Octavia Spencer on being home alone: it’s just me and my kitchen, it’s not great

Actress Octavia Spencer arrives at the World...
Jimmy Fallon did a joint interview with best friends Octavia Spencer and Melissa McCarthy this week. They were promoting a superhero comedy they’re going to be in together next year on Netflix, written and directed by Melissa’s husband, Ben Falcone. More than that they were bringing awareness to the charity they’re both working with, Frontline Foods, which hires local restaurants in cities around the US to cook meals for hospital staff.

I didn’t know Octavia and Melissa were so close. Melissa said she’s known Octavia for 20 years. Octavia used to come to her stand up shows and would liven up the audience by laughing so loud it was infectious. They did a bit where they pretended not to know basic things about each other, which fell a little flat but made me laugh at the end. I really liked what everyone said about cooking, especially Octavia who admitted that she’s not much of a cook. Jimmy said he kept finding kitchen gadgets he didn’t know he had! That’s a very specific problem. My mom and ex give me cooking gadgets so I could relate to that. Here’s part of what they said:

Where are you quarantined and who are you with?
Melissa: I am in Los Angeles, I’m with my family and my mom is here
Octavia: I am in Los Angeles and it’s me and the kitchen.

How are you in the kitchen?
Octavia: Not great, nobody’s ever asked me to be in the kitchen so I’ve been winging it, eating off my friends’ kitchens still.

I’m finding all these new gadgets that I forgot I bought

I heard that you guys have quarantine traditions
Melissa: There’s a beer o’clock. It’s always noon, Ben started it. A couple of times the kids were like ‘it’s 11:51.’ We had a driveway, socially safe distancing. We both sat in lawn chairs on opposite sides of our driveway and had a cocktail.

I can’t wait for a hangout, I don’t know what to do. I’ve been invited to the Zoom hangouts
Octavia: I just figured Zoom out, I’ve been using it on my phone.

[From The Tonight Show on YouTube]

Jimmy’s example of a gadget he didn’t remember he bought was an apple cutter, where you push it down on an apple and it takes the core out. I have one of those and I use it! They sell them at Dollar Tree. I am so glad I bought a lemon/lime cutter right before this (we featured it in an Amazon post) as I have been putting the cut limes in my drinks, which feels fancy and keeps me from getting scurvy.

Melissa was clowning Octavia for using Zoom on her phone and only letting people see her forehead. In the interview, which is below, she’s using her laptop, which is how you should always use Zoom, on a laptop or desktop. Otherwise you can’t get the lighting and angles right and you look terrible. If someone wants to Facetime you, remember you can use a Mac for that too. I don’t have an iPhone so I just use my macbook. (I have a PC desktop, I’m flexible like that.)

Last night I helped my older German friend set up Zoom so that she could go to a meetup we have scheduled with friends on Sunday. She used Whatsapp to call me and said Zoom was too hard and that she would watch YouTube to figure it out! I emailed her a meeting link and told her to use her laptop. She had the problem everyone does where she was muted at first, but we fixed that and she’s ready to go. I thought Zoom was easier than that, but it’s mostly easy on computers.

Here’s the interview!

Embed from Getty Images

Embed from Getty Images

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6 Responses to “Octavia Spencer on being home alone: it’s just me and my kitchen, it’s not great”

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  1. lucy2 says:

    LOL about the muting thing on Zoom – my friends and I have been doing a weekly zoom get together, and every time someone joins, there’s a lot of pantomiming that they’re muted.

    Melissa’s house looks like a lot of fun during the quarantine. I like that they’re such good friends, and I hope their superhero movie happens!

  2. Joan Callamezzo says:

    It warms my cold dead heart to learn these two awesome women are close friends. Putting cut limes in your drinks so you don’t get scurvy? Celebitchy you’re on fire today.

  3. IMUCU says:

    I love my apple corer, it’s probably my most frequently used kitchen gadget! I randomly decided to use a knife to cut up an apple yesterday and in the middle of doing so I really began missing my corer bc it’s so much quicker and cleaner!

  4. sa says:

    They are delightful. I didn’t realize they had a movie together, but I am now so excited to see it!

    Octavia’s white sofa is very pretty, but it would terrify me in real life. I assume she doesn’t have any pets with that sofa.

  5. Amelie says:

    I thought the title said “it’s just me and my KITTEN” and I was hoping to hear a story about Octavia’s new cat hahaha. I did not realize it was KITCHEN which definitely sucks more than having a kitten around.

    • Guest with Cat says:

      Oh my goodness a superhero movie with Octavia?!!!!!!!!!! I can’t wait to see this!

      Her career is on fire right now. I hope Covid-19 doesn’t knock it off track.