a forum, as a medium. But there is something about being able to engage with,

with an audience and create a relationship with that audience, which is the whole reason I still do stand up quite honestly, is because I think that there's so much artificiality

And so many like hands in, so many cooks in the kitchen when you're making a movie, say, you know, like there's so many people giving you feedback, giving you notes, you know, so many people who have different agendas for what the movie should be or the project should be. And stand up is like the purest form of

of any of the art forms that I practice these days because for me it's just about walking on stage forming a relationship with that audience in the room that night and um the immediacy of it you know because listen I'll be frank a lot of people I've seen the comments when I am um

About my success, a lot of people chalk it up to DEI and say like, oh, if Hollywood wasn't pushing diversity on all of us, you wouldn't have a career, etc., etc., etc. Which, you know, is easy enough to sort of shove to the side and ignore. But for me, stand-up is this...

This closest thing to a meritocracy in some ways in my field because the fact is is I get out on stage for an hour and people are either laughing or they're not and there is no politics to that like no one's laughing at me for an hour straight because of woke you know like they don't they aren't forcing themselves to laugh at something that isn't funny and so when I'm out there on stage and I

The people are laughing or they're not laughing. You can't tell me anything. I'm like, no, I am good at this. These people are laughing. I formed this relationship with this, you know, crowd. And it's really special to me because there is a lot of nebulous sort of, you know,

Not, I can't curse, but it's just, you know, it's a lot of nonsense that goes on in the process of making a television show or a movie that doesn't exist in stand-up. And it's so, it feels so pure in that way. It's just me and a microphone and my thoughts. There's no network notes. There's no, no one's telling me what to say or what to do. The only feedback I get is from the audience. Yeah. We're talking about stand-up with Joel Kim Booster, a stand-up comedian.

As specials have included Psychosexual, you may know him as Nicholas from Lude or also from Fire Island as well. We're also getting life hacks from Joel Kim Booster as well. So share your questions and comments with him after the break. You are listening to Forum. I'm Mina Kim.

Hey, have you heard of On Air Fest? It's a premier festival for sound and storytelling taking place in Brooklyn from February 19th through 21st. I'm Morgan Sung, host of KQED's new tech and culture show, Close All Taps, and I'll be there at the fest to give a sneak preview of the show, along with an

IRL deep dive all about how to sniff out AI. You'll also hear from podcast icons like Radiolab's Jad Abumrad, Anna Sale from Death, Sex, and Money, and over 200 more storytellers. So come level up your own craft or connect with other audio creatives. Grab your tickets now at onairfest.com.

You're listening to Forum. I'm Mina Kim. We're talking with Joel Kim Booster, comedian, writer, actor, host of the podcast Bad Dates, who stars in the Apple TV series Loot and was the writer and star of the movie Fire Island on Hulu. He's got two appearances at Sketchfest this weekend, his sold-out stand-up special Rude Little Pig tonight, and a live taping of his

Bad Dates podcast tomorrow. So do you have a terrible dating story you want to tell Joel Kim Booster? Or what is it that you want to ask or tell Joel about his work? You can email forum at kqed.org. Call us on 866-733-6786. Again, that number 866-733-6786. We're also on our socials at KQED Forum, Blue Sky, Facebook, Instagram, and others.

And Michael writes on Instagram, I have asked this many times, but how do we get Joel to host Saturday Night Live? He is so worthy. I'd love to watch him on air with cast member Bowen Yang. I mean, that would be a dream. It's, you know, it's the clock is ticking because I think Bowen is quickly outgrowing that show in a lot of ways. Well, he's been there for almost seven years, I think. And, you know, it is one of those jobs that I think,

They may be. I don't want to speak out of turn. Listen, no, no, no, no, no. This is Bowen sanctioned, by the way, I should say. I'm speaking out of pocket. But I do. I do think that he is at a point now where he's ready to leave the show and ready to go and do bigger, massive things in his career, which he's definitely going to do. He's already starting to do it with things like Wicked and Wicked.

And so the clock is ticking. I have to get famous enough to be on SNL within the next calendar year, or I don't think, I think I'll miss Bowen on the cast. But no, it's obviously, it's a dream. I grew up watching Saturday Night Live. It is like my entire career is one long con to get famous enough to be asked to host Saturday Night Live, bar none. You've talked about how people have misidentified you as Bowen. Oh, it happens so frequently.

