Ayo Edebiri became a household name thanks to her role in the acclaimed dramedy The Bear, but it took a while before she found her true calling. The 27-year-old actress embarked on quite an interesting academic journey before finding success as an actress and comedienne.
Edebiri became interested in performing after joining the improv club at Boston Latin School. Despite her passion for being on stage, acting didn’t seem like a viable career and she made a practical choice by pursuing a teaching degree at New York University.
She quickly started having second thoughts about her career choice, especially after realizing that “teenagers are really scary and they will tell you when you’re not a good English teacher”, as she told Trevor Noah. She started doing stand-up, interned at the improv group Upright Citizens Brigade, and decided to give comedy a shot after getting her teaching degree.
“In New York, [an undergraduate teaching degree] runs out after two years and you have to go and get your master’s. So I thought, ‘Well, I’ll just work really hard for two years and if it doesn’t work out then I’ll just go back and get my master’s,’” she told Forbes.
Her plan eventually worked out and she met the fellow actress Rachel Sennott through a writing program. The duo starred in the Comedy Central series Ayo and Rachel Are Single, and they’ll appear in the teen comedy Bottoms later this summer.
