Mike Birbiglia's Working It Out - 198. Sarah Sherman Returns: If Chucky Went to Sarah Lawrence

Episode Date: January 12, 2026

This week, SNL’s Sarah Sherman returns on the heels of the release of her new HBO special, “Live + In the Flesh.” Sarah and Mike discuss why Sarah goes to therapy three times a week, which SNL cast member Sarah is jealous of, and the difference between Sarah Sherman and her stage persona Sarah Squirm. Plus, the Weekend Update character that Lorne Michaels himself thought of for Sarah to play.Please Consider Donating To: Trans Lifeline Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

I'm obsessively reading letterboxed reviews. I never read anything online with S&L because I'm like, well, there's no way that's going to be good. Right. But I'm genuinely curious with what people think about the special. There's a lot of half stars. What? Yeah. But what's been so fun is that a lot of the negative reviews are bring me just as much joy as the positive reviews.

Because they've achieved an intended effect. Here's a half. Sarah Squirm, my slimy pussy is full of bones and animals, and it's huge. My boyfriend throws up while licking it. I'm crazy, audience claps politely. The negative reviews are all amazing. They are amazing. The intended effect has been affected.

That is the voice of the great Sarah Sherman, aka Sarah Squirm. You know Sarah from Sarah Aunt Live. She has a new HBO special called Sarah Sherman Live and In The Flesh. It is phenomenally original and funny and bizarre and creative and cool. We talk all about it today. She was on this podcast in 2022. You can go back and listen to that one. It's a really good episode.

And she is back today. And we have a great conversation about her special, about SNL. Thanks to everybody, by the way, who's signed up for the text message alerts. we are announcing some small club shows with new material in Philadelphia, Palm Beach, Madison, Buffalo, Raleigh, Los Angeles, and Nashville, as well as New York City. If you want to be the first to know about those, text 911-444-7-1-5-0 and then text the word berbigs. So you'll be the first to know about those shows. Thanks to everyone who signed up for working it out premium. We just dropped another bonus episode with Jenny.

My wife, Jenny. That was a lot of fun. There's more bonus content coming. Also, I will be appearing in the Broadway show All Out from January 13th through 18th, alongside Beck Bennett, Wayne Brady and Cecily Strong. That is really, really exciting.

Tickets for that show at all-outbroadway.com. I love this chat with Sarah Sherman. We talk about therapy. We talk about SNL. We talk about her new special. which is fantastic. And then we work out a bunch of new jokes at the end. We both have tags for each other.

It's a great chat today with the great Sarah Sherman. You guys are getting me at like a delirious. Because you just woke up? No, I woke up and then once a therapy and then I just like didn't eat and drank a lot of coffee. So you're getting like raw. Oh, nice. This is what we want.

Okay. This is how we planned. Okay. You went to therapy. You go in person? Mm-hmm. I do psychoanalysis on the couch. Oh, you do in the couch?

Yeah. I've never done on the couch. I'm supposed to go three times a week, but I'm like, bro, you cannot have all that with me. In your special, you say you go to therapy three days a week. Yeah, I lied. It's two. I've never heard of that. It's psychoanalysis.

So it's like a whole, you're supposed to be in there every single day digging, digging. And it's like the more you do it. the less like, it's supposed to be like every day. It's weird because that you'd be in therapy twice a week because... I don't have time.

First of all, you don't have time. You have this insanely taxing Siret Live job which is famously time-consuming. Yes, yes. Like what? But I go on writing, I go on writing night day before writing night.

Before you stay overnight. Which feels good because that's the day that I have the most. night terrors about. Like, I think going into the job, I was like, oh, I'm going to have the recurring nightmare of, like, being on live TV and saying, fuck, but the by accident, right, right. By purpose, because I'm ripping a picture of the new Chicago Pope.

Yes, the new Chicago Pope. Yeah, yeah. But my recurring night terror is writing night. I'm late. Everyone already has their sketch ideas for the week and is, like, paired off and working and writing and I'm going down the hallway that keeps getting longer and longer knocking on all the doors being like, do you want to write with me this week? And people being like, no, I'm booked up. Sorry. Wow. So. What do you think that dream means that I'm a dumb bitch?

I am a dumb. And I'm literally on the, every week I'm on the couch like this. And I'm going like, my sketchy got cut. And it's like, I'm supposed to be in there talking about my mother, my father, you know, whatever. Right. And every week I'm like, oh. I look so good at a blonde wig. What does it mean? What am I rejecting about myself? You always play on the show a lot of characters. A lot of the characters with extreme costumes,

extreme kind of animal anthropomorphic attributes. Like, is that, do you know, is everyone know, well, that's going to go to squirm? I have a little peek behind the actor's studio. Ooh, I'm telling all, this is a tell-all. Oh, yeah, it's a tell-all. I have, those have never, those have always been Lauren ideas. Really?

Every time I've played an animal on weekend update. Yeah, like the drunk animal. Yes. I have written something that week, that's something else. And then Lauren is like, you should play this famous animal that just happened this week. It's always his idea. It's Lauren's idea? And he'll be like, so drunk, I didn't even fucking know there was a drunk raccoon.

