Nicole Byer

Byer was born and raised in New Jersey and moved to New York City in the early 2000s. She worked there as a waitress for a restaurant and cabaret club. She described how the experience eventually led to her to studying improv, "They would give me a lot of money because they were like, 'You're very funny. You have to get out of here. You're very bad at this [waiting tables].'" Byer's parents both died when she was young, her mother while Nicole was a teen in high school, and her father when she was 21. She has said that comedy helped her work through both her parents' deaths, "it was a blessing that I had found these things before they passed away so I could escape." She then took classes at the Upright Citizens Brigade, starting improv and sketch comedy in June 2008, the same month that her father died. She continued with improv and sketch comedy before starting her stand-up career in 2013. Byer graduated from the American Musical and Dramatic Academy Certificate Program in Professional Performance. == Career ==

She tours the United States doing stand-up comedy and regularly performs improv with Upright Citizens Brigade in Los Angeles. TV Byer began appearing on Girl Code on MTV in 2013. In 2014, she hosted the first season of MTV's Are You the One? The Aftermatch Live, an after-show for Are You the One?. She appeared in several roles on network television in 2016. That year, she had supporting roles on three shows: MTV's commentary show Girl Code; a hidden camera prank show Ladylike, also on MTV; and she was a series regular on the Fox show Party Over Here, a half-hour sketch comedy created by Paul Scheer and Lonely Island, which was cancelled after one season. As a commentator on the show Girl Code, she was described by Maitri Mehta at Bustle as a "beloved talking head"; Early in her career, Byer learned to do her own makeup and hairstyling before performances, after experiences with on-set makeup artists and hairstylists unprepared to work with her skin tone and hair texture. Nailed It! Since March 2018, Byer has hosted the Netflix original bake-off series Nailed It! alongside head judge chocolatier Jacques Torres. Each episode features three home bakers with a "terrible track record" attempting to recreate extremely complicated pastries for a $10,000 prize. Byer received a nomination for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Host for a Reality or Competition Program four times (2020, 2021, 2022, and 2023). She is the first Black woman to be nominated in the category. Because her comedy is "not kid-friendly", her commentary is edited to create the "feel-good G-rated comedy" that the show is known for. An entire season is shot in only 13 days. Loosely Exactly Nicole In 2016, MTV premiered Loosely Exactly Nicole, a scripted, single-camera comedy written and starring Byer, based on her life. Loosely Exactly Nicole premiered September 5, 2016, on MTV. It was later cancelled after one season. Shortly after, it was picked up by Facebook Watch for a second season. Wipeout Since 2023, Byer has been the co-host of Wipeout with John Cena on TBS. ''Why Won't You Date Me?'' In December 2017, Byer launched a weekly podcast ''Why Won't You Date Me?'' on the HeadGum podcast network. The guest also critiques her Tinder profile. Byer concludes each show by asking the guest host if they would date her. Past guests include her very close friend Sasheer Zamata, Emily Heller, and Brooks Wheelan. Critics have referred to the show as "bold" and "refreshing." In 2021, the show left HeadGum to join Conan O'Brien's Team coco podcast network. In 2024, the show was back to HeadGum and acquired by them. Each episode features a guest who provides more background on the series and characters. Past guests have included John Gemberling, Demi Adejuyigbe, Paul F. Tompkins, and Betsy Sodaro. Season one covered the Star Wars franchise and The Lord of the Rings in the second. The third season explored Tyler Perry's body of work and the fourth goes through the Fast & Furious franchise, with a new co-host, Jon Gabrus as a guide. The fifth season covered selections from the Marvel Cinematic Universe and a sixth season has Byer and Lapkus experiencing various Batman films. Book Her first book ''#VERYFAT #VERYBRAVE: The Fat Girl's Guide to Being #Brave and Not a Dejected, Melancholy, Down-in-the-Dumps Weeping Fat Girl in a Bikini'' was released in 2020. The book features over 100 photos of Byer in bikinis with much of the book written through captions, making it both a comedy book and a photo book. Byer has explained the long title, "I, Nicole Byer, wrote this book to #1, share my impressive bikini collection and my hot body with the world, and #2, help other people feel #brave by embracing their body as it is." The title began as a joke hashtag on Instagram, making fun of the way people often comment on photos of fat women wearing relatively little clothing as, 'You're so brave.' In 2018, she appeared in a Smirnoff ad campaign with actor Ted Danson. == Comedic style ==

On The Ringer, Allison P. Davis described Byer's comedy: "Most easily compared to a raunchier Retta with a hint of Ilana Glazer's madcap energy. She's mouthy, vulgar, a little bit goofy, relatable but ridiculously charming, and not afraid to infuse her broad comedy with a confident sexuality." Writing for USA Today, Jaleesa M. Jones said that "it's precisely [Byer's] brazen, ribald brand of comedy that landed her in the creative incubator that is MTV, where she toplines two new comedy shows in 2016, Ladylike and Loosely Exactly Nicole". Byer described Whoopi Goldberg, Tina Turner, and Mo'Nique as her early inspirations. == Personal life ==

Byer supports body positivity and stated in an interview with Brit+Co, "Body positivity, to me, means you accept the body that you're in... And if you want to change it, you can, but you should love the skin that you're in currently, forever. Because everyone is beautiful. No one's truly ugly. You're always beautiful to somebody, and you're always ugly to somebody." On her sexual orientation, Byer has said that she "doesn't identify as straight", but is uncomfortable with the labels "bisexual" or "queer." She has stated on her podcast ''Why Won't You Date Me?'' that she is open to dating people of any gender, and has dated men and women in the past. She lives in Los Angeles with her two rescue dogs named Clyde and Charlie. She previously lived with fellow comedian John Milhiser. Byer was diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder as an adult. == Filmography ==

Film Television Podcasts Web series == Awards and nominations ==