Bo Burnham Interview 3/1/16 @ TCNJ

what's up this is Adam Oppenheimer from LTV and we're interviewing Bo Burnham after he did a show here tonight how's it going but what's up how's it going first question early answer either type what's up I didn't answer there's a third what's up I give you a second it's already off to contentious start I like a yellow paper thank you surreal old-school Seinfeld wrote all of his episodes on yield favors is that true yeah with him cool yeah anyway that was my question early on your career you made a college humor video where you taught people how to get laid using a piano mhm now on the flip side of that are there any instruments you recommend people definitely not used when trying to Gilly Oh God Steve Martin was successful with the banjo I think that's out of it yeah four cents fourth since can we get the elevator turn down okay I'm sorry what was it unsexy instruments yeah like what wouldn't get you four cents of the sodium yeah keyboards not a good one a weird weird al' does not successfully to a nicety gets ladles you know about weirdo sexual life I talked John he said he's doing well with it oh cool yeah pretty good weird I was doing love sex wise but great for synth yeah am I saying that right I don't know you're forcing for sykes was that the gesture let's keep going okay why that's it so that's it no no we're gonna relieve your journalistic endeavor we're gonna come back okay good okay Corey oh we're going down the line I get it's a line thing I don't know I thought we were doing you're just you do all about oh really what are you doing oh all right cool okay more serious question hand over to them show these three but Susan work to this so we're looking at so what's the difference in finding inspiration from when you were kid making YouTube videos whereas now you're an established comedian do you find it harder to find inspiration now than you did before no I never know I never quite knew what that meant in terms of like finding inspiration I don't know um like is it defined material comes to you easier now that you're more well known no probably not I mean well known isn't a problem it's you know being oh just like think of what you were when you were 16 right then how old are you now right how old am i oh you guys are 20 21 yeah like I think of when you were 16 how differ you are them now and then you'll probably I feel the same way about your age that I what yeah I mean you're so different from 25 to 16 so I can't really it's like inspiration I was like I'm a whole completely different person I mean back then I was like just trying to be like edgy and offensive I think and I kind of quickly found out that like being edgy and offensive is the least edgy thing you can possibly do you know it's like the bread and butter of America it's like you know Ted - it's like Deadpool it's like revolutionising this superhero genre it's like it's Seth MacFarlane jokes and the constant I mean this is not this is the most bankable stuff you could possibly do the least risky stuff you can do is be like really edgy and offensive and I just kind of got tired of that epically cool and lastly do you find it easier to be more open through musical comedy than through normal stand-up have you found that as a way to maybe speak about things that you wouldn't be able to if you're just doing almost Anna um I don't know if it's about openness and I don't know if I totally separate them because I think my shows about both of them it's easier to be bigger it's easier to a larger idea it's easy to probably make when I go to theater I like that it can be a little bit whatever a lesser pretentious word of transcendent would be of like you know in a concert you can just kind of lose yourself and you can't really lose yourself on a dude talking or woman talking so yeah at allow I just it just all of this stuff I think are tools to do what I'm talking about and what I think I'm talking about is a whole other thing you know so you don't find yourself saving some material for song specifically it just comes out as that or not you know I mean it's not like you see it's not saving it for a specific meaning of any kind of reveals himself as that it's just that you know it's not like who do I do this is a stand up right - it is a write a musical thing it's just like little jokes he put in it sometimes you could put a little joke I guess in a song but that's what my stuff was earlier I think my my earlier stuff was just like kind of bad jokes over music so they became okay jokes and now I really think I only make I try to make it for have the music evoke the thing or build the idea first I got no cool thank you that was almost the thought this is it for me oh now we go down the Lyle oh you do I thought you're doing all of everyone's crushes I get this man oh you know it doesn't matter it doesn't matter stuff if you switch now social yeah I think it's a switch sit there oh oh y'all scoot over gotta go who knows well I can do it look at it wait wait I do the radio tell me what to do all right you listen to 91.3 FM WTS are at the College of New Jersey hi I'm Luke Ambra and we're here with comedian Bo Burnham who just from the hilarious entities in his very own Candle hall we'll have bricks Bo welcome thanks man happy to be on this thriving medium of radio all right cool well um so first off you come into the comedy with a much more theatrical I classical-style comedy do you sir do you series of continuing with that style because it's contributed to your success or do you like see yourself branching out to other realms of combin I don't know man I don't I I am not lying when I am saying it's a very good possibility I don't do it anymore after this one comes out in a couple months there is a real possibility of that the show is sort of about my anxiety towards performing I mean today was fun and we liked it you know screw around with the kids and stuff you'll see in the special what it kind of is about um yeah I like writing I feel like I'm a writer you know so I'd like to continue to write I'd love to continue to make theater shows maybe for other people but I might be raising the end of the line for me so more poetry books or something yeah or like it yeah or writing a show for another person or like a stage show or musical or something you know I'd be more than a little tired of myself a little tired of writing for myself you know I kind of want to collaborate a little bit only so much I can do and and so much of what I write is limited by my ability like I'm not a great singer or anything he's so great to write for someone who can really belt speaking of writing um i am i coming up on this where are you girl oh okay um so speaking of writing actually i you worked on a screenplay a few years back was that like what was the most difficult part about translating your style and sense of humor for like the screenplay and medium as opposed to like a theatrical show oh yeah well I read a lot of you know I really enjoy writing screenplays and stuff and the key for me is not to