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and the othersoapy reality dramasthat have become some of our cultures most sacred texts.
Where does the name Boman come from?I dont think Ive ever seen it before.
My mom is from Spain.
Shes from Galicia and over there, its Celtic; they wear kilts and play bagpipes.
She gave me and my brother Dakota Celtic names.
Usually Boman is spelled with a W, like Bowman, but I guess she wanted to be different.
When did she know that?
She claims it was even before that!
Like, I just have a feeling!
When did she tell you that?
Because thats a lot of pressure to have growing up!
Although my mom was somewhat of a stage manager a momager.
Every year after Christmas dinner and before dessert, we would do the Ana Martinez Family Christmas Show.
And this went on for years.
It was like our version ofSNL.
My mom was the director, the producer.
She was grilling me and my cousins and my brother.
We were rehearsing sketches about the year that just happened.
She was always like, Youre going to be a performer.
I feel like theres still room to grow.
I leave it there because its kind of campy.
Ive made my way a little bit.
This all started as a pandemic thing for you, right?
I had alotof time on my hands.
Thats pretty common for people who are at your level.
At the beginning of the pandemic, they just sort of found an audience.
I started making TikToks in December 2019.
It all felt very intimidating to venture to make it as an actor in Toronto.
I was like,How do I get the fast-track pass to cut the line a little bit?
Conveniently, TikTok was just becoming cool.
I was dating a guy who was on TikTok.
It was a red flag.
It was cringe at the time to be using TikTok.
That guy went viral, and then I was like,Oh my God.
Hes not even funny!
I went viral for the first time in February 2020.
What would surprise people?
Im not gonna be like, Its a hard job.
Any job is hard!
Any job comes with very exhausting components.
I do think that it would surprise people how mentally taxing it is to constantly care about social media.
I cant take a social-media break.
I mean, I could, but like, Icant.
It can be a mind game.
I would post anything!
I would be getting so many likes.
!Its not that way.
Im wondering if being Canadian has affected your sense of humor.
Have you had to tailor things to appeal to Americans?
Or do you find its kind of universal?
Youre somebody who has an innate understanding of TV.
Where does that come from?
What role did TV play in your childhood?
I grew up watching TV.
I was watching a lot of reality TV a lot of TLC.
I also fell in love with the shows that I would watch.
I was watchingThats So Raven,and I was acting it out with her.
I always saw myself as her.
I would pretend to be her or say the lines that she was saying.
And then I would bring that to school, then I would be making jokes about that.
I would learn from it, then deliver it elsewhere.
I saw her recently at an event in L.A.
The breath left my body.
It was like seeing Michael Jackson.
I told her that she raised me.
And I can now say I made Raven-Symone laugh, which is crazy.
When did you start discovering all these slice of life reality shows?
It was actuallyDance Moms.
That was the first one that I really got into.
And then my ex-boyfriend showed meThe Real Housewives.
It takes a gay to show another gayThe Real Housewivesto really get it.
The way that its edited is really funny.
I then took that and implanted it into my content to show everybody this is so funny.
Do you remember when you first watchedKeeping Up With the Kardashians?
And your first impressions?
I remember it being on, and I could never get into it.
Im not a fan of the show.
I dont have anything against the show; I just have never been able to get it.
Because I went to school for radio and television, I feel like I know when things are forced.
I could just never get into theKardashiansbecause to me its just not believable.
But that being said, the earlier seasons of theKardashiansare so iconic.
I went back and watched those, and I fell in love.
Has parodying these shows changed the way you see them?
Thats such a reality-TV thing to say!
Nobody talks like that!
Is studying these shows the secret to parodying them so well?
Its studying it, but I want it to feel like its its own thing.
I want to parody it, but I want people to also reference theBodashiansas its own show.
My dream is theBodashiansgetting its own Wikipedia page.
I want people to feel like theyre watching TV when theyre watching me.
I use TikTok as my resume.
I use it to show people what I can do.
I want to act.
I want to create TV.
And this is an example of how it could look.
I have a song coming out thats called I Have A Thing.
Lets talk about the transition from TikTok to TV.
Many have not succeeded.
Im wondering what lessons you learned from their failures forMade for TV.
We wanted it to feel unscripted.
We had a writers room, but its very improvised.
So that fueled so many moments of this show where youre watching and youre like,Is this real?
Was this supposed to happen like this?
Is there someone whose career youre trying to emulate?
She started on social media and went on to create a show that shes starring in.
Im doing it to a certain extent, but I would love to do something scripted.
Oh my gosh, yeah to a fault!
Some of these people aretooreal.
I know some people who have gone on toCanadas Drag Racewhom I do not like because they are mean.
And then they go on the show, and theyre mean.
And people probably watch it and think theyre just giving us the drama that were looking for.
But thats just how they are!
There are some Real Housewives who Ive met who are exactly the way that they are on the show.
You watch these shows and youre like,This show is fake.
These people dont do anything.Thats not true!
Because Housewives areprofessionalsat what they do.
I think people would be very surprised by how real these shows are.
So as you become more famous, do you worry that youre going to become everything that you parody?
Yes, and Im so excited for that day!
Ill be that girl.
I think it feeds into this idea of being delusional and how important that is.
