Quinta Brunson, Star Student

Getting an at-home mani-pedi in your sun-drenched Los Angeles home — just days after a slew of photo shoots, late-night TV appearances, and dinner with Kid Cudi in New York — is not the picture of relatability. But when I first connect with Quinta Brunson over Zoom and glean that exact scenario, her affability is what I notice most. She's wearing a simple black T-shirt emblazoned with #BuiltPhenomenally — a hashtag created in support of a Ford campaign voiced by Angela Bassett — and her face is makeup-free. In the three months leading up to our conversation, Brunsons show Abbott Elementary has become a feverishly viewed and critically acclaimed ABC sitcom amid Hollywood's current wave of marathonable, hours-long dramas and docuseries — a rare feat that stands to propel her to a higher echelon of fame. But she's taking this Zoom from her phone, which keeps toppling over to reveal the ceiling's exposed wood beams.

Brunson is still wrapping her head around the show's success, describing the Abbott-related attention she received recently at a wedding with amusement. "The amount of women who came and grabbed my cheeks...and they're like, 'I love Barbara and Ava, and we need you to leave Tariq!'" Brunson says. "They're so invested."

She may be marveling at the reception to her show, which has already been renewed for Season 2, but the 32-year-old creator, writer, and actor has long been confident in her own ambition. "I believed that I would have my own show one day," Brunson says. "That was my dream." Before Abbott Elementary, she'd gotten tantalizingly close to realizing that dream: She had developed and sold pilots, fronted a Facebook video series, and played roles in shows like Big Mouth and A Black Lady Sketch Show. Abbott just happened to be the breakthrough. "The timing of Abbott came at the right place for where I was in my career," she says. "It all kind of lined up."

Growing up in Philadelphia, Brunson was a student of sitcoms. The Jeffersons, 227, and The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air were household favorites that she watched with her parents and four siblings. Her tastes were varied; she was a fan of The Andy Griffith Show, even though it's "old as dirt," and still feels strongly that a certain Nickelodeon show was slept on. "iCarly came on TV the other day and I was like, 'Man, that was a good sitcom, right?' It doesn't get enough credit because it was a Nickelodeon show, but it actually is such a well-written sitcom."

Though Brunson knew early on that she wanted to write and perform comedy, for years she "found it to be unrealistic," partly because aside from Wanda Sykes, there weren't many people who looked like her being funny on TV. Will Ferrell and Tina Fey were entertaining, but not the most relatable performers to a Black girl from Philly. Plus, her parents wanted her to have a "standard, good old-fashioned career," so she shelved her comedic aspirations to study advertising and broadcast telecommunications at Temple University. It didn't last long: She soon started traveling to Chicago while in college to take classes at the renowned improv and sketch theater Second City. Eventually, much to her parents' disapproval, she left school and moved to LA.