Robin Thede, the creator and showrunner of the sketch comedy series on HBO, talks about how they created the sketches in Season 4 and the return of several zany characters.
There is no show on television quite like “A Black Lady Sketch Show.” Now in its fourth season, Robin Thede’s fearless comedy series slices and dices pop culture, race issues, dating woes, feminism, religion and more into 30-minute blasts of fantastically twisted humor.
Co-executive produced by Issa Rae, the show is renowned for pushing the boundaries of the absurd with its cast of featured players Gabrielle Dennis, Skye Townsend, Tamara Jade, DaMya Gurley and Angel Laketa Moore. The show also features weekly guest stars including Rae, Angela Bassett, Sam Richardson and Tracee Ellis Ross. Airing weekly (Episode 5 premieres tonight on HBO), the new season expands upon the madness with such eloquently titled episodes as “Peek-a-Boob, Your Titty’s Out.” We spoke with Thede, television’s first black woman director and black female head writer of a sketch comedy show, about what it takes to bring the show and its litany of characters to life. (One note: This interview took place several weeks before the writers’ strike.)
Thank you for your willingness to break down the anatomy of a sketch, or several sketches.
I will talk about any sketch and tell you all the juicy details, because there’s so many great stories. It’s like shooting a new short film every day with the best guest stars, the best actors, the best writing.
How about “Baptism Runs on Dunkin’” (Episode 2)? It’s structured like an NBA Slam Dunk contest, but the competition is between church deacons. Their goal is to baptize the most babies in a quarter, and the “game” is replete with a court, hoop and commentators.
“Baptism Runs on Dunkin’” is hysterical and disturbing. Once you get over the shock of what’s happening, you get into it. But at first you’re like, WHAT!? The [idea] was from one of our amazing writers who’s also a producer on the show, Corin Wells. We like to merge worlds to create really absurd situations, so she was like, ‘What if it’s the NBA slam dunk contest, but with deacons baptizing babies at church?’ I was like, ‘100% yes, and why does your mind work this way? Let’s go.’
The script was perfect when it came in, but I wanted to get at least one real NBA player in there because I thought that would be hilarious. Our director, Bridget Stokes, her manager is friends with Derek Fisher. We don’t make people audition for the show. We just send offers, so we sent him an offer and he was like yeah, I want to do more stuff like this. I’d also been dying to get Tahir Moore, who’s a famous internet comedian. We like to have a mix, from A-list casting like Angela Bassett and Gabrielle Union to all these amazing internet comedians that we love, like Tahir and KevOnStage.
For the sketch, Chloé Hilliard, who’s one of our co-head writers and a great stand up, had the basketball skills to play pastor Trudyo Werd. Oh, and Kimber Zak [Thede] is back. She’s been around since Season 1. She’s the “famed” announcer who commentates on the everyday life things. And she has a new partner, Skip Appeal, a church lady who’s very saved and sanctified.
The setup is ambitious. A basketball court in a church, a choir, bleachers.
