Offline with Jon Favreau - How Bo Burnham’s “Inside” Inspired Offline

Episode Date: May 9, 2024

Bo Burnham’s comedy has long captivated and caricatured the internet, but the era his songs skewer the best is the hyperactive, blood-thirsty, online world of peak-pandemic lockdown. Max, Jon and comedian Jamie Loftus discuss “Bo Burnham: Inside,” in which a child of the internet breaks it down and breaks down. Was 2021 the peak of performative virtue signaling? Which host impersonated a flamingo on stage with Bo himself? Is apathy a tragedy and boredom a crime? Find out on this week’s Offline Movie Club. For a closed-captioned version of this episode, click here. For a transcript of this episode, please email [e-mail] and include the name of the podcast. 

Every time he would launch into a monologue about why the internet was bad, I would reflexively grab my iPad. Oh, he's like, Bo's going to take it away. And I would open a mobile game and be like, well, how would I play Homescape if you took that away? I do love the idea that Bo Barton is going to personally reach out of the Netflix app and take your phone away. Take my cracked iPad. No, I can see that. He's right, but I need my little games. As he was saying that, I was like, come on, we get it.

We all know. And then he got to calling people in Silicon Valley bug-eyed salamanders. And I was like, you got me back. You got me. I'm Max Fisher. I'm Jon Favreau. This is a series we are calling the Offline Movie Club. Every episode, we watch a beloved movie, then discuss how that movie reflects or shapes how we think about technology and the internet. And with us this week, Jamie Loftus, comedian and writer, author of the hilarious bestseller

Raw Dog, The Naked Truth about hot dogs. What's up, Jamie? I'm so excited to be here. I love an excuse to watch a movie and pause it every three seconds and yell at my boyfriend about why I'm right about the previous three seconds. It's a great excuse to be on your phone throughout a movie and say, no, no, it's good. It's for work this time. Yeah, it's research. I don't have an attention problem. So you are as both a person who is offline, but also running a podcast currently called 16th Minute about the Internet. Yes. Yes. I was really excited to revisit this in particular.

Yeah. My new show is a weekly show that profiles a different character of the day every week. Generally, we'll either talk with them if they want to or if they want to disappear, that's fine. And then we'll talk to experts like you, Max Fisher, who know a lot about the Internet and why stories sort of popped off or were like sorted and algorithmically fed to us when they were. And if that means anything. What a great idea for a podcast. That's a great idea for a podcast. I love that. That Jamie stole from me. Yeah.

And this is the confrontation. And then Max's lawyer team just walked in they're coming in that's right has anyone ever been surfed on a podcast that would be really awesome well you just ruined the surprise wow content is amazing that's what i learned from this movie and what i learned from getting sued by you here today so speaking of absolutely wild real life content this week we're talking about inside the one-man show that comedian musician filmmaker bo from getting sued by you here today. Yeah, so speaking of absolutely wild real-life content, this week we're talking about Inside, the one-man show that comedian, musician, filmmaker Bo Burnham recorded in his little home studio

over the course of a year during the pandemic, mostly the 2020 lockdown. It's songs and skits. It's funny and sad. And it's a time capsule from the absolute worst time in many of our lives. I'm excited to chat with you guys about it. So just to start, I want to ask both of you,

and maybe, John, you can start us off. What to you makes this movie important? Well, we probably wouldn't be sitting here talking without this movie because it was maybe the biggest inspiration for Offline. Wow. I didn't know that. So I had been thinking about a podcast where I was like, I want to do like an interview show, but I feel like it needs to be

about like how the internet broke our brains. But is that like a real topic? And then as I was thinking about that, I inside came out and I watched it and I was like, this is totally a podcast. There's a million topics. There's a million different angles here. We should do it. It does feel like it's a show that's very evocative of a specific moment where we all realize that the internet like really is that bad for us. Yes. And it was, I think, the first like movie, special, whatever

to really dig into that. At least that I've seen. And so I think it was so far it's the best movie I've seen about the internet and also the best movie I've seen about what it was like to be inside during the pandemic or to be isolated during the pandemic. So it is a good time capsule for that. And I think that it captures like what it's like to have your brain broken by the Internet and social media, which is what we talk about here all the time. Right.