Yeah. And I wrote, I think I wrote a, I can't remember which, I think I wrote a Frankenstein update where I play Collins Monster. Yeah. I mean, I guess I'll never write this. This will never make it to air. But I wrote something where I'm Collins Monster made out of all the body parts of like dead interns. and like I keep I keep being like kill me you know whatever and I look like a and I've got boobs on my back or whatever And Lauren goes how about you play there? So he's like not bad, but how about you play this raccoon? And I've been thinking I talked about this in therapy

I'm like what is it? He like wants me to play these animals and I think it's because He he knows what works on the show. Yeah obviously it's his show. Yeah and it's like how can we best harness my my my wild energy for the show. Your animal-esque energy. Right, which I never really, like, because I don't, I'm less good at writing for myself for a way that works with the show. Yeah. As you've seen my special, you can understand it.

So it's like, I'll write these really wild pieces that's like, I am a dead, I'm made out of dead body parts and I'm like, you know what I mean? And it's less fitting for the show. Right. And so it's a way to more... How do we take that energy? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And fit it to something in the news.

It's funny hearing that Lauren came up with that because it's like, I've never worked on the show, but I don't think of him as coming up with ideas from scratch. Really? Yes, he comes up with a lot of the... People always ask, like, how involved he is. I mean, he's 80 years old, right? He's faster than me, and he writes the show.

He writes the show. I mean, that's crazy, though. It's crazy, though. It's crazy. It's crazy. And he's at work as much as I am. Wow. And more than Che. More than Che.

I'm like, please come back to work. He's like, you don't even care. We care. I love when he's at work. Jay said you don't care? He was being funny. I care a lot. I love him.

Michael Chee, if you ever listen to this, which you don't even care. probably not going to listen this. I love you. I think we're all obsessed with Chet. I'm obsessed with him. He's a genius. He's the greatest. He also, like... He was here last week.

He was the greatest. He's the funniest person. I tried to get him on this show for five and a half years. I tried to get him in my office every day. Do you? I pitched him a... I was like, I know how to write a sketch with him. I'll pitch him a wrestling idea.

Oh, really? And so I pitched him a wrestling idea. That was so... It was so bad. that we both had to laugh. Because you thought he was just like a wrestling idea? Yeah. It was something like maybe you're...

I didn't know... I don't know what the wrestling moves are called. So I was like, maybe you're giving someone the chair on the head. Yeah, sure. Smashing a chair on somebody. But it's an IKEA chairs. You have to assemble it first. That's good.

That's funny. Come on. It's money. Come on. How is that not getting on? Maybe you're giving someone the chair. And he goes, giving someone the chair. Sorry, I don't know when it's called. Sorry I don't know what it's called the stone called chair.

or Stunner or whatever. People have always pointed out to me that, like, one of the things about Che is that when he was a co-head writer of the show, he, like, would write tons of sketches that you wouldn't even imagine he would write. Yes. He's like a perfect, he just knows, okay, so there's the joke. And then he knows how to make it a fucking, like, a good sketch. I still don't know how to write, like, a good sketch. I can think of like a funny little concept or like a little voice or something. But I don't know what makes it a sketch.

And he can like last this past weekend he did Black Santa Claus. And it's just like a do you believe in, I was the show, do you believe in Black Santa Claus? And it's a perfect sketch and it has perfect jokes. And it's just like so simple. It's not try hard. It's really easy. Yeah.

I don't know how to make something. easy. Like I only know how to make something that complicated that's hard to swallow. But your special, I think is perfect. Thank you for saying this. I really want people to watch it. Your special is great. I want people to watch it. And I think that there's something for everyone in there. And I think it can come across like all the, I mean, there's fucking billboards and Times Square. Oh, nice. There's billboards and Times Square that have like a flesh, sphincter tunnel with veins and eyeballs

and my head popping out with like a bisexual haircut and an eyeball falling out and I think people walk by the billboard and they go like, that's interesting, it's not for me or they'll watch like the first couple of minutes and be like, I can't get through this,

it's not for me. I, well, because I'm obsessively reading letterbox reviews. I never read anything online with S&L because I'm like, well, there's no way that's going to be good. Right. But I'm genuinely curious

with what people think about the special. because it's, I'm genuinely curious. And letterbox is more like away from the fray. Like it's not 4chan. So I'm like. Yeah, yeah, totally. And people like doing measured kind of reviews of it. And so I've been like, fascinating.

I read all of them. If you wrote one, I read it. But like a lot of people have said like, it's pee-pee-pooh humor for kids. And I'm like, respect valid. But I'm like, that is the first. first five minutes it does change. Letterboxed. Sarah Sherman.

There's a lot of half stars. What? Yeah. But I, I, what's been so fun is that a lot of the negative reviews are, bring me just as much joy as the positive reviews. Because they've achieved an intended effect. Right. If people being like,

this is fucking crazy, I hate it. Gross woman. All I'll say, My letterbox review is that my wife and I watched it the other night and we were losing it laughing. Yay. Well, because it's so original and it's so like irreverent and you just clearly like don't give a shit about it feeling like other comedy specials. Like you're not trying to fit into the box of comedy. You're just like, blah.

