 friend to Churchill, and I'm here with, what's your name? Kendall Farrell. Kendall Farrell. And we're doing the comedy of state this afternoon as an interactive, a little bit of an interactive talk show. Now when the title of the program is Everyone Has a First Time, and I would say that this is my first time doing a tape show, but I've actually done a couple shows already. One was for Here Channel 17, My Friends on the Tee also did a show with me, and- We love Nikki and Emoji. Oh, Nikki and Emoji are hot stuff, and all things LGBTQ out of working media down in Montpelier also did a nice interview for me, and I'm just excited to have the opportunity to get my message out and bring in some queer comics and have fun with my friend Kendall. Thanks for having me, Brenda. You're welcome. I'm gonna throw in a little disclaimer that anything that's said here today is actually my opinion, and does not represent anybody from the folks that I represent as the, excuse me, what is it I am? I am the liaison for the LGBTQIA Alliance of Vermont, and as such, we'll probably talk a little bit about that as well, but I wanna get to my guest Kendall Farrell. Kendall's from Burlington right now, and he's a stand-up comedian, and this is your, I think this was your bio. Yeah, I think we pulled it from my Facebook page. Rye Sly-Style and Dry Wit has made him a favorite in his home state. He won the annual Vermont Funniest Comedian Contest in 2015, profiled seven days, regular at the Comedy Club. He's open for headliners all over New England, performed on Night Train, and how was that? Was that a big club? Night Train, it's at a place called Littlefield in Park Slope, and Wyatt Snack Hosts, and the line-ups they get are just insane. That was a lot of fun, and Wyatt was super nice. Nice. Locally, we got a course at the Vermont Comedy Club, Comedy and Crapes at the Skinny Pancake, Brewers and Brows and Foam Brewers, Barn Party at the Zen Barn, and something that ties in with our theme today, which is the United We Stand Up. Yeah. Political. That was such a fun show. Annie Russell, and I host that. Some Vermonters might know Annie Russell from VPR, where she's, I think now the deputy news director. She, I mean, I was glad to see her. It was a lot of fun. That show was a- And also very funny. The show was a, oh, she was. She was. Keeping with both the political theme and the first time thing, I'm gonna relate a little bit about my first time with a pride parade. And this was about three years ago. I got to pull my, or I got to drive my big red jeep up Church Street. It was a panic. I had people waving, screaming, shouting. And I was just hopeful I wasn't running over anybody. And behind me was a trailer full of my gay young friends bouncing to RuPaul. And so I was also honored this year with my friend Craig Mitchell to be co-martial. I asked him to change it to Marshmallow, but they didn't quite get to Marshmallow. But Craig and I got to go up- I'm surprised you got resistance on that. Craig and I got to go up Church Street together. We were laughing and joking all the way up through. And then I got beautiful roses from my friend Meg. And it was just a really wonderful day. I had a blast. Were you in this year's pride parade? I, yeah, they did it in Battery Park this year, which was super fun. I missed the parade part of it, but I was there for the big party afterwards. I had to, I had to come, I had to leave work early and then go back to work afterwards. Oh my goodness. But it was a lot of fun. It was, the whole park was packed. Now you and Annie do a routine or have done a routine. Yeah. And it, the one I saw happened to be down in our state's capital, but you've been all over the state doing this routine? Yeah, yeah, we took it. So the show is called United We Stand Up. And it's like a politically themed comedy show. So what we do is we bring a bunch of stand up comedians some from Vermont, some from out of state, sort of a mix of people and just people who have sort of politically relevant material. And then at the end of the show, there's an interview with a local politician or political figure in general. So we've had David Zuckerman on the show. He was our guest at the Vermont Comedy Club, city counselor Max Tracy from Burlington, the newest city counselor, Ali Jang. We had him right after he was elected. And yeah, so it's a lot of fun and Annie and I love doing it. Annie is moving too. I heard that. So the series is on a hiatus for a while. And you're moving as long as you mentioned that, we'll just talk about it. You're taking off and going to the big Apple for brighter and bigger things to do. The big Apple, yeah. I, a lot of Vermont comedians have, former Vermont comedians are living there now. So I'm excited to join my fellow expatriates. You think you'll be able to find a political venue to bring New York politics to the forefront? Yeah, I don't, it has been kind of on my mind because I have no journalism skills. So Annie was like really important to the show because she knows about like journalistic ethics and all, you know, she's a very talented interviewer. So she kind of would like book all the political guests and she spearheaded that part. And I would kind of book the comedians and manage that part of the show. But I've been thinking a lot about ways that we could keep it going or, Annie's gonna be in Chicago. Maybe I would go visit her. Maybe she could come visit me. Annie, I'm pitching this to you. I hope