Jamie, what do you think? I came to this as first and foremost, a longtime Bo Burnham fan. One of my favorite fun facts to tell people about myself in college was that Bo Burnham was a senior when I was a freshman and we were in the same drama competition. And he played like King Lear, I think. And I stood so far away from him and I was like, because he was like, wow. Because he was like a famous internet child. Were you in college together?

No, no. Oh, it was high school? Yeah, it was like a regional drama competition. Just like big time loser stuff. And so he was doing like high school Shakespeare. I was playing like a flamingo in like a show about Aesop's fables. It was all, you know, terrible, bad. I didn't realize there was a flamingo in any of the fables. Well, it was a reimagining Max.

Okay, got it. This fable was a little different. Aesop in South Beach? Yeah, it was a Floridian. Honestly, I was in like, I was not very good. So I was in the background. So maybe I was just doingamingo as a creative choice. Like I didn't really have a part, but I had to be on stage.

So I just sort of would lift my leg and look on attentively. Anyways, I'm sure he saw me, noticed me and was like, I'm too shy to talk to her. I think it's inspired his entire body of work, seeing you as the flamingo. Yeah. He's like, who is that 14-year-old who was basically not visible on stage as Flamingo? But anyways, I was really into his work ever since he started on YouTube. And he's such a fascinating artist to follow now almost like 20 years into his career. I think he's so creative. He's so interesting.

I like that he goes away for long periods of time and really seems to like think and process and come back with something completely new. I feel like any comedian 10 years before or after him want to be him and are kind of jealous of like i wish like i i feel like so many of my friends in comedy saw inside and they're like that was amazing and then like resentful pause i could have done that well you didn't uh it was amazing i mean i saw this like probably i think the day it came out because like he hadn't released something that was a solo work in so long. And it was interesting to revisit because it's really rewarding if you know how entrenched his career was in the internet,

but it's also really rewarding if you were just inside for a year. So it's cool. That's true. I got the sense that he was very online before this came out, which makes sense that he would be someone who would be seeing the kind of effects of that and documenting it maybe a little bit before the rest of us were. Yeah, I think that, I mean, I don't know. I wonder, and I think he like sort of touches on it in this, but like when he became internet famous in the mid 2000s, there wasn't really a lot of blueprint for like what that would do to a kid like there was a blueprint for child stardom but like in this context where everyone has access to you all the time and you get like

there's no way to really filter out feedback and you have this squishy brain and you're just trying to make funny stuff like i can't imagine and then you know there's like a creepy 14 year old at a drama competition who's obsessed like it seems but, it seems... Well, we can all relate to that. That's very relatable. But that's why I think it really was one of the first sort of pieces of content that sort of dove into

how the internet's really breaking our brain. Like, today, it's like everyone's talking about that and has for the last several years. Max and I were talking before this, like, it's weird to think that it was all the way back in 2021. And then it's like three years ago.

Because it does, it seems, still seems like it was just like a couple months ago that it came out. Yeah, we'll get into this. But the experience of watch, I'd never seen this before, of watching this movie for the first time, four years after he started, three years after he came out, was wild. Because it made me realize, like, that was a long time ago. Yeah. Or it's starting to feel like a long time. And it's very particular moment and like i will get in the categories in a second but i like i think what to me this movie is really important because i don't think there's anything that captures so well what it feels like specifically to like live on the internet

and that feeling of like you're constantly performing you're chasing attention you're constantly looking around and being like am i doing doing the right thing? Do people like what I'm doing? Do they like me? Do they hate me? And it's like both kind of about and also a product of living online and like that cycle of doom scrolling and posting constantly. And so anyway, I'm excited to kind of get into like what that reflects for how we engage with the internet. So let's do the categories, guys, the big questions. So, okay, we're going to do a set of questions we do for every movie where we talk about like how it shapes how we see the world. And the first one, what is the biggest thing this movie gets right?

John, do you want to kick us off? Yeah, there's one song he does, but like a little over halfway into the special that I think sort of nails for me what it gets right about the Internet. It's maybe the best description of the Internet that I've heard. Here's a healthy breakfast option. You should kill your mom. Here's why women never fuck you. Here's how you can build a bomb. Which Power Ranger are you?

