In addition to her second stand-up comedy special, Wake Up, which dropped on Netflix in December, Robby Hoffman had scene-stealing roles in last year’s FX limited series Dying for Sex and, more recently, the HBO comedies Hacks and Rooster. If you ask her, she’s quite happy to split her time between the two mediums — acting and stand-up comedy — and Hoffman insists that a career doing both has been the game plan all along.
"As a child, I got an audition for Degrassi Junior High, because they came to my school in Montreal," she says. "I must have been 12 or 13, but my mother wouldn't allow it. She didn't want me to go to Toronto alone with some strange man saying he wants to put me in a show. She was like, 'I've heard that story before, and she's not going anywhere. We're happy with the school theater program, and that's it. She can be in the play and nothing more.'
"I think where [the casting director] really put the nail in the coffin was, he said, 'We want to take pictures of her.' He was talking about headshots, but my mother doesn't want to hear about some middle-aged man taking photos of her young teenage daughter. She hung up the phone and basically was like, 'I don't know what this is, but we're not doing it.' So, that was the end of that, and I went on with my childhood. But I was interested, and I did like to act. I tried to tell my mother, 'He liked my acting!' and she goes, 'Of course he did,' thinking everybody's a pervert."
Hoffman’s perspective on which acting roles she’ll take on is fairly straightforward: "It’s about the right part and the right time," she says. "I take everything I do very seriously. With stand-up, I commit to stand-up. I very much do stand-up. So, when acting presented itself, I also wanted to take that seriously. If it’s the right role and I can dive in, then I definitely welcome that, and that’s something that has been happening more and more. It's just nice to have all these areas to play. Entering TV land is really fun.”
Unlike the comics of today who grew up entranced by the stand-up comedy specials they watched on television, Hoffman says she didn’t become familiar with the format until adulthood. "When I was younger, I didn't know that stand-up was its own thing. I was probably too young for that," she says. "But I heard about stand-up in Montreal, because they have a festival there [the comedy festival Just for Laughs], and I was like, ‘What is it even? Oh, of course, I could do that.’
"Which, 99% of the time, if you have that thought, you can't, but I got really lucky. So, if you're reading this: No, you can't. But it did work out in my case and a few other cases."
A scene from Hoffman's Netflix special, Wake Up
Watching TV as a child in the Hoffman household was a communal experience involving the whole family. The Simpsons was a staple in their home; she vividly remembers watching it every Sunday with her nine siblings.
"Growing up, we had one TV, and there were a lot of rules. We had one large, three-seater couch and one two-seater couch, and sometimes one chair. But we were also 12 people living in the house, and that’s only five seats. So, we had rules: Like, when commercials are on, you can go pee, but so help me God, if you need to do a number two and you're not back, you've lost your spot. So, TV was a very regimented, warlike but enjoyable experience."
These days, now that Hoffman is on television, her rituals for watching have changed: "TV is now a bit more manageable, time-wise. I can watch it when I want, and solo. I find that I can still have my spot back, even if I have to pause and come back."
But some things really do never change. “I do still have PTSD from running back to the TV," she says. "I’ll catch myself running in my own home."
Here, Hoffman shares some of the TV projects that help define her.
My first favorite show as a child: Sex and the City
I was a kid in my tween years, but my mother let me watch it with her. We didn't have HBO in Canada, but there was a network that played it at 11:30 or so on Saturday nights, and that was my weekend for a bit. And my mother, who had 10 kids in her 20s, would always joke that she loved the show, because it's as if she got to relive a more youthful 20s and 30s experience — because her 20s and 30s were totally ruined by us. And we would just watch it together. It was a family show. And I just remember the static of HBO coming on, and the [theme song] of Sex and the City. That was probably my first-ever favorite show.
The shows I can watch over and over again: Girls, Girlfriends
Gabby [Windey, Hoffman’s wife] and I rewatched Girls. It really held up, we thought. Also, Girlfriends is a comfort show. I don't know if you remember that show from Tracee Ellis Ross, but I used to watch that with my sister. That felt like a more grown-up show somehow, I guess because I was living with my older sister when we were watching it.
I watch a lot of comfort TV, because I travel a lot, and I'm in shady hotels a lot for stand-up — not to brag, but The Hyatt House, Express Hotel — and Seinfeld is always on. It’s all the syndicated shows. Sometimes you'll get a Girlfriends episode, sometimes you'll get Judge Judy. And what's really comforting about the comfort shows when you're in a hotel is, you’ve got to sit there. So, I am rushing to the bathroom and coming back.
The last thing I watched: Escape at Dannemora
Gabby and I just recently watched it for the first time. It’s a Showtime series with Patricia Arquette, Benicio del Toro and Paul Dano. And Ben Stiller directed it. We were like, "What? We've never heard of this!" So, we were able to find that one and just watched that. We might be late, but that's the most recent thing where we could not wait to do another episode.
The show I love that may be surprising: Black Mirror, Severance
People expect me to only like comedy, and I tend not to watch that. People are also surprised that I watch a lot of car stuff. I could watch Jay Leno's Garage on YouTube forever and be thrilled.
I also have guilty-pleasure TV: Anything to do with "The Big Family" — I love the Kardashians. I also love Sister Wives on TLC. I follow all of that drama. I haven't missed an episode of The Kardashians or Sister Wives.
The show I’m embarrassed to say I’ve never seen: The Sopranos
I know I should watch It. It's just that I was too young when it came out, and now I can't watch that aspect ratio. I can't watch a show that's in a square on a rectangle TV. If it's not in the rectangle, I don't know what happens to me, but I just can't do it. And it has nothing to do with the show, which I'm sure is phenomenal, but I'm like, I don't know how to adjust the settings. It's not for me. I don't have the temperament.
And you know what? I've been fine not going back. I don't feel I'm missing out. There's a lot I haven't seen, but you know what? I've seen Escape at Dannemora, and probably not many people have seen that. And that's a damn good one, so it all shakes out.
This article originally appeared in emmy Magazine, issue #7, 2026.
