"Things shifted very severely,” the comedian said
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Tig Notaro is reflecting on the fallout of her friendship with Cheryl Hines.
Notaro, 54, appeared on Nicole Wallace’s MS Now The Best People podcast on Monday, March 9, where she revealed more about her former friendship with Hines, with whom she posted the podcast Tig and Cheryl: True Story from 2020 to May 2023.
The comic explained that due to Hines’ husband, Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s political career, she and her longtime friend had to conclude their podcast. The podcast ended after Kennedy, 72, kicked off his unsuccessful campaign for the White House in April 2023.
Kennedy ultimately dropped out of the race and endorsed President Donald Trump in August 2024. Trump appointed him as Secretary of Health and Human Services, which drew controversy given his views on vaccines and his overall inexperience in the health field.
Notaro told Wallace, 54, that her and Hines’ friendship “pre-dated Bobby.” Their friendship went back to the early 2000s, after Hines caught one of Notaro’s standup sets. That performance would later push Hines, 60, to help Notaro get her first manager, according to PodNews.
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Notaro and Hines' friendship began to fall apart when Notaro decided to leave the podcast, she explained. Their show was funny and "ridiculous," which became “hard to do that when he was gaining momentum," Notaro said.
“People would interrupt my stand-up shows and yell, ‘Bobby is crazy!'” Notaro said. “I was telling Cheryl, ‘I know it’s a small percentage that pushes back online or yells out at shows,’ but I was like, ‘Man, this is not my world. I don’t do this. I don’t want to be a part of this.’ And she was like, ‘I understand,’ but she wanted to keep doing the podcast. I had to step away, but I loved her so much.”
Notaro revealed that the “most upsetting” element was that, although they “were in such opposing places, [Notaro] continued to reach out to her and send her love and support.”
“I didn’t know what was going on behind closed doors," Notaro confessed. "Then things shifted very severely. I realized one day that she doesn’t ever reach out to me anymore. She responds to me, but she doesn’t reach out to me. I had to kind of shake myself out of denial that, ‘Oh, she’s gone,’ and, ‘OK, I need to let this go. I need to let it go.’ ”
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Notaro clarified that it was a “bummer” that despite her efforts to “be friends” with Hines, there were interviews “claiming [Notaro] dumped her and left her in the dust because of Bobby.”
“It’s been very strange, and I think I’ve moved past the confusion and sadness,” she said.
Notaro’s recent comments come after she made brief comments in October 2025 about their fallout. She said in an episode of the Breaking Bread with Tom Papa podcast that it was "really sad" to have lost the friendship over Kennedy and his politics.
Weeks later on Notaro’s Handsome podcast, she spoke with her co-hosts Mae Martin and Fortune Feimster about the nationwide reaction to her comments on Papa's podcast.
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She said Hines was a "really important person" in her life who she had a "longstanding friendship" with, and described the Flight Attendant actress as "one of my favorites and somebody I absolutely loved being silly with."
"And so Cheryl, I don't know, she was just a real bright spot in my life," Notaro said, before shifting to talk about how Hines' marriage influenced their relationship. Notaro added, "There's a lot of issues that I do not believe in that he is endorsing, that Cheryl is clearly endorsing."
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