Take this quirky quiz. Obama sent the immigrants to vaccinate your kids. Good, I interest you in everything. All all of the time a little bit of everything all of the time apathy is a tragedy and boredom is a crime anything and everything all of the time yeah so that's that's what the internet is a little bit of everything all the time i also like to the boredom is a crime too because that's we have talked about this a lot on the show, which is the idea that you're not allowed to be bored anymore.

And you also, and apathy is a tragedy. Like you're supposed to care about everything all the time and voice your opinion about just everything that happens, no matter whether you have expertise in that area or not. You're just always supposed to talk about it.

You're supposed to care about everything all the time, everywhere. I love that that comes halfway through the movie, too, because I feel like it really nicely captures this transition in what he's doing in the movie, which is, of course, capturing like what we were all going through in that time between up to then he's tried to be productive. He's tried to be good. He's FaceTiming his mom. He's like trying to invent things.

But we're right at the point where he starts to like really snap and sort of like really like have all this anxiety and he's like kind of off the walls and it's like that is the moment when i think we all recognize that experience of like you deal with that by just chasing this constant dopamine rush on the internet yeah so they're really nicely captured that like arc of all of us going crazy in that period yeah uh jamie do you think? What did he get right? Yeah, I was pausing this movie every 30 seconds just to try to kind of track what he was doing because I feel like he gets the experience of, you know, if you were inside for most of the pandemic,

like the day-to-day just like dissociative aspect of it where it's like sometimes he is being goofy, sometimes he's being a bully for no reason sometimes he's being deeply introspective and like what do i need to say about the world should i say anything should i say nothing like just i just felt so entrenched in like and you could go through all of those feelings and like you know desires in the space of a day just staring at your phone i feel like he captured that perfectly and also managed to do it without getting so incredibly specific in the day to day that you felt like you were being dragged back into a news cycle

against Drew Will. Like he captured the feeling without turning it into a documentary. I guess you could argue that it's that, but I don't think it is. It feels like he's just trying to capture this feeling from his perspective as best he can and it's really cool and it also it like was kind of i had to like go on a walk afterwards because i had to like remember that like i i can do that you are allowed to go outside yeah i was tempted i was truly tempted to go to a bar afterwards just to be like because this is allowed now and i can do this and it doesn't matter if i'm alone there's people here like he really captured it because it puts a pit in your stomach to

to watch certain sections it really does yeah the thing that really gave me that feeling every time that it's like between a song and he's like setting up lights or something or he's like trying to get something to work and he's like cursing in himself and i like know that's in there for effect but that feeling of like bouncing off the walls and like struggling to find the next thing to do in the pandemic it's like really brought me back it also i mean not just a pandemic thing but like the struggle to be creative by yourself yeah uh just like it brought me back to writing speech writing and i would just be like alone in an office forever and staring at a screen and you start going nuts and you're like i'm terrible i can't do this and this is you know that it's it captures that really well there's a moment where

he's sitting on the floor i can't remember what song he's playing he's playing a song on the keyboard and he starts it and he'd like oh fuck i i breathed too loud i have to start it over and he keeps it in and i was like yes that's the most relatable thing I've ever seen. It's just like getting really mad at yourself for like fucking something up on mic for a second. Yeah. Just filling dead air with I'm a piece of shit. It's just so in the air.

You're like, yeah, I have a moment to myself. Like in the second you look away from your phone, you're like, well, I'm awful. And it's like he i don't know like it he sells it and it makes me sad because it's like dude you're bo burnham you're the best i know i know but i i just i don't know yeah like i like that he includes those like little moments um of hating how you breathe that's also the plight of the podcaster just being like why do i breathe like shit why are my breaths so wet why did I say the word like 20 times

during that episode wasn't necessary well this is something I thought he also he got like got right in how he portrayed it is this like crippling sense of self-consciousness that was so specific to that moment where it was like everything that everybody was voicing

in their policy where he's like I'm a white guy commenting on race and i'm self-conscious about that but i'm still doing it but i'm self-conscious about being self-conscious about it and like i'm sorry but also i still want to have a funny song and like i feel like that really captured that specific zeitgeist of 2020 in a way that's so fucking annoying i had i took a note that it was that it nails the performative progressive virtue signaling that that really peaked in 2021 right as it came out and i feel like it's sort of on been you know on the uh on the down slope since then but uh the at one point he has a chart when he's talking about like healing the world with comedy and he has a chart about like like live saved comedians teachers. Yeah.

