Celeste Barber on the Beauty of Being Totally Unfiltered
“I would like to live one day without anxiety. I would also like to be a Janet Jackson backup dancer. That’s all I ask for.”
Episode 02
We’ve got someone on the show this week who makes it her business to show us exactly how wonderful we as women are–just as we are! She is the queen of keeping it real, a hilariously honest actress, standup comedian, and the Instagram star who has become our go-to for a belly laugh when the world’s expectations just seem a tad too polished–it’s Celeste Barber!
If you haven’t seen Celeste on her Instagram account, get on over there and join the nearly 10 million people who are clamoring for her content each week (and if you have any doubt, she won the “Funniest Lady on Instagram Award” back in 2017). She’s also a successful standup comedian who sold out three seasons of her “Challenge Accepted” Tour in the US, and has a Netflix Special (“Fine, Thanks”) and a dramatic comedy series that we just love called “Wellmania.”
Jen and Celeste get into it about:
- The riotous juggle Celeste manages by shining a light on the quirks of the beauty industry, all while paving her own extraordinary path.
- Celeste opens up about the nuanced battles of being valued for her sharp mind and quicker wit in a scene often unforgiving to women.
- Celeste and Jen share about the beautiful chaos of balancing a career with being a superhero mom (or at least trying to be).
This episode is more than just laughs (though, swear, you’ll have plenty); it’s a pat on the back for every one of us out here, doing the thing, being utterly magnificent in our complexity. Here’s to celebrating the splendid and wonderful you!
Hey, everybody, Jen Hatmaker here, your host of the For the Love podcast. Welcome to the show. I know why you’re here. We’re in a series right now called For the Love of Wonderful You, which is just a fun idea we had. 2024 is an intense year and we just thought man, let’s bring a series that celebrates the individual that’s out there listening; just your wonderful and wild and unruly and fabulous, complicated, funny, smart, quirky self. We wanted to make room for that and as best we could, push aside some of those awful competing narratives that keep us so sidelined and flattened. So much about how we look. Oh, God, it’s so exhausting. I’m so sick to death of it. Just sick to death of it. And so, you guys, I cannot tell you how glad I am that somebody, in fact, I know who it was– my friend Melissa, ages ago, sent me an Instagram account and said, “You have to immediately follow Celeste Barber.” At the time, I didn’t know who this was. I mean, that was maybe the best Instagram decision I have ever made. Listen, before I get on about it if you don’t know who I’m talking about, literally pause this show, go over to Instagram, and follow Celeste Barber just so you can see what I’m talking about. It’s going to make the rest of this interview make more sense and trust me you’re missing out if you weren’t already.
She’s a comedian. She’s an actress. She’s been making a name for herself in her home country of Australia and then ultimately Hollywood. In 2015, she started posting really hilarious parodies of images and videos of people like Kim Kardashian and Britney Spears and other really notorious models and influencers. They would be posing, or doing a video in some impossible way that only like ghosts–very elite women can pull off. She started copying their videos and their stills, but doing it in parody fashion, trying to look and dress like they do, but with hilarious results. I can’t do this justice. You’re just going to have to go watch it because I scream out loud. I don’t think I’ve ever missed one of Celeste’s posts.
So of course, her Instagram account started to catch fire. She’s so funny. Also, she’s an everyday, normal person, like all of us. So taking these impossible, ridiculous images and turning them on their head was just the funniest, best thing that ever happened to Al Gore’s internet. She has almost 10 million followers on Instagram now. She’s been hailed as the Australian queen of comedy. In 2017, she won the Funniest Lady on Instagram award. In 2020, she won the AACTA Award for Favorite Comedy Performer of the Decade, and in 2021, she won a Webby Special Achievement Award. She has so many other things happening because she’s so talented. She was on the highly successful stand-up comedy tour “Challenge Accepted” which went on to sell out three seasons in the US. She has streaming platform specials, including last year’s “Fine, Thanks” on Netflix, and then this wonderful comedic series, “Wellmania” that she stars in that came out in 2023. She is married to #hothusband, who she has known for over 20 years, married ten, and who is such a good sport and gets in on her antics all the time. They have two boys together and she is a delight. I mean, she is one of the things that makes the internet worth it. What a lucky girl I am to get to meet her and how lucky are we that she said yes to the For the Love podcast. So please enjoy this conversation with the absolutely delightful Celeste Barber.
MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:
Celeste Barber: Challenge Accepted (Celeste’s 2019 Comedy Special)
Celeste Barber: Fine, Thanks (Celeste’s 2023 Comedy Special)
All Saints (Medical Drama that got Celeste her start)
Wellmania (2023 Netflix Series Starring Celeste)
Celeste Barber: Backup Dancer Tour
Celeste Barber and Tom Ford Collab
Celeste will be in Dallas June 10th at the Majestic Theatre, in Austin June 13th at the Paramount Theatre, and in Houston June 14th at 713 Music Hall.
The For the Love Podcast is a production of Four Eyes Media,
presented by Audacy.
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