Ilana Glazer Says ‘Broad City’ Made Morons Think She Wanted to Smoke and Sleep With Them
Because it apparently needs to be said, Ilana Glazer is not the same person as Ilana Wexler, so all of New York’s Hannibal Buress doppelgangers can stop propositioning her with dime bags.
When Glazer and her comedy partner Abbi Jacobson launched their web-series-turned-sitcom Broad City in 2014, much like most self-created and self-starred sitcoms made by comedians, the series was a semi-autobiographical take on their real-life experiences building their careers in New York, with a heavy emphasis on “semi.” The Broad City version of Ilana would never have been able to handle the responsibilities and grueling schedule required to make five seasons and 50 total episodes of a Comedy Central show, nor would she have even preferred endless production meetings and 14-hour shoots to smoking weed that she pulled out of “nature’s pocket.”
As such, the real Ilana is endlessly annoyed by some lower-IQ Broad City fans’ apparent belief that Comedy Central didn’t bother scripting the show and just filmed her and Jacobson’s daily routines.
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In a recent interview with Vanity Fair, Glazer spoke about some of the most unwanted fan attention she’s received post-Broad City’s sleeper success, saying that too many people thought that she would be equally as down for a casual blaze-and-bang as her TV character. They’re going to have their minds blown when they discover that Buress isn’t a dentist and won’t fill their cavities.
“When Broad City was on TV and people would see me, they would think I wanted to smoke with and fuck them,” Glazer said of the creepy fan interactions she's had to endure. “And it was just like, ‘No, dude. What? I’m truly looking at these grapefruits. This is a really aggressive energy.’ It’s been so nice to get older, where people seem to understand that I’m not my character. I’ve had clarity and understanding that I’m not my character.”
It's been five years since Broad City ended its critically beloved five-season run, and although fans have started to learn to separate the artist from her slacker-stoner art, Glazer still has gripes about the way some journalists talked down to her and her partner about their breakout sitcom. “There was always this infantilizing and demeaning of Abbi’s and my talent,” Glazer explained, saying that she was sick of fielding questions like “Are you really best friends?” from members of the entertainment media.
“Why do you fucking care?" Glazer said about the insipid inquiry. “Are you asking It’s Always Sunny if they’re really best friends? You can’t see us as showrunners because we’re in our fucking 20s and because we’re women? Is that why you need to see us as BFFs?”
“Our episodes were a million bucks. We’re in charge of $10 million worth of production,” Glazer said of her time show-running, executive producing, writing and starring on Broad City. “That’s who I am. You don’t know me as a BFF. Also, you’ll never know me as a BFF. How is this related to this fucking interview about a professional endeavor?”
So, next time you see Glazer on the streets of New York, don’t ask her if she wants to smoke, don’t ask her to go back to your place and don’t ask her if she and Abbi are still friends. In fact, maybe just don’t ask her anything while she’s grapefruit shopping.
