Nicole Byer Is An Emmy Nominated Nailed It Host With A Skate Gang

Over four regular and two holiday-themed seasons of Netflix’s “Nailed It!” contestants have tried to recreate professionally crafted confections with dizzying effect. The highly binge-able series has seen sister versions pop up for Mexican, French, German, and Spanish audiences, but a pressing question remains for original host Nicole Byer: Are the amateur bakers actually getting better?

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“No, which is honestly incredible that they can keep finding people who are just so terrible,” Byer says. And again, they really are this bad. She adds, “I don’t think they’re faking it just for the show because there is money on the line. And these are adults trying their hardest, and I think that’s the funniest part about the show.”

In the Emmy-nominated fourth season, which debuted in April, Byer was particularly charmed by contestant Larry Nelson in the “Jungle Bungle” episode.

“This man Larry was so kind, so adorable,” Byer recalls. “And he made this sloth cake that was just so funny to look at. And then you look at this insane sloth cake and then you look at his smiling face. I can’t explain to you how funny it was. I couldn’t stop laughing. And I had to tell him after, ‘I’m not laughing at you. It is just pure comedy that you have this face and then this sloth has that face.'”

“Nailed It” earned its second Emmy nomination in the Competition Series category last month, but Byer also saw herself recognized for her incredible work in the Outstanding Host for a Reality or Competition Program field for the first time. An honor that not only makes her the first African-American woman nominated for the ward but puts her up against four-time winner RuPaul Charles of “Drag Race” fame, the cast of “Queer Eye,” “Top Chef’s” Tom Colicchio and Padma Laksmi, the cast of “Shark Tank” and “Making It’s” Nick Offerman and Amy Poehler.

“I was so excited. I didn’t realize that I had been nominated because I was getting congratulations on the show being nominated,” Byer recalls. “And then one of the execs from Netflix was like, ‘Congratulations.’ I was like, ‘I know. It’s so exciting. The show’s nominated again.’ And she was like, ‘No. You.’ I was like, ‘Wait, what?’ So yeah, it was really cool. It’s really incredible.”

Byer says when she was first approached about the show she immediately liked how silly it seemed and that it had a great shot at succeeding thanks to Netflix’s huge reach. The program has become a staple for the streamer (a fifth regular season was about to begin filming before the stay at home orders began) and the audience has fallen for Byer breaking the usually invisible wall between the crew and the contestants. A bit that has made assistant director Weston Bahr, among others, into fan favorites.

“Wes has done ‘Top Chef’ and straight cooking shows, and I think it was just an adjustment to have me talk to the camera operators,” Byer says. “Rob is one of my favorite camera operators. Rob loved Jason Mantzoukas so much and was so excited to meet Jason, and when Jason was being Jason, Rob was just laughing behind the camera, and we were like, ‘Rob, you’re going to have to shakiest footage.’ And I think they left in some of the shaky footage. It’s just like it’s a dream. Everyone is so cool. Everyone is so wonderful and there’s just like a real positive love vibe on that set.”

Already the host of the popular “Why Won’t You Date Me?” podcast, Byer saw her career as a stand-up country transform after the debut of “Nailed It!”

“You kind of eat shit as a comic,” Byer says. “You beg people to come to your shows. You try to sell them out. They don’t sell out. You do five shows a week and you’re like, ‘Oh God, it’s only half sold, I’m only going to make my minimum. But when my shows started selling out, I was like, ‘Oh, O.K. Yeah, it’s big.’ I did shows at Helium Portland, which is one of my favorite venues. I did seven shows in three days and all seven shows sold out. I sold out of every single thing of merch that I brought. I was like, ‘Oh, okay. Yeah, people like me and this is awesome.’ It is so cool to go, I’m going to this town. I’m doing five shows and then they sell out and you’re like, ‘Oh, I’m going to do a sixth show.’ I sold out The Wilbur Theater in Boston, which is also another great venue that I’d been to before on someone else’s show, and then having my own show sell out there was such a huge, huge milestone in my career.”

You may have also caught Byer over the years on MTV’s “Girl Code” or “Loosely Exactly Nicole,” but you may soon see her on a new NBC comedy as she was scheduled to film the untitled Dan Goor/Phil Augusta Jackson comedy pilot before the pandemic hit. In the meantime, Byer has been doing what she can to keep busy with not only her “Date Me”? podcast but her “Drag Race” recap podcast, “Drag Her,” as well. Oh yeah, and if you’re in the greater Los Angeles area you might just run into her skate gang.

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“I created a skate gang where I made a bunch of my friends buy roller skates and we skate once a week which has been so joyful and really nice,” Byer says. “I pole dance. I’ve been poling at my house. I’ve got a pole in my backyard. I can do a split and I wanted to get it flat, so I’ve been working on that, trying to work on flexibility shit. Just trying to do shit that brings me joy.”

And for those wondering what Byer might wear to the virtual Creative Arts Emmy ceremony where she’s could easily upset RuPaul, well, at least she’s honest. Byer quips, “I don’t know, but hopefully there’s a budget so I can get a real pretty dress.”

All six seasons of “Nailed It!” are available on Netflix.