you're watching. Sounds like a road trip. In any case, what would you like to do with today on the show? What have you got in mind? Oh, I guess if we're talking about first, first times. I have a funny story about the first time I went to a Pride parade. The first time I ever went to a Pride parade, I was there for probably like a half an hour before I heard some like poor like disenfranchised straight bro who was like walking by and he was like, man, well, why don't we have a straight pride parade? I just remember thinking like, I don't know, man, but if I had to guess, I would say there probably just aren't enough straight parade planners out there. That's a good point. I don't know who he thinks is like stopping him though, like go nuts. Are you kidding me? I don't know about you, but I would love nothing more than to see that. Nothing would delight me more. Oh my, I don't know what it's gonna look like. I keep like imagining it's just gonna be like a bunch of really drunk people in the parking lot of like a home depot. Just like barbecuing and listening to like Kid Rock. Straight pride. There you go. We'll put it in the bin to check on later and see what we can do there. That is just a joke, of course. Of course it is. Straight people will never take home depot away from lesbians. I think we all know that. No, that is a great place to shop. Yeah. I've been told. Yeah, there's another local comedian who has a really funny joke. I won't give it away in case you have a run about how the hottest place to meet single lesbians in Burlington is at Pet Food Warehouse. Wow. I'll have to make a note of that. Yeah, right then. Good thing you brought your pet. But then I gotta get a pet. Yeah. I don't think Suze has a pet. I think she just hangs out there. She's just like trolling for a pussy at the Pet Food Warehouse. It can be done. I think she has done it. I hope Suze is watching too. Yeah, we'll have to get her on the show to refute or substantiate those claims. Suze would be a great guest. I think she would too. She just wound up her first year up in St. Albans last night. I think you guys did the show at, what's the venue that? Twigs. Twigs, yeah. That's always a fun show. A lot of local entertainment up there and she's been doing that show now for a year and I've been to a couple of those shows and they're great. They're always great. She's got a rapport with the audience and she can warm you up and get anybody laughing. Just curious, when you're doing a comedy routine, are you able to discern the differences between a gay crowd like with your LOL comedy series and a straight crowd and how do you change that up? How do you do that different? Yeah, well, I think it depends on maybe not if they're straight or gay but just where you are. I think the further away from the cities you go, like they're a little progressive enclaves and stuff but you go like, you know, there used to be shows we were just talking about out in Morrisville, Moog's Place, used to be shows at Moog's Place and you go out there and they have no, it's not that they don't like gay people but they just have no idea what Grindr is or they don't know about like, I think they're just ill-informed about gay sex. So it was pretty shocking for them for these rural audiences. It might be a tough venue. I will tell you that my friend Christine showed her documentary denial at the library in Montpelier this past week and it was a predominantly gay crowd and they all got the jokes, the innuendo, all the overlays that were in there and all the things. I was asking her where has that happened before? She says, Spain. I said, what? She says, well, they had subtitles and they laughed at everything that was spot on. So I said, well, that must mean that the written word is stronger than the spoken word but only in Spanish. I suppose so. I was gonna take a few minutes to review what I do within the LGBTQ Alliance and I'm gonna kind of read what is our mission and purpose statement and the LGBTQIA Alliance of Vermont comprised of representatives from a range of LGBTQIA organizations and individuals from the broader Vermont community, our missions to anticipate and collaboratively respond to proposed and enacted laws, policies, action and community level crisis that impact LGBTQIA Vermonters. The Alliance provides expert advice to elected officials, political activists, state industries, community-based and professional organizations and other interested parties on representing and protecting the interests and rights of LGBTQIA Vermonters. The group seeks to fairly represent the collective voice of the LGBTQIA Vermonters through advocacy, community building, education and representation. Now, within the context of the Alliance, there's five organizations that are cornerstone or original groupings and I don't know if you know them all. Can you guess? I think Green Mountain Crossroads is probably one of them. They are. Outright Vermont. Outright Vermont is, yeah. The Pride Center. Yeah. God, I'm trying not to cheat and look at my sheet here. I did provide answers to the quiz. Yeah, I got three of them. Okay, so can I cheat? Yeah, you can cheat. Oh, Vermont cares. Oh, those guys are great. I thought they were part of the Pride Center. No, Peter Jacobson's executive director there and actually I'm gonna review some of the fundraisers he's got coming up. There's an A's Walk in City Hall Park on October 1st at 10 a.m. I would go right to their website for