And one of the things that I really appreciated was something that you wrote that I have become now more conscious of what I do, which is that when people do that, you try to make them feel better. Yeah. I remember it was like New Year's going into 2023. I think we were in – Bowen and I were in Miami. And we had this –

late night, like come to Jesus, like holding hands being like, no, our resolution is when someone mixes us up, Bo and Yang and me who looked nothing alike, um,

Our first instinct before would be to be like, oh, no, you're OK. You're OK. It happens. It happens. You're not racist. You're not racist. And it's so much weird. It's like so much labor that we were taking on to make this person feel better about their mistake. And we were like, no more. No more. If someone does that and it's blatant, I'm going to let them sit in it because it is like it is uncomfortable, but it is a.

a level of like, you should sort of examine that, you know, uncomfortable and turn it into, you know, maybe some introspection because for me, quite frankly, it is very bizarre. I've had, you know, industry people, the head of film festivals, like confuse us. And my thing is, is like, what a confusing movie going experience Fire Island must have been for you. Did you think it was the parent trap?

And that we were just, you know, like it was the same actor for both parts. But it's frustrating because it tells me that many people in their computer brain, they scan us and they go gay, Asian, and then stop thinking there. And that's as far as our humanity goes for them. And they don't bother to, you know, sort of...

absorb any other unique characteristics between me and Bowen or even try. Yeah. And comments like that, I mean, they're on social so often. The mistake is so often made there. And I understand that you have actually sort of really...

the amount of time that you are on social media or changed your relationship with it quite a bit. Why? Tell me why. Listen, I think it got to the point where I was seeing a lot of things about me that didn't...

It is so strange. It is the most disorienting part of becoming mildly successful in this industry and having people who don't know you talk about you is that it can become this thing where you're like, you're suddenly... They are...

The people who hate me online have constructed a version of me online and they hate that version. And it has very little to do with me. But it is, you know, a version that is constructed based on assumptions and projections and just complete false information. And it can get really tough to separate yourself from that version that these strangers online have created. And you begin to look at it as a mirror and you say, oh, my God, am I this person?

Am I that? And it was just becoming really untenable for me on a mental health level, I think, because I would, you know, especially when I was touring, I would be alone in a hotel room on my phone, on Twitter, and I had a pretty strict do not engage policy until I was 20.

alone in a hotel on Twitter at 4 a.m. and I was lonely and feeling isolated and I would jump in the comments and like engage with whoever wanted to engage with me and it was just so, so unhealthy because at the end of the day these people don't know you, you know? But I was struck by something you said in an interview about how

If you can't give credence to the negative comments, then you also can't to the positive ones too. Yeah, this is something that I kind of came to a realization about recently, which is that like, you know, you scroll through the comments on most of my videos and it's like, you know, 90% positive. And then you hit the negative one and that's the one you fixate on. And it's this interesting thing where it's like, people are always like, but look at all the hundred positive comments. And I had this realization where it's like,

Those people don't know me either. You know, those people and I appreciate the positive comments. Don't get me wrong. It's really kind. But you cannot give too much power and rely too much on those comments. Because if you give power to the positive comments and say like, oh, that stranger's opinion of me actually matters because they like me, then inevitably it's going to create this tension.

idea in your brain that, okay, the negative comments must be true then too. You know, and it's like, who do you believe? And at the end of the day, you just have to step back and be like, none of y'all know who I am. You have, you are working, you are operating under so little context and it is, you know, whatever,

I've put out into the world, which every version of that is a different version of me. And it's not the totality of who I am as a person. And I think like, it's about stepping away from the identity that the internet has constructed for you and really like grounding yourself and reminding yourself, that's not who I am. That's not who I am. This person hates someone that does not exist. And I,

Getting off Twitter has been a real boon for my mental health in that regard. I would think freeing yourself from focusing on external validation or criticism, right, kind of forces you to really trust your own judgment of your work. Yeah.

