'Janelle James: How Romantic'; Gino at the Movies

When women are like, hey, can you walk me to my car? It's late at night. Can you stand here with me? I feel unsafe. Can you protect me? Right? We're not scared of the boogie woman. I'm coming. Oh, I love her so much. I do, too. Sure. Janelle James' debut hour-long stand-up special is now on Netflix. All right, so, Gino, you had a chance to talk with her all about it. Derricka, I'm not objective when it comes to Janelle James. I'm a huge fan of hers. And, in fact, she even tweeted something out about it. And in the special, she talks about that a guy came up to her and said that they dated for five months and she didn't remember him. So I thought she might not remember me. Oh, hey. Yay! Okay, you don't remember me because you didn't remember the guy you dated for five months as I saw in your special. Oh, boy. Oh, boy. I interviewed you before, and you tweeted a picture of the two of us saying, this man must be my biggest fan, and this man is your biggest fan. First of all, Gino, I do remember you. Don't tell me what I remember. I remember you. Thank you. I'm doing great. And in these troubled times, we can't say anything. I just have to say, you are so beautiful in this. You look amazing. Thank you. Thank you so much. You can say that. Yeah, I'll take it. So take me back. Take me to the first time you stepped on stage to when you did this special. I see you on stage confident at the top of your game, owning that room. Oh, thank you. You mean the very first time I did stand-up, period? Yes. Okay, yeah. First time, a bar, biker bar. Maybe 12 people in the room. I had a notebook. I had everything written down. I do have a video of it. I was looking at the ground the whole time. I never really looked at the audience. I was talking very low and monotone. And then now, like you said, this special, I think it was 2,500 people. I think I felt and looked pretty confident. I was confident and was happy with every aspect of it, which is a new thing for someone Stand up that I've released. I've always usually have something that I would have changed or done differently or look differently. And this one, I'm really happy with it all around. So, well, you almost lost one of the audience members. I was watching that woman in the front row. She was going to throw her back out, her laughing so hard. Well, that's so funny you say that because I did two shows back to back and we tape both. And the only cut that we have in the special is that a guy fell out of his chair. Like, literally, and so we had to cut that and use a second show for that joke because I had to stop. We had to make sure he was okay and everything like that. So, yeah, people were having a good time, and that makes me happy. Okay, if we lost that guy, you made a guy die from your comedy. How funny. That's what I said. I didn't kill, but I maimed. I love her laugh. I love that she can make people laugh. She has, like, a joy about her. And we've talked about her on Abbott Elementary. Every line she does is killer. She's amazing. Oh, my God, yeah. I mean, her laugh is contagious to you guys' point. And, yeah, as they briefly mentioned, too, she's also part of Abbott Elementary, an award-winning show. So I guess the big question is, how does she find time to, like, write and be a part of this special here? Yeah, it amazes me that anyone can come up with a strong 45, 50 minutes And she did find the time to do it, but listen to how long it took to finally get to this final stage. To put this strong special together called How Romantic, by the way, on Netflix, how long does it take to get to that strong amount of time that you did? So, okay, so I only usually do stand-up period when the show is on hiatus. So we're on hiatus usually from March to... Oh, to July. So, was that three months? Three months or so? And so, I got this deal three years ago, and that's when I started working on it. So, 12 months, basically, a full year to build the hour. And then this hiatus, I did 30 shows, basically, back to back, and then we shot the special. So, yeah. Yeah, well, it's like three years thinking about it and a year actually performing it. Yeah. Wow. But also living it because you're talking about things that have happened to you. Yeah. Yeah. And then. Yeah, of course. And then it changed as I went on. So I've been doing it for, you know, practicing it for three years. But the material grew and changed as the shows went on. Yeah. You know, I'd love to talk about specifics, but I'm not going to give anything away. I want people to watch this show and enjoy it and see it like I did. Did you enjoy it? Wait, I think you know. Your face. You can see I'm my biggest fan. You're like beaming. I appreciate it. And if I'm honest, I fell out of my chair. Aye. Awesome. It's cool to see in the process, though, because obviously when things would still be relevant, she was moving along with it. And I will say this. If you watch Abbott Elementary with your kids, maybe your kids shouldn't be in the room in this one, but they will hear you laughing and wondering what you're laughing about. Also, I'm a member of the Critics' Choice Association. We have our awards every year. Janelle James is hosting in January. Oh, that's special, man. Coincidence? I don't think so. Nope. Yes, and of course she remembers you. Who could forget you now? A lot of people would write this. No, no. Thank you. All right, coming up, getting ready for game day. Von Maur is here with ways that you can support your team and still be very stylish. That's coming up next.