information on that to register and by all means contribute to that. Rainbow Umbrella of Central Vermont actually put on the first Pride Solidarity March that coincided with the official Pride date this past year and it was very successful. We had people represented from all communities there and we had speakers afterwards. That is anticipated to be again next year. Great. The Pride Center just completed the Pride celebration two weeks ago and I mentioned that Craig and I were co-grand marshmallows. We're gonna adopt that, co-grand marshmallows. Yeah, I think you guys should push for that. I think we should. Green Mountain Crossroads, which is down in Brattleboro, Vermont. It was just down there a couple of days ago. H.B. Lozito is sponsoring again a very successful two-day seminar out in the country. It's October 27th and again, go to Green Mountain Crossroads to register and find out more information. I'm one of the presenters for that as well. Oh, very cool. So, and lastly, we have outright to Vermont, not leastly though, Dana Kaplan, new executive director there. He is having a fire truck pole fundraiser on Church Street, September 30th. Oh, I think they've done this before, haven't they? They have done it before. Have you participated or watched it? Yeah, I think the Comedy Club put together a team to be part of it last year. And I was out of town, I think, but it looked, I was really sad to miss it. Big fundraiser for our friends at Outright and one of the things that you can do is you can go on their website and you can look at their information there and there are, interestingly, one of the unique things that they've come up with for fundraising is that they've found individuals that will post their fundraiser on their website. So if you're interested in doing that, follow some of the guidelines there and post that and you too can earn funds for the fire truck pole or better yet, sponsor a team, be on a team, just come out and have fun. I guarantee the weather that day is gonna be beautiful and crisp and cool. I promise it will be. You promise? Yeah, Tom Messner and I have been talking. Oh yeah. So again, these are the organizations that I represent to the state house and as nonprofits, they're always working very hard to generate funds to keep their staff. They're partially grant funded but contributions go a long, long, long way. Couple of the things that I also wanted to mention are what we've identified as challenges that are currently being confronted by Vermont's LGBTQIA communities. We're doing that through some interesting things that I've uncovered this summer. One of the things that I'm working on is the changing driver's licenses to add the letter X to it. We've been working with folks at several different levels to see if we can make that happen. I remember, I think we chatted about that a little bit and it sounds like we're not gonna have to do that through the legislature. Yeah, we're actually looking to do it administratively, which is really huge cost savings because if you don't have to run it through the legislative process, it is part of the DMV's upgrade to their system so we're working to ask if we can get that inserted in there and that actually follows what Canada's doing with their passports now. Oh, I didn't even know that. They're actually adding X to that. New York is working on similar legislation. It's already been adopted in Oregon and California, so states that are much larger than us, including a whole country, are working towards this and I think it'll be great for young folks who are coming up and have to put their first legal document in and they don't have to lie. They said, well, I'm not M and I'm not F and X works. X will work for lots of folks. That is one of the things we also have coming up in the Senate this session is H-333. This bill proposes to require that any single-use toilet in any public building or place of public accommodations be identified as gender-free. I mean, my gosh, who wouldn't wanna have the opportunity to use one or the other when there's a line at one and you can go in the other? Yeah, I can, I always use the word. There's probably a joke there somewhere. Yeah, I don't know. I feel like you're not gonna get in trouble for going in the other, I've never gotten in trouble for using a women's room before and I use it all the time because they're always nicer and also, there's usually, there's always some old man cleaning the men's room. I don't know, I've run into that everywhere I go. That happens. I know there's a joke there. I think you're right and I think they have both of the- There's always some sort of like mess that's being cleaned up in the men's room. Always has like an out-of-order sign. I'm hopeful that this will go right through. It did get through the house. I did testify there and I believe we'll have a good result with that. I've been also getting out to meet folks which has been really interesting. I've got a literal laundry list of folks that I've been able to have time with and just from an educational standpoint, anybody who's listening to this, anybody who's a citizen, you don't even have to have been legally able to vote but these folks will talk to you. They'll definitely spend some time with you and they wanna hear what your concerns are and I would really suggest that you look up your local representative and speak with them. Most recently I've talked to Phil Scott, T.J. Donovan, Becca Ballant, Tristan