Multi-tasking comedian carves his own path
Former SNL, 30 Rock writer Hannibal Buress dishes out laid-back standup sketches
Hannibal Buress, the final headliner in Toronto’s JFL42 comedy festival, came to fame on his own terms.
Sure, he had typical network TV opportunities as a young comic such as writing for SNL and 30 Rock, but those jobs didn’t showcase his voice.
Instead, Buress made his name through laid-back standup specials, his reoccurring role as a laid-back (that word again) dentist on Broad City, being the closest thing to a voice of sanity on the lunatic Eric Andre Show, hosting his own Comedy Central series Why? and, yes, bringing international attention to sexual assault allegations against Bill Cosby.
(The Star was warned before the interview that the comedian has tired of talking about Cosby.)
Buress is a comedian who carves his own path. Fortunately, that’s working out just fine.
Looking back on his days writing for Saturday Night Live and 30 Rock, Hannibal admits it was an awkward fit.
“I was coming into it as a standup without much writing experience. Like anything, you get better over time and gain perspective.
“But at the time those gigs weren’t really for me,” Buress said in an interview in advance of his show Saturday at JFL42.
“I’ve always tried to make what I do onstage seem as close as possible to my personality offstage,” he explains. “I think that’s what the best comedians do: find a way to get across who you are comfortably and clearly. And jokes are good, too.”
Buress’s rise was more of a slow burn than a rocket ship, so playing larger venues such as theatres is still a bit of a novelty.
“Standup is best experienced in a small comedy club. But unfortunately, if you want to make a lot of money doing standup comedy, you have to play bigger rooms,” Buress admits with a laugh.
He’s also taken advantage of the added resources of bigger venues to include a DJ to deconstruct music as part of his act.
“It’s something I wanted to do for years,” he says.
“It adds a different energy and since that part of the show is so prepared, I can kind of turn my brain off and plan the rest.”
That sort of on-the-fly multi-tasking is undoubtedly a factor that helped Buress secure prominent roles in three TV series besides his regular live comedy tours.
Of those projects, Why? may be the purest onscreen expression of his brand of comedy yet, and “learning how to extend my comedy into television was interesting,” he says.
“I’ve always tried to make what I do onstage seem as close as possible to my personality offstage.” HANNIBAL BURESS COMEDIAN
“I never got over seeing four people showing up wearing costumes because I said some dumb thing off of the top of my head the day before.
“If we do it again, we’ll probably figure out some sort of consistency because I think people crave that from television.
“But I don’t know, maybe we’ll keep trying things like performing to just one audience member. We’ll see.”
Buress’s ever-increasing fame has its drawbacks, particularly in terms of maintaining anonymity. Though the comic says he enjoys meeting fans, selfie culture is starting to try his patience.
“I don’t like when people just walk up and take a picture. I like when people, you know, speak to me or say, ‘What’s up?’ or something,” he quips.
“Some people will even try to take pictures with me without knowing who I am. I can catch it now since there’s always a certain energy to them.
“I’ll ask, ‘What’s my name?’ If they say, ‘Uhhhh,’ then I’m not taking a picture.”