“A lesbian bride is like a straight bride, except she’s experienced orgasm” is the kind of joke you can expect to hear Jenny Hagel tell on Late Night With Seth Meyers, alongside her fellow writer and BFF, Amber Ruffin. Together the women helm the segment “Jokes Seth Can’t Tell,” a delicious dedication to the kind of humor that’s off-limits to their straight, white, male boss.

“I’m black” is how Ruffin opens the bit. To which Hagel replies, “And I’m gay!” The women then sandwich Meyers at his desk as they rip punch line after punch line about women, people of color, and the queer community. It’s a hilarious and cathartic reprieve in the midst of late-night television, which remains alarmingly white and male.

Hagel and Ruffin are adept improvisers, but their ease with each other isn’t an act. The two have known each other since both moved to Denver to develop a sketch show for Second City. “It was like being a comedian on a semester abroad. The two of us would just hang out and get to know each other,” Hagel tells Glamour. (Ruffin deadpans, “I first met Jenny and I thought she was stupid and I didn’t like her at all.”)

But the gig didn’t last long, and they lost touch after both left Denver. Still, when a spot opened up in Meyers’s writers room in 2016, Ruffin immediately thought of her old pal. And they’ve been happily writing jokes about lesbian penguins, Popeyes, and Ruffin’s “sweet chocolate buns” for the show ever since.

Here the duo sounds off on networking, being “HR nightmares,” and making each other laugh on the job.

Network with your peers, not your elders.

Amber Ruffin: When we needed to replace [comedian] Michelle Wolf, who does a butt ton of work—she’s a workhorse—on the show, the only person I knew who was also like that was Jenny. When we were at Second City in Denver, the assignment would be to come in with one sketch, and Jenny would come in with three. Whatever she was asked to do, she always did more. So I thought she would be perfect here, because I’m not gonna do nothing. [Laughs.]

Jenny Hagel: Amber texted me one night saying, “Hey, I think we might be hiring someone if you want to send in a writing packet to be considered for the job.” She sent it to me on a Thursday night and asked me to give it to her by Sunday. I sat down on my little laptop and typed and typed all weekend. I was so grateful to Amber because at the time I didn’t have an agent or anything, so the only way I could’ve found out about one of these jobs would be through word of mouth.

One of the questions I get the most from young people who want to be comedy writers is about networking. I think there’s a weird myth that networking is meeting somebody who is several levels past where you are right now, giving them a business card, and convincing them to give you a job. Networking is actually just finding that thing you want to do, finding other people your age or at your station in life who also want to do it, hanging out with each other, and little by little helping each other advance. I didn’t “network” into this job. I hung out in Chicago, went to a lot of keg parties, and the people I did improv with and drank cheap beer with when I was 24 are now the people I recommend for jobs.

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