Like it's clearly like your subconscious manifested in comedy. Well, what was interesting about the, I had been putting off doing a special for a while because I love my live show. I love doing it. I didn't want to give up the jokes. I was having so much fun doing it. But also energetically, it's a weird thing to figure out how to translate into film. Yeah.

And so what I was most concerned about, was not... Okay, it's a stand-up special. How do we do that? It was just making sure that was translated. Yeah. And so I hope we achieved that.

Sorry, I'm looking at letterbox. No, there's good stuff in there. Okay. This is Elias Demoski Ferris, who said, Five Stars, Ain't nobody doing avant-garde pussy shit like Sarah, dude, what the fuck? That's...

That's the review. Read like a half-star one. Okay, okay. I'll go to a mean one. I'll go to a mean one. This one's squirm-nose ball. That's nice. That means that's Gen Z for like respect.

Okay, okay. Here's a half. Sarah Squirm, my slimy pussy is full of bones and animals, and it's huge. My boyfriend throws up while licking it. I'm crazy, audience, claps politely.

I'm saying, like, the negative reviews are all amazing. They are amazing. Yeah, that's a pretty, That's a pretty funny negative review. The intended effect has been affected. Is anything, like, I mean, I feel like I know the answer to this. I was going to say, is there anything too much for the special?

But it's like, no. What would be cut from the special? That's the craziest version. They were 30 minutes cut out of it. Really? Yeah. Like, why? My producers were, there were a lot of producers on it,

but, like, Ronnie Bronstein and, like, Josh Safdi and Eli B. Bush who like, you know, they had just gotten off of finishing Marty Supreme. Oh, right. So they were like really in their bag. Like they were firing on all cylinders. Wow. And they were like, leave people wanting more, which as a maximalist has never been something I've considered ever.

Right. I leave it all on the ice. You are a maximalist. Yes. So the idea like, oh, they're like, it's a comedy special. It's an hour. And I'm like, well, it's an hour and a half. That's what I did.

And they're like, it's an hour. So we took out a lot of stuff. Shut up, kid. It's an hour. Yeah. It was very like, huh. And it's an hour. Wow. Give them a show.

How did you get Safty and Ron Bronstine to work on this? Like, they don't do comedy specials. They did Sandler's. Oh, yes, they did. And I loved that too. Yeah. That was good, too. Yes.

Oh, I hunted them down. Oh, you did? I did. What did you say? What did you say? How'd you hunt a band? When I saw Uncut Jets. I was like, I was like, this is about, this is about my family.

Right. Because you're a gem, you're a gem salesman in Africa. And in China Town? My dad works in the garment district, some schmattas in Midtown. Oh, okay, yes. And I'm from Long Island. Right. And I saw all of it in the movie.

I saw the commute from Long Island to the city. I saw all of it and I go, who wrote this? Who fucking wrote this? Ronnie is from my literal hometown from the same town on Long Island. We went to the same weirdo basement community center. I was like, who is this person

who I've never understood anything more? And it's from the same fucking... But good for you. So you called them. Like, how... Do you write him an email? I wrote. How does one get in touch with these people?

I don't mind hunting people down. Yeah? Through like 80s. agents or like managers and stuff. And then that didn't, I had hunted, after uncut gems, I was like, yeah, you know, whatever. And then Ronnie saw, I did a short called Sarah vaccine like 100 years ago before S&L. And then he saw that and he was like, you know, he reached out to me. Oh, nice.

And so, yeah. Wait, to go back to therapy for a second. I love your joke about how you have a male therapist and if you had a female therapist, she would fix this. you point to yourself and there'd be no show? Mm-hmm. What needs to be fixed? Dare I say. David Lynch writes a lot in, what is it called?

Like reeling in the fish or whatever, his meditation book. Yeah, yeah. He's like... I thought called that, but I know you mean. Yeah, it's like being... Reeling the big awesome, cool stuff or whatever. I'm going to get this right. The book is called Catching the Big Fish.

Yes, catching the big fish. He writes like... you know, we have romanticized this idea of the tortured suffering artist. Yes, totally. And it's not, you can't do anything if you're in pain and you're acting like a fucking piece of shit and you feel like shit and you're acting like, like, nothing good comes out of that. Yeah. What good can come out of suffering? So, like, I am in therapy because I'm not being my best self.

Yeah. If I'm suffering. Right. Even though I think a lot of the special is about being a, a neurotic Jewish-crazy-jew with stomach problems and mental problems, but I aspire, I mean the whole

last 10 minutes of the special is a meditation because I actively am in pursuit of healing myself. Yeah. Because I don't like negatively affecting people around me. Right. With like, you know, my best friend Jack, who produced a special,

he's in the special, he opens for me on tour. Like, when we're 20, a lot and we're up and down in planes every single day and I'm worried that the veins in my eyes are swelling I start acting like a crazy person I'm not fun to be around and I don't

want to be that person anymore I don't want to be that. So you think your veins your eyes are swelling but it's actually not true? Well this is my theory okay you know when you fly a lot you like start getting inflammation or something well first of all there's a ton of radiation yes yeah these are all the jokes I cut out of my special I had a whole thing that's

well oh I I think about this all the time because I fly constantly as a comedian. I'm like, oh, God. I start my whole airplane bit by talking about like when we are in the realm of angels, yes. There's something is happening to our. They're like, Yes.