translate it that that it is not that you know I people wanted like to to make my stage show into a television show and it just isn't that my show is my comics show so specifically built to be a live thing that you experience you mean live so when I go to write a film or television show I want to write that medium I think like if you have something that just trans mutable missable to other medium it's probably not that great maybe there are some things that just perfectly translate to other mediums and a lot of comedians specifically right there do their stand-up in a way as they're coming up so that they can get a television show it is it isn't to be a stand-up show it's to be a showcase for their eventual sitcom and I didn't want to make that you know I look at my satchel and I go I have no idea to put that on television because it isn't on to me so yeah it was more the challenge of learning how to do something different so I always try to approach it like that trying to approach something differently you know and then yeah yeah hope you could kind of see similar style or you know it's coming from me so I guess that's the consistent thing but yeah my stage shows is is the stage stuff and you know everyone everyone wants to make a million varieties of everything and wants to make the radio version of this the television version of this and you know I think you just kind of should stick a little bit in your lane when you're in it and when you go into something else try to you know it's like it's like Shrek the musical and I'm just like Oh God like you know I mean it's like Legally Blonde it's like all the musicals on Broadway right now our movies mean it's just like this is awful this is the this sort of like everyone's hands to each other's cookie jars I think it's kind of detrimental to the stuff because I think when you embrace a medium for what it is and you look at the medium and you write something for it rather than translate something to it that's better alright good er um and finally the people want to know why did you stop using your vine account will there ever be an outtie person with you lady yeah cuz vine became a cesspool of I it's so funny because I like I started on YouTube you know making videos there and I was able to see like over the course of five years that community sell out and become derivative and horrible and over the course of five years I got to see like original videos made by people turn into like thumbnails of girls cleavages and clickbait bold titles and vine you got to see it happen ten ten times quicker within three months people were like hacked the app so they can upload their own stuff and they were like selling everything else was an ad and you know and I was like this is not fun anymore I'm walking away it was fun when I did really fun and I felt a bit like I was at YouTube and like the gold mage I it's all that I'm talking with YouTube because I think it's the same answer for me oh yeah and like in 2006 2007 when I was sixteen seventeen you guys were ten whatever I was convinced like and I think most people were like oh oscar-winning movies and shorts and everything will be YouTube videos in eight years it has not happened and the reason it hasn't happened cuz like it just sucks I mean go on YouTube and look at like a majority of user-generated content it is god-awful I know there's some really good stuff and I know there are probably a lot of people doing good work they're not giving the most views the most popular people are you want to talk about like translated mediums and derivative stuff it's just like kids talking about other pop culture it's The Tonight Show posting their own clips on it this was supposed to be like the medium that bypassed all the corporations and bypassed all this stuff and it isn't we lost we lost the Internet I stand by that then the internet got we had a chance to be like the people's medium and we lost and and like you know every Tonight Show clip and H you know even I'm just saying even John Oliver's like home and I'm like I love them but I'm like this is just awful that the most viewed videos of the day or it's really just a medium for anyway wahoo I can go all day about that so Instagram videos where you going exactly I cool exactly Instagram of the new format in the boss it's natural um so I know you touched upon this but do you ever get backlash from people who don't understand your songs like kill yourself and you ever feel the need to cater to the idea of political correctness as you see I didn't do that song tonight before that raisin um but that the song that yeah um the thing about political correctness is that like I yeah for comedians it's a problem who cares the fact that like the young people might be coming into their morals and be a little irony deaf in exchange of not being bigoted is fine you know the idea that life oh my god people aren't like kids aren't so Sykes for my subtle racial humor than if they they should understand that I'm actually making fun of the privileged and not but but in exchange that you know it's it's I think political correctness is a slight over correction to a problem that needs to be corrected it's a little bit clunky it's a little bit but it's young people caring about things so I don't really care and I'm a tough guy it's supposed to be all these comedians complain about I'm like is this what you don't you guys you're the same guys that like worship Lenny Bruce for being carted off in in handcuffs the crowd might get a little sour to it um but yeah I I can defend and it isn't so much the crowd or political correctness but I can defend everything I do up there I don't think anything is bad and I do believe that comedy can be bad I don't think if it's just funny it's funny some of the worst times in my life have been being laughed at I think that's everyone's feeling laughter is not a good thing inherently at all but I can defend everything you know but I could also if someone were to say I didn't like that at the point that you're making doesn't like the point I'm making with women when I get called like the show calls me a in the show if somewhere like I don't like hearing that word I just don't like hearing I'd be that's completely fair AI can defend it in terms of like what it does in the show and what it is for me but if someone's offended that's completely fine I mean that's what that's what you're doing you're you're putting safe you're you're you're asking for people's judgement and you're asking for their approval so you might not get it so who you know who cares I don't know I just think like if conveniens spent half the time working on their shows that they did talking about comedy or talking about the problems in comedy comedy would be a lot better it's a lot of guys sitting it's like guys sitting around guys and running in in smoky comedy clubs talking about the idea of their lives for three hours a day and performing for 10 minutes you know so you know it's all crap and I called this when it happened sorry when this PSA stuff happened some unnamed