Monday Night with Miranda Bloomfield

You might know her as The Girl You Wish You Hadn't Started a Conversation With at a Party on Saturday Night Live or as the voice of ISIS' resident choking fetishist Cheryl Tunt on Archer, but there's more to Miranda (interestingly nicknamed Randy) Bloomfield than a punchline. We met with her on a very muggy day in Los Angeles that was surely a challenge for the Boston native who usually spends her time in New York. "Don't let my naturally tanned complexion fool you," she remarks, visibly wincing as she removes her sunglasses. The sun shines right in her face, adding shine to her hazel eyes as she squints and continues. "I like my weather cold and frigid like my aunt Nona."

But she doesn't seem very interested in talking about the weather for long, so we move on to items of more import. She explains how she tends to only be in Los Angeles for short periods of time. This visit she says was for a friend's birthday and a few other private engagements. She doesn't offer up any names, although we could easily do some speculating, given the actress' known usual company. She speaks in a way that's both animated and carefree all at once. Somehow everything she tells me feels like an inside joke between just the two of us, and I have to say it's a little addictive. "So I'm going to get a cocktail, please leave your judgments at the door and we'll be on the path to friendship in no time." I have no judgments to leave, and so she orders a strawberry daiquiri with her roasted tomato and goat cheese sandwich.

I'm reminded then that she is in fact a longtime vegetarian. She tells me how when she made the change as a teenager nobody believed it would last. "It just struck me, you know? I loved animals so much, I became uncomfortable with the idea of eating some while keeping others as pets. I made the choice and it just kind of stuck. Innuendo aside, meat honestly has no appeal for me. I've never had a burger and I barely remember the last time I had a hot dog." She feels the need to clarify though, that she far from claims to be healthy. "I basically just have pizza five times a week. My sister, she's really into nutrition and fitness, she has a fit every time she visits my kitchen." She is insistant upon this, although her seemingly fit figure argues otherwise to my eyes.

Bloomfield, a graduate of New York University, got her start on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart where she worked her way up from intern to correspondent. She didn't always have comedy in her plans, discovering a love for making audiences laugh through her college improv troupe. "I honestly had no idea I could actually make a career out of this shit. It still blows my mind on a regular basis that I get a paycheck for making a fool of myself on stage or tv. And I guess in movies now too." She is referring to her upcoming first foray into serious film acting, Life Partners.

Based on a play of the same name, the official synopsis for the film is as follows: "Close friends Paige (Gillian Jacobs) and Sasha (Bloomfield) find their bond test when Paige -- who has vowed not to get married until Sasha, who is a lesbian, has the same legal right -- falls for a charming young doctor (Adam Brody)." Safe to say it's a very fitting story in light of this year's recent events. Bloomfield's real film debut was a work of her own called Ass Backwards, co-written with and costarring New Girl's Shana Ehrlich. It's a buddy road trip movie, but with ladies, based in part on the two actresses' real life friendship. The soon to be 30 year old seems genuinely proud of the project when she speaks about the film, which made its debut at the Sundance Film Festival, despite the fact that it has yet to find a distributor."It was one of those things where we'd talked about doing it forever, and then suddenly one day it happened. We stopped sitting on our lazy asses eating M&M's and started a script. Then we ate more M&M's."

But Bloomfield no doubt is most recognized for being a key part of the fresh blood introduced to the legendary Saturday Night Live this past season. It is no small honor to be selected for the show. To even get an audition you need to be hand picked by Lorne Michaels himself. Despite this, the woman in front of me remains modest. Sort of. "I got lucky, that's the long and short of it. I mean, don't get me wrong, I worked like hell to get where I am. I didn't really leave myself the option to not make it on the show. But I totally consider myself lucky because if Lorne hadn't come to see me perform that one day, who knows how many people I would've had to kill for this job. Much cleaner just landing the gig based on merit."

Her career hasn't been without its share of moments lacking luck, though. "I am not exaggerating when I say for every part I've been fortunate enough to land there are at least three others that didn't even get a call back. Which I mean, that's to be expected in this business. It's always disappointing to not get what you want. People tell me I'll get used to it after a while but honestly I'm not there yet." She speaks frankly, and it's here that I can really tell how passionate the woman is about her line of work. "Still, I know I'm not going to get everything because more often than not there's going to be a better actress for the part. I still have a bit of a hard time even calling myself an actress. There are others, a lot of my friends even, who've honed their skill so much more than I, they deserve that title of actor. Remembering that softens the blow for sure. But then again, there are also always going to be the casting directors who tell me shit like I'm not pretty enough, or that my mixed mutt ethnicity isn't what they had in mind."

Bloomfield his Chinese on her mother's side, and says she does feel closely connected to her Asian heritage, but would never live there permanently. "I have family there still, so I visit sometimes. Oh fuck, you're not gonna ask me to speak Mandarin are you? Why did I tell you I speak it? I don't, really. I mean I'm just really, really bad at it so I'm not about to embarrass myself and my family. Just this once, I'll spare them."

Family seems to be an easy topic for her, and she offers up a bit more. "Anyway, my relatives in China, I can totally unabashedly say that my grandmother is my favorite. I swear she is where I get the comedy gene, she makes me laugh so much and has supported me in everything I've done- even when my mom has her reservations." She explains how her career is a regular source of disagreement amidst the female members of her family. "My mom and both my sisters have so many ideas about how I should run my career- not to mention my personal and love life. Mostly my mom just collects back up jobs for me. I'm holding out hope for the day she accepts that she has a comedy addict for a daughter and there's no changing that."

In the scheme of things though, Miranda Bloomfield seems from all appearances to be content with where she is in life. In the next week, she takes off to do a handful live stand-up and improv shows in a few cities with friends. In the fall of course she'll be back in NBC studios ready for another season of Saturday Night Live. The show is at a bit of a crossroads, but with Bloomfield being widely recognized as a welcome addition to the cast I have a feeling hilarious things are in store.

"Honestly, I'll be most happy with my career if one day down the line people say things like 'I feel like having a good laugh, let's pull out the Miranda Bloomfield collection. And yes, I do mean one of those cheaply put together collections you can find on the internet or the clearance section with the person's face plastered on the cover of the box."

*This article originally appeared in the July 8, 2013 issue of New York Magazine.