Bringing the weird to comedy festival
JFL NORTHWEST: Bamford’s irreverent show a combination of monologues, mini-skits and different voices
Whenever I see comedian/actor Maria Bamford, I wonder how she is? Is she OK?
I have no personal reason to wonder about the state of Bamford. It seems I, just like a lot of others, have an overwhelming urge to hug her.
“My friend Jackie Kashian, we tour a lot together, says, ‘People always want to carry your luggage, what’s going on?’ I don’t know what’s going on, it might be the trembling,” said Bamford recently over phone from her home in Los Angeles. The trembling isn’t a joke as it’s a side-effect of drugs she takes to help her cope with bipolar II disorder and OCD.
“I am doing well as a far as I know. I’m sure if I am not doing well people will tell me as they do on the internet. The internet will tell you everything you need to know about how you are doing, or my mother or my husband.
“I am fully medicated,” added Bamford. “I am so medicated I feel super-awesome and not super-obsessed all the time anymore. I also went through an OCD treatment program that was unbelievably helpful. But I think the meds have really changed my life.”
Bamford will be in Vancouver on March 3 at the Vogue Theatre. Her show is one of the many that make up this year’s JFL NorthWest comedy festival, March 1-10 at various venues. The festival is jammed with great shows, including standup from top-notch comics like Bill Burr, Trevor Noah, Jo Koy, Brian Regan and Nikki Glaser.
If you haven’t seen Bamford, it’s probably best you give yourself a bit of a primer. This isn’t your regular setup, punch-line-kind-of-comedy. Bamford is, well, irreverent and absurd. Her act is a combination of monologues, mini-skits and many different voices.
You can catch Bamford’s act online, of course. There are numerous comedy specials, including the latest Netflix special Old Baby.
Old Baby is filmed all over L.A. It’s her doing comedy in front of a handful of people in a living room, on the street and in a theatre.
“I thought it would be fun,” said Bamford, when asked about her active approach.
Bamford, who has a solid acting resume, also stars in the Mitch Hurwitz (Arrested Development)-created episodic, scripted show, Lady Dynamite, on Netflix. In this she plays an exaggerated version of herself. It’s both funny and sometimes kind of heartbreaking. It’s human.
Like lots of comedians, Bamford is thankful for Comedy Central (she was the first female comedian to have two Comedy Central Presents specials) and Netflix for funding so much comedy. Getting paid is great, but for Bamford the TV exposure goes even further and helps to better curate her live audience, making the experience better for her and the people in the seats.
“People usually know what they are coming to see, so that’s a delightful change,” Bamford said.
However, like just about every comedian today, the exposure isn’t as easy as it seems and often that sword does have another edge.
“Part of comedy is the element of surprise,” said Bamford. “It’s hard to surprise people, especially when you have all that content and material out there. I’m not sure what to do about it except to keep trying.”
Bamford is part of an industry going through a watershed moment. Sexual harassment and assault are headlining conversations. Powerful men have been brought to their knees. Bamford has had a lot of different gigs and jobs over her decades in show business. She has even worked on Louis C.K.’s show, but says she never witnessed any untoward behaviour from the star who has had his career closed down due to admitted sexual harassment and just plain gross behaviour.
“I definitely benefited from his support,” said Bamford about C.K. “I don’t have any experience like that with him, but I totally believe the woman. It’s just miserable.”
Bamford says she has faced her fair share of male BS when she was starting out in comedy.
“I have definitely had the micro-aggression experience, you know dudes giving me advice on my act after a show that was not requested,” said Bamford. “Saying things about my appearance and that would make my act better if my appearance was better.”
Bamford points out during the discussion of the current state of things that she thinks there is always room for improvement in how we treat each other.
“I want to acknowledge that probably as a 47-year-old white woman I am not the wokist,” said Bamford. “So please wake me up if ever I say something dumb or unhelpful. I’m sure I do things that I am not aware of. I can only try to be a better person. We should all try that. To be kinder, better people every day. That’s all we can hope for.”
■ NOTE: Aside from the star-studded, live-comedy lineup at JFL NorthWest, the event is also kicking off its first Vancouver Just for Laughs Film Festival. Programming will include short- and feature-film screenings, premieres, Q&As, panels and more. The opening-night film (March 6 at The Rio) is The Death of Stalin from Armando Iannucci, the Emmy-award-winning and Oscar-nominated writer/ director, (Veep, The Thick of It, In the Loop). The film is a dark comedy about nervous insiders trying to secure power and stay alive in the days after Josef Stalin’s collapse.