Amber Nash, the voice actress who breathed hilariously absurd life into the animated, “sturdy bisexual” Pam Poovey on FX’s Archer, is now flexing her improv skills in the new 10-part web series Hart of America.
Created by members of the Atlanta based improvisation theater Dad’s Garage, the concept is a parody of detective shows mixed with raunchy humor and characters. The series took a week to shoot, with cameos from Colin Mochrie and Fred Willard, and with Nash playing all of the other characters—from an officer, a sweet, yet, hardcore grandmother and a hippie who finds companionship in a pot smoking Big Foot.
Nash tells Paste that she wanted the opportunity to showcase her acting abilities and fearless humor in front of the camera.
“I was like, ‘Hey, I’m an actress and nobody wants to put me in anything and I keep auditioning for stuff, so why don’t I make my own thing?’” Nash says.
Besides her heart’s desire to someday be Tim Burton’s muse and work alongside John Goodman in a comedy heist movie, Nash also wants to have her own sketch comedy television series. She’s hoping to gain the support to get Hart of America picked up as a show.
“My dream is to have my own show. I want my own show on Comedy Central, or on FX, or something. I still want to totally be doing voice work, because I love it and it’s so easy. I will have it one day,” Nash says.
A self-described “ham” growing up as a kid, Nash earned a degree in Psychology and worked as a counselor, but said she was in need of something new: improvisation. She credits it as the reason she’s an actress, saying, it’s the best thing she has ever done in her life.
“I was just missing something. I needed something creative in my life. so I went to see an improv show and was like, ‘Oh shit, this is awesome!’ So I signed up for classes that night and just kept doing that until I found Dad’s Garage, which is really the best improv theater in Atlanta,” Nash says. “I scrubbed toilets and bartended there, and took classes and they finally put me up on stage.”
Nash has come a long way from the list of odd jobs she took that led her to improvisation. From decorating ice cream cakes at Baskin Robbins, to wrestling strippers at strip clubs two nights a week for $75 (“Why is this happening? I don’t want to watch this,” Nash recalls some drunken men in the audience protesting).
By fate, it landed her the role on the Emmy nominated adult animated series, Archer, which is returning for its seventh season in March 2016 on the FXX Network.