We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Cory Jacob a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Cory, appreciate you joining us today. Can you open up about a risk you’ve taken – what it was like taking that risk, why you took the risk and how it turned out?

I moved out to LA by myself when I was 24 to go to acting school. When I was 28 my girlfriend at the time got pregnant. Turned out to be twins. We had less than $1,000 in the bank. I had to figure out how to make some decent money, aside from my serving job, so I took commercial acting class after commercial acting class, the plan was to book my first SAG commercial. My mom thought I was crazy! “How can you spend $300 on an commercial acting class when you have next to no money and kids on the way?!?” I said I was investing in myself and a sag commercial could pay anywhere from 5-30,000. After taking 3 commercial acting classes in a row I booked a commercial that paid me about $8,000 and we were able to move to a bigger apartment. Believe in yourself. Put in the work. The universe will see your effort, focus, and belief in yourself and award you accordingly!

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

In addition to being an actor and comedian, my journey (and covid) has led me to vintage goods, and I am now Co-Owner of Yes Baby! Vintage and Catnip Coalition Vintage Mall in Burbank! Come check out my stores for all your vintage needs! Clothing (for auditions- we rent as well) , records, toys, collectables, housewares and anything vintage and cool! We also pride our stores on being interactive. At Yes Baby! Vintage we have a to-scale replica of “The Price Is Right” wheel, which we call “The Cause Is Right” wheel. It’s $1 to spin- half the money goes to an animal charity- and you could win a gift card to our store! We also have a video game lounge, where you can play over 500 games on our retro Nintendo, or you can listen to records or play instruments in our music section. At Catnip Coalition we have partnered with cat fostering agencies and you will likely see baby kittens in our window, which YOU could adopt!

Here’s how it happened- In 2013 I was a struggling actor, bartender, and newly single dad of twins with no family in the state, and receiving no child support. All I did with my time was take care of my kids, bartend, and perform live comedy and take comedy and acting classes. That’s all I did. I was able to barely squeak by paying all the child care by landing a bunch of national commercials and small parts on TV and sketch comedy TV shows. Two weeks before the pandemic my partner was visiting a podcast studio where I was the guest , and flirted with me alot afterwards and we exchanged numbers. I had a 2 bedroom apartment with my 9 year old twins and had a standup comedian living on my couch. That didn’t scare her away, lol. She worked as a vet tech and loved animals, and was an avid thrift store hunter, as am I. I brought her some thrift store gifts to our first date before I knew she was big into vintage clothing and thrifting. After a few months of the pandemic, Flappers Comedy Club being shut down (where I worked), and watching me sit on the couch while she worked, she suggested we start selling vintage clothing online. One thing led to another, and I ended up using all the money I made from acting and commercials to open a vintage store. We both love people, hearing their stories, and have made a lot of awesome friends thru the store. We consider YES BABY! Vintage and Catnip Coalition to be a friendly retreat from the world for people of all backgrounds and enjoy being part of the Burbank and LA Community.

Are there any resources you wish you knew about earlier in your creative journey?

I would say that as far as being an entertainer – comedian and actor , I should have definitely used social media platforms more in the past. So as far as resources go, I would say to do research into different platforms (YouTube, Instagram, Twitter , TikTok, Vine, etc) and JUST MAKE CONTENT! I tend to be a bit of a perfectionist and that has definitely hurt the trajectory of my career. I scared myself out of not creating content sometimes because I wanted it to be of a certain level of taste or quality. I would say, and I say this now to myself, put yourself out there. You will learn as you go and will constantly improve. There’s going to be growing pains no matter what you are doing, so best to START TODAY! That being said, I will be making a podcast in 2024 and regular, short comedic videos as well.

Is there a particular goal or mission driving your creative journey?

The entertainment business is extremely competitive and relies alot on luck. I like to focus on the things that I can control, which is my work ethic and professionalism. My main goal as a comedian and actor is to reach my potential. To be a master of my craft. I’ve done 15 years of improv, sketch, characters and comedy writing and for the past 3 years I’ve used all those skills I’ve learned to focus on standup comedy. I like that I am in complete control of my material and also how often I write and perform. My goal is to become a master of standup comedy and to hopefully make people think about the world and how others around them see the world, and that there isn’t just a “right or a wrong way” to view things. We should consider EVERYONE’S opinion and then make our own informed opinion.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.coryjacob.com
• Instagram: www.instagram.com/coryjacobcomedy
• Twitter: coryjacob
• Other: IG- Yes Baby! Vintage @yesbabyvintage CATNIP COALITION VINTAGE MALL @catnipcoalition