Bill Burr may have made his Broadway debut last week in Glengarry Glen Ross, but as a stand-up comedian, he has long been known for his strength in closing. Burr is the latest big-name stand-up to make the leap to Hulu, but will anything seem different about his comedy? Or are we more likely to see a different side of Burr now just because he’s getting older and America is getting less wiser?!?
The Gist: Hulu bills their first collaboration with Burr as “his most personal and introspective hour yet,” as he addresses his audience in Seattle with thoughts about mortality after a friend of his dropped dead, thoughts about the insanity in American politics and cultural conversations, and how he’s taking a more thoughtful approach to his mental health to make sure he sticks around a bit longer for his own children.
What Comedy Specials Will It Remind You Of?: Of all of the Boston-area comedians to come out of “the 128” in the 1990s, Bill Burr’s new hour brings him closer in alignment with Gary Gulman. If they weren’t already similar enough before, they’re definitely more comparable now. If you don’t like that comparison, then perhaps Greg Fitzsimmons will do it for you?
Memorable Jokes: Will you be excited to know that Burr’s home life is going the best it ever has in his two decades with his wife? He jokes about how he figured out how to avoid speaking in “eggshell voice” and no longer treat his wife as if she were a ticking time bomb. Turns out he just had to be less combative, and agree every once in a while to her suggestions instead. Of course, with Burr, agreeing feels like it comes at a personal cost, quipping: “What you’re looking at here is a broken man.”
But the alternative is much more costly, as Burr explains that at 56, he’s now in the age range he considers his titular “drop dead years.” He says between 49-61 guys like him might die for any reason, a “uniquely male experience,” citing a friend of his who died in the past year.
So Burr is contemplating how he’ll spend the rest of his own life, and he realizes he doesn’t want to suffer just because “men aren’t allowed to be sad.” If you’re looking for a way to describe toxic masculinity, Burr indirectly supplies one. “We’re allowed to be mad or fine,” he says, while other emotions are “just called gay.”
When Burr does get political, it’s to provide cartoonish juxtapositions, such as a bit about how drivers seem to respect HOV lane rules leading into him imagining someone driving down the freeway in a KKK outfit with racist bumper stickers and all. Which leads him to chastising all of us for where we draw the lines on racists, guns and hate groups, and what little we do to stop any of it.
Plenty of comedians Burr’s age want to revisit our changing attitudes toward certain slurs, and he’s quick to argue that while his wife has helped him disabuse some language, he still wishes we had come up with suitable replacement words by now, even just something he could yell at other drivers when they cut him off in traffic.
We learn how Burr decided to quit drinking, and how he compares that decision to other potentially addictive habits; how he didn’t think he was homophobic until he recoiled at the idea of having a male masseuse treat his back pain (but he offers a solution for everyone?); and how, even though Burr isn’t dating in his 50s, he does offer some suggested “red flags” to keep a watchful eye toward for anyone looking to date these days.
Our Take: Bill Burr has never suffered fools gladly, as they say.
Burr has said he filmed this hour in Seattle precisely because he wanted to see how some of his material would play in a traditionally liberal city, and when that audience gives him applause breaks, no matter whether it’s for declaring himself against wars in Gaza and Ukraine, for comparing what Israel’s doing now to what America has done for generations, or for being married for a long time, he’s not having any of it.“I don’t want these Oprah Winfrey applause breaks,” he implores them.
Even when he made fun of then-President Joe Biden and heard applause for that, Burr’s instinctual reaction is to ask: “What is wrong with us?”
What is wrong with us, indeed. Why do we laugh or applaud when something bad happens to someone we disagree with, when if it were happening to just a regular person, we might have empathy for them?
Then again, at the top of his special, Burr acknowledges that he only became a comedian when he was younger as a way to earn the affection and adoration of strangers. “I did stand-up because that was the easiest way to walk into a room full of a bunch of people that I didn’t know and make everybody like me,” he says, adding that “the way I’ve moved through the world has always been where’s the place I have the least chance of being hurt?”
The hour is even more revelatory if you’re paying close attention.
Burr not only deconstructs generic male toxicity, joking that his friend and other guys his age might drop dead because they don’t know how to cry or express their emotions, but specifically mentions dealing his own depression and hoping to avoid “the fog” that settles into men who never deal with trauma they may have experienced as a child. Because, as he says in an aside about why he avoids handling his young son in certain way, Burr openly confides: “I got touched as a kid.”
It’s a momentous thread that Burr doesn’t pull at further, but then again, why should he have to do that as a comedian in a comedy special. He’s never tried to pull a Nanette. And he doesn’t need to.
That Burr is willing to address his mental health for his personal betterment, and willing to acknowledge it onstage, is more than enough.
Our Call: STREAM IT . Burr may continue to rub some people the wrong way, but that’s always been a part of his comedic ethos, and if you can listen to what he’s actually saying, there’s a lot not only worth considering, but also worth laughing about. If not also crying sometimes.
Sean L. McCarthy works the comedy beat. He also podcasts half-hour episodes with comedians revealing origin stories: The Comic’s Comic Presents Last Things First.