It's like, yeah, that's a real. He's very funny at poking fun at himself, but there's also a certain like preemptive defensiveness about it that feels very 2020 progressive virtue signaling where it's like, look, you can't be mad at me. You can't criticize me because I'm already criticizing myself for like taking myself too seriously. And then he'll sort of like, I thought it was interesting. I don't know. I didn't remember it from the first time I'd seen it. But where he's commenting on the commentary video on the commentary video, like the infinity loop. Which is like, it also feels, I don't know, all of this feels so specific to three years ago. But it feels like a million years ago.

Like, I feel like he's acknowledging when he's being deflective and reflexive. But then it still comes back. And like, it's, I feel like he's acknowledging when he's being deflective and reflexive, but then it still comes back. And, like, it's, I don't know, it's interesting watching him sort of try to thread that needle, especially for Bowheads, where he's singing the song about his past content sins, which is stuff he said when he was 16 years old. And I can confirm it's autobiographical because I knew every single thing he was talking about. He's referencing his 20-year-old YouTube videos and that. And so it's like, I thought it was interesting. Like, there were certain moments where he was getting deeply autobiographical and you could know that or not and still sort of get the gist of what he was saying. And then there were other moments where I was like, hmm, is he talking about himself here? Like, I don't know. There were

moments where I wasn't sure, but it didn't take away from it. I don't know. There were moments where I wasn't sure, but it didn't take away from it. I don't know. Oh, totally. Yeah. But there was it was kind of part of that deflective, signally, but self-conscious, like progressive way of talking in that moment, which like I felt like I noticed that even more than the feeling of being transported back to the pandemic. Like, I thought I was going to watch this and be like, oh, it's going to be weird to be back in lockdown in 2020. But I feel like what I really noticed, like, wow, in 2020, we really had a weird way of talking about everything. Our discourse was so stupid. Things go a little out of hand. So I have a clip I want to play on that because I think it's one of the moments that I think is

interesting because it captures how we talked in that moment. And I'm really not sure if he's like skewering it, commenting on it, or if he is just embodying it. Do you know? I know exactly what you're... Maybe he doesn't know either. I said, right, which is part of the point. So we're going with my boy, Socko. read a book or something i don't know just don't burden me with the responsibility of educating you it's incredibly exhausting i'm sorry socko i was just trying to become a better person

why do you rich fucking white people insist on seeing every socio-political conflict through the myopic lens of your own self-actualization this isn't about you so either get with it or get out of the fucking way so like is he making fun of himself is he actually participating in this like i thought it was too on the nose it was a little on the nose to be yeah for it to be serious right like i thought i thought he was skewering that kind of uh yeah sure it's it's too much of a don't it's a burden on me to educate you kind of so that which is very 2020 which is very 2020 but it feels a little bit like one of the ones where he's like edging out of like like commenting on it's so weird how we all want to prove we're one of the good ones to like he's trying to prove a little bit that he's one of

the good ones right right whereas i don know. Yeah, that sketch is interesting because it's like he's, I feel like there's parts of him in both of those characters. And so it's like hard to know who he, because obviously the way that actual physical non-Sako Bo ends that is like really aggressive and horrible.

And like, which is like a funny way to end that. But, and Sako did nothing wrong. Sako had some points. It must be said. Sokko, yeah. I mean, they were broad, but they were true. And I don't know.

But the power dynamic in the end won out. That's sort of what I got from the end, right? Is that like Sokko's making all these points and can be very annoying, but at the end of the day, even if you're annoyed by that, he can shut it up. I thought, John,

I thought you were going to say that Sokko really needs to learn to persuade people and needs to learn about the value of the day, even if you're annoyed by that, he can shut it up. I thought, John, I thought you were going to say that Sacco really needs to learn to persuade people and needs to learn about the value of door knocking. Well, that is exactly what my first thought when he was like, oh, my burden of educating you is like, OK, well, do you want to live in a fucking democracy or not? Well, I think we're going to get a chance to get into that because I believe Sacco is guest hosting on PSA, right? Is that in May?

