DAYTON, Ohio — Luna Malbroux’s nights have never been quiet, but these days, her apartment will often be found ringing with music, as well as the usual laughter.
In quarantine, the comedian has been experimenting with new sounds, but her heart is in the same work: changing minds, one laugh at a time.
Malbroux’s always been a performer. She said she sang all through high school, and though her medium shifted toward standup in the years since, Malbroux still finds a home in the limelight.
Over the past few years, Malbroux’s performed her standup across the country, whether it’s private Google functions in Silicon Valley, an HBO festival in Boston or a comedy night at home in Cincinnati.
Unfortunately, the coronavirus pandemic has thrown off that rhythm.
While unable to perform her traditional shows, Malbroux took up a few instruments, piano, banjolele, and vocals.
“I tried banjo first, like an actual banjo, which is one of the hardest string instruments to learn,” she said.
That experimentation turned into a band, with her roommate, Shawn Braley. Malbroux even found a way to incorporate it into her comedy, especially with all her shows online.
“I needed something else to kind of fill that space, that rhythm where like laughter is, and so I used music to accent my jokes,” she said.
It could be a trill here or there or a harsh, sour note, anything that allows Malbroux to serve as her own musical sound effects board.
“It’s just a different type of creative energy,” she said.
Meanwhile, the substance of her work remains the same, whether she’s on stage or off.
Malbroux describes herself as an equity consultant by day and a comedian by night. That means spending much of her time training companies and organizations across the country how to respond to prejudice, bias, and inequity in their own workplaces.
“People are finding in a lot of different ways that there’s a lot of work that needs to be done not only in unpacking their biases but also organizational culture that continues to create inequality,” she said.
In that regard, 2020 was a busy year for Malbroux as much of the country grappled with the deaths of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor, both at the hands of police officers and the civil unrest and calls for change that followed.
Malbroux works with a number of consulting agencies, like Soul Bird, where they help groups talk through and understand major events like these as well as the everyday acts of bias, women, people of color and other minorities face constantly.
Ben Stevens, who often works with Malbroux on these sessions said the two of them work to make everyone feel comfortable, particularly those who might get defensive in conversations about privilege.
“You impact fragility through storytelling,” he said. “You make it human.”
In that respect, Malbroux said the work is a lot like comedy.
“I’m using my own personal experiences and my own personal pain points to find universal truths,” she said. “As soon as someone is laughing, they’re relating to what you’re saying.”
That’s why she said there’s room to find the funny even in these difficult conversations, in her sessions, as well as on stage.
“The comedy I do is inherently political because I’m a Black, queer woman who does racial equity work,” she said. “So even in telling my own personal stories, they’re going to be interwoven in that is going to be the white supremacy and patriarchy that I push back against on a regular basis.”
To her though, there is a right and wrong way to form a punchline around identity.
“There are these narratives, these scripts that already exist, these stereotypes, these ideologies that are racist, sexist, ableist, those are already out there,” she said. “It’s very easy as a comedian to name those things, poke at those things and just say those scripts.”
Instead, she said it’s much more interesting to examine how ridiculous they may be compared to the universal truths about life as a member of one or more of those groups.
“The thing about being a skillful comedian is being able to understand all those narratives that exist and your positionality within that and being able to say let’s find the real humor in that that’s not punching down or not necessarily even punching up but just finding the core thing about it that makes it really human,” she said.
Malbroux said she averages about three equity sessions a week, and one or two virtual shows. She’s not sure when she’ll have a traditional standup experience, but she is preparing for a few outdoor shows by the end of March.
In the meantime, she’s trying her hand at songwriting too. Hoping to find the universal truths there that can also turn a place of pain into a smile.