Tolino, Celine Colburn, Brian Chia Sina who is also a really talented DJ here in the area. Barbara Ratzelsen, Deanna Gonzalez, Gilles Krawinski, Connor Casey who is the executive director of the Vermont Democrats. Oh my goodness, Mark Hughes had me on his radio program a couple weeks ago. How was that? It was interesting. He wanted me to come down and co-host with him at Goddard College at 7 a.m. And I said, probably not. Not only the drive would be fun but just getting down there in one piece would be interesting. But we're gonna do that again. Cindy Weed and Dan Connor up in my neck of the woods have been always open to conversations with me. Also, I've spoken with Senate Leader Pro Tem Tim Ash, Speaker of the House, Mitzi Johnson. And it's really been great to have the ear of the Lieutenant Governor as well. Like you said, David Zuckerman came and sat down with you. So that's pretty enjoyable. Taylor, what are you doing over there? You're wrecking the place. But all of these folks have been identified as folks that we can go and speak with and they're very open to conversation. I'm really lucky to have worked with, and this'll be just a little bit of prop for my collie's on Keith Goslant who has been around a long time, was on the Freedom to Mary Caucus for the men. And he has been both my trainer, my teacher, my mentor and a friend. And it's been a blessing to have somebody bring me through this process. Like I said, I always tell people I wished I had paid more attention to civics in high school to know what's going on. And that's kind of that. So, let's see, where are we? What have I left out? What do we wanna cover? Oh my gosh, I was kind of curious about what your experience has been like working with Governor Scott and his new administration. Well, it's kind of interesting because we had early on identified that we'd like to get in and speak with the governor. Everybody knows he's got a two year term and he's about a third of the way through the two, both the terms. And we had the opportunity to sit down and speak with him last week. It was really good. We had about an hour of his time and he asked a lot of questions and Keith and Goslant and myself were able to provide a lot of information and things that he was genuinely interested in. I feel good having a governor that will take the time to sit down and listen and folks within his office also are remarkable. We had a great conversation afterwards with Rachel Feldman and we spent some time discussing some of the nuances of the conversation that we had with Governor Scott. T.J. Donovan very much the same way, very open and asking questions. If you ever thought law enforcement wasn't on your side, you need to spend some time with the man because as the enforcer of all of our laws, he is definitely watching out for us. I now have his personal phone number. I don't know if you want me to know that on TV, but if you- Can we put it on the screen? No, no, I don't think that'd be appropriate. But what I would like to say is that if anybody has- I was gonna text him every night like you up. That's somebody else you think of. One of the things that we did cover was how to report an incident and he advocates that if anybody in the community has incidents of bias, any type of hate speech, anything that maybe we're observing in other states and it filters into Vermont, if you let me know, I will let them know and it may be part of a larger case study or they may already have information or complaints about the individual or group. So nothing is too- People in public service, you mean? Yeah, yeah, they do have a chain between the state and the state's attorney general, the FBI, local law enforcement. As much as they have bad press, they also have some good press and they have good people that work there and TJ is one of them. So I'm really glad to have him on our side. He marched in the Pride parade with us. Oh, no way. Which was really cool, really cool. So we had him and several people from his office that were in there with us. Cool. Being able to talk to folks or call them up or send them an email really is one of the strengths that I think I have in the position that I'm doing because if I say, can we get a meeting? Nobody's declined time with me. Yeah, no one has, for United, we stand up. The only people who have said no to the show are Republicans. It's been very hard to book a conservative, which is too bad because Annie and I are nice people. But we've had, yeah, everybody has been, that's the nice thing about living in a small state is that your public officials are all very accessible and we've had great luck booking people for the show and the thing is about Vermont politicians, almost every single politician we've interviewed has either had to leave early or get there late because they have some sort of animal that they're taking care of. David is a farmer. Yes, yes. I think, if I'm remembering correctly, could only do Annie and my show if his horse didn't give birth that day, which is a weird booking show. It's a showstopper. We had to book around that. Speaking of Republicans, I have not had the opportunity yet to reach out to Republicans, but I will tell you that the- Well, Governor Scott. Well, Governor Scott is the top Republican, but with that said, he should be accessible to everybody and I think that all the electorate should. My own county of Franklin, I have the Senate Minority Leader, Dustin DeGree, and he's on my list actually in the