Michelle Obama guest-starred on the final episode of popular 2 Dope Queens podcast, talking about stereotypes, anger, and things she and former President Barack Obama could never have said publicly throughout their eight years in the White House.
The former FLOTUS stopped by at WNYC for the podcast while on tour to promote her new memoir, “Becoming”, according to Hollywood Reporter.
The chemistry between 2 Dope Queens hosts and comediennes Jessica Williams and Phoebe Robinson helped push their WNYC comedy podcast to the top of the iTunes charts since its inception in 2016, AVClub reported. The duo has since adapted their show for HBO with a live tour and series of specials. The first four HBO specials of 2 Dope Queens aired in February. The next round is scheduled to begin on Feb. 2, 2019 on HBO.
The Obama interview is the first new 2 Dope Queens podcast episode since December 2017 — and the last. It went live Wednesday. “We couldn’t have dreamed up a better, more meaningful, finale,” Williams and Robinson said.
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Williams and Robinson met during a taping of The Daily Show. Williams was a correspondent and Robinson, a stand-up comic and TV writer. They developed a joint stand-up routine that became the 2 Dope Queens podcast, NPR, reported.
During their podcast with Michelle Obama, they discussed politics, hair, anger in the White House, motherhood and Obama’s famous “when they go low, we go high” moment.
Fans of 2 Dope Queens know that the hosts often talk about their hair. They asked Michelle Obama how she kept her hair looking so impeccable in the White House, Fast Company reported:
Michelle said, “this wasn’t just a first lady journey, this was a black professional women’s journey.” She tried a “little bit of everything–braids, weaves, wigs, extensions,” whatever it took to keep her hair styled while she went through the day-to-day of living publicly. “You gotta have hair and clothes that can transition from doing pushups on the floor with Bishop Tutu, which I did by the way. He challenged me to a pushup contest.”
Here are more excerpts from the podcast:
On anger in the White House:
“I’m not gonna pretend like I’m not angry. But if I’m trying to move an issue, if my anger doesn’t work to move the issue, then it’s not helpful…. And that’s what going high means. Going high means you don’t ignore it. Going high doesn’t mean you don’t acknowledge the fear…. Usually your goal isn’t to just be angry,” Obama siad suring the episode. “Every word I uttered on the campaign trail was picked apart and it was analyzed and oftentimes incorrectly…. I had to control my voice so that it wouldn’t be misinterpreted. And I still do.”
On double standards:
“There’s a lot of anger being expressed these days and I just think, man, if I ever said that … if I said those three words, it would all be over,” she said on the podcast. “And those words are said every day, all day, these days.”
On Barack’s temperament:
His even-keeled temper is not just ’cause he’s calm and cool and not emotional,” she explained. “It’s just like, you know, brother can’t get too angry if he wants to move things forward. He doesn’t have the leeway to solve problems with anger… And that remains true for women and minorities.”
On stereotypes:
Williams asked Michelle about the “angry Black woman” stereotype she discusses in her book. “(I)f you’re a woman and you’re too angry, people stop hearing the point,” Obama said. “They don’t hear you. And I’d love to be able to get in (and) change that, but the truth is that people will hear things differently from me. I will do one thing and somebody else will do the exact same thing, and it will be interpreted completely differently.”