Has that been easy to do? No, I have absolutely no objectivity about my own work. It is, you know, I struggle. You mean like you're a harsher critic? I'm a much harsher critic. And I think that like I let the voices of, you know, those people on the Internet sort of... I'm always trying to weirdly play this game of 4D chess where I'm like...

okay, if I do this, then the internet's going to be mad at me for that. So if I can subvert it this way, then they won't be able to. And it's like, that was when I was still on Twitter, you know? And I think, like, it's funny because Andrew Ahn, the director of Fire Island, would constantly, I would, like, freak out about, you know, like, something going on in the movie, and he would be like, Joel, we're not writing this movie for Twitter, okay? Like, you are worried about what the Twitter commentariat

is gonna say about this scene or this aspect of the movie and you can't, those people aren't real. Those people, Twitter's base is actually quite small. It represents a very like small section of the actual world and culture and people. And if you are in your head about trying to appease the like anime avatars that exist on Twitter, then we've lost. And so let's make a movie.

And that was a conversation we kept coming back to over the course. And I thank God every day for Andrew Rahn because he really, I can't imagine making that movie with anybody else. And he really was a guiding light for me in a lot of ways. We're talking with Joel Kim Booster, who wrote, starred in, and executive produced Fire Island. And you, our listeners, are also wanting to talk with Joel. Let me go to Bruce in Santa Rosa. Hi, Bruce. You're on.

Hey, Joel. Hi, Bruce. I agree with everything you're saying.

I graduated high school in '71 in Los Angeles, and you couldn't come out with gay. I ended up years later, I moved to Santa Barbara, and there was a great bar there. I walked in one day, and here's this guy. He says, "Buy me a drink, it's my birthday." I said, "Okay."

Three days later, I went back into the bar. Here's the guy. And he goes, hey, buy me a drink. It's my birthday. And I said, no, your birthday was three days ago. From that moment on, we have been together. Oh, my God. So it worked. It worked on you. It's just you. You can use like you said.

When you quit looking, all of a sudden, there it is. And you know it. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. And you find a very intelligent scammer at the bar to fall in love with. It was the perfect scam, I got to say. Well, Bruce, thanks so much for that story. Joanna writes...

How about a good first date story? I knew who was going to be my lifelong partner before our first date. Whoa. Before I even laid eyes on him. Whoa. This was long before the internet. I heard his beautiful voice and heartfelt laughter in the next room. Mmm.

And turned to my friend and said, this is the guy I will spend my whole life with. I didn't care what he looked like. And the fact that he turned out to be super handsome was just a cherry on top. Wow. She sounds like a love is blind contestant coming out of the pods. But much more of a bigger success story, obviously.

Yeah, listen, my thing is, I get a lot of flack for this because that piece of advice, because I've heard comments from people being like, I met my wife and we were, you know, frenemies for three years and I didn't even like her. And then like slowly over time, like we got to know each other and I fell in love when we got married. And if I wrote her off as like in the first, you know, after the first date, then we never would have gotten together. Yeah.

And I think that like people are sort of missing the, the like core at that of that advice, which is don't, don't force yourself.

You know, like it should be easy, especially at the beginning. It should be easy to at least sit in a space with a person and connect with them. If you are already in the first couple of dates and you're dreading going on a date, if you're stressed about going on a date, if you don't know, if you if you are going into the date, seeing it as labor because you're like, oh, God, I'm going to have to like work.

bringing up things to talk about and what are we going to do and making sure that the activities... That, to me, is a sign that, like, you are dating because you are... You want the experience of dating and you are seeking something so, you know, with so much vigor that you are ignoring the alarm bells that are going off in your own brain that are saying, this isn't quite right. I feel like what I'm hearing you say is to just...

Trust yourself, really. Like trust the feeling. Don't try to analyze it or overanalyze that feeling away. Maybe that's something we do too much. We actually dismiss that initial feeling as frivolous. But you're saying that there's a lot more there than... No, I think it is. And I think it's if you are... I just I have so many friends who are like, yeah, I don't know how I feel about this guy, but I'll give him until the third date. And I'm like, babe, it sounds like you know how you feel about this guy. You know, it's...

It sounds like he's pretty boring. Well, Joy writes, a guy at work asked me out to a casual dinner and a movie. I expressed interest in the Christmas, in the Christine Jorgensen story, a biopic about a pioneering trans woman. My date was appalled, expressing so much distaste at the very idea that I quickly adopted a hard opposing stance. We argued for a while until he more and more flustered, blurted, I would never date you if you were like that. You're not, are you? What?

