Today<\/a> show. It\u2019s the last thing Debbie, full name Debbie Shields, was expecting when she made the impromptu decision to say \u201chi\u201d to O\u2019Brien. The 68-year-old native New Yorker didn\u2019t know what SubwayTakes was or that she was about to get pulled into an improvisational-comedy bit, but thanks to a childhood spent performing in church and experience hosting comedy and karaoke nights at Confessions, the bar she owns in Brooklyn, she says her instincts kicked in immediately. This SubwayTakes appearance isn\u2019t even the first time she has been put on the spot by someone with a huge comedy platform. Mo\u2019Nique once pulled her onstage at Barclays Center to give marriage advice to the thousands of people in attendance. It\u2019s the sort of \u201cfluke\u201d she encounters regularly, she says: \u201cEverything just happens to me.\u201d<\/p>\nHi, Debbie! Thanks for taking the time to talk. How are you?
Everything is beautiful. How are you?<\/p>\n
I\u2019m great! You are a big star all of a sudden! How does it feel?
I\u2019m ecstatic! I am a nervous wreck!<\/p>\n
I would not have guessed you\u2019re a person who gets nervous. You seemed so composed and assured with Conan.
When a mic hits me, it hits me. I was raised in church, singing in choirs and doing things like that, so my mom prepared me for the surprise interview. Boom! Here I am!<\/p>\n
Were you familiar with S\ufeffubwayTakes when you came across the show being filmed?
No. My friend and I got on the train together, and he pointed it out: \u201cIt\u2019s Conan O\u2019Brien!\u201d I said, \u201cOkay, well, I\u2019m going to go over and say \u2018hello\u2019 to him!\u201d And it went from there.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Were you a big fan of Conan beforehand?\u00a0
Yes, from his television show!<\/p>\n
Everyone online has been talking about how impressive it is that you kept up with him. Have people always told you that you\u2019re funny?
Yes. I know how to make people laugh, that\u2019s for sure. I laugh at funerals. I\u2019m not in the casket, I\u2019m good.<\/p>\n
What kind of humor do you typically gravitate to?
Well, Conan is funny. I like Jimmy Kimmel, I love Saturday Night Live because it\u2019s just crazy, and I love Madea. She\u2019s out of control. I\u2019ve been onstage with Mo\u2019Nique at Barclays Center. I was sitting in the audience, and she was asking people how long they had been together. They were saying nine years or eight years, but they weren\u2019t married. So then she said, \u201cWell, you guys don\u2019t know what you\u2019re doing. I see Auntie has a wedding band on her finger, so she obviously knows what she\u2019s doing. Come up here and show them what they should be doing.\u201d That was really funny. I own a bar in Brooklyn, and I do a comedy show there every other Friday \u2014 we\u2019re going to turn it up to every Friday. I have comedians come in and do the show, but I\u2019m not a comedian. I just love to laugh. Laughing is good for the soul, and it\u2019s good for the health.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s funny that Mo\u2019Nique called you Auntie. I don\u2019t think you\u2019re that much older than she is.\u00a0
Well, you could be young at heart, and you could be young in your mind. But then you realize how really freaking old you are the next morning when you\u2019re sore as hell. I say, \u201cI used to drop it like it\u2019s hot. Now I lay it down like it\u2019s warm.\u201d<\/p>\n
That\u2019s great! Is that an original joke of yours?
That\u2019s mine. Definitely.<\/p>\n
You say you\u2019re not a comedian, but you clearly have a knack for it. Have you ever thought about going into performance?\u00a0
I\u2019ve been told several times that I should, but I haven\u2019t embarked on it. My thing is the spontaneous thing. Even at my comedy shows, I go onstage and host before the comics come on. I just ad lib, and the audience is cracking up laughing. I also host karaoke nights, and everybody who sings gets a gag prize and I insult every singer. I talk about how bad their breath smells on the mic, and they get a prize that might be breath spray, toothpaste, or mouthwash. I tell them, \u201cThe more you drink, the better you sound!\u201d<\/p>\n
Tell me about how you came to open your bar.\u00a0
It was a fluke! Everything just happens to me. It\u2019s a blessing. I was going to open another business, but I decided it was too close to where I lived and I didn\u2019t want to mix business with the community. So my friend said, \u201cWhy don\u2019t you open a bar?\u201d And I was like, \u201cOkay, I guess I\u2019ll try it!\u201d And boom! Then I had to decide what to name the bar, and I thought and I thought and I thought. I called my son, and he said, \u201cWhy don\u2019t you name it Confessions?\u201d<\/p>\n
So at Confessions Bar, we have a Confessions Box and people come in and write confessions. After they write the confession, they ring a bell that says \u201cRing for Oral.\u201d The box is full of confessions, and as I do different shows, I pull the confessions out of the box and read them to the audience.<\/p>\n
It sounds like a show that would do really well online. Have you ever thought about filming it for social media?
No, but everybody\u2019s telling me that\u2019s what I should do. I\u2019m getting a lot of advice at this point.<\/p>\n
With your newfound fame, if an opportunity came along to host a show of your own, is that something you\u2019d be interested in?
Definitely.<\/p>\n
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