Sacco is going to be coming on. Yeah, what's Sacco's history with direct action? Not really clear. Sokko, do the work, Sokko. Not enough to post. One other thing I thought the movie got right in this way that like

was really kind of prescient was this monologue that he has towards the end where he's talking about, let me just read from it. All humor action should be contained in the much more safe, much more real interior. I was just going to read this. Oh, really me just read from it. All human action should be contained in the much more safe, much more real interior. I was just going to read this.

Oh, really? Okay, take it away. No, no, no, do it. I'm just excited that you are. The outside world, the non-digital world, is merely a theatrical space in which one stages and records his content. For the much more real, much more vital digital space, one should only engage in the outside world

as one engages with a coal mine. Suit up, gather what is needed needed and return to the surface wow that one hit me folks i felt that one well because at the moment it's ostensibly about the the pandemic right like you go out it's like but really it's it's just the whole way the internet is right we're all just walking around but we got we gotta be on our phones looking for content and the real good stuff happens on the internet yeah that's why i feel like bo Burnham is the perfect person to make that observation because who would know better than him? That's true. Who has been through every iteration or has been at least pressured to adapt to every iteration of the internet. And part of what I love about him is that once he was in a position, like, you know, finances, power, whatever it was, he opted out.

That's true. like, you know, finances, power, whatever it was, like he stopped, he opted out. Like he only makes what he wants to make. And he only talks when he feels like he has something to say. Like he opted out of that attention economy once he was, which is like a lucky thing to be able to do. I would love to shut the fuck up. Oh, we're going to get to that. Thank you. Thank you.

Where's the part where the, where women are silenced on the show because i kind of relish it that comes in post-production got it got it it'll come when we discuss your instagram oh my gosh oh yeah my my uh my white woman's instagram we're gonna get into it yeah uh but i just like that metaphor of like the world the real world is the coal mine that you stood up to go into i was like but i just like that metaphor of like the world the real world is the coal mine that you stood up to go into i was like wow i feel a little implicated yeah for sure and i also thought it was so it made me like really curious about like if there was we're going to come out now what would be different with that because i feel like now i was like watching that part and i was really thinking about like all of the people who were either medically or psychologically impacted by the pandemic in a way that like it's still hard

for them to go out a lot and it like really felt like it brought an extra layer to that that I know I'm sure he didn't intend at the time you know I took that I took the whole thing is so much even though it came out during the pandemic and it was like a pandemic piece of content I felt like it was much more about the internet than the pandemic oh for sure you know but that's so to your point about like people who like he didn't do too much of we're stuck inside we're doing this it was it was a lot more like we're stuck inside the inside the internet kind of but it makes it i think it does make it i think you're right but it makes it a really compelling metaphor that he's talking about thinking about the outside world that way through the internet at a time we were thinking about it that way.

Like for real because of the pandemic. All right. What's the smallest thing this movie gets right? Like weird little stuff you notice that you thought like, oh, that's pretty good little observation. I've got one. I really related to the absolute painstaking energy he put into framing and blocking himself on little Zoom cameras. Like I really took me back to like, oh, yeah, I only exist to the outside world as I do on this Zoom camera. So I really have to think about the lighting on it really hard.

The woke brand consultant. Oh, yeah. Like, who are you, Bagel Bites? I mean, that was your life, right? I was going to say, like, I have sat in meetings with brand consultants that are, like, the parody is actually not that much of a parody that he did. Really? Oh, yeah. What was the one?

I was once with a brand consultant. Tommy was with me, too. And this guy was, like, someone was talking about sound or something and we're trying to figure out like a slogan for this company or like a narrative message narrative

he goes you know I hadn't thought about that sound is an interesting vector to concept around we're like an interesting vector to concept

what the fuck are you talking about I've been in marketing meetings where they talk about concepting as a verb and it definitely makes you want to walk into this you just go and like the powerpoint presentations and the whole thing about like who do you want to be what it's not just enough to sell things anymore it's like it's what it's about your value but kindness the world wants kindness right now so let's sell wheat thins i have always kind of suspected that the purpose of those and like, please stop me if I'm getting

too close to home. But like the purpose of those consultancies was not to improve the image or perception of a company, but rather to make the people in the meeting feel good. Yeah. But they are cynical. No, I think that they think that it's actually helping the company. It's helping improve the image of the company like they buy it. I think they desperately want the company to be mission driven. And so they think that the new branding will make the company mission driven and not the thing that you do.