What difference would it make? I countered. You should an ultimatum. And I had to swear I was not a man. I refused and he took me home. Wow. I mean, talk about a very clear non-negotiable there. Wow. Do you have one? Like, oh, I think, no, it's funny. I often said before I met my partner,

I had decided about a month before I met my partner, I, you know, I'd sworn off dating. I was not interested in a relationship. I was married to my career. And then my dad passed away and it sort of shook me. And I said, no, you know what? I think I'm ready to finally like,

Yeah.

And I'm sure many of our San Francisco listeners can relate to that. It's a huge, you would be surprised, actually, you probably wouldn't be surprised to learn that in Los Angeles, at least, it is frequently one of the first topics that someone will bring to the small talk show.

And it is so crazy to me because I will meet so many people that I initially thought I would vibe with and then say the most horrendous things about, you know, unhoused people. And it's just it was getting so frustrating and it was a catch all for a lot of political ideals.

But I did ask my partner the first night we met. I brought it up because I brought up SF's homelessness crisis. And we had a conversation about that. And his approach was empathetic and kind. And that was a real turning point for me. And I was like, OK, that tells me a lot about a person when they...

How they view that crisis, you know? And let me tell you, in L.A., the responses are horrific. You talked about how...

your shows. I quoted this in the intro, how your shows sell out here because of the big gay-Asian overlap. But is gay-Asian San Francisco really that different from gay-Asian LA? I'm just kidding. No, it's not completely dissimilar, but I will say that there's just like a higher concentration. It's just gay people, Asian people, gay-Asian people, they're all here. It is like the perfect encapsulation of like

of people that have not traditionally been represented in these spaces and I think are hungry to see and be included in the conversation. And so, yeah, historically, I've never had to work very hard to sell out

San Francisco. Now, you know, Cincinnati, it's a different story. But yeah, San Francisco, it's part of the reason that I first drew me to this city was the high population of both Asian people and gay people and gay Asian people. And it felt like when I first got here, the first time I ever visited, it felt like Mecca. It felt like I was like walking around and like looking at, it just, it felt so much more like wilderness

We were active participants in the fabric of this city in a way that I didn't feel in a lot of other cities that I had lived in up until this point. Well, our listeners are loving you back. TJ on Discord writes, I don't have dating stories, but I love, love, love Joel Kimberster. Yeah.

And another listener writes, the heads up scene in Fire Island is so funny. The Marissa Tomei impression. That was one of my favorite days to shoot on set.

Because, I mean, obviously it was scripted and there are definitely lines in there that were in the script. But a lot of it was, let's watch Matt Rogers and Tomas Matos who play Luke and Keegan in the film, who are the stars of that scene. Let's just let them play. Let them go, you know? And I gave them a framework and it just turned out... And it's so... I think for me...

When people say like, oh, I recognize my friend group in that movie. For me, I think a lot of people are referring to that scene. We'll have more with Joel Kim Booster after the break. You are listening to Forum. I'm Mina Kim. This is Forum. I'm Mina Kim. Joel Kim Booster will be at SF Sketch Fest this weekend for a sold out stand up special, Rude Little Pig, and a live taping of his Bad Dates podcast.

But he is with us now, the writer and star of the movie Fire Island and also who plays Nicholas on Lute. So you, our listeners, can join the conversation with any bad date stories you want to share with Joel Kim Booster or good ones, too. We've got some good ones that we've been getting. Things that you want to ask or tell Joel about his work, whether a role has had an impact on you, etc.

Or one of his comedy specials as well. Again, the email address, forum at kqed.org. Find us on Blue Sky X, Facebook, Instagram, or threads at KQED Forum. Call us at 866-733-6786. 866-733-6786. Perry on Discord writes, San Francisco is also full of rude little things. So why is your Santa special called Rude Little Things? Are you the rude little thing?

I am the rude little pig. So just a spoiler alert. The whole phrase, it comes from a joke in my set where I talk about couples and I do believe that every couple...

There is a dichotomy that exists universally. Gay couples, straight couples, everything in between. And that is one person is the angel who's always paying the bills on time, remembering all the chores, being nice to the TSA agents. And then the other person in the relationship is the rude little pig who's always being rude and a little pig and getting the TSA supervisor called on them because they were too mean to the TSA. And I am the rude little pig in my relationship. And.