We're not supposed to be up there. Yeah, you're not supposed to be there. So I think. They're not interested in us being there. And it makes your body feel weird. Agree. And I think that when I'm on a plane and people have said this is because airplanes are dry. Uh-huh.

I have noticed that the veins in my eyeballs become more pronounced. And I've heard that it's because they're dry and they're red because it's dry. I think I'm going, in my mind, I'm going into a different pressure zone in the atmosphere. And the veins are swelling and I'm Sam Neal and Event Horizon. That's what I think is happening. Is there physical evidence of this? Like, do I have a picture? No, yeah.

Or like, are you seeing it in the mirror even? I'm seeing it. It's not just in your mind. And I'm going crazy being like, Jack, I think I have a staff infection from sitting on an infected toilet seat on my butt. And it's just like, I don't want to be like that. I want to be fun to hang around. Yeah, you want to be a good hang.

I don't want to be a fucking chore and a burden to everyone around me. This is what's putting Che off, I think. Yeah, that's why he will write the wrestling chair sketch with me. There's a New Yorker profile that mentions that you find it challenging to balance your two personas, is the shamelessly revolting stand-up and the more restrained SNL performer. Can you describe the tension?

My dream in my life is I want to be good at my job, S&L. You're so good. No, I'm not even saying this for fishing. It's like, you'd say that I'm good, but I want to come into work and just be like,

I have the perfect SNL sketch right here, right it, whatever. And it's like, it is, you know, like we were talking about the animals, it's like, I didn't even come up with those. That was Lauren. Yeah, but that's okay. I know.

You're a great performer. You're a professor. You're hired to do be a performer. I know. That is true. That is true. I'm hired to be a performer. I think you're being kooky on this.

Yeah. You're great on SNL. What are you talking about? There is so much of the job that I want to be good at that I'm just not. And it's like I can come in there every single day of the week and pitch a Sarah's Scorm sketch. Yeah. I'm less good at the Sarah Sherman stuff,

and I want to be better at it. So describe to the listeners the difference between Sarah Sherman and Sarah Squirm. Sarah Squirm is just the stuff you can't put on TV. Right, right, right. It's the gross out stuff. It's the eyeballs. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's the organs, internal organs.

And it's blood. Blood. But it aspires. its ultimate goal is I'm like a shock jock or something but its ultimate goal is like it is despite what you may have seen in the special I do want to make people laugh

and also entertain them and shock them and give them a ride Oh I get that. Right and then I think SNL, the main goal of SNL is comedy it is like more straightforward it is comedy. Yeah. And I think that it's

taught me how to put more jokes in my own stuff. And I just want to, it's harder for me to write something that's not a butthole. But I'm trying, I'm trying. So when he assigns you playing like the drunk animal, are you co-writing that? Are you like riffing on it? So me and, like this raccoon thing. Yeah. He assigned me the drunk animal.

So it was like me, Mike DeSenzo, Jake Nordwin, Asha Ward, and Josh Patton. Yeah. Go into a room. It's a limited time. That's a fun bunch. It's really fun and we can do the kind of writing that we don't get to do on writing night, which is writing night is really intense and there's not a lot of time to just like get together and actually write something out loud.

It's a lot of like passing around drafts of something, which is less hands-on and more email-based. So we get to do my favorite kind of writing, which is we're all in a room, we're all looking at a screen, and we're lined by it. line just saying it out loud and doing it. Just kind of a what about this, what about this, what about this, what about this? Literally, I think we wrote it being like, like Colin Joseph at the update desk. What is this first line he says?

Right. And then Sarah rolls out, what does she say? And I go, do you go last night? Which is my favorite kind of writing as opposed to just being like, oh, I have to do a draft. I'm on my computer. Like, which feels more homeworky, but that's like because of the time constraints. It's kind of what you have to do is just kind of bang something out on your computer, kind of by yourself, as opposed to like on your feet kind of riffing. How close is Colin Jost to the persona that you put on him on weekend after?

Very far. Very far. He's just so easy. He's right there. He's so nice. He's an easy target. He's an easy target. I've never seen him not be nice to people.

He's nice and he's just down for whatever. And I think a lot of people, like he's really. The only reason I was ever on update is because he was like, come on update. And I'm like, okay. Really? Yes. Wait, what was the first character? Myself.

Yourself, okay. Because I was, when I joined the show, I was like, you know, I'm coming from stand-up, so I'm being like, okay, let me write a sketch character. Maybe I have a weird voice on a funny wig. Like, I didn't know. Yeah. And he was like, just come on as yourself. And I was like, okay.

And then I just was like, well, you asked for it. So then I was mean to him. But because I knew like- Was your first one mean to him? I think I'd written a couple of things that didn't leave table. And then PDD help me, I mean,

pick me out of the mud. Really? Yeah, like I didn't know how to do sketches. Ben and Martin and John? Yeah, they, I didn't know how to write sketches or do sketch comedy at all. And they, since they already were amazing at it.

