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\n Photo-Illustration: by The Cut; Photos: Getty Images\n <\/p>\n
Lisa Ann Walter likes to think of herself as America\u2019s auntie. Many of us have developed a tender parasocial connection to the actress from watching her as Chessy in The Parent Trap<\/a> and, more recently, as the no-nonsense elementary-school teacher Melissa Schemmenti on Abbott Elementary<\/a>. \u201cI feel like a lot of people have grown up with me,\u201d Walter tells The Cut. \u201cThat gives me a unique ability to engage with people of multiple generations.\u201d Her upcoming stand-up special, It Was an Accident, streaming from May 15 on Hulu, riffs on some of that generational crossover. She promises lots of \u201ccranky advice,\u201d of which she loves to offer unsolicited \u2014 whether it\u2019s to her friends or a gay married couple fighting over if they should buy the overflowing tub of berries at Costco. \u201cI just call it: I know what to do. So listen to me, because I\u2019m smart and I know a lot of stuff.\u201d<\/p>\n You may want to listen closely. After all, Walter is a crowned Celebrity Jeopardy! winner, taking home $1 million for the Entertainment Community Fund back in 2024. While we wait for her special, Abbott Elementary continues to be the ultimate comfort-TV show. \u201cMy favorite scenes to do are the ones where we\u2019re all working together and making space for everybody else\u2019s funny,\u201d she says. You may be surprised to find out that unlike Melissa\u2019s obsession with Real Housewives, Walter has never seen a single episode of the Bravo franchise. She prefers a juicy Dr. Pimple Popper episode or anything in the 90 Day extended universe \u2014 both of which she watches anthropologically, of course. \u201cIt is in our animal nature; it\u2019s our biological imperative to root out the disease,\u201d she says of the fascination with bursting pustules on television. \u201cI have no shame about it.\u201d<\/p>\n How are you feeling ahead of your upcoming stand-up special for Hulu?<\/strong> What has been your favorite story line to explore on Abbott Elementary?<\/strong> I like the opportunity that I\u2019ve gotten to be in relationships on the show that are better than my own. On the show, Quinta\u2019s written relationships for Melissa with men who are lovely and charming and show up for her. Melissa has a real sense of confidence about her attractiveness and allure and right to be in a relationship, probably more so than Lisa. The writing of that character has impacted me and made me feel that way. Not that I\u2019m out there looking.<\/p>\n After five years on Abbott, are there any other shows you would love to drop into for an arc?<\/strong> What was your secret to winning Celebrity Jeopardy!?\u00a0<\/strong>
If anything\u2019s going to save us right now, it\u2019s probably stand-up comedy. Along with some of the things that you see on the internet, people telling truths is really fricking important right now. I talk about everything that I feel like I\u2019m going to bust if I don\u2019t say. It\u2019s the reason I started doing comedy in the first place in 1988. There were so few women comics at the time, and I watched Bill Cosby do a 15-minute-bit about having a baby. I\u2019m like, Why is he doing that? It\u2019s our experience! There should be a woman telling that story. There were such narrow rules about what women were allowed to talk about, and I\u2019m not a good rule-follower girl. So you can get a lot of ideas out there that some people might call edgy, I just call it real, and it doesn\u2019t upset people because it\u2019s funny. We should do it while free speech is still a thing.<\/p>\n
I really have loved from the beginning the dynamic with Melissa and Barbara. Historically, they might have had one Barbara Howard, and everybody else would be young, because why do we care? But in this show, because it\u2019s realistic, they have two actresses of a certain age, old broads, be best friends. Because that\u2019s real. These people would gravitate toward each other. I love the fact that Melissa will defend Barbara with her life. She is her bestie, and that\u2019s it. You mess with her, you mess with me. I appreciate it both as a feminist and as a person who loves comedy.<\/p>\n
I have no problem saying Hacks. I would love to be on Shrinking or Only Murders in the Building. Or The Pitt. People have already decided that Melissa and Dana are cousins somehow, like a running feud of Philly versus Pittsburgh. I\u2019m good friends with Carrie Preston; I\u2019d love to be cast on Elsbeth because they write wacky guest-star roles. My goal on the next thing coming up is to do something that people haven\u2019t seen me in. I want to do something that\u2019s like, just hag. Crazy hag. Put me in some hag makeup.<\/p>\n
The first thing that came to my mind when you said that was, I\u2019m just smart, but honestly that\u2019s not it. The thing that I have is a weird connection from things I\u2019ve read or things I\u2019ve heard. I don\u2019t know why it gets in my brain. Maybe my brain is full and I haven\u2019t taken on anything new in ten years. I was a voracious reader from the time I was 3 years old. My father was a geophysicist and my mother was a schoolteacher \u2014 she was the trivia queen. She would have me watching Masterpiece Theatre on PBS and the black-and-white movies of the \u201930s through the \u201970s, getting a real education about the world. Any time something came on talk radio she would start teaching about it, basically.<\/p>\n