Last Things First: Kylie Brakeman

Episode #396

Kylie Brakeman is an actress and comedian who broke through during the pandemic, as millions have found themselves laughing and sharing her videos where she faces the camera as one of many high-energy characters just trying to make sense of the world we live in now. From the strength of her videos on Twitter, Instagram and TikTok, Brakeman has landed writing jobs on Peacock’s The Kids Tonight Show, as well as the Discovery Plus series Kicking & Streaming. Brakeman is showcasing her character live and in person at the 2022 Edinburgh Fringe Festival with Kylie Brakeman Presents: Linda Hollywood’s Big Hollywood Night. But first, she sat with me to talk about her life and career thus far.

Here’s a taste of Linda Hollywood for you:

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So tell me about Linda Hollywood, because she's probably someone who — people who follow you from Twitter or Instagram or Tik Tok may have been introduced to Linda Hollywood, but maybe not.

Yeah, so basically I've only ever done like one video with her. She's just like an agent-producer just general Hollywood cartoon type, driving down Sunset Boulevard, taking calls, saying like absolute showbiz gibberish. And, at first, the show sort of started out with her as an anchor, just as a way for me to showcase other characters, like OK, she's a fun rock and host to come back to each time. But as I started developing it, it became more and more about her, and really diving into, OK, yeah, she's a cartoon character and she acts this way and she's like, very Hollywood, but those people do kind of exist and what is their deeper underlying problem, and who would they actually be? There's still a lot of characters in the show, but they're more axiomatically tied to her and her world. There's a lot of new stuff. And so, it's both things that I was doing before the pandemic onstage, that are just goofy, and then there are some that are adapted straight from videos and have been worked out for the stage. So it's kind of a whole mix. I'm throwing shit at the wall and seeing what’s sticking right now. I'm having a blast.