LOS ANGELES _ It's not just kids.
Tiffany Haddish, host of the new ABC reality series "Kids Say the Darndest Things," debuting Sunday, is just as likely as any youngster to say the darndest things. The comedic actress doesn't hold back whether the question is about how fame has changed her or why she didn't end up involved with Scientology.
As to how success has changed her, Haddish quickly replies: "I've gained weight because I eat more."
Her serious response is she's far more protective of her time. The decade she spent trying to get her career started was filled by her taking any and all small jobs. It was her role on "The Carmichael Show" in 2015 and the 2017 feature film "Girls Trip" that put her on the map. She went on to appear in numerous TV productions and feature films such as "Night School" and "The Oath."
"I want to make sure that whatever I am doing with my time edifies me," Haddish says.
That's why she signed on to "Kids Say the Darndest Things." Originally a part of "Art Linkletter's House Party" radio show, which started in 1945, the show's new iteration features Haddish chatting with youngsters. The premiere's first guests include a panel of a future rock princess that questions her friendship with a favorite musician, two 6-year-olds who discuss all the weird things grown-ups do and a musical prodigy.
Haddish watched old episodes to study how Linkletter handled the youngsters. Haddish has always been a fan of veteran comedians like Linkletter, Red Skelton and Milton Berle. She studied their work to help form her own comedy identity.
That Haddish approaches comedy in her own way is why "Kids Say the Darndest Things" executive producer Eric Scholtz saw her as the perfect host.
"What Tiffany adds to the mix, like Art, is she listens to what the kids have to say and doesn't try to be the joke," Scholtz says. "They're the sort of affirmation of the joke, but it's kids saying the darndest things. And then Tiffany reacting to it in that way is not off-putting and it's very gracious as a comic, because she's not always trying to get a laugh. She's trying to watch what happens, and she listens, which is an amazing skill."
As for her brush with Scientology, Haddish was having no luck finding acting work early in her career and eventually found herself homeless and living in her car. Someone with the group approached her and offered her $50 a month plus a roof over her head. That all sounded good, and she signed what she describes as "a billion-year contract." It all ended when Haddish was shown to the bunk bed where she would be sleeping. Haddish told them she didn't sleep in bunk beds and threw such a fit they tore up the contract.
Between time spent in foster care and homeless, Haddish had to grow up quickly. She learned to read people, and that helped her in dealing with the youngsters on her show.
"Every kid is different. I can see some of them, I'm, like, 'Oh, this one is going to be a superstar' or 'This one's going to be, like, a mean police.' Some kids have really bad dispositions, I felt like. Maybe somebody else might have thought they were cute, but I personally was, like, 'Mm, I don't like this one." But I never said it to them 'I don't like you,' but I'm sure they know. We vibed," Haddish says.
She adds talking with the kids has sparked her to write new comedy material and to remember to take her birth control pills.
Haddish knows what she would have said had she been a guest on one of the earlier versions of "Kids Say the Darndest Things."
"I still feel like I'm 6 or 7 or 8 from time to time. And at that time in my life, I knew that I wanted to do something really cool. And when people asked me, 'Tiffany, what do you want to be when you grow up?,' I'd be, like, 'I want to be a horse farmer' or 'I want to work in a Snickers factory' or 'I want to work in a beef jerky factory,'" Haddish says. "And everybody would be, like, 'Why would you want to do those things?'
"I'm, like, 'Because my grandma said, "Do what you love," and I love horses. I love Snickers. I love beef jerky. So there you have it."
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