This week we talked with Emily Flake and had a lot of laughs, got insights into her life, creative process, what she’s up to next, and general shenanigans. Her cat liked us, obviously.
Emily makes cartoons for The New Yorker, mostly, but also sometimes MAD Magazine, the New Statesman, and other places. She had a weekly strip called Lulu Eightball that carried the jokes that are too vulgar for grown-up publications and too racy for MAD, back when alt-weeklies were strong and we were young. She also does a bi-weekly cartoon for The Nib, usually about whatever the political or cultural shitstorm du jour is.
She wrote and drew a book called These Things Ain’t Gonna Smoke Themselves (Bloomsbury USA). She also wrote and drew a book of cartoons and essays called Mama Tried. It is about parenting and was published by Grand Central Publishing. You can buy it here.
She also performs – a hybrid of cartoons and stand-up wherein she shows cartoons via the magic of PowerPoint and then tells funny stories. She has done this at Union Hall, the Bell House, QED Astoria, UCBEast, and a bunch of other places from the fancy to the hopelessly vile.
She also co-hosts a quarterly-ish comedy show called Shitshow with NPR’s Ophira Eisenberg; it’s comedy about parenting.