Marcel the Shell With Shoes On is the Academy Award-nominated animation-meets-live-action tale of an endearingly existential, anthropomorphic seashell. This month sees the UK release of something entirely different for Slate, who has often described her own career as “random”. An indie hit about a woman seeking an abortion after a one-night stand, it not only set Slate out as a compelling dramatic force, but gave her a platform to discuss her passion for reproductive rights. Constantly pushing the boundaries of what it meant to be a comic actor, her movie break-through came in 2014’s acclaimed Obvious Child. Then, in 2009, she joined the cast of Saturday Night Live where she would only appear for one season before moving on to off-kilter US sitcoms such as Parks and Recreation and Girls, as well as beginning a rich run of voiceover work thanks to her distinctive vocal talents, starting with Bob’s Burgers. By her mid-20s, Slate had started to make waves and was spotted by a commercial agent, who put her in adverts selling everything from “energy drinks to dishwasher detergent”. Photograph: Moviestore/Rex/Shutterstock I’m proud of the way we unconsciously sorted what could survive and what couldn’t “I’ve always just shared really personal stories,” she says, “many of them about my body.” From the start, her comedy was intimate and revelatory. After graduating from Columbia University, the Milton, Massachusetts-born comic spent years honing her craft as a standup in “shitty dive bars” across New York. Slate’s brand of openness doesn’t just extend to telling strangers about the trials of parenting a toddler a radical kind of honesty has long permeated her stage and screen work. “I was so tired when we got there that I just started to silently – not sob – but just leak tears out of tired eyes … But I think I’m all right! I didn’t, like, walk into the canyon or anything …” It did, but by this point it was too late for Slate. Slate adds that she and her husband went out at around 7am to get coffee, thinking a change in location might soothe their wailing daughter. “I’ve been up since about 4.30am with my two-year-old,” she explains. When I ask how she is, the comedian and actor is brutally honest. I t is 9am in Los Angeles and Jenny Slate is smiling – or is that grimacing? – over Zoom.
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