Spend an hour with Chonda Pierce and you could count on laughing for the rest of the day—maybe even the rest of your life. Her fairly innocent irreverence is applied to topics ranging from growing up as a preacher’s daughter to shopping at Walmart to political fodder. Pierce also performed at several White House events when Donald Trump was president.
She has appeared on a myriad of major television shows including the daytime ABC talk show “The View,” where she left the show’s liberal hosts and longtime stand-up comedians Whoopi Goldberg and Joy Behar—both known for their raunchy skits—scratching their heads over her success. Pierce recalled Behar telling her, “I don’t introduce myself as a Jewish comedian,” after Pierce was introduced on the show as a Christian comic.
What may stump Hollywood comedians even more is just how Rated G, with the occasional PG jokes, her popular standup is.
Andrew Tenenbaum, Pierce’s manager who represents an A-list of clients, said the 62-year-old comedian, known as the “Queen of Clean,” was an easy sell for three reasons: “She has talent, talent, and also—talent.”
While Tenenbaum usually won’t take on a client until he sees them live, he booked her after watching just 10 minutes of one of her DVDs. “She had all the comedic chops of the greatest female stand-ups I’ve ever seen, including Roseanne Barr, Ellen DeGeneres, Rosie O'Donnell, Joan Rivers,” said Tenenbaum. “She was as good as any of them: Her instincts, her comedy, her engagement with the audience—it was all just top-rated.”
Even the U.S. military has appreciated her wholesome wisecracking, having invited her to perform at USOs, the well-known nonprofit that provides live entertainment globally to the U.S. Armed Forces and their families. The wife of an Air Force general once told Pierce that she insisted that Pierce be booked after sitting through the act of a very famous comedian, who she described as “embarrassing.”
To fans of what she calls filthy-mouthed comedians, Pierce says this: “Go home and write out your favorite comedian’s routine and take a magic marker and mark out all those obscene words, all those F words, and all the nasty words. Then, read it back. If it’s a funny story ... see, all these words were not needed at all. But most of the time if you mark them all out and read it back, it ain’t that funny.” She adds, ”They had to flavor it up with something, to shock you into laughing. To me, I love comedy too much. That’s just a cheap shot.”
In spite of her sinless comedy, she has offended a few with her occasional mild one-liners about intimate moments with her late husband, but that is about as bad—or as she puts it in Southern terms—as “nasty” as she gets. Some religious zealots have also taken umbrage to her poking fun at faith, which is somewhat funny in itself considering how devout a Christian she is.
With demanding tours on her plate, Pierce never misses church. She also founded several Christian counseling centers throughout Tennessee. Under the name Branches Counseling Center, trained Christian therapists offer counseling to people on the A to Z’s of life challenges, including alcoholism, obesity, family counseling, religious abuse, sex addictions, and depression. The center has been recognized with a variety of local awards.
Pierce makes no excuses about the source of her material: her own long list of personal tribulations, including the loss of her husband, an adult daughter that she has estranged herself from, and a bout with deep depression that landed her in a psychiatric facility. Her autobiography, “Laughing In The Dark,” one of eight books she has written, was an Amazon best-seller.
“For years, we’ve known the voice and have seen the smiles of Chonda from her light side, and we’ve always been encouraged. In this new book, she gives us the privilege of experiencing another side that’s equally as brilliant and engaging,” wrote Women of Faith President Mary Graham about the 2015 book.
On the flip side, turning her personal struggles into material for her acts has also been fodder for criticism by the religious, with some writing letters telling her that she was going to go “to hell.”
“I remember when I first started talking about depression, this church lady came up to me and said I don’t think you should talk about taking antidepressants. That makes your face look weak,” recalled Pierce. “I said, ‘well, you need to take your glasses off and drive home.’”
Pierce says she can understand when people sometimes get offended by comedians who turn tough times into punchlines, referring to Bill Maher as an example of a legendary stand-up who often turns tragedies into jokes and ridicules religious people. But, Pierce says, that’s because “he didn’t earn the right.”
“I walked in these people’s shoes, I am not an outsider poking fun at Christianity. I am a Christian. And I paid my dues. My family was poor, and we still pastored a little church,” Pierce emphasized. “Why Bill Maher sometimes gets beaten up by Christians is because he’s never earned the right to say some of the things he says.”
Asked if liberals gave her a lot of material, she laughed hysterically. “That’s the whole problem with the ‘love thy neighbor’ thing. That it includes the Democrat living next to you,” she quipped in innocent jest, joking that she still hasn’t seen Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg in any of her audiences.
Tenenbaum, however, is quick to point out that, politically, Pierce’s shows are made up of what he called “a purple crowd”—50 percent red and 50 percent blue.
“You’re not going to find any New York Times-editorial page-reading, Upper East Side residents at a Chonda show,” he said. “But I‘ll bet you this: if those kinds of people went to see the show, they’d laugh.”
When she pokes fun at religion, no one is off-limits, whether it be Mormons or Catholics. If a crowd “oohs” at one of her denomination-specific jokes, Pierce tells her audience, “hey, I'll get to your church in a minute.” Even Tenenbaum, who is Jewish, was fair game. Pierce turned their trip to a Christian bookstore into 15 minutes of side-splitting stand-up.
All kidding aside, Pierce’s stand-ups serve as inviting sermons that you actually don’t want to end and are okay to laugh during.
Pierce ultimately hopes the laughter she brings will offer some relief from everyday problems and “the tougher ones,” as she put it. As a bonus, she hopes that somewhere in all her irreverent rollicking there’s even a message or two that ”shines out"—for all of us to do a little better in realizing the true meaning of life.
“I always thought, ‘Why waste your pain,’” Pierce reflected. “You walked a road for a reason. You may not know why, but maybe it’s to warn the person walking behind you where the potholes are.”
Chonda’s “laughter lane” has definitely paved a new road to success over life’s bumpy roads.
