Lisa ann walter: from class clown to comedy star

“Life is hard. So to make people laugh, it’s a gift. God gave it to me. I am so happy to be able to share it,” says actress and comedian Lisa Ann Walter, who stars as Philadelphia public

school teacher Melissa Schemmenti in the Emmy-winning ABC sitcom _Abbott Elementary_. Walter, 60, shares how her father inspired her show business career, how she won _Celebrity Jeopardy!_

thanks to her mother, and the middle school teacher who she remembers as “wise and wonderful.” _This interview has been edited for length and clarity._ _Abbott Elementary_ highlights the

important work teachers do every day. Was there one teacher who inspired you to learn? The teacher who inspired me was my advanced English teacher in middle school, Mrs. Freddye Davy. And

she took education very seriously. She was very much like [Sheryl Lee Ralph’s _Abbott_ character] Barbara Howard. I was at Takoma Park Junior High [in Maryland]. There were times when we

were reading Shakespeare, and we were doing all of this very advanced [learning] in seventh grade, and when I would speak out, she would say, “If you know the subject, Miss Walter, come and

teach it.” And then she would hand me the [lesson], and I was on my own to discuss dangling participles or whatever it was she was teaching. She was brilliant. She was so wise and wonderful.

Every time Sheryl does the character of Barbara [and] goes into the Barbara voice, it reminds me of Miss Davy. Walter stars alongside Sheryl Lee Ralph in the hit ABC show “Abbott

Elementary.” Gilles Mingasson/Disney WHAT KIND OF STUDENT WERE YOU IN SCHOOL? I was a class clown, and I ran my mouth. Here’s the truth: [It’s] because I started reading at [age] 3, and I

was so ahead [of my classmates that] by the time I got to kindergarten I was reading at a fourth-grade level. And so what [my classmates] were doing — learning letters — was boring. And I

did not like to be bored — I always liked to be doing. My kindergarten teacher used to send me to the upper classes — like first grade — to read to them. My mother didn’t want me to [skip

grade levels] because … she was a teacher, so I guess she was thinking kids who skip sometimes are too young emotionally to be in the upper grades. But I probably should have [been placed in

a higher grade level], because I did have teachers that did not like [me] trying to help other kids with their work [or] trying to make them laugh. I would get sent out of the classroom or

made to face the corner in front of the classroom and stand there.