Leslie Jones My Hard Road to Hilarious

AS SHE PREPARES TO DROP HER RAW NEW MEMOIR, THE COMEDIAN AND SNL ALUM OPENS UP ABOUT TRAUMA, LOSS AND CHASING LAUGHTER

- JANINE RUBENSTEIN

Leslie Jones knows exactly where she got her confidence. "My dad would always say to me, 'I don't care what they tell you, you can do whatever you want to do as long as you work hard,'" she recalls. "They're going to tell you you're Black; they're going to tell you you're a female, he'd say, but none of that matters." 

The Army veteran knew what he was talking about, even if he had no idea his young daughter, then struggling with low self-esteem and emotional scars from childhood trauma, would one day be a superstar comedian after a bumpy decades-long ride on the stand-up circuit. "That's why I never quit," says Jones, 56. "There were days where I was just crying and worrying, but the thought always came to my head: 'Okay, what can I do?' Dad said, 'Become undeniable.'"