This past September the comic actress and singer Bridget Everett was in Cleveland shooting an upcoming feature for Netflix called "Little Evil." In the film, Everett, who headlines Cobb's Comedy Club on Saturday, November 26 and Sunday, November 27, plays the best gal pal of Adam Scott's just-married character, who is realizing that his six-year-old stepson may, in fact, be the Antichrist.
"I'm not sure what you call this kind of movie," said Everett during a recent phone interview. "It's a horror comedy, I guess."
Perhaps the most horrific element of the filming for Everett was when writer/director Eli Craig's mother showed up on set.
"I didn't know what to say," says Everett about meeting Craig's mom, who happens to be Academy Award-winner Sally Field. "Was I going to go up to her and say, 'Hi, I have a lot of pictures on my phone where my dog and you have been put together with Photoshop.'?"
The origin of this strange dilemma, explains Everett, was two years ago when she bought her first dog, a Pomeranian named Poppy who now tags along most everywhere mama goes.
"My friends would make plans to go out, and I'd always want to bring her along, and so my catchphrase became 'Not without my Poppy.' You know, like the Sally Field movie, 'Not Without My Daughter?' "
"One of my friends ended up putting a picture of Poppy into the movie poster and then it just snowballed into Poppy on the Norma Rae poster and, well... it's pretty ridiculous."
So, did The Flying Nun get to see her furry stalker's photos?
"Nah, I was trying to play it cool," says Everett before pausing a moment. "I guess I played it too cool."
Shooting another recent film project, "Fun Mom Dinner," Everett again found herself slightly daunted by the presence of an award-winning collaborator: "The first scene I shot was with Toni Collette, who I have admired forever. I'm just meeting her, and I had to be screaming at her in this scene."
Since 2013, when she began a series of occasional appearances on Inside Amy Schumer - command performances, really, for fan-and-supporter Schumer - Everett's been collaborating with more and more famous names. She's also attracting a much broader audience than the in-the-know New Yorkers who started to form a cultish following after her raucous 2007 off-off-Broadway show, "At Least It's Pink," which one less appreciative critic ungrammatically deemed "a jambalaya of nastiness existing only to heap cheap thrills atop even cheaper thrills."
To be sure, Everett's live act is not everyone's cup of tea. Blowsy, potty-mouthed, and often nearly naked, Everett works the stage, and the front section of the audience (count yourself warned), like a force of nature. Her original songs include the likes of "Titties," "Pussy Power," and "Fuck Shit Up." This is a woman who has drawn audiences with the help of exhortations like, "I may never play Madison Square Garden... but I am going to sit on your face."
But its her blowsy, potty-mouthed, and often nearly naked cabaret and concert performances -one of which is captured on her 2015 Comedy Central special, Gynecological Wonder- that have brought Everett to the attention of mainstream Hollywood. It can't figure out just what to do with her.
After seeing Everett perform at an Austin comedy festival, the quirky comedian Maria Bamford offered her a regular part on her Netflix series, "Lady Dynamite."
"We are complete opposite types, but she's 100% true to herself and she has a giant heart," Everett says of Bamford.
While playing Dagmar on "Dynamite" and a succession of other small roles in big screen comedies has let Everett make a living as a performer (she only stopped waitressing at the Times Square location of Ruby Foo's in 2014), it hasn't quite lit the spark that - for a decade now - friends have suggested will inevitably lead her entertainment career to blow up bigtime.
"I'm taking all these opportunities that come along," says Everett, whose constantly-on-the-cusp status has contributed to battles with depression and insecurity. "But it's hard to know if there's going to be a big break. Nothing has felt like 'This is my moment.' "
A couple winters ago, Everett says she felt totally overwhelmed with life and decided "to go surfing for dogs on PetFinder."
Enter Poppy.
"She's a former sex worker," says Everett. "They bred her until she had nothing left to give, and then they put her up for sale. I try to bring her with me as much as I can. Having her around makes me happy and less depressed."
Mama likes her. She really, really likes her.
Currently, Everett is pushing another pet project. "I wrote a pilot with Bobcat Goldthwait and Michael King, from 'Sex and the City.' " King, an old friend, co-wrote "At Least It's Pink" back in the day.
"So we're out there pitching it to everyone. It's funny and its got heart and music. But its also pretty out there, so you never know."
For the time being though, Everett will continue to do her concert gigs and take the film roles that come her way.
"It lets me keep Poppy on her organic raw chicken diet," she explains. "And that makes her poop solid, which is totally worth it."
Bridget Everett performs at Cobb's Comedy Club November 26 & 27 (7pm). $29.50. 2-drink minimum. 915 Columbus Ave. 928-4320. www.bridgeteverett.net www.cobbscomedy.com