'Abbott Elementary's' Lisa Ann Walter is coming to Austin for Moontower

Lisa Ann Walter has never been to Austin. But, if you can believe it, she has been to the panhandle.

"I've been to the panhandle for goodness sake, years ago when I was helping, oh my golly ... it was Regis (Philbin) and Kathie Lee (Gifford). They were doing a thing where they were giving away kitchen makeovers to people and I went to someone's house and surprised them. It was fantastic," Walter told the American-Statesman in March.

Walter, who you know as Chessy from "The Parent Trap" and as Melissa Schemmenti from hit sitcom "Abbott Elementary," will have lots of tourist-ing to do this month when she visits Austin for Moontower Just For Laughs Comedy. The annual festival brings dozens of comedians to the city.

We caught up with Walter ahead of her visit and had what can be described only as the best chat ever with the actress.

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This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

American-Statesman: Who are you excited to see at the festival?

Walter: Leslie (Jones). I've known her for a long time and I've done gigs with her and she's always, always fantastic. She does a lot of riffing and audience stuff and with what's going on in the world thee days, I know she's going to be on fire. So, I'll definitely go and try to catch Leslie, and I've never seen Jenny (Slate), but I'm a huge fan of everything she does. My kids kind of turned me onto her while we were watching "Kroll Show" and watching her other stuff. I've never gotten to see her perform live so I'm excited about that.

OK, cool. And can ...

Wait, you're gonna tell me.

Oh go ahead!

Who's the young woman that's on "Hacks"? I know she's in a trio.

Megan Stalter?

I want to see her. She kills me. (Stalter is performing at Moontower with "Together Together" star Patti Harrison and current "SNL" player Sarah Sherman.)

What's really funny about being in this (recent award season) situation with "Abbott" is that I get to hang out six times with Cate Blanchett, who I've always adored her acting ever since the first "Elizabeth" movie. I fell in love with her and I thought, "This is the actress of our generation." And then I get to just see her, over the course of a month, over and over and just be like, "Hey Cate, yeah, I'll help you find your purse. Oh you dropped your purse over here?" Literally, she crawled past our table (at the SAG Awards). I'm like, "Who is that incredibly beautiful, thin woman? ... that's Cate Blanchett crawling by our table because she dropped her purse."

I knew where (Blanchett) was sitting and then when I got on stage, I was like, to Quinta (Brunson), "Cate Blanchett is right there!"

But I saw Megan (Stalter) there and I didn't get to say, "I love you and I love your work and it's so different." That's the thing I love about comedy these days. When I was coming up, when I was a kid even, there were people that were just doing different stuff. Steve Martin's stuff was just different. I went to see him when I was in high school and his material was having an arrow through his head and wearing the white suit and playing the banjo for a little bit and just being weird. It was just weirdness, courtesy of all the people that you saw on ("Saturday Night Live") popping up in live venues.

George Carlin was my first comedy album, I had all of them, and I don't think I was allowed to go see him.

That makes sense.

It's dirty, but it very, very much informed how I did stand up later in life. I was as dirty as possible.

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How do you approach your stand up? What can Austin audiences expect?

I started doing stand up just after I had my first son, which was just after I graduated college. I went to New York to be an actress and got knocked up instead. I looked at the lives all my friends were leading as college graduates as I was going through being a working mom in New Jersey. Everybody was leading this life of having to do it all. In our generation it wasn't like, are you going to work or stay home? Because who had that option? Some very rich people. It was, "What incredibly high-powered job are you going to do?"

I always used to say, "Guys think women are bitches because of our periods, no we're bitches all the time." It's because we're trained to do too much. We have to raise a family, find a cure for cancer, have a flat stomach. We can't do everything. That was kind of the beginning of my voice. It was stuff that I had to say. Now, it's all stuff I feel like I have to say. Some of it is routine and very relatable about dating and having kids and having teenage kids and what that horror is. They're always scolding you, always! Like I'm the toddler now. But I know they keep coming home because I have free food and Wi-fi. Ya rats.

Some of (my stand up) is mundane life stuff and some of it is quite political, which I always was in my stand up because I've been intensely politically active since I was a kid. ...

The people that are out now at the clubs are usually people that grew up with me. They grew up with me as the nanny in "The Parent Trap" and now, of course, I'm Melissa in "Abbott Elementary." I'm so thrilled to be connected with those iconic projects and to have audiences feel like they know me and love me. Right off the bat, I do a disclaimer of how much I love the characters, but I'm not them and kind of warn (the audience) my set might have stuff that ruins their childhood. Then at the end, I do life advice from Chessy and Melissa Schemmenti.

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It must feel so great to have fans who have followed you since "The Parent Trap."

When I get done (with stand up sets in Los Angeles), all the young women come up and they want to meet and they want to talk and they want a picture and they'll always say, "Oh well, I'm sure this probably bugs you. You're tired of it." And I'm like, "Absolutely not!" What bugs me is my kids who still haven't watched "Abbott Elementary." The two older ones know what's up, but my younger ones, the twins, my identical twins born on the same day as the kids in "The Parent Trap," yeah October 11 is their birthday, they could not care less.

