Most comedians nowadays get the privilege to try out their new material on live audiences before filming it all together in an hour-long special.
However, Brian wrote his entire new special, save one joke, during the COVID-19 pandemic, and had little chance to test out his material before filming it.
“I used to have this great room, and it was shut down before COVID,” Brian exclusively told Distractify. "It was called Meltdown… It was a room in the back of this comic book shop, which was already my favorite comic book shop in LA. And so they started doing stand-up. And that became my favorite place to go try material because they were my people and even if they weren't paying to see me that night, it would fit, and I could kind of judge the material better than I would at the Comedy Store.”
During the special, Brian jokes about tweeting back and forth with his man crush, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson. But he also gets goofy about “gaining weight” and “that sort of COVID-motivated stuff.” So as we watch the special, it feels very current — and there’s a sense of humor about everything we collectively went through.
“This whole act got really worked out on the road so it’s just trusting that it works at this point,” Brian explained. “I've been telling jokes for 30-something years, 35 years. So I know my voice at this point.”
Although Brian’s been performing and writing comedy for over three decades, he’s still inspired by some of the classic greats, such as Robin Williams, Steve Martin, and Richard Pryor. But even with that, Brian’s excited about the direction in which comedy is moving.
“I love how big comedy has become,” he said. “And really, anybody has a voice now — you watch Netflix, and it's so diverse and so great, not just fat old white guys.”
For those who aren’t familiar with Brian’s style of comedy, he’s pretty self-deprecating. “There's talk of punching down and punching up,” he explained. (This could be a reference to recent criticisms about Dave Chappelle and Ricky Gervais’s trans-centric jokes.)
Brian continued, “I always just punch myself. Self-flagellating forever! I’m a total self-deprecating comic and that's just what I'm more comfortable with.” He still has done and can do roasts, but he said he prefers to roast himself.
