Getting Sticky With: Ilana Glazer

Photos by Lelanie Foster, Words by Thessaly La Force

Is birth a kind of magic trick? Ilana Glazer certainly sees it that way. In her new comedy special, Human Magic, the comedian, actor, and writer delves into her pregnancy, her delivery, her body—even the way she would indulge in the tiniest puff of marijuana before going on a walk with her newborn to get her “right the fuck on baby level.” 

Throughout, Glazer looks at motherhood with reverence, offering tenderness toward herself while challenging the cultural expectations surrounding parenthood. It’s a refreshingly modern perspective that positions Human Magic among a new wave of films, TV shows, and literature redefining what it means to become a mother.

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Most of us know Glazer from Broad City, the hit comedy series she created alongside comedian and actress Abbi Jacobson. It keenly portrays a kind of female friendship that’s rarely reflected on screen: complicated, nurturing, occasionally co-dependent, but inherently deep and capable of growth. Unsurprisingly, many of those same themes extend to parenting today.

Glazer says she always knew motherhood was something she desired. Her body began to want a child when she was in her late twenties, but she chose to wait, partly due to the demands of Broad City—eventually giving birth to her daughter at the age of 34. “I know I couldn’t have created the art I have and also had a child,” she explains. But like any true artist, her life remains the best fodder for her work, and this new chapter is no different.

Earlier this year, she wrote and starred in the feature film Babes, about a young woman who unexpectedly discovers she’s pregnant. Like Human Magic, it centers her protagonist’s pregnancy in a way that few other films have. Both illustrate how Glazer’s art confronts the banal and the sublime of the human experience with lightness, humor, and awe. And both reveal how her talents as a comedian have only become more powerful since becoming a mother. 

Control is non-existent, okay? We’re capitalist pawns 

I wasn’t able to picture being a comedian or a mother before I did it myself. I couldn’t picture how to swaddle a wriggling baby. I couldn’t understand how I’d operate through lack of sleep, and that I’d have to slow down my productivity and find pockets for napping during the day. But then I did it, and I realized that being a human being, living life, is much less neat than I had previously thought. Capitalism and the way we’ve organized ourselves in society have tricked us into thinking that we have much more control in our lives than we really do.

In my standup special, I have a bit about how I had my child for me—not for her. It’s a hard thing to be accountable for. She’s here, and it’s like… Welcome to… Hell?  It’s hot, it’s crowded, and it’s getting worse. This was for me, for sure. But I needed her. I knew I did. I wanted to be reborn from the inside out. I wanted to learn how much I know without thinking. I created her whole body – her organs, her teeth, her nails, her smile, her limbs – without thinking about it. I wanted to know that life is out of my control. And while that all sounds dark and scary – and it is! – being a parent comes with mind-blowing cosmic wonder on a daily basis. So it’s a fortunate balance. And I know that my daughter will make meaning on her own, beyond having simply been brought here, but in the early years, it’s on me to make use of the decision we made.

How “am” I? 

It’s hard to describe, but the feeling of being alive has changed. I actually want to feel it; I want to feel my feelings. I am not drinking these days, I barely smoke weed, I don’t long for cigarettes in sadness. I enjoy gummies – lol, low-dose with CBD – I do. I haven’t tripped on mushrooms in a long while because parenting is totally trippy on its own. It’s a connection to the cosmos that we often use drugs or alcohol as a conduit to find. 

It’s true that parenthood completely changes everything, but it also reveals the person that’s been there all along. The more I’ve changed, the more I’ve stayed the same. This experience has helped me peel away layers of societal programming that still require a lot of effort to unlearn, but the foundation has shifted, so it’s easier to see everything from a new angle. The pleasures I used to take—that still feel good, that are important, that I’m in touch with, those joys outside of our identity as mothers and as parents—are important to have. But I feel so creatively fulfilled and so seen in my work now, and I’m not yearning so hard to know myself outside of this role. I know that person. 

Spontaneous sexuality, spontaneous arousal

It’s worth stating that I feel sexier than I ever have. The whole experience has helped me feel myself in my body. I was so surprised to learn how horny pregnant people are. It is not something we talk about, and it’s absolutely hilarious… and fun. I love experiences that remind me that humans are animals. Pregnancy unlocked a more spontaneous version of me. Spontaneous sexuality, spontaneous arousal, to feel my feelings and my body, to really know them. I was always told through television and film that becoming a mother desexualizes you. But I’ve become more in touch with that part of me; more sensual, more able to take and hold pleasure and joy.

Out of your head, into your body 

For the first six months of my pregnancy, I was very sick. I felt like I was perpetually on the first part of a roller coaster. I would throw up everything – even water! In the nineties, the messaging about pregnancy on film and television was that you’ll want to eat everything, but I couldn’t eat anything. I was stuffed with the baby and nauseous all the time. I finally stopped being sick at month seven, can you believe? And by then, the baby was so large, I felt like I couldn’t fit anything else inside of me. Then I ate a ton after I gave birth. For the first time in two years, I was literally starving all of the time. I breastfed for 10 months, which makes you so hungry and so thirsty, it’s shocking. I found the experience miraculous and phenomenal. I’ve always been so in my head, and I loved how pregnancy brought me back to my body. I am so grateful for this little person that just makes me feel so much. 

On birth: “I had fun!” 

Birth was a positive experience for me. I’ve heard so many traumatic stories from women who are violated in the medical system, and on this gradient of race; you really come to understand that the Black maternal mortality rate reveals a medical system of an impoverished nation, and it is plainly cruel and racist by design. I experienced medical misogyny at a young age and suffered for 20 years from pelvic floor dysfunction. 