And it's just a fascinating thing. It's a lot of crowd work that I do in this section of the set where I get into the ins and outs of what it means to be dating somebody who, you know...

And it's all grading on the curve. Oftentimes I'm talking to two angels who are forced to then decide which one of them is the closest to being a rude little pig. But it's just a fun section of the set to talk about because it's a newer one for me. Because this is the first...

hour of stand-up that I've toured since being in a relationship. You know, like my Netflix special, we had been dating when my Netflix special came out, but I didn't include any of the new jokes about our relationship in that special. So that special, I was single, quote unquote, and then this special is very much based on my relationship. And

Like the things that I've learned in that in the three years that we've been dating. And it's exciting. And I think like Rude Little Pig is obviously evocative, but it is also one of the main, I think, sort of observations I have made about being in a relationship with someone who is nine times out of 10 perfect, remembers everything and does everything right. So given that it's about your relationship, did that change the way you wrote it?

Um, it definitely has because listen, this is the thing. Like I've been doing standup for close to 14 years now. And for the first 12 years of that, or 11 years of that, I was talking about my life, what went on in my life. And I was beholden to no one, you know, like I could talk about my life however I wanted. And now suddenly I have this other person in my life

who is, you know, in the fabric of my life. And there are things I want to talk about, about our relationship and about our life together. And I have to be a lot more delicate. I can't just sort of go guns blazing on stage and reveal all of the ins and outs of our relationship because there's another person now that is a part of that. And, you know, I...

he wants to be in the C-suite someday. He works a regular job. I can't say everything that I want to say about our relationship. Yeah. Yeah. The other thing that your special is about, and these are your words, you're dead dad. Yeah.

No, so yeah, the joke is that the special is about the two most important white men in my life. And that is my dead white dad and my alive white partner. And, you know, it threads the needle between the two and sort of the complications and...

of both of those relationships and what it means to be, you know, it's a weird time to be in an interracial relationship right now, I think, in this climate. And I think it's interesting because, you know, people...

are mad at me on both sides for falling for someone of not my race. The amount of times they get called a race traitor in the Instagram comments is unbelievable. And it's for me, it's like, listen, I never I was not planning on ending up in a relationship with a white person. I was not seeking it out. But I don't think at the end of the day, like, listen,

I fell in love with someone very quickly, very unexpectedly who sees me, who is a incredible support system for me. And I'm not going to throw that away because it's not politically expedient for me to be dating a white person. You know, like I just, I'm not, I think like when I'm casting a movie as an executive producer, I,

It's very easy to be like, yes, let's let's cast a verse. Let's make sure that like the we have control over that. But falling in love, you don't have control over that. I'm sorry. It's like you tripped over a cord and now you face planted straight into somebody else's soul. And I, you know, I'm not going to throw away something that has been deeply transformative in my life because Twitter is mad at me. Right.

In terms of also, will it be a pretty new thing to go in depth about your dad? If you do, I mean, I'm making assumptions. Yeah, it is. It's a newish thing. And part of it is, is that like I have been, you know, cannibalizing my life with my family since I started doing stand up 14 years ago. And I took a break from that a little bit with Psychosexual. But returning to it now, it's

You know, post my dad's death, I'm reexamining a lot of the ways I talked about my parents and specifically talked about my dad on stage and the character that I sort of painted him to be.

in my early standup. You say he's white, he's also Midwestern, right? Evangelical Christian. Evangelical Christian, very farm boy, very like masculine, like man's man. And so this is almost a re-examination of that relationship. And yeah, it's just, I want people, I wanted people to get a different side of my dad, I think than the one that I had been, you know,

using for jokes on stage for years prior. This listener on Discord writes, I would say in my relationship, I'm the rude little angel. That's a new one. I'll have to dig deeper and figure out what that exactly means. But

And my boyfriend is the nice and polite little pig. It's actually pretty all right. I also knew that I was going to be dating him when we first met, but both of us were in a rough patch in our lives, so I didn't want to say or start anything. But sure enough, six months later, we were going out. We've been together for six years. Yeah, the timing thing is interesting, right? Yeah.

I don't think you should ever consider extenuating circumstances, of course. But like timing is something that I think people focus too much on when and the inconvenience of the timing or it. And I honestly think it's the first thing that should go in your considerations, because the fact is, is that like.

