After finishing her workout with her personal trainer and soothing Clyde, who was “yelling at a ghost,” Nicole Byer began to think about her busy agenda.
She is trying to balance four podcasts, a table read for another production, and developing new stand-up material.
Byer is now getting ready for what may turn out to be one of her career’s most crucial moments.
This year, she is a finalist for three Emmy Awards. For her work on Netflix’s “Nailed It!” — an amateur baking competition where failing to execute the design of a famous pastry chef is the norm — Byer is the first black woman to be nominated for an outstanding host for a reality or competitive show.
As the show’s executive producer and nominee for the award for best reality or competitive program, she is also up for an Emmy for outstanding writing in a variety special for her Netflix stand-up special, “Big Beautiful Weirdo.”
After finding out about the nominations, she posted a set of clips on Instagram with “Give me an Emmy, please.” (She was also a finalist for two Emmys the previous year.)
The 35-year-old Byer referred to herself as “the Bob Saget of our generation.” She has a passionate youthful fan following, some of whom yell the catchphrase whenever they see her in public, thanks to Netflix’s wholesome “Nailed It!”
Her comedic acts, however, often take bold detours into her sexual antics and remarks on racial issues, such as the surprising reason she enjoys having sex with white guys.
She is the Nicole Byer of her generation—a dreamer nurtured in a white suburban community, the offspring of Jim Crow South migrants and Barbadian immigrants, and a performer who designs her career with the cunning of the business executive her mother and grandmother would have loved her to be.
Byer claims that she has striven to liberate herself from the notions of what it means to be a black woman along the road. She said in a 2019 interview with NPR that trying to mold yourself into the stereotypes of others is unpleasant and comparable to blackface.
She told NPR, “It’s upsetting when you realize, yeah, Hollywood just knows one sort of black.
Like, Emma Stone and Emma Roberts – all these females get to exist, and they are not required to be anything in particular. They are free to be anyone they wish. And we must only be one thing.
In Middletown Township, New Jersey, Byer grew up in a neighborhood with a predominance of white residents. She credits her mother Lillie Byer, a native of Mississippi, for recognizing her humorous abilities and directing her into theater. She learned the value of having the ability to make others laugh at that point.
Byer claims that while her mother supported her theatrical inclinations, she preferred for her to follow a more conventional career route after high school. Byer chose to travel to New York City to pursue acting after the passing of her mother when she was 16 years old. If she hadn’t passed away, Byer said, “I wouldn’t have been able to leave.”
Working odd jobs, eating inexpensive pizza, and using marijuana with pals helped her get by in Manhattan. As she was honing her skill, she wanted to be an actress like Viola Davis or one with the range to appear in “A Raisin in the Sun” or “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?”
Byer said she was searching for a method to deal with her sadness after the death of her father from a heart attack when she was 21 years old when she came into improv and started to find her feet. She enrolled in the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre’s improv training program and started acting.
She sometimes found the humor on stage to be ineffective. Byer and Sasheer Zamata, her closest friend, didn’t always get the cultural allusions made by the mostly white improv troupes. There was often mutual bewilderment.
Some audience members would be perplexed when “we would come on (stage) and mention stuff like black church and R&B,” according to Zamata.
Byer and Zamata started performing as the improv ensemble Doppelganger throughout New York City because they were often mistaken for one another. Keisha Zollar is a fellow black female comic.
Byer was offered a spot on the MTV program “Girl Code,” where she and other comedians and actors would discuss grooming customs like waxing and provide humorous interpretations of the unwritten norms of female behavior.
Offers to do stand-up comedy at colleges and universities came after that. Because stand-up was so foreign to her, Byer said that she was first hesitant to accept such gigs. However, her manager convinced her to take a risk and accept the pay.
Her manager reportedly advised her that she was “leaving money on the table” by not trying stand-up comedy and for not knowing enough about it. “My father would be furious,”
Byer said that she would “smash” her college performances during the week and “bust” her weekend performances at comedy clubs in Los Angeles.
She was given the opportunity to create a scripted program by MTV. “Loosely Precisely Nicole” portrayed her experiences as a 20-something actress seeking to get into the industry while navigating maturity.
In one episode, Byer played a white casting director who instructed her to sound and act “blacker” for the part, a memory she has kept with her since she first entered the entertainment industry.
“We’re not a single entity. She answered, “I sound black because I am black.
“I don’t know, I just want to do myself,” the speaker said in response to the statement “Be blacker, be sassier.”
For having a varied cast in a series that didn’t only concentrate on the individuals’ identities, Byer’s program received accolades. It received criticism for failing to find humor outside of crass jokes and racial stereotypes.
In 2016, MTV canceled the program after one season. It was renewed for a second season by Facebook Watch, but not for a third.
She stated, “I’m particularly pleased of the huge comedy I made about a large black female.
“I gained experience being on set. I gained experience working in a writer’s room.
Byer said that she no longer cares whether she is criticized for being black.
Byer commended comic Faizon Love for directing people to her now-Emmy-nominated Netflix stand-up special after he disparaged her as a “unfunny black lady” in an Instagram post last year.
She replied sarcastically, “He doesn’t have a Netflix special for me to watch,” adding that many others agreed with him.
Byer claims that she is instead concentrating on creating an empire. Her dating podcast, “Why won’t you date me,” is currently produced by Team Coco, owned by Conan O’Brien. She portrays real estate agent Nicky Coles in the NBC comedy series “Grand Crew,” which has an all-black ensemble and portrays upper-middle-class life without focusing on black tragedy.
Byer co-stars with Diane Keaton and Loretta Devine in the newly released film “Mack & Rita.”
Despite the fact that Byer may not have the business degree her parents would have preferred, she has perfected the art of being herself.
She remarked, “My folks would be very happy that I worked it out.
It would have been good if they had been there to provide assistance, advice, or support. But my mother would be quite pleased with me. These jokes may not be for me, but they’re for someone, she would say.