Lolly Adefope

“The thing I love about comedy is that it challenges you.”

“Yeah, Patrice Johnson is an incredible actress. She makes it real easy to cry when she cries.”

“I live with my boyfriend, but we never cook together. It's too stressful.”

“Performing a play or a musical or something is obviously an incredible rush, but I don't think you get that immediate response like with comedy unless you get a round of applause or whatever.”

“You don't get white comedians being asked to talk about their race in their shows. I should be given the same agency to talk about what I want to talk about.”

“In a nightclub, the women's loos are not just the women's loos; they're where temporary female friendships are forged.”

“When I was about six years old I decided to make a teddy bears' picnic in our dining room, so I set up 10 dolls and teddy bears around the table and made them each an apricot jam sandwich. It was only when I sat down that I realized I'd made 10 apricot jam sandwiches for 10 inanimate objects, and that I'd have to eat them all.”

“I was desperate for comedy to seep into me somehow, convinced that being surrounded by it would give me the confidence to go onstage myself.”

“I wanted to do comedy, but I didn't grow up wanting to be a standup.”

“You can hit the comedy, but a lot of 'Shrill' is also emotional.”

“Whereas acting, you have to wait for someone else to give you the opportunity to do it, in comedy, you can just pick out your own strengths and be like, I'm just going to show the best bits to the world.”

“Online shopping. I spend the weekend browsing, but need the closure of a purchase before the new week starts.”

“It's freeing to be that person who people turn around to look at, wondering who could have a laugh that loud.”

“It's easy to look at a show with a diverse cast that's touching on topics that haven't been talked about and to think, 'Oh, this is just political correctness; this is just box ticking.'”

“I'm starting to play lots more naturalistic, realistic people than when I first started. Maybe because I was doing character comedy shows, and I was doing slightly weird, oddball characters with weird accents, those were the characters that I got cast to play - which made perfect sense.”

“It always felt that there were a lot of shows where there was a white lead female, who was attractive, and then I was being offered the kooky friend. And it was just like, 'Why can't this be the other way around?'”

“All my characters are like, weird people. Weird, un-self aware people.”

“I'm hyperaware that I'm traveling as a Black woman, but I try to remind myself that there's a lot to be gained by stepping out of my comfort zone.”

“Making comedy is a privilege, so you should be doing something no one else can do. That's when it feels like art; it's a personal expression and it's being done in a unique way.”

“Adam Hess - he thinks that if you swallow enough chewing gum you go from being left-handed to being right-handed, and vice versa, but he is my best friend anyway.”