Published on Show Me Mizzou Aug. 27, 2024
Story by Julie Seabaugh, BJ ’02
Peter Smith owes their diploma to an unlikely factor: the weekly campus event Comedy Wars. Since graduating, the New York City-based comedian, performer and cabaret singer has appeared on Comedy Central, in films including Fire Island and even Shakespeare’s Macbeth in 2022 on Broadway. Currently, Smith is serving as an understudy for the acclaimed Broadway play, Oh, Mary! But before that success, it was three years in campus improv group Comedy Wars that first taught Smith, BJ ’12, who is transgender, not only how to take rejection in stride, but also who they truly were as a person. In the interview below, which has been edited for length and clarity, Smith spoke about their trajectory.
You were born in Chicago. How did you end up at MU?
I didn’t see the campus until orientation. I didn’t even visit. The plan was to go to culinary school, and then at the end of senior year, I was talking to some chefs. They were like, “Are you sure, kid? Do you know what working in a kitchen is like?” “No, I just love cooking for my friends.” And they were like, “Well … it’s actually the opposite of cooking for your friends.” So I panicked. Mizzou had rolling admission, and two best friends were going there because it had the best journalism school in the country, and I was interested in media. I just dove in. And Comedy Wars is the reason why I stayed there, to be honest.
What did joining the group teach you?
I loved performance from a young age through high school. I had put that aside for media journalism. By the end of freshman year, though, I knew I needed to be on stage reading plays, collaborating with people, being silly, all that stuff.
All I want to be doing consistently is ritualistically gathering with people, creating something, offering it to an audience to make them smile and give a break from the stress they’re going through. Once a week there were hundreds of people that religiously came to us for laughter.
There was a Comedy Warrior who was also in the journalism school named Lauren Zima, BJ ’09. She sensed I felt out of place in Columbia as a visibly queer kid, and I considered transferring. She said, “You only get four years to experience this college thing in this very specific way, in an American Midwest college town with Greek life and bars and all of that.” Comedy Wars was a beautiful way to observe that and process it through comedy while being cradled by the friendship of a bunch of semi-outcasts.
You were also active in the theater department.
Yes! Comedy Wars was major, but Dr. Cheryl Black was so crucial in showing me that I had a lot of acting talent and could handle drama as well as comedy. She introduced me to Susan Glaspell’s The Verge and Tennessee Williams. Then I did The Zoo Story, my first Shakespeare — which was Hamlet, and I played Claudius — summer rep was The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee. Also, the department started a cabaret my senior year. That was my first real taste of solo performance. I stayed in Columbia for two summers to work in the repertory theater. Also working in the costume shop, where my creativity and queerness were championed. I’m extremely grateful to the theater department. If I ever have any money, that’s where my donations will go.
What Comedy Wars lessons do you still use today?
Improvisation skills are crucial because you learn to be fully present in a moment whilst simultaneously thinking 10 steps ahead or behind to solve any given problem. Most of the time when improv is most successful, it’s because the players have developed a chemistry and innate trust over many years.
The Comedy Wars cast would actively hang out and develop personal relationships that then made the on-stage jokes flourish. Every Wednesday after a show we’d get some beers and wings at the Heidelberg. In show business, thinking on your feet is most of the job. But really, it’s the people you surround yourself with that make show business fun.
[After graduation] I moved to NYC and wasn’t performing but was working with this artist for Kanye West doing art direction and visuals, which is another passion of mine.
When that ended, I knew I needed to perform again, and improv was my way back into it. I took Upright Citizens Brigade classes and saw how hard it was for people who hadn’t had years of engaging with the improvisational process that I took for granted. I thought, “Maybe I actually do have good boundaries about performance and can take a note and fail gracefully.”
I even auditioned for Saturday Night Live in 2021. I got through to the end of the process and met with Lorne Michaels but didn’t end up getting it. A week later an audition for Macbeth on Broadway came in. I ended up booking the Broadway job. That was helpful to remind me how I see rejection. I didn’t get SNL but there’s always a next opportunity. Mine was doing Shakespeare’s greatest tragedy on Broadway with Daniel Craig and Ruth Negga and Sam Gold, Tony-winning director.
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