How Carol Burnett wound up appearing in Chef Carla Hall’s new Olney Theatre show

Chef Carla Hall’s new Olney Theatre show is an electrifying master class in reconnecting with childhood dreams

Despite what her show’s title suggests, Carla Hall is not one to be underestimated.

The 62-year-old celebrity chef and D.C. resident has bottled years of struggling to make it in the worlds of food, media and entertainment into an electrifying, silly and heartfelt one-woman show.

“Please Underestimate Me,” a play that chronicles Hall’s life experiences, just nabbed a two-week extension at the Olney Theatre Center, now running through July 26.

A Howard University graduate and alum of Gaithersburg’s L’Academie de Cuisine, Hall worked as a chef and caterer in the Montgomery County area before rising to fame competing on “Top Chef: New York” and “Top Chef: All-Stars.” She has appeared on a slew of food television shows.

The Banner spoke with Hall about creating her one-woman show, her comedic idols and how she got her favorite comedy legend involved with the show.

This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

How did this project come to be?

Seven years ago, I said I wanted to do it. I’ve just been actively trying to — I know it sounds weird — change my consciousness around it. So that means getting an acting coach, having my agency [find me] voice-overs, cameo roles. I was literally trying to put myself into this space, going to see so many solo shows. But we started writing it in February of 2023, and I want to say sometime in 2024 I mentioned in a New York Times article that I wanted to do a one-woman show. Jason Loewith, the artistic director at Olney, saw it and reached out. It sort of snowballed from there.

What a great lesson in speaking what you want into existence.

That is exactly it. I think a lot of times we say we want to do something but we don’t do anything toward it. You can say it, but you have to put action behind it.

You also just closed your Capitol Hill-based pop-up restaurant bumblebirds, a Southern comfort spot focusing on fried chicken sandwiches. What was that experience like?

Once you have a restaurant that maybe didn’t go the way that you hoped, I needed to get back on the horse. So this is me getting back on the horse. Or shall I say chicken? I think we will look at other places where bumblebirds could be, like airports, kiosks, other places. I have really been enjoying it.

“Please Underestimate Me” is technically a one-woman show, but you bring audience members onstage to act as your scene partners. What have you learned from directing non-actors in the middle of a show?

I love it, because you can’t plan it. You’ve got some people who are really nervous, and I really try to put them at ease. And you get some people who really want to go off script. I’m like, “Yeah, no, we’re not doing that.” It keeps it fresh and fun, and I want people to come back and have an experience that you just can’t plan. It’s different every time.

In the show, you talk about being a die-hard Carol Burnett fan since childhood. Where did that love come from?

I grew up in the ’60s, so it was Lucille Ball, Carol Burnett, Dick Van Dyke. If somebody falls, I will laugh. I like the slapstick of falling. I don’t want anybody to get hurt, but it’s something about that physical comedy that I loved, and so it informs everything about me and what I find funny. Carol Burnett was very much a part of that.

One story arc in “Please Underestimate Me” is about how you had to fight for the opportunity to interview Burnett when she was scheduled to make an appearance on “The Chew,” a cooking-themed ABC daytime talk show, in 2018. How did that experience shape you?

Two weeks before [Burnett was going to join the show], I was told, “We’re not going to let you interview her.” I felt sucker punched. I couldn’t believe it, but then I had to advocate for myself. I felt like, if the producer left my dressing room and it wasn’t settled, it really would have been over. I was so calm and, as I was pleading my case, then she said, “OK, we’ll let you interview her.” When I look back on that moment, I’m so proud that I was so calm and advocated for myself. A lot of times, we just don’t do it. We just give up. But you really can’t mess it up.

What was it like to get to interview your hero?

It was amazing. I was so in my head about it because so many people were watching me, but it was surreal that she was there. There was a clip that one of the cameramen had captured after this interview. Carol had left, and I am almost in a dreamlike state, walking toward the middle of the set. I was like, “Oh my god, I wasn’t breathing the entire time.” And I just burst into tears.

Carol Burnett makes a cameo in this show, via pretaped video. What was it like to find out that was going to happen?

We had written her in as a voice-over [other characters in the show appear as voice-overs recorded by Hall], and it was one of those moments where I’m like, “It would be really amazing to have her do the voice-over.” I wrote to her agent through my agent and said, “I’m a really big fan.” It took a minute, but instead of just doing a voice-over, which we had asked for, she actually did a video that she approved to be in my show. I remember, the day that I found out she had done this, I cried. It was just such a confirmation that this show was supposed to happen. Even now, when I talk about it, I get a little emotional because I’m like, “Wow, that little girl — I’m literally doing her dreams 50 years later.”

What do you hope people take away from the show?

I really hope that people will reconnect with dreams that they had when they were younger and realize that it’s never too late. I hope that people will find some kind of agency in their lives, understanding that they have more power than they realize and their dreams are powerful. We are put here for a reason, to do a particular thing, and sometimes we forget to ask what that is. I want them to leave feeling inspired and seen. The last statement in the show, about how everything that happens to you happens for you, I truly believe. You can’t mess it up. The only way you can mess up in this life is by not participating, by sitting on the sidelines, waiting for somebody to give you something.