Yes Please

It’s called Yes Please because it is the constant struggle and often the right answer. Can we figure out what we want, ask for it, and stop talking? Yes please. Is being vulnerable a power position? Yes please. Am I allowed to take up space? Yes please. Would you like to be left alone? Yes please. I love saying “yes” and I love saying “please”. Saying “yes” doesn’t mean I don’t know how to say no, and saying “please” doesn’t mean I am waiting for permission. “Yes please” sounds powerful and concise. It’s a response and a request. It is not about being a good girl; it is about being a real woman. It’s also a title I can tell my kids. I like when they say “Yes please” because most people are rude and nice manners are the secret keys to the universe.

I have always thought that Amy Poehler's public persona is likeable and funny and just offbeat enough to stand out from the crowd (I'm thinking of Amber, the one-legged white-trash character from SNL), but because I don't read People or Us Weekly, I didn't know anything about her personal life; didn't even know she was married to Will Arnett until I somehow heard they were breaking up. To be concise: I don't much care about the personal lives of celebrities, and if I read a celebrity memoir, it's most likely that I'm just looking to be entertained. Yes Please is entertaining (without being laugh-out-loud funny), and oddly enough, I don't think I know Poehler much better now than I did before I picked up this book.

The only behind the scenes story I previously knew about Poehler came from Tina Fey's Bossypants (and yes, it is the law that you need to name-drop one of these massively talented and entertaining women when mentioning the other): Apparently in an SNL writers' meeting, Poehler was doing some vulgar and "unladylike" bit with Seth Meyers, and Jimmy Fallon turned to her, and in a faux-squeamish voice said, "Stop that! It’s not cute! I don’t like it." Poehler turned on him and, cursing like a sailor, let Fallon know that she didn't care what he liked and went back to what had been amusing her. I appreciated that story when I first heard it -- it must be impossible enough for a woman to make it in comedy without worrying about being cute and ladylike all the time. But Yes Please did add some new perspective: it seems that Amy Poehler is always quick to anger and spends most of her time cursing like a sailor. This book has expletives on every page, and as the tone is conversational, I have to conclude that this is just the way that the author speaks. Now, I'm not offended by this because it's unladylike, but I was underwhelmed because it seemed so unprofessional; I can't think of another memoir or book of essays in which I was cursed at so much and it doesn't jibe with the "nice manners are the secret keys to the universe" that Poehler claims as her philosophy. So, does she speak this way simply because she's from a lower-middle-class blue-collar background? Is it her attempt at fitting in to a male-dominated profession as a 5'2" elfin blond? Is she actually Amber at heart (the one-legged white-trash character) saying, "Yeah, I farted. Deal with it.", because ultimately she doesn't care what I think of her? But shouldn't an author start from a position of not wanting to turn off her audience? 

While throughout Yes Please Poehler comes off as likeable, she's quick to point out that she might not be as nice as you think in real life -- especially if you try and approach her:

When I walk down the street and someone asks me, "Excuse me, can I ask you a question?" I immediately put my hand up and firmly say, "No!" No one needs to ask me a question. There is no reason to talk to strangers. I do not want you to hand me your homemade CD or talk to me on an airplane or try to upsell me on drink specials. As I get older I get real pleasure from maintaining boundaries with strangers. I have come to enjoy telling the cheese guy at the farmers' market that he does not value my time. I like letting my massage therapist know that she is putting her needs before my own. It may be difficult to tell my family I feel pressure to entertain them, but it's easy to tell the UPS guy that he needs to respect my personal space.

Poehler especially resents the young up-and-comers who think that she could break them into show biz because she did it the hard way -- spending over a decade honing her improv skills with Second City and ImprovOlympics in Chicago, moving with the Upright Citizens Brigade to NYC, working as a waitress to keep her theater company afloat, and taking small roles that led to bigger and better opportunities. This part was interesting to me and I wish there was more of the climb to the top -- and especially because I had no idea just how involved Poehler is with live theater even to this day. I wish I knew more about the alt-comedy movement: I really like going to live comedy but wouldn't be impressed if the audience was compelled out onto the street where a woman was walking by naked to protest her rent increase. Art piece, maybe, but comedy?

Yes Please is mostly a collection of philosophies that Poehler has collected so far (like "other people are not medicine" or "nothing is anyone's business"), and although there are some autobiographical facts thrown in, this isn't really a memoir. And that's okay because, like I said, I'm not much more interested in Amy Poehler's personal life than she is in sharing it, but there's something kind of…pointless…about this book. The philosophy isn't mind-blowing, the behind-the-scenes glimpses aren't fascinating, and the stories often break off in the middle and resume without transition later. There are some embarrassing-but-cute childhood pictures, hand-written notes, poems, and other scrap-booky bits that make this 300+ page book a very quick read. But the only two stories that I found interesting were show-bizzy -- a lapse of judgement in an SNL skit that it took Poehler years to properly atone for and an uncomfortable interaction with the producer of a televised event -- and I would have been interested in more stories like these, if only because Poehler does have a ringside seat to a world most of us will never know (whereas her thoughts on divorce and dating are rather banal). I don't regret reading Yes Please so I won't drop it to two stars, but as I've heard she's writing another book, I will remember to give it a pass.

Mallory is such a huge Parks and Recreation fan -- and becoming an SNL fan -- that two different friends gave her copies of Yes Please for Christmas. When she saw I finally got my copy from the library's waiting list, she thought it would be cool that we're reading it at the same time -- but I don't know if she'll still want to discuss it with me once she really gets into it. Not only does Amy Poehler curse non-stop, but she mentions drug use a lot, and tells us several times that she has become very good at sex. I don't think these are topics any 16-year-old wants to risk her mother bringing into a book discussion, and it's hard to know how she'll react to my less than glowing review. Time will tell...