You don't get these opportunities every day. You know, that a person that you connect with, you don't meet that person every day, every month, every year even. And so for me, for us, it was really bad timing. My boyfriend, my partner was moving from San Francisco to L.A. He had just taken a job. I lived in L.A.,

And after that first weekend we met, we had this really serious conversation. And he was like, I don't want a boyfriend when I move to L.A. And I was like, I don't want to be your first boyfriend when you move to L.A. That sounds like a disaster. Like...

And then he moved to LA and we ended up hanging out five times a week and pretty much being inseparable for the first six months that he lived there. And we finally caved. And it was one of those things where it's like, yes, on paper, the timing didn't seem correct, but I'm not going to miss out on an opportunity to

with someone that could be the one because the timing doesn't fit within our own ideas of what appropriate timing is, you know? I love that because the timing of my now husband's relationship was literally the worst timing. And I was on a rebound and, you know, everybody was warning him away from me. Yeah.

So, yeah, timing, who cares? Throw it out the window. It's the first thing to go. Speaking of timing, I want to ask you about your timing in terms of coming in and doing comedy, becoming an actor, like really...

that this was something you wanted to pursue because you were in this Netflix documentary that came out last year. It was called Outstanding, A Comedy Revolution. It's a Hollywood Bowl performance with dozens of pioneering queer comics like Margaret Cho and others. And you were invited to join and you did express some degree of surprise about being almost like credited as one of these.

Yeah, I mean, I guess I listen, the imposter syndrome is real, I guess. But you look at that lineup and it was one of those real paradigm shifting moments in my career where I, you know, I just realized like, oh, I'm a I'm a part of that. Like I am at a point now where like.

I'm being invited to events like this and asked to perform at events like this. And it's just so disorienting because I still see myself as like a pretty, like, I don't know. In many ways, I still see myself as like an open mic comedian. I just like don't, it's hard for me to feel the impact of my work as a standup and to, you know, gauging success in this industry is so hard.

And so when Paige and Wanda invited me to do that show, it was such a huge honor and very much, again, that thing of all of us standing backstage and I'm being like, I'm following Sandra Bernhardt and I'm like, what am I doing here? You know, this is so wild. These people, you know,

And paved the way, created the, you know, opened the doors that I walked through to be able to do this work. And, yeah, it was just a real honor to be able to share the stage with them. You said there was something about how you came in at a good time. And you did to some degree. But then I was reading more about your background and seeing that you still had...

to do these stereotypical roles that there was still very little available when you were starting out and you had to create your space. You had to create kind of a new path. And I think maybe the one benefit at that time is that

It just so happened that maybe there were more people who were open to what you were creating, but the landscape itself wasn't necessarily tremendously different. Yeah, I think also it was like the rise of the internet helped a lot. There's a democratization of what people were able to seek out and find. You know, there's all these alt spaces opening up and like it just no longer was stand-up comedy owned and completely operated by the club system.

And I think, you know, people were saying like, let's make our DIY spaces in Brooklyn. Let's like, you know, just take over a bar and figure out a way to make a show happen. And I think like that, you know, finding ways to make it outside of the traditional systems is kind of like paramount for any sort of emerging art movement, you know, like,

Like we have the structure in place that like has a very strict and sort of, you know, boring vetting process of like who they anoint to be the next, you know, big thing. And I think a lot of people back when I was starting and it's still going on today, I think you see it a lot with social media and TikTok and et cetera, but it's like, no, I'm going to build my audience. I know there's an audience out there for me and I'm not going to wait for some guy in a suit to,

or most likely a track suit, to anoint me and say, now you can join, you know, you can be at my club, you know. We're talking with comedian, writer, and actor Joel Kim Booster. And let me remind listeners, you are listening to Forum. I'm Mina Kim. This listener, Ron, writes, one bad dating story. There was a lady that screamed for me to stop and let her out of my car when I turned the wrong way.

Another listener on Discord writes, love is love is love. I will draw the line at how one treats waitstaff, though. Oh, that is a huge... I want to talk about both of these things really quickly.