comics we're on Twitter going all about it and I went at them and I went like cuz they're all complaining my penis and I was like it's not true what are you talking about it's fine and then six months later who happens to be championing the anti PC movement for Donald Trump and use these I'm just saying I'm not if your former against them all those comedians are against them and you can see them like an T P scene is the world's - PC you can't even write dirty Jew on the wall anymore I mean that's like what it really is it's like you know it's good it's a good thing it's a good thing that people feel like they should you know be nicer to people it's it's it's society if you're not gonna go to prison but it's like if you're not nice you're gonna get a slap on the wrist just be nice garrison whatever and if comedy if comedy goes down the drain cuz of it good I don't give it crap good old question one or do you think that students can relate your commie mores over others since this is your like target demographic uh yeah I mean I don't know why I don't know my I don't have a target demographic I mean I do practically probably have a demographic that is ends up being the target I don't have a target I'm like trying to in some way but yeah for sure I mean I definitely am lucky because I'm I just I really can't take the idea of a multi Multi multi Multi multi millionaire who's been on top of the comedy world forever being really upset about you know I don't know I just you know Anthony Jeselnik is a good friend of mine like say friend of mine he says good he'll make me forever um like he performs a colleges all the time and he's like bring it on if you don't like it bring it on this one it's about these scared a bunch of 19 year olds that are like in like taking sociology classes like who cares I'm saying like what's the flip to it I don't know it is this this hostile environment towards these things I just think like I don't know I like that you know I get to get up there and talk for an hour if someone wants to write an angry blog or an angry article about it it's the least they can do everyone wants to express themselves everyone wants to be heard right if all these comedians that get up and are just heard non-stop forever gets so angry when the audience has the same policy and then whatever series so more serious sir Pearson all right so during last song of your tour and obviously you did today you mentioned feeling like you had to put your fans have this kind of before your own do you feel like your success is worth it or does it ever make you one yeah the truth is about like all that stuff is that like it's stiff me on stage is still a character it still kind of is it is it is me as a performer so for me as a performer them liking me or not is life and death the good thing isn't truly in my real life I have wrong personal relationships and stuff that I that I fulfill me to the point where I don't totally 100% need this um so I'm saying I I'm much more dramatic it's funny that like I do something crazy and funny and people are like he's kidding and then I do something a little dark or whatever and everyone's like this is him this is absolutely him you know um both are exaggerations of something but yeah I mean I've never been great with performing I've been you know I've had panic attacks on stage and from like 2500 people you know it's very strange to me and I feel like I signed up for a life that I necessarily chosen if I had started now when I was 16 but the more important thing to me I think and when I figured out what this show in particular is like comedians talk about everything and they hold you know everything's feet to the fire they're exposing truth you're speaking truth to power about government and society and letting it live but they're never really speaking truth to the power that they're actually participating in which is performing which is like the actual bat truly what I think I have the most the thing I have most um and most qualified to speak about that's troubling is celebrity and attention that's what I do so for Kamiya's to get up and you know hoe airlines and bush and it's like yeah but you're sitting you know you're you're you just by doing this you're perpetuating this stuff so it was tough for me why my shows always are a little strange and conflicted I think it's because I'm I as I grew up and came in I think I realized oh I hate I hate a part of this I hate truly hate I sound so it's not so lame to say but I really do think celebrity is so so so bad so bad all of this form is really corrosive to people's spirits and I think that started being that when the floor fell over because these just be famous people but now it is a continuum which starts with one like on your thing and ends at Kim Kardashian people really do think that they that it's like a ladder they fall upon and that ended like that almost people you're going to find this like in like a college or in a group the popular kids are like more famous like the famous ones at school you know really is it I think it's awful I think it's really really bad and so I can't stop talking about it on stage look it's all so the point of all that stuff you're asking about is that I had to rip apart I wanted to wake people up to what was happening which is like we're all facing like there's a thousand of you here and I'm up here and I'm trying to be relatable and you guys all like me and I'm the cool guy but this is bad this is so weird this is truly truly weird and you know but I still like have like shows a little girls come screaming up and linked were you listening but not only because a lotta a lot of fun little kids like yellow like I like the idea of you now like I see me like I think I've Act which spawn is that like a lot of and I am in fact a target demographic thing which maybe you were saying were you saying which like I'm so I used to not want a young audience I used to be like I want adults I want like 30-year old cool comedy people but they don't need this they don't need anything they're cool so I feel very lucky that I get that young people just want to I don't take that lightly you know I yeah because what's weird is that and it's starting to not happen now but I felt like the youngest working comedian since I started that's what's so strange I still feel like the the really aren't comedians younger than me that are touring or anything or doing a show so I've always felt like and I'm just starting to now get the Jerrod Carmichael or Pete Davidson your other comedians now it's starting to come up and I'm just so excited to see it and I was so worried than when it started to happen I'd be like Oh am I going to be so wreck so negatively to this but I'm just so happy I remember I'm excited to see what people my age and younger have to say and I think they will be talking about this I'm just saying about that I think they will be very self-conscious about things because we've just been taught that way god I don't know where that answer started or when it's great word salad yummy yummy

