Not only has Ayo Edebiri cleaned up with trophies this awards season, already winning Best Supporting Actress at the Emmys, Critics Choice and the Golden Globes — she's also (and this is more important) stolen the internet's heart.
If you've been seeing the Ayo love lately and you're not quite sure why, consider this your crash course into the internet's new IT G-I-R-L.
Welcome to Internet Obsessions, where the ABC Entertainment reporters — here, Yasmin Jeffery and Jared Richards — unpack viral sensations and trends with a chat.
Who is Ayo Edebiri?
Most people know Ayo from The Bear, where she stars opposite a certain Jeremy Allen White as his character Carmy's extremely determined, immensely talented sous-chef. That's the role she's been sweeping awards season for.
But Ayo has layers… kinda like the onions sous-chefs get stuck chopping for three hours. Beyond The Bear, Ayo starred in a suite of 2023 comedies — Bottoms, Theatre Camp and The Sweet East — seeing her nominated alongside Jacob Elordi for the coveted Rising Star Award at this year's BAFTAs.
While 2023 was a breakout year, she's been acting steadily since 2020. You might have caught her in TV shows like Abbott Elementary and Black Mirror, or heard her voice in Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse and the latest TNNT movie. She's also a slashie, having written on What We Do In The Shadows, The Eric Andre Show, Dickinson and Big Mouth (she also stars in the last two).
Why are people obsessed?
Yaz: Ayo was/is the best thing about the super stressful The Bear for me. I hate to start off being all earnest talking about "representation" but I don't think I'll ever forget the way she portrayed Sydney, the young Black sous-chef with huge dreams, desperately trying to make it in an industry in which she'll always be an outsider.
There was something so real about the quiet determination (borne of intergenerational struggle) she brought to the role, which resonated with me and seemingly every other extremely online Black woman, especially dark-skinned Black women.
So, first things first, her acting chops are REAL and huge and amazing and TV is lucky to have Ayo.
Jared: I gotta admit, I'm only just watching The Bear now because of its awards sweep (and okay, maybe the Jeremy Allen White Calvin Klein ad), so I came to Ayo from her online presence first and from her friendship with actor Rachel Sennott, who I've been obsessed with since her 'I'm from LA' Instagram video.
Just like her bestie Rachel, Ayo's really, really funny — she's 28, so innately gets how the internet works. She's not afraid to be silly with the press and play with memes without running them into the ground (Nicki Minaj, it's time to retire Gag City!).
Perfect example: her shouting out her "homeland" Ireland at the Emmys, leading to her name becoming inextricably linked with the country.
Yaz: (Readers, Ayo is from Boston, Massachusetts.) This whole Ireland thing started in March last year when Ayo did an interview with Letterboxd using an Irish accent and claimed she lived in Ireland for four months and walked around on all fours to get into character as Jenny, Colin Farrell's donkey in The Banshees of Inisherin.
And obviously, the internet lives for displays of this sort of batshit energy instead of earnest answers to serious questions about the craft of acting.
The Irish are obviously fully embracing their new idol.
Jared: I know parasocial relationships are out in 2024, but I can't help feel like I could be friends with Ayo. (Provided that she would want that, too. I'm not that delusional!)
Old-school untouchable celebrity is increasingly rare, but so are 'laid-back' everyday celebs. The 'oh-so casual' IG photo dump or random story doesn't feel real, but Ayo's presence does: her Letterboxd, for example, is filled with the exact kind of shitposting me and my friends do.
Yaz: Ayo writes the kind of takes on Letterboxd that I screenshot to my photo album just so I can have a little impromptu laugh at a later date. Everything about her seems so down-to-earth but also effortless, chic, cool? She's even capable of making improv seem like a thing that shouldn't be default embarrassing.
Jared: Yes! I normally steer clear of people who make improv their whole personality, but she studied at the Upright Citizens Brigade, which is basically a school for comedy greats, so it makes sense she can harness that energy for good, rather than 'Yes, And' evil.
Being self-aware helps, too, like when she thanked her parents in her Emmys speech: "Thank you so much for loving me and letting me feel beautiful and Black and proud of all that. It's probably not, like, a dream to immigrate to this country and have your child be like 'I want to do improv!,' but you're real ones."
Yaz: She was so brave and real for that.
Jared: Did you know she improv'd that iconic 'not gonna happen' monologue in Bottoms? And Theatre Camp was heavily improv'd across the board; it's basically a Gen Z Waiting for Guffman. More people need to see it!
Yaz: And she can sing????
Jared: We need a Theatre Camp sequel where Ayo belts out 'Camp Isn't Home, Still'..
Yaz: At least we have Ayo joining the Marvel Cinematic Universe in anti-hero team-up Thunderbolts to look forward to, whatever her as-yet-undisclosed role ends up being. I am a bit scared the slowly tanking Marvel machine will change Ayo though.
Ayo, if you're reading this, please be batshit and hilarious and an open book forever. We need you.