INGLEWOOD, Calif. — (AP) — What do Tom Brady, Taylor Swift and comedy have to do with learning about football?
In the case of Nikki Glaser, it is all intertwined.
Glaser has become a familiar face to football fans this season. Her breakthrough performance at the Tom Brady Roast on May 5 paved the way for five appearances on Amazon Prime Video's "Thursday Night Football″ postgame show.
Before last Thursday's game between the Denver Broncos and Los Angeles Chargers, Glaser said doing her "Late Hits″ segment was a no-brainer following her success at the Brady roast.
"The football audience is kind of familiar with me already. It’s one that is OK with me not knowing every detail about football or expecting me to be an expert about it because I was who I was on the Brady Roast. I kind of admitted to not really following football that much," Glaser said. “And I became a fan of Tom Brady and the sport in doing it through that process. So then I was like, ‘Let me just keep learning about football through joking about it.’ And that was kind of my goal.”
Glaser admits her knowledge of football is not all the way there yet. Still, it is further ahead than it was a year ago when she started casually watching Chiefs games due to Swift's relationship with Kansas City tight end Travis Kelce.
And mostly then, it was to see when Swift appeared on screen.
However, Glaser decided to start learning more about the game, which she compared to trying to learn a new language.
“I went my whole life putting on blinders because I was just scared to look stupid if I tried to learn. I always thought football fans would be really judgmental and cruel about my lack of knowledge. But they’re not,″ Glaser said. “They’re eager for you to understand and explain.”
While NFL viewers are used to seeing comedians, those were mostly confined to the pregame shows and have been taped segments. Fox Sports used Frank Caliendo and Rob Riggle for years, while Caliendo has also made appearances on ESPN.
Glaser’s appearances on "Thursday Night Football" took place after the games and are more like roasts of both teams.
Instead of having at least a week to try out a joke or hone material, Glaser and her team of writers are coming up with material as the game is taking place.
“I give her and her team a ton of credit because what they did was they took a risk by doing live stand-up comedy on a sports show. And there’s no way we could have rehearsed what our first one was going to be like. None of us knew what the reaction would be in the crowd,″ said Spoon Daftary, senior coordinating producer at Prime Video’s pregame, halftime and postgame shows.
According to Nielsen, Prime’s postgame show is averaging 2.05 million viewers, an 11% increase over last season. That is also outdrawing network late-night shows.
The other significant improvement from Glaser's first appearance, which was after the Sept. 19 game between the New England Patriots and New York Jets, to last Thursday's was that the fans who stuck around to see the postgame show in the stadium could hear her segment and react.
“It’s a perfect balance. Sports is entertainment, so it’s a natural thing to have that aspect incorporated whether it’s pregame or postgame,″ said Charissa Thompson, who hosts the Prime Video pregame, halftime and postgame shows. “I love that we’re willing to try new things, have fun and do things that are unorthodox or not the norm. I’m glad we have a chance to showcase even more of her talents in the sports space.”
Glaser and her team working on jokes and doing them live also has served as good preparation for her hosting the Golden Globes on Jan. 5, which will air on CBS and Paramount+. Ironically, the Golden Globes will come on after CBS Sports airs a doubleheader of NFL games for the final week of the regular season.
“It was a perfect training program for the Golden Globes coming up because I’m going to write jokes about things happening during that show, which is something I’ve never done before. I’ve always been someone who, like, really prepares beforehand and knows exactly what they’re going to say,” she said. “We’re just tossing out these insane jokes that we don’t even have time to go run them at comedy clubs to see if they even work. I mean, we’re finding out live on air if they work or not.”
Glaser is not scheduled for any more appearances on Prime Video’s postgame show this season, but all parties would be interested in doing it next year.
“I feel like I’d come to the table with a lot more knowledge about the sport that I got from doing it this year,” she said. “I find myself now like I’m able to walk by a TV in a bar, and I can watch it and kind of talk about football with people where I can kind of hold my own in conversation, and that is a huge triumph for me.”
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