next couple of weeks to reach out so I anticipate reaching across the aisle, so to speak. Well, that's good. And I don't identify as either Democrat or Republican and I know that many people have very strong feelings within the LGBTQ community, but keep an open mind and I will when we sit down. Yeah. Yeah, I think it's certainly important to just talk to people as individuals, but I wonder how Governor Scott, it seems like he was interested in what you were saying and was responsive to the issues you were bringing up. I wonder how he feels about his party's hard line on those same issues. If you've noticed any of the press that's come out of the governor's office lately, he has denounced the rescission of DACA. He has also come out with 10 other governors for the current health care program, not the repeal and replace that the current federal Republicans wanna do. He understands the people of Vermont and while the nuances of taxes and teachers and things might have gotten into a different category with some folks, I think sincerely he thinks about our community and really does. I know that Republicans will be Republicans and Democrats will be Democrats, but with that said, I think it's a pretty good state for some partisan work and passing of the first part through H333 through the house had very little objection as well as some of the other things that we're doing. So I'm looking forward to working with everybody and the governor and legislature is where we're headed. Yes. Got any more comedy for us because I'm really dying to hear some jokes. Oh, yeah, should we end on a joke? Well, we could, yeah. Well, I don't know if, are you on any dating apps, Brenda? Did I admit to? Did you admit to? Yeah, I'd have to say one or two. One or two? Do you know if I ask which ones? If I could remember them, that's how often I go in there. Okay, Cupid's a common one. Okay, Cupid is one of the ones. A lot of people are on a Cupid. That seems fairly LGBTQ friendly, so. Oh, really? Yeah. I haven't tried it. Well, mostly L, so that's mostly L. That's why. It could be, it could be. There's not much for me there. Yeah, I don't know. I am on Grindr and Tinder. Look me up. So, promotion. Okay, Grindr. And yeah, being on Grindr is fun, but it also makes me terrified of getting murdered. Tell me about that. Really, in the Green Mountain State, you might feel like you're getting murdered. I make me nervous about getting murdered because if you get murdered, you just lose any sense of privacy you once had. They just, the cops go through all your stuff and I just feel like I don't need that kind of hassle in my death, you know? What do they go through? What do they? Well, if I got murdered, they would have to go through my Grindr account and that is absolutely my worst nightmare. Is that on your PC or cell phone? It's on my phone. Oh boy. Which, yeah, that's pretty damning. These poor cops are not even gonna know what this guy's face looks like. They're just gonna have to work backwards. Like a picture of his headless torso. There's no registry for that headless torso pictures? No, it's just gonna, I'm so afraid it's gonna be all over the evening news, like, squashed across. Like, have you seen this faceless torso? Contact the Burlington PD. Oh my goodness. And beware that he could have shaved by now. I know. It's my worst nightmare. I don't know if everybody will get that, but I know all the folks who are gay will probably. Yes, you don't have to be gay to be on Grindr. I think that's the worst. You can use it to find gay people in your area. You could also use it to avoid gay people in your area, and how you use it is your business. Okay, I'm gonna start to wrap up a little bit. I got the 30 minute notice. Better than stretch this into 45 minutes. I wanna let you know that my collie's on Keith, Ghostland and myself are planning a road trip, actually to four different locations. This fall we wanna talk to the LGBTQIA community without any filters. We need to know what's going on in there, and we wanna be able to have a very firm commitment to you guys, as well as my organization, that we're representing you, not ourselves and not our own ideas. So we need to hear from you, and we'll announce that pretty broadly. I am gonna take a moment to introduce my next guest, Taylor Radke. She's a young queer comedian and a friend, and also, I read here, this can't be right, you're recovering from a near fatal accident, plane crash? Something like that. Okay, were you trying to fly, or was it, oh, it was a skateboard. Oh, I must have misread that. Yeah. Cool. Yeah, and you can find her at Zero Gravity, pour in your favorites hopefully soon, and I wanna also give a shout out to Zero Gravity for their great contribution here in the Pride celebration. They did a promotion with Beer, which is okay with me, and donated back to the Pride Center, and I wanna really thank Kendall for being here with us today, and my show debut, and being the beautiful co-host that you are, and- Well, thanks for having me, Brenda. I know you're gonna be successful going down to New York City, and we'll see you again when you come up to Vermont. You certainly will be invited, I'm sure, anywhere, everywhere. I hope so. Okay, and this is Brenda Churchill for the Comedy of State. Some news and some queer comics, and hopefully a fresh perspective for you guys, and we'll see you soon. I wanna thank you very much for watching. Have a great evening, or day, or night. Yeah.