The waitstaff thing, that is the biggest red flag that I always tell people to watch out for. If they are treating the waitstaff or the service employees poorly or pay attention to the tip, all of it, it's a no. Because it's like eventually that behavior trickles down and you will eventually become that waiter. You will be spoken to that way. I think it is one of the biggest indicators of someone's

moral, like, center, basically, is how they treat service employees. And, yeah, it's just a huge indicator for me. And as to the guy whose date freaked out and wanted to be let out of the car when he turned the wrong way, I'm going to chalk this up to... This is a...

You're not putting yourself in the headspace of a woman in this era. Okay? Listen, if she's on her Google Maps and knows which way the restaurant is and you take a sharp left turn in the opposite direction, yeah, I think as a woman, you'd probably be a little freaked out when your steady stream of true crime podcasts about women being inducted in Ubers. Like, yeah, of course you're going to be a little freaked out.

Noelle on Discord writes, okay, went and put Fire Island in my queue. I know I'm behind the curve. Hugh, you said that you don't think Fire Island would get made today. No, I don't. Listen, the industry is post-strikes, post the consolidation of a lot of these studios and streamers, and now post-election.

I think that there is a real three steps forward, two steps back sort of cycle that goes on in Hollywood, especially when it comes to telling diverse stories.

And, you know, I was really lucky. I got in at a time when Hollywood really believed in diverse stories. And I took out a lot of projects to sell on television this year. And the notes that I kept getting back were it was too niche. It's too niche. It's too niche. And, you know, I...

It's a polite way of calling me a f***, basically. I don't know if I'm allowed to say that. Well, our bleeper will bleep if it's the... Because Danny's the best. Yeah, but it is like there is less of an appetite. I think people are more nervous now to center diverse stories at the heart of these shows because...

You know, everyone wants Yellowstone. And it's interesting. I think Yellowstone is a great show. And, you know, when I've watched it, it is amazing. But so many people you talk to about Yellowstone are like, oh, it's just so not political. It's not political. I'm not forced to engage with politics. And what they mean by that is this cast is all white, all straight, all

All cis, you know, and it's unfortunate now that a lot of the industry sees that like, oh, if we put a gay Asian man at the center of the show, then suddenly that becomes political because suddenly people are going to be like, oh, they're shoving this diversity in my face. And it's it's it's we can't even exist anymore.

you know, and it's a cycle. It'll get better. I think eventually, but right now I talked to one of my producers at the studio at searchlight. And I said, if we took this project out now, I do not think it would be made. And he agreed. We have just a minute left, but tell me about the status of your film again, again, again. Um, it's, it's, um, we're gearing up. We've hired a director. We are, um, you know, hopefully slowly moving into the pre-production process of that. And I'm very excited for this movie. Um,

It's about a wedding. It's about a wedding. I will say, I always say this. It is much more Rachel getting married and much less bridesmaids. It is like Fire Island was hijinks and comedy and like, you know, real stuff as well. This is definitely much more of a dramedy and it's a much more, it's a quieter, smaller in scope sort of movie. And it's about friendship and it's about relationships and it's about mental health and everything.

I'm really excited for people to get to see a really different kind side to who I am as a writer. Are you thinking about wedding venues around here? We are. In fact, I am leaving this recording to go and visit a wedding venue here in San Francisco because we do want to get married in San Francisco because...

You know, our first date was at Martini's and, you know, it's just a really special place for us. Our joke last year, and it became true, was we were in San Francisco more than we were in Venice in L.A. And, yeah.

It's true. It's just easier to get to, honestly. Well, it's been such a joy to have you on. And congratulations on that and all your successes, Joel. Thank you so much. It was a real honor talking to you, truly. Joel Kim Booster, check out his work. The Forum team is Caroline Smith, Mark Nieto, Susie Britton, and so many others I can't fit in. But thank you for listening to Forum. I'm Mina Kim.

Funds for the production of Forum are provided by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, the Generosity Foundation, and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. Hey, have you heard of On Air Fest? It's a premier festival for sound and storytelling taking place in Brooklyn from February 19th through 21st.

I'm Morgan Sung, host of KQED's new tech and culture show, Close All Taps. And I'll be there at the fest to give a sneak preview of the show, along with an IRL deep dive all about how to sniff out AI. You'll also hear from podcast icons like Radiolab's Jad Abumrad, Anna Sale from Death, Sex and Money, and over 200 more storytellers. So come level up your own craft or connect with other audio creatives. Grab your tickets now at onairfest.com.