Wow. And so they, and I would literally be like fighting them on jokes that were insane. I think I even might have talked about this when I was on here the last time, which I was like, I roll out looking at Mike myself, and I roast myself by saying,

I'm out here looking like Chuckie's last wish. And Ben was like, that's not a joke. You say, I'm out here looking like Chuckie went to Sarah Lawrence. That's a joke. That's funny. And I'm like, but I'm so, I love, like, attitude and texture with jokes. So I'm like, I'm out here for some reason.

But, like, he was, and he was like, I'm telling you, they know what works. Right. If I said Chuckie's last wish, people would have been like, huh? Right. But I'm such a textural, bad punchline comedian. It's a great joke.

Chuckie went to Sarah Lawrence. It's a perfect joke. It explains what I look like. Was that in your first update? Yep. That's great. What a great joke. I know.

That's the thing about SNL. It's, you get all this credit for jokes that you didn't write it. Like, every time I come out on Weekend Update, people are like, you're hilarious. I'm like, well, because Martin Ben and John wrote it. Right. That's what I'm so jealous of about people who work in SNL is you get to do kind of college again. Which is so funny because I hated college.

Exactly. I mean, same. I liked like half of college maybe. But there is something about the camaraderie. It seems like fun. I mean, I get that there's politics or whatever. Coming to standup is amazing to have camaraderie. Yeah.

Because it really, and it taught me that collaboration of life. You're not going to, nothing, you don't get anywhere alone. 100% true. That's why it's so weird when people start to be like, it was all me. It's like, no. No. It's never. Never.

Jinks. Never, jinks. I'm too, jinks. It's never one person. Even with a stand-up special. I'm like, people produced it. A director made choices. Yes.

Thank you. Everything is collaborative. It's so weird when people try. try to take full 100,000% credit for anything. And at least if you're going to do that, give you credit to your mother. You got to give it to your mother. She did it. She made you.

No, it is, that is so darn true is, is the thing you're doing at SNL is a microcosm for the larger thing of collaboration. And I think that's another reason why we're all obsessed with SNL. It's the hierarchy. It's a this. But it's also like a group of people. It's like 50, 60 people, whatever it is, who work there, 100 and something people, every week we're like, blah, here's the show.

And it's like everybody's success and everyone's failure every week. And like, I cannot stress enough, like, how much contributions from people that you wouldn't think necessarily are, like, I did a squirrel. It was another last minute thing. We wrote it on a Friday. I played a score all. I didn't kind of really know what I was, like I didn't have the embodiment or the voice in my mind going into it

because it was so last minute. Yeah. And I could talk a lot about how that process has actually been very, like, nice to learn to surrender to something that's bigger and more chaotic and wild, like than yourself has taught me a lot. Yeah. Because I have a hard time letting go of things. Sure.

And it's just been like, you have to go. a squirrel right now and you're like okay I can't think about this so the costume designers fucking put these nails on my fucking suit and now all of a sudden and then when during run through I'm in the suit for the first time

and I noticed that the nails are making a clicking sound on the desk and then you'd make a bit out of it and then it becomes like a whole like fucking bit and then I'm like so who wrote that joke is the costume designer yeah and then there was Jeff in sound effects had this little

like chittering squirrel sound And so every time I went like this, he would play it for, you know, whatever. And then me and him sort of have a fun back and forth with when we're hitting the queue. So it's like collaboration on this like five-dimensional level. Yeah. Of like all these people's input and hard work and artistry are informing something that the reason it's good is not me. It's weird. Like how this zooms out, like it's similar to when Lynn Miranda was on this podcast.

And he goes, everything's the school. play. It's true, right? Like, and when you're growing up, if you're lucky, you get to work on school play, costumes or makeup or act or whatever. And it's like, and that's everything. Yeah. And that's Hamilton.

And that's S&L. And it's whatever your improv group in, in Chiboygan, like, it doesn't matter. Like, it's all the same. Yeah. I feel like that's lost sometimes. Like, people, like, look at you probably, and they go, oh, well, she gets. She gets to be on SNL. That's different from what I'm doing in, you know, my theater in Tucson.

It's like, not really. Like, oddly, I mean, I know that the audience is smaller, but it's for a group, you know, any show is for a group of people and you have the opportunity to collaborate and make something like spectacular. Even on like a simpler level, because, again, it's theater, like going back to this theater thing, things do have to be more DIY and, like, bare bones, even though it's like the biggest TV show like in history.

Just because by the nature of the fact that it's like a fast theater show and everything's like moving around really fast. You got to put it together in six days. Yeah. There is like still like a DIY element that I love. Totally. That's like at the end of the like in the Josh O'Connor show he sits down at it, this is my favorite thing.

He sits down at the table and he has to tip over a mimosa and everyone goes, Oh, come on, man. So there was just a Richie in special effects. There's just a string tied to the end of a mimosa glass that when he sits down, I pull, knocked over the whatever. That's just like, that's like a two-cent magic trick. You know what I mean? And like, so that's that shit that I love.

How did you convince Bowen to quit the show? I'm so sad. I'm sad. It sucks. But how come you're leaving. It sucks. Come back. When do you know?

When do you know? A while. A while, yeah. It seems like it was out there. He has stuff going on. He's making on movies and the wickeds. He's amazing. He's got culturalistas.