Channel: TCNJ Lions Television

Views: 282,941

Rating: 4.9621553 out of 5

Keywords: TCNJ, The College of New Jersey, LTV, Lions TV, Bo Burnham, bo burnham interview, tcnj ltv, tcnj lions television, bo burnham tcnj, bo burnham make happy, make happy interview, bo burnham make happy interview, straight white male, adam oppenheimer, ej paras, tyler law, jared sokoloff, brooke schmidt, from god's perspective, oh bo, words words words, bo burnham personal, bo burnham 2016, bo burnham new

Id: OG-kVHWO55c

Length: 21min 18sec (1278 seconds)

Published: Thu Mar 03 2016

Reddit Comments

[u/JAMellott23]

That was fascinating. I hope he has more stage performances in him, but I'll follow him wherever he goes. I think he's up there as one of the most honest artists of our generation.

[u/Scublly]

He mentioned Snapchat, anyone his his account name?

[u/FlashlightBarn]

So yeah, my school TCNJ got Bo to come as our spring comedian. He did a variant of Make Happy. I didn't catch him during the actual tour as much as I wanted to, but I imagine a good 10-15 minutes of the show was modified for my school in particular when he started cracking jokes about my school's architecture and when he started walking around the aisles of our theater kinda interviewing students about their majors. This interview dives into his opinions of media as a whole now, the current state of comedy, and what #MakeHappy means to him. Some light questions, too: the first one's about what instrument he deems the "least likely to get you laid." Hope you guys enjoy and learn something new!

[u/Kmaster224]

My heart broke when he said he might be done performing for himself.

[u/Sam3323]

Man, really interesting what he had to say about YouTube and how the "people" lost the internet. He is such a fascinating guy. Really sad to hear he might be done doing specials :(

[u/invadepoland]

Wow! I really hope he keeps performing, because he's so dynamic and fluid onstage!! One of the best performers I've seen live.

[u/psybermonkey15]

Thanks for sharing this. Very insightful. I definitely share his frustration with a lot of what he spoke about.