I was really studious about my birth preparation with Erica Chidi, who’s one of my closest friends and a reproductive health educator. My birth completely followed my mother’s first birth experience – 36 hours of labor and 15 minutes of active labor. The preparation I did with Erica and the pelvic floor physical therapy gurus at Origin Physical Therapy connected the dots for me and helped me feel strong and ready for birth. I had fun! The whole experience exemplified the “human magic” I was referring to when I named my special.

Frustrating shit can (and should) be funny 

My daughter made a joke the other day. She loves Thai green curry and the other night I asked her if we should order it because I didn’t want to cook. She said no, and when I asked why not, she said, They’re all Thai-d up! She wasn’t trying to be funny; she was just doing that dreamy toddler word play, and I was sent straight to heaven.

I don’t use comedy on purpose in my day-to-day interactions with my daughter, but when it finds me, I know I am letting myself and her be human beings. I’m not trying to control things beyond that. And when I can't find frustrating shit funny, I know I’m misaligned. 

Schedules change—you’ll get used to it 

I was thrilled to discover how family-centric standup could be. Touring typically happens on weekends, and you set Friday and Saturday shows and hope to sell those out. If there's a spillover, you do doubles and an early Sunday show. This upset me because weekends are when I cool out and reconnect with my family. I talked about it with my husband, and he said, What about doing it on other nights? The programming ran so deep in me that my reaction was to say no, but then I took a breath in, breathed it out, and I listened. He asked, Like… Thursdays? And I was like, damn, so we made the whole tour Thursdays and Fridays that way I’d be gone two nights at a time. This made the 52 shows I performed in 48 cities stretched across 11 months instead of, say, cramming it into three months, which is more standard and cost effective. But it was worth whatever financial loss I experienced. I was wealthy in time with my family, in the recharge, in the space to actually feel how the show had gone, with the time to process the energy of thousands of people I had taken in and played with.

Naked on stage 

I will say, I started using security on this tour. I didn’t want to spend the money at first, like a short-sighted fool! Then I had an incident of being followed by a car and literally got into a high-speed chase, and it was suddenly time to spend that money, honey! And not for nothing, it was a Palestinian-American, a local Ohio cabbie, who literally saved our lives from God knows what.

The very week after that was October 7th, 2023, when Hamas killed over 1,000 Israelis, and I toured for seven more months after that, as Israel’s genocidal campaign against Gaza ensued. Security was heightened around Jewish-American performers, which I really appreciated, but I didn’t see or hear of the same safety measures used for Muslim-American or Arab-American comedians. Publicly advocating for the inextricably intertwined safety of Jews and Muslims, of Israelis and Palestinians, really tested my values and fear. The whole thing made being away from home feel a lot scarier and more painful. It felt like I was naked on stage.

“Sneak attack feminism” 

When Abbi Jacobson and I were making Broad City, we were leaping from lily pad to lily pad,  making art out of our experiences and then sending that out into the world. I remember a writer named Megan Angelo wrote about Broad City, the web series, for the Wall Street Journal (years before it was owned by Amazon) and called it “sneak attack feminism.” Our minds were blown because we had no idea that what we were putting out was going to be received as feminist. We didn’t have that vocabulary down in the trenches of comedy, though we were proud feminists, and I don’t know if we thought our work was worthy of that value system. We saw ourselves as tomboys bruising our way through the world.

Amy Poehler, who Executive Produced the show, once spoke about the “sexual politic” of Broad City, and I was like, I have no idea what the hell you’re talking about. I just didn’t understand. I went to high school with 3,000 kids on conservative Long Island. I went to NYU as a vehicle to get to the comedy scene in New York, but I didn’t study acting or film or TV. All that to say, I didn’t know how to criticize art within a social landscape. I always went with my gut and gained this understanding over a long period of time. It’s always been important to me to create work that injects health into our sick world. 

A love story between friends

I think it’s cool for kids to watch Broad City when they’re 12 or 13. I think it’s a good idea to watch with parents and talk about it. You know how Friends is now a kids show? And it was sexy and risqué when we were younger? I believe that art made with humane intentions becomes wholesome content over time. Broad City was only considered raunchy because of how harshly we police women—both being able to talk freely about our own experiences and also how harshly we police and violate women’s bodies at a state-sanctioned level. Still, I never saw Broad City in that light. I saw it—and still see it—as a love story between friends. I’ve heard from families who’ve watched it together how it helped them discuss topics like sex, sexuality, gender, and drugs. And that makes me so proud. 

Slowing down is surprisingly powerful, actually

My goal is to represent myself and my perspective, so I won’t talk about my kid or husband in a way that claims their experience. And any material about them is approved (and considered and often workshopped) with my husband.

My capacity to care about superficial things has completely changed. I found slowing down to be powerful. This privilege of having a child, with mostly joy and the resources for basic necessities and beyond, has given me the freedom, space, and time to feel deeply human and to no longer think of myself as a machine, valued first and foremost for my productivity. I am still developing this new sense of value, but I am building and deepening into it, and it is the way forward for me. 

I have to shout out Susie Fox, my producing partner and long-time manager, who had two kids 20 months apart. She paved the way for me by helping me see how it’s done, which, of course, is simply doing it. She helped me be fearless about it. Same with my publicist! Lindsay Krug. Lindsay had her kids farther apart, and her second is the same age as mine. It’s that human village, community, and dare I say, Divine Feminine Spirit, that provides the spark of possibility in all of this. All of it.