The Scenic City will be the first city to find out what’s the latest thing on Chonda Pierce’s mind. And, whatever it is, it may be out of her mouth before she knows she said it.
The Christian comedian kicks off her “Did I Say That Out Loud?” tour today at Memorial Auditorium.
“My mouth works faster than my salvation,” she said. “If my career is ruined, I’m going to do it myself.”
Pierce, a resident of Murfreesboro, Tenn., said Chattanooga still does “feel like a sense of coming home” because she spent six months of the last year in Los Angeles.
“You talk about a fish out of water,” she said. “You walk on the sidewalk, and you get pages and pages of material. They have some really, really funny ways.”
The women, for instance, carry their dogs and their dogs’ waste in their pocketbooks, Pierce said.
“And they think we’re backwoods,” she said. “They should let their dogs do what they do naturally.”
In Los Angeles, Pierce said, she’s been looking into developing a movie for the “next thing to do.”
IF YOU GO* What: Chonda Pierce.* When: 7 p.m. today.* Where” Memorial Auditorium, 399 McCallie Ave.* Admission: $20.75 (plus fees), $18.75 groups.* Phone: 642-8497.* Web site: www.chattanoogaonstage.com.
“In this economy,” she said, “I’m just glad to have a job. But with my ADD (attention deficit disorder), I get bored easily. I don’t know if it’ll happen or not, but I get a lot of free lunches.”
The lunches, though, are not the fare Pierce says she’s used to in the South.
“Everything is all organic and bean sprout sandwiches,” she said. “And they’re carrying the fertilizer in their purse.”
While Pierce said she met some wonderful people — and Christian believers — in Los Angeles, she said things are just a little different on the Left Coast.
“You can’t smoke out there,” she said, “but you can smoke dope. And you buy your grocery sacks and take them to the grocery store. It’s all very hoity-toity.”
When Pierce isn’t touring (she’s among Pollstar’s top-selling live performers), writing (six books) and looking for the next big thing (she already has been named Comedian of the Year at the Christian Music Hall of Fame Visionary Awards), she finds time to host “Aspiring Women,” a talk show on the Total Living Network.
There, she said, she has met incredible people with incredible stories, such as a former beauty queen who lost her outer beauty because of a facial tumor but found inner beauty, and done lighthearted stories like washing a dog three times her size.
For her work, Pierce has received three Emmy Award nominations.
“I don’t know what that means to your career,” she said, “but it’s nice to have a certificate.”