Ayo Edebiri Says April Is Her Own Person This Time
Aug 5, 2023
[Editor’s note: This interview was recorded prior to the SAG strike.]
The Big Picture
Emmy nominee Ayo Edebiri revisits her journey from her earliest inspirations to joining the cast of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem. She recalls meeting Rachel Sennott for the first time and explains how their collaboration has evolved from Ayo and Rachel are Single to Bottoms. Edebiri explains how she captures the spirit of the April we already know and love while also making the Mutant Mayhem version of the character uniquely her own.
There are a number of artists having big years right now but, dare I say, Ayo Edebiri is having one of the best of the bunch. Not only did she just score her first Emmy nomination for her work in Season 1 of The Bear, but she’s also exceptional in the recently released second season of the hit series and has three stellar films coming out back to back to back — Theater Camp, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem, and Bottoms.
Hopefully you’ve seen Molly Gordon’s episode of Collider Ladies Night and Noah Galvin’s episode of Collider Forces in honor of the release of Theater Camp, but just in case you need a refresher, the Searchlight Pictures film focuses on a theater camp struggling to stay afloat after its founder falls into a coma. Edebiri steps in as Janet, a new teacher at camp working amidst a group of AdirondACTS diehards who’ve spent their summers there for years. The film delivers big laughs as it pokes fun at camp clichés, but it also rocks a powerful beating heart that celebrates what a special experience it can be, especially when that love is shared with newcomers.
On August 25th, brace yourself for Bottoms. It’s a coming-of-age comedy that doesn’t hold back in the least, delivering consistent laughs and shocking story beats via an irresistible ensemble, a combination that not only sparks the itch for repeat viewings but could ultimately turn the film into a raunchy high school comedy classic. Edebiri stars opposite longtime friend and collaborator Rachel Sennott as Josie and PJ, two unpopular high school students eager to hook up with cheerleaders. How do they go about doing that? By starting a female fight club, and it actually works.
And finally, we have Edebiri’s new movie hitting theaters nationwide this weekend, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem in which she takes over the iconic role of April. Edebiri’s version of the character has had enough of being dubbed “puke girl.” She wants her peers at Eastman High to respect her, and she might have found the perfect way to make that happen — by teaming up with the Ninja Turtles. Turns out, the Turtles also just want to fit in. If the Turtles can save the city by stopping Superfly and April can break the story, they might all wind up being accepted and respected.
Clearly Edebiri’s career is skyrocketing at the moment, but it took some time and legwork to get there, and she took a moment to recap some of that journey on an episode of Collider Ladies Night.
Image via FX Networks
While Edebiri was always drawn to comedy and knew that was a path she wanted to pursue, she actually opted to go after a degree in teaching when she started studying at NYU. Edebiri laughed and noted, “Well, I didn’t finish my teaching degree,” but continued by explaining why that particular field appealed to her:
“I really like working with people. I like working with kids and I really love history. I love English. So I think before I could conceptualize doing something like this as an actual career path, that was a job that made sense to me and I knew there were skills in that job that I was decent at. The actual teaching part? I don’t know. Not so much really. But that felt like a job where I told myself, I could do this day to day and feel like I’m doing a good thing and like I’m happy and it’s related to creativity and you’re working with kids, and maybe I can do improv or comedy on the nights and weekends.”
Ultimately, Edebiri’s life would be filled with far more improv and comedy than just on nights and weekends. While at NYU, she met an ideal creative partner she’d start going down that path with, someone she’d wind up making a Comedy Central series and a feature film with, Rachel Sennott. What was it about Sennott that made Edebiri suspect she could be a great collaborator for her? Here’s what she said:
“We were talking about this recently because, for her, she remembers we did this sketch together, and she remembers watching me in the sketch and then being like, ‘Oh, something’s here,’ but I just remember being at a party and Rachel was drunk [laughs], and she was talking to somebody and she’s like, ‘I don’t care what anybody says. I’m gonna be doing stand-up and you can do it in the city.’ And I was like, ‘Who is this? She’s a lot, but I think I love her.’”
Image via Orion Releasing
Edebiri’s instincts were on point. Not only was there a special spark between the two right from the start, but there was also significant opportunity to grow alongside one another. While discussing her experience working on Bottoms, Edebiri highlighted qualities of their collaboration that have stayed the same over the years, but also elements of their approach to the work that have evolved.
“I think Rachel and I have always been able to bounce off of each other really well, even as friends. So I think there’s always been a baseline of banter that we have and this understanding of each other’s voices, but since that time so much life I think happened for the both of us, personally and professionally, and I just had this really crazy sense of like, ‘Wow, we both have grown so much in our actual skill set.’ And so we were able to bring our different areas of knowledge to this one project and just sort of help each other. It was really, honestly, one of the best experiences. We were in a honey wagon, sharing a honey wagon in the middle of lightning storms in New Orleans, but we just felt like we were sharing a comedy brain.”
Edebiri’s circle of top-notch creative partners grew when she scored the role of Sydney in The Bear. “It’s just such a beautiful, positive experience.” She added, “It’s a show that I know can be stressful to watch, but filming it is so gentle, is so focused on the work and just getting it done and being decent to each other.”
As one might expect, Edebiri was most looking forward to taking cooking classes when she was first cast in the show, but she also pinpointed a particular quality of Sydney’s that wound up being more creatively fulfilling for her to play than she ever could have imagined:
“I really enjoyed the fact that she’s flawed and I think she feels like a real human being to me. She’s not perfect. She makes mistakes. She makes a lot of mistakes, but she tries to learn and grow from them. And that the journey is not super linear is very exciting.”
Image via Paramount
When it comes to Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem, Edebiri faced one of the greatest challenges of joining a beloved franchise and playing an iconic character — capturing the April that fans know and love while also making this version of the character her own. Here’s what Edebiri said while explaining how the Mutant Mayhem script helped her achieve both:
“I think the fact that she’s a journalist, that she’s got this friendship and this bond with them, and is such an iconic character to people, I feel like there’s just a lot of people who have so much fondness for her. [Laughs] A lot of early first crushes. But I loved that in this iteration I felt like she had so much agency and was her own person and had her own goals and uses that or feels that in tandem with the Turtles, if that makes sense. She has her own goals, she has her own drive, she wants to crack a story, but she realizes throughout the journey of the movie also how important friendship is with these little Turtle freaks.”
Eager to hear even more from Edebiri? Be sure the watch her episode of Collider Ladies Night at the top of this article, or you can listen to the conversation uncut in podcast form below:
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