Rachel Feinstein moved to New York City from Maryland at age 17 with her boyfriend and his band, “Dicksister.” Like everyone else, they moved to the city in hopes to make it big, but when her boyfriend dumped her, she found herself alone, not knowing what to do. It was this now can be considered life changing breakup that lead her into comedy and the life Rachel knows today.
After being dumped, Rachel found herself working part-time at a store that sells crystals on Broadway where someone recommended her to an acting coach. Once she started acting and doing theatre, she transitioned into stand-up.
Story teller, impersonate people, people in her life, I didn’t have the ability to do big monologues and chose to tell stories
Never write those nice crisp clean jokes, just went with what is natural
“It was a weird way to start. It was hard,” Rachel says. “But thank god for Dicksister, he got me to New York. I would have never had the bravery to move to New York if it wasn’t for [him].”
Rachel’s comedy style consists more of story-telling, telling stories from her personal life. She likes to impersonate people, mostly her family and friends. She chose this type of comedy because it was what came naturally. She felt she didn’t have the ability to tell the “nice, crisp, clean monologue jokes” like some comics, so she just brought in stories she knew instead.
Finally, Rachel had her big break in 2016. She made both her network late-night TV debut on The Late Late Show with James Corden and her first hour-long special on Comedy Central, Amy Schumer Presents Rachel Feinstein: Only Whores Wear Purple. Earlier this year, she opened for Louis C.K. on his North American tour and she just finished off her appearance at Toronto’s Comedy Festival, JFL42.
However big these accomplishments may seem, the appearances don’t get to Rachel’s head.
“I just think about what I haven’t done or the thing I didn’t get … to keep myself grounded,” she says. “Usually I just think about a small social interaction that didn’t go the way I wanted it to instead of focusing on my achievements.”
Starting off in the industry wasn’t easy for Rachel, mostly because of her gender. Female comedians weren’t fully accepted by audiences and having more than one in a set was just plain weird. Instead of seeing Rachel for her humour, it was her gender that was most important.
It came to the point where she would not be allowed on stage because they already had a female perform and having another back-to-back was too repetitive. After hearing her routine, people still couldn’t get past her gender but realized that females could be funny.
“People come up to me all the time and say like ‘I usually hate female comedians but you’re great!’ which would be the compliment you always get. It’s like ‘I hate women comics but you’re great.’ [I hear this] from women and men.”
To get past the misogyny, Rachel chooses to focus on her act and ignore the judging. It definitely has changed a lot since she started, and people have grown to realize that female comics are funny and are just as capable as men to entertain an audience.
The next couple of months are just as busy as for Rachel as she takes her routine to The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon. She also is currently working on a TV pilot and hopes to make another comedy special.