I don't know how he's done all of it. He does everything. He's the busiest show business man. And he still makes time to be nice. And he's the busiest person on the planet. Yeah. I can't even believe he did this much of SNL with all the stuff that he has going on. And he still.

And he's still. came in every single week with 10 ideas that were all funny. And I'm like, but when did you have time to think of those? What's your, what's the thing you'll miss about Bowen the most? I feel like I'm going to cry because I didn't really cry that much on Saturday because I was so just like overwhelmed or something. He's so funny.

Yeah. And like, just interpersonally, just in the office. Like if I'm feeling stressed out or tired or feel like shit, like he's going to make me laugh. He always makes me laugh, always. Even if we're like pitching an idea in his room that we never write that's just like he's a, he's so, like we were on. He's funny in his bones. Yes. And like even just we were in the pre-tape sketch on Friday.

We all got there at 8 a.m. We're on one hour of sleep. And we were, it was kind of behind. So we were just like in my dressing room watching Real Housewives. And he's just like mimicking all the voices of the women. And he's like, kid. Killing me. Oh.

Killing me always makes me laugh. And so it's just such a... It sucks. It sucks. You're going to have to do all those parts now. I'm going to have to do Moodang the Hippo. Okay. Let's do the slow round.

Who were you jealous of? I'm jealous of a couple people. I'm jealous of Ashley Padilla. Uh-huh. My co-worker in front. Because it goes back to that thing I was... talking about, she just, she writes the perfect sketches. She's great on the show.

She's amazing. So are you, but she's also great on the show. She's unbelievable. And she has, she's so fucking, she's so fun. She's so nice. And I've said to her, I'm like, how do you fucking write this shit? Everything I come, I will write like, I'm a lizard who lives in the drain. And everyone's like, okay, well, this isn't going on the show.

You know what I mean? Right, but about the show. And so, right, right. That's nice. That's nice. But we have a show to do in two days. We have to do it on the television. So I've been to her like, I'm like, how do you do this?

How do you do this? She's like, she helps. She helps. She'll be like, what's this character's motivation? And I'm like, I don't know. I don't think about stuff like that. She's good. She's really good.

So I'm like it's. Were she from like groundlings maybe? Yeah, she's from groundlings. So it's funny to say it's like I'm jealous of her skin. skill and then she's not stingy with it. She'll go out of her way to help anyone. That is so nice. So it's like there's, yeah.

And that's a great lesson too. It's like when people are generous to other people creatively, it's like, it doesn't hurt you. It helps you. It helps everybody. It actually helps you. Look at all your carmic points. Yeah, you get tons of carmic points. What is a time?

I don't know if you have this. Was it the time you were caught in a lie? Oh. John Waters is my special. Oh, yeah. He does a cameo at the beginning. Yes. And I was so starstruck that I literally couldn't speak.

Like, I couldn't move my mouth. How did you ask him to be this? I just, I sent him a letter. You just send him a letter? I sent him a letter. I was like, hi, I'm, I know every fucking psychopath on the planet says this, but I'm your biggest fan. Aren't we all? I'm like, would you be in my special?

And then I drew a picture of myself as a pile of bones and guts. And I said, this is your scene partner. Would you be interested in this being your scene partner? And then I put my phone number in it. And then one day I got a phone call from an unknown number with a Baltimore area code and said, Sarah, this is John Waters. See you on set. And I was like, that is so funny.

When I was on, I was so Starstruck, I couldn't speak. And he made a joke about some old movie actress. I couldn't, I was blacking in and out of consciousness. I had no. And I said that I knew, I was like totally. Like I was like, I totally knew. I was like, yeah, I know who you were talking about. That's a lie.

I was lying. It's a good lie. But I couldn't, I usually am good at being like, so did you see this movie? No. Totally. I would be intimidated by that with John Waters because he's also a legendary filmmaker. And I just. You feel like you sort of have to lie.

Oh, yeah, of course. Yeah, no, definitely. But then I like saying that I don't know something because I like also giving people the opportunity to explain something to me. Especially him. him getting to explain anything. Right. It's almost like the art of, when you're with someone like legendary like him.

Yes. The art of how do you fake it? Right. That you're worth even speaking to. Right. Right. But also have enough lack of intelligence that they want to tell you.

Right. Or teach you. I literally just wanted to be like this. Let's say, just talk to me. Just tell me anything. I love hearing you. you speak. I pay money to hear you speak. That's what I do. Your Christmas show.

I'm front row. Yeah. He's amazing. Okay. What is the what's the best piece of advice someone's given you that you've used? Dynasty Handbag, legendary performance art comedian, hilarious.

My favorite person in the world runs Weirdo Night in L.A. I like did Weirdo Night once and I brought all my fucking, I had my videos, I had a crazy costume, blah, blah, blah. And she was like, you're amazing, you don't need to do all that. You don't need to schlep all your props and your whatever. It's like, you're enough. Yeah.

I was like, because it is like when I was doing like bar shows, I'm bringing like my own projector and hanging up a pillowcase for a projection screen. It's like, it's all good. Yeah. You don't need to try. Like, you're getting paid $24 in a dikewarm. Coke to be here. You don't have to fucking do a fucking cartwheel on top of a sea horse. Like, you don't need to be spinning all these. Like, you're good.

