When brainstorming titles for her new comedy tour, Stormy Daniels wanted to choose something that wouldn’t immediately reference her previous career in the adult entertainment industry.
That meant instantly discarding pun-heavy options like Partly Stormy and The Perfect Stormy.
“I wanted words that, if you Googled them, didn’t bring up any of my adult movies,” Daniels, 47, told the Current during a recent interview. “I didn’t want somebody to Google the wrong thing. I wanted to make sure my [comedy tour] came up.”
What Daniels ultimately landed on was Unicorns in the Kitchen, a comedy show that blends stories from her years in adult entertainment with reflections on her life as a wife and mother, along with candid takes on politics, scandal and everything in between.
Daniels became a household name in early 2018 after reports surfaced of a hush-money payment tied to her alleged sexual encounter with Donald Trump in 2006, which later became a highly publicized storyline during the 2016 presidential election.
The reports led to investigations into whether Trump made hush-money payments that violated campaign finance laws. A New York court eventually found him guilty on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records tied to the arrangement.
With her past behind her, Daniels brings Unicorns in the Kitchen to Woodlawn Comedy on Friday, June 12. She ends each show with a live Q&A with the audience.
During our interview, Daniels talked about the meaning behind Unicorns in the Kitchen and the kinds of crazy questions audiences ask her at her shows. She also revisited her memoir and how she managed to piss off Mario Kart enthusiasts and mushroom farmers with a single sentence.
Besides wanting the title of your comedy tour to be easily searchable online, what’s the story behind it?
Unicorns in the Kitchen started when my daughter was three or four years old. She blamed a unicorn for a hole she put in her daddy’s birthday cake with her tiny finger. She said, “Well, there’s just one hole in it, mommy. It might’ve been a unicorn.” So, that’s been the running joke.
Your name was constantly in the headlines during the 2016 elections. When you’re on stage, does it feel like you’re reclaiming your own narrative?
Absolutely. For years, people used me as fodder, and now I’m using them as fodder. I’ve actually been doing comedy since 2019. There was, obviously, a break in the middle because of COVID, and because I had to testify in a little trial, if you remember. But this is not my first tour. I write all my own material. The show is not all political. The best part of the show is the Q&A at the end. I always say, “Don’t ask me something you don’t want to know the answer to!”
What kinds of questions do you get?
The content of questions never ceases to amaze me. It’s everything from the size of the president’s anatomy to horse training tips to dating advice to stuff that happens on an adult film set. It’s always very entertaining.
What kinds of questions do you wish people would ask?
I wish they would ask me about the President trying to make me sign another NDA two years ago that specifically said that I would not do stand-up comedy or speaking engagements. When I said no, they shadow banned me. Most people, even those who follow me, don’t see my posts about my comedy tour. So, I think of every ticket purchased as a way people are helping me out.
Was there a moment when you realized that your life had become part of American political theater?
A big moment is when I got to say, “Live from New York, it’s Saturday Night!” That was a huge deal. It was my dream to be a writer for Saturday Night Live growing up. One of the bad [moments] was the first time someone woke me up at 1 a.m. with a death threat and started saying terrible things about my daughter. I had to start wearing a bulletproof vest. I also got doxxed, and my horse got shot with a rubber bullet. There’s good and bad in life all the time.
Where do you find the humor in the bad stuff that’s happened to you?
You know, coming from the adult business, you have to have a pretty good sense of humor. Human existence is pretty ridiculous. We’re all pretty ridiculous creatures when you think about it. If I can frame that in a way that people can identify with, but also find humorous, that’s what I like. If I can go up on stage and laugh at my incredible, tragic, hilarious existence, it makes it OK for audiences to laugh too.
In your memoir, Full Disclosure, you described your encounter with Trump in a way that probably ruined Mario Kart for everyone…
That’s one of my claims to fame! I somehow managed to piss off Mario Kart enthusiasts and mushroom farmers in the same fucking sentence! I got hate mail from both!
Looking back, do you think those details help clarify your experience or did it overshadow it? Or was it just a good reason to laugh at him?
You know, I was able to describe [Trump’s penis] in a way that people could envision, but also in a way where I wasn’t claiming to be a victim or part of #MeToo. I didn’t want the book to lean into trauma. Also, I needed a way to describe something in such detail that it was accurate and descriptive and proof that I was telling the truth. I didn’t want to body shame anyone, but he called me a liar. The only way to prove I was telling the truth was to specifically describe something. You and I both know that if I was lying, he’d have dropped his pants and showed us all a long time ago. Prove me wrong, bitch.
$38.97-$119.08, 8 p.m. Friday, June 12, Woodlawn Comedy, 1920 Fredericksburg Road, (210) 255-1336, woodlawncomedy.com.
Sign Up for SA Current newsletters.
Follow us: Apple News | Google News | NewsBreak | Reddit | Instagram | Facebook | Twitter | Or sign up for our RSS Feed