So, I'm like, no I get ignored at home. I love having people come up and say, "I'm so sorry to bother you, but I just want to tell you how much I love you." And I'm like, "You would be so surprised by how not bothered I am by that. That is perfectly all right."

You're definitely one of the first things people mention about "The Parent Trap," right after "Oh my gosh Lindsay Lohan isn't a twin," and that has to feel amazing.

It does. It absolutely does. I've heard so many things from people who have reached out on social media and say, "I grew up queer and I hated myself and I didn't feel accepted by anybody. But if I had a Chessy, she would accept me." I think that's partly because Chessy was in on the secret of the twins and helped them and loved them. I think there's a connection there. But it could be anything — my parents were divorced, I felt alone, I didn't feel like I had any friends. There's so many beautiful things that people share with me and love that they give me, that I'm just so moved. I've said, "If I never do anything else in my career, that's enough." That would have been enough, but now I have this great opportunity with "Abbott."

It's funny because Quinta (Brunson), creator of "Abbott Elementary," saw the kids recognize me from "The Parent Trap." And she stopped in the doorway going, "That is an entire baby that just recognized you from a movie that was made 30 years before they were born."

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OK, before we're out of time, I have some burning questions about "Abbott Elementary." First, do you have a dream guest star?

Speaking of the love for "The Parent Trap," when I went to the SAG Awards with my bestie Elaine Hendrix (Meredith in "The Parent Trap"), people went crazy. They were like, "You gotta have her on Abbott!"

You know, Hannah Waddingham. I would love Hannah Waddingham from "Ted Lasso," who's a fan of the show. She said to me, "Maybe I can be an annoying English teacher." And I'm like, "Yeah, you're way too calm." But maybe she could run the Philadelphia public school system. That I would buy. Or a rich person who wants to run a charity. I would buy that.

Have you had any celebrities come up starstruck by you since "Abbott Elementary"?

Elizabeth Banks grabbed me the night before the Oscars party and stopped me as I was looking for my friend who I lost immediately upon entering ... She had to stop right in front of me and go, "Oh my god! I love you so much. We love your show. My son is 9 and we watch the show together!"

Who was the other one? Jessica Chastain! I was walking by her at the Golden Globes and her friend that she was with said, "Oh my god, we love your show; it's so wonderful."

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Who would you want your teacher to be if you were a student at "Abbott Elementary"?

Barbara Howard (who is played by Sheryl Lee Ralph), that's who I'd pick to be my teacher. I just think that she is so calm and good at her job and lovely and she reminds a lot of the teacher I had in middle school, Freddye Davy. She was my favorite teacher that I ever had in school. ...

(Freddye Davy) was very much like Barbara Howard. She was one of the first kids to be in an integrated school in America and she took education very seriously. When she would speak, it was very much Barbara Howard.

She would have me come up and teach different subjects because she knew the reason I was talking out in class was because I was bored. My mother was a public school teacher in Washington, D.C., so I was taught a lot of these things very early. So she would let me teach different subjects. And she said, back then, "You would make a very good teacher."

And so here I am, all these years later, pretending like I am.

If you go: Moontower Just for Laughs Austin Comedy Festival

When: The fest runs April 12-23 at the Paramount and State theaters and other venues around town.

Lisa Ann Walter: You'll have a handful of opportunities to see Walter at the festival. She's performing on April 20 and April 21 and twice on April 22.

Also on the lineup: Modern "Saturday Night Live" icon Leslie Jones, late night host Seth Meyers, "Marcel the Shell with Shoes On" mollusk mastermind Jenny Slate, "Full Frontal" host Samantha Bee, Showtime chat show provocateur Ziwe and "RuPaul's Drag Race All Stars" winner Monét X Change will all take the stage as headliners at the Paramount Theatre. At the State Theatre next door will be impressionist/"SNL" alum Jay Pharoah, Australian puppet Randy Feltface and "Only Fans" comic Matt Rife.

Carlos Ballarta will perform two shows in Spanish. Others on the lineup include Punkie Johnson, Jon Rudnitsky, Marcello Hernandez, Molly Kearney, Michael Longfellow, Devon Walker, Felipe Esparza, Vir Das, Chris Distefano, Chelcie Lynn, Nimesh Patel, Brad Williams, Robert Kelly, Preacher Lawson, Dana Gould, Adam Ray and perennial Moontower presence Maria Bamford. And so many more!

Where: Venues include Antone's, Cap City Comedy Club, Parker Jazz Club, Parish, Creek and the Cave.

Cost: Tickets for individual shows start at $20 and badges start at $150.

Information: Find the full lineup, schedule, venues and buy tickets at moontowercomedyfest.com.

This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: 'Abbott Elementary's' Lisa Ann Walter is coming to Austin for Moontower