Right. Just you as yourself, just being funny. Funny. Yeah. Versus like a ton of prompts and things. What's a song that makes you cry? I have two that make me cry immediately. The Christmas shoes song, don't, I can't even think about it. Like, the mom's sick and he gets the Christmas shoes. Don't know it. And. And, And then picture, I think it's called, Cheryl Crow and Kid Rock. That's a good one. I saw your picture today. Yeah.

And they broke up. But when they see the picture of each other on the bedside table, they cry. I have material. You have material? I do. Kind of. Throw it out. Throw it out.

Okay. I mean, mine's not really developed at all either. It's basically nothing. Okay. It's, oh, my God, you know, body standards on women is so tough. like, God, I just got back from Brazil or whatever. I got a BBHL, Brazilian butt hole lift,

which sucks because now I have to poop like this. You don't do like a whatever. Back handspring on the toilet. But it's like it needs the like, it sucks because now whenever to shit I have to take a yoga class and do a backwards dog or whatever. It's like it's missing the that.

What do you mean the that? It's missing like the joke part. Oh, the joke part, right. It has like, I like the image, a Brazilian but a hole lift and now my hole is like in the middle of my back, but it doesn't have the like. Right. And you just did this physical thing for the audio listeners. Oh, right. You just did like a back bend kind of thing.

To demonstrate that I would have to be shitting out of my back. Out of your back. A butt hole lift. Wait, so tell me what the Brazilian actually is. So the BBL. Right. That's a Brazilian butt lift. And that's when the girls get the big shelf butts.

Oh, okay. I mean, honestly, this is how much you might need to educate your audience. You might have to even explain it. Wow. Wow. Look. You're laughing. You're laughing.

Gary's laughing at me because he's like, no, people don't need to know. But I'm part of your audience, too. That's true. That's true. Gary knows, but I don't know. That's fine. Right. Here's what I say is like a universal, I think, in all comedy, is some, it's like you're wading through with trial and error, I think, figuring out what the audience knows and doesn't know.

And then figuring out what you have to say to them. Like, I think there's a way that you repeat, like, so a Brazilian blah, blah, blah is this and make that part funny too. Right. And then what I want to do is blah, blah, blah. And then that's funnier. and then it becomes more of the twist of the punchline too. Right. And then also, yeah, exactly, like, what to what you were saying earlier,

like, what if your butthole was lifted, what would be the repercussions of that? Right. And I want to get to the physical part. Right. Or now I can just shit at the urinal like this. Just going out of the back, just being backwards to the urinal. Oh, finally. I can do something standing up as a woman.

Something like that. It's also like if you got the butthole left, food would come out fast. Right. Because it would be the exophageal sphincter would be, right. I mean, it's a faster process, so you're literally just like eating a taco and like, like blowing it out your back.

Right. And it would be a more dignified way to do a human centipede. No one would have to get on their hands and knees. That's right. Which is undignified. I'm trying to think of what the other ramifications would be of... Tall underwear? Tall underwear?

It does make you think about underwear. What's the point of underwear? Right. Because, right, you theoretically underwear whenever it was invented. It's a goo catcher. It is a goo catcher. It's a goo catcher. I think it's worth breaking out what underwear does.

Right. And why it would have to go higher. But, okay, let's talk about the practicality of a butthole lift in terms of, like, why you'd want it. Like, do you want that or is it just sound funny? Well, that's, like, the problem with all these, like, aggressively, you know, the stranglehold, like, unfair body standards have on the female body. Oh, right. We're right. Oh, right.

I forgot that that was the premise. They want us to lift everything. Right. They want you to do the butthole rigs. Right. In this reality that I've construed, in my ironic reality that I've constructed. Well, I would say, okay, my boyfriend wants me to get a butthole. Right. And I said, I'm only 21.

It hasn't sagged that far. How much sagging has it experienced? Nope. Your but your butthole is sagged? Well, just everything does. Oh, everything. But that's not why he'd want the butthole. hole. Oh, for easy access. Oh, maybe. Because he wants to do a standing reverse cowgirl.

This is all great. Use it all. I do it. It's Saturday night. Everyone goes, huh? Esty goes, I didn't book you tonight. You're canceled? I'm outside. We're canceling you midset. Are you at this hell under night? No. I love watching you there. I miss going there. You're so good there. I miss you, I miss it. I miss going there. All right. Here's what I got. Okay. I was walking around Brooklyn and there's like 10 kids on a leash. You know the thing? Like they're dogs.

They're so cute. I'm just thinking how do we get here? And I, you know, the reason that they're on a leash is that they don't want them to be human trafficked. But in the process, they look like they're human trafficked. It's like saying, we got them, fellas. Go find the rest. And they're wearing those like reflective caution vests. You can see them a mile away. Right.

Usually if you're a trafficker, you would want to disguise everyone. Right. You'd be, yeah, you'd keep them under wraps. All right. So that was one thing. I like that. Well, also, you're in Brooklyn, the dog walkers, that's huge. Dog walking is huge.

