Jaye McBride’s a modern comedian with a deep appreciation for the classic one-liner with the unexpected turn: “Sorry houseplants, I’m not doing dry January by myself.”

Or “Owning matching towels means I'm finally adulting — even if they do all say 'Holiday Inn.'”

Was she always this funny?  

“I think so. I did a talent show when I was in seventh grade, doing stand-up. And that was the first time I ever did that, and I think I did OK,” she said on the phone from her home in Brooklyn. When she was a student at the University at Albany, McBride decided to give open mic night at the Lark Tavern a try. At first, she chickened out, but two weeks later she took the stage, and told this joke: “My doctor just texted me. He said, 'Your STD results are back. Frowny face.'”

“It’s just a one-liner. It’s really quick. And I love that kind of humor that’s just really quick, in and out, with a kind of twist, you know? There was this joke years ago by Henny Youngman: ‘Take my wife — please!’” she said. Mastering the art of the one-liner has taken McBride far. She opened for Louis CK at Madison Square Garden in 2021, earning the distinction of being the first openly transgender comic to perform at the famed venue. She toured with Amy Schumer and can be seen in Schumer’s 2022 “Parental Advisory” on Netflix. McBride, a regular at the Comedy Cellar in New York City, also performs at clubs upstate. And she recorded an album: “Daddy’s Girl.”

“It takes a math degree, for sure,” she joked of succeeding in comedy. Math is what she majored in, along with psychology, at UAlbany. She chose psychology because in the 1990s, it was difficult to talk about becoming trans.

“Obviously, being trans wasn’t even in the vernacular at the time,” McBride said. “Part of the reason why I majored in psychology, I think, was because it’s the only time you could learn about trans people.” At the time, depressed and struggling with her identity, she left school. More than a decade later, McBride returned to campus, having transitioned to female and picked a major that suited her.

“I finished the psychology credits. But then I thought, well, I never really wanted to do this except to know about trans issues. So, why don’t I do something I enjoy, and I actually enjoy math, which I know, I know, you hear that all the time – like another math fan,” she said. “I really, really, really love those years.”

McBride adds that the administrator of the department was supportive of her transition, and her fellow math students didn’t seem to care. “They’d be like, ‘I don’t have time for that. I’m in the middle of this abstract algebra question that’s more important,” said McBride, who earned her double major in 2009. After graduation, she worked in retail around Albany while honing her craft at local comedy venues. Then her career took her to Los Angeles and New York City to showcase her act.  

“When I first did comedy, I didn’t even talk about being trans,” she said. “I think my justification for not talking about it was saying that I didn’t want to be pigeonholed as someone who’s trans, but I also think I was terrified of it. And I think that’s a real reason. But then I did start talking about it, though. It just makes sense. It’s like, wow, I’m actually being authentic with this,” McBride said.  

“It’s fun to talk about it in a way that isn’t beating someone over the head with it. If someone’s in the audience, I don’t want them to feel like they’re going to a forced diversity lecture for work. I want them to look at me and be like, 'Oh, trans people are actually people,' you know.”

Her family and their reaction to her coming out gets woven into her act: “I remember when I was little, I was like, Dad, what do you call a little boy who wants to be a little girl. He said, “'I don’t know, but they’re definitely not getting any ice cream.’”

McBride said her father respected intelligence, athleticism and a sense of humor. “And I'd like to think I'm smart. I don't know that I'm very athletic. But we would always just like bust each other's chops,” McBride said. “It was a funny family. So, I think because of that, I think it's just, yeah, I think I've always was a little bit funny. I just didn't believe it until I was an adult.”

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