That's a great point. The dog walking is huge and the kid walking is huge. Right. So how come nobody's trying to walk me? Meanwhile, I'm sitting here. I want to get a nice walk. Where's my leash? Where's mine?

Yeah. Everybody in Brooklyn's getting walked up for me. Can you imagine if you just, you and like a bunch of like six friends just threw a leash on? Had another friend walk you around? And it's like a bar crawl. That would be a good hang. It would be amazing. I can never get my friends to answer a group text.

I would love for us all to be on a leash. Yeah. Be like, no one's responded to the memes I've sent in the past week to my, group chat called soccer club. You know who you are, Jack Ruby, Dan Sloan, Eric Ray Hill. By the way, when you did the PDD improv show with me and the boys, it was so fun. You should do it always. I know.

They never ask. They don't ask. No. Okay. I'm going to speak with them about it. No one asks. No one answers my group text. That's why I want to get everyone in on a leash.

They have to talk to me. You're telling me that the time that you did it with us, that was the only time anyone asked? They'll ask me sometimes so last minute that I'm offended, where I'm like, I was not even the, I was not even an afterthought. I was after the afterthought at the bottom of the phone book. No, we book it, we book it like 45 minutes in advance. I mean, it's not you. It's us.

Okay. I had a bathroom joke, which is like, my problem with using the bathroom key at a cafe is, is like the wooden block. You know, the wooden block? Yeah. It's like 99% chance that wooden block was just touched by someone who just used the bathroom and wipe their ass. It's like if somebody who was like,

here, hold this big hunk of wood that moments ago was held by someone who wiped their ass. I'd be like, um, no thank you. This proposition. This is a little sickening to me. Get away from me with your weird bathroom block. Or when it's like a ladle. And then you're like, so now I'm thinking about some other guy touching this ladle in the toilet? What's he doing with this?

I know. Also, I'm not fucking stealing the fucking key. Chill out. Chill out. God damn. Yeah, I know. Yeah, they're really concerned that you're stealing the key. I'll give it back.

Jesus Christ. Here's your fucking wooden blocking ladle. Oh, my God. Jeez, Louise. What if you got the label and you're like, oh, this is. This is what I use. Thank you. Thank you so much.

Now I'll finally be able to transport whatever's in the toilet into my fucking car, gas station owner. I think I'm going to add ladle to it. It's always a like a big ladle or a spoon. Yeah, a big spoon. It's like whatever they have lying around that's the biggest thing. Oh, thank God you gave me a thing. Yeah.

And now look at me. Now I got to walk my sorry diarrhea ass all the way around this gas station to the fucking toilet that's like behind it with a fucking spoot. Maybe maybe it's such a big thing on the key because they know you're going to encounter someone someone on the way to the bathroom and they're

giving you a weapon. Oh that's smart. At the gas station. They're like, good luck. Here's a brick. There's a guy who lives in the bushes. Here's a knife. Yeah, that's what the bathroom key should have a knife. Oh my God, you're absolutely right. The bathroom key should have a weapon attached to it.

Sharks. This is a, by the way, perfect punch-up of this joke. Yes. Okay. The last thing we do is working it out for a cause. Is there a nonprofit that you like to support? I'm sure you support many. I like the Trans-Lifeline.

Trans-Lifeline. Trans-Lifeline is a trans-led organization that connects trans people to the community support and resources they need to survive and thrive. Translifelign.org will contribute to them we will link to them in the show notes Cool Sarah Squirm Come on

Watch the special Please watch it Please please Please please That's so good It's a classic I think we'll watch it for many years to come Torturing yourself

Working it out Because it's not done We're working it out Because there's no That's gonna do it for another episode Of working it out You can follow Sarah on Instagram at Sarah Squirm.

You can watch Sarah Sherman Live in the Flesh on HBO and of course watch her every week on Saturday Night Live. Check out berbiggs.com to sign up for the mailing list to be the first to know

about my upcoming shows. The full video of this episode is on YouTube at Mike Berbigley on my little channel. You can subscribe. Click subscribe. That helps us out a lot

and then you'll see more and more videos for posting a ton of stuff. Our producers are working out of myself along with Peter Salomon on Joseph Barbiglia, Mabel Lewis, and Gary Simons. Sound mixed by Shub Sarin,

and supervising engineer, Kate Balinski. Special thanks to Jack Antonoff and bleachers for their music. Special thanks to my wife, the poet Jayhope Stein, and our daughter, Una, who built the original radio fort made of pillows. Thanks most of all to you who are listening. If you enjoy the show, rate us and review us on Apple Podcast. We've got almost 200 episodes all free, no paywall. We've got our 200th episode coming up.

We have a very exciting guest. secret guest coming up. But check those all out. Thanks most of all to you who are listening. Tell your friends. Tell your enemies. Tell your friends who are getting a Brazilian butt lift. You know, the procedure can sometimes take a long time. And you could say, you know, while you're getting the lift done, you could listen to a podcast called working it out. They work out jokes and creative ideas and they talk about process. There's an episode with Sarah Sherman from Serent Live that you might find relevant to this day. And then maybe you might get another procedure. See you next time, everybody. We're working it out.