So instead of focusing actually on the work of being a mission driven company or your philanthropy or whatever else, if you could just talk about it differently, then not only will it help your brand, but it will help you feel like you're doing it. And then you have a consultant who's reassuring you that like, now you're saving the world. Now you're part of justice. Yeah. And again, something that really, really peaked in 2020, 2021. I wish that brand consultants would, I don't think maybe they just wouldn't agree to talk to me because there, I had an experience like it it would would have been in 2021 where we got a podcast ad that it was like and they always come during like women's history month and they're like some whoever it was working in marketing for it was like not lysol but something like lysol and they just sort of sent an email

that were like hey we're lysol we bought a bunch of ads on your show. Could you make it about woman? Thank you. The ad should be 30 seconds. And we were like, yeah. Cut to the next ad break. That's right. What is the biggest thing the movie gets wrong? I can, unless someone has one they want to jump in, I can start us off with the big one.

White women's Instagram. I feel like we got to one, white women's Instagram. I feel like we got it. We got to talk about white women's Instagram. Some random quote from Lord of the Rings Incorrectly attributed to Martin Luther King Is this heaven? Or am I looking at a white woman? A white woman's Instagram Okay, it's funny, but I feel like it's not aged great. Am I wrong? Am I being a buzzkill?

What white women are you following? I was seeing a different... What do you think, Jamie? I don't want to get all down on it if I'm totally alone. No, I agree with you. But I also feel weird about feeling that way. I was pausing a lot during this one because because like the visuals are really funny he has clearly captured a very very specific aesthetic like and i i think the aesthetic he's talking about is a lot of white

women but i also think he is actually talking about basic women. Yes, that is exactly right. So I think that there is a tendency sometimes, especially when it comes from a cis white guy. Yeah. I think that he adds the qualifier of white women, even though I do believe he's mainly talking about white women. I think he adds the qualifier of white women because it sounds bad if you just say women. And like, I didn't. Yeah. I like the visuals of it a lot of the specific gags are very funny but the i don't know i yeah i was in a whole debate about

it with my boyfriend where i'm like first of all check my account you will not find it and so as a white woman i grew defensive but but i think like i don't know and then adding the little twist at the end of that song where it's like and but i just felt like the moral of that song was like women i don't respect are people too and you're like yeah yeah the thing about the mom was dark we go to this long thing about like mom it's been so long like clearly someone writing a message about their their right and then he goes right back to making fun of her which is kind of funny which is like very pandemic era bullying too where it's like i recognize that you're a person but i can't stand you like yeah i don't know yeah i felt like i took it to be more you're right he it was too general by calling it white women's Instagram.

It's really like resistance. White women. Sure. Yeah. That's sort of like the Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Yeah. I mean, I think you either need to like broaden it or narrow it like that. Yeah.

And it just it's like it felt like very of 2020 where we're talking about white women specifically in a way that it like kind of presented as being anti-racism but it's like maybe we're just a little bit doing misogyny sometimes yeah yeah it was like it felt like there was a weird crossover of like i understood what he was trying to do i don't think he had any like malicious intent but i also totally get why that didn't work for people yeah i think it's like a very like white women are so frivolous like discourse in 2020 that I think we have moved past. That feels like very post like Central Park encounter, very like summer 2020. Okay. What else?

What else did he get wrong? Oh, I the thing that but and I I don't want to criticize Mr. Bo. I love him. It's all coming from a place of love. It is. The thing that ticked for me when I first saw it and did now is that, like, I understand why he needs to, to some extent, for the aesthetics of this movie. But he's in the guest house of his mansion. He is not, like, this is filmed in his guest house.

Bo Burnham does not live in a studio apartment for a year. But I feel like the aesthetics of this movie want you to believe he lives in a studio apartment. There's a bed there. All his shit is there. We never see him leave. But ostensibly, at the end of the day, he goes back to his mansion with his partner, who he had been with for many years. And like, that's fine. I understand that. But it just felt a little, it always chafed a little bit for me of like, it felt almost like a little bit of like stolen valor where it's like, he's going through the same set of,

you know, mental strain and losing your mind and getting sucked into your phone. But just the, I don't know, there felt like a little bit of like, trying to shift the ways especially because there are sections where he is trying to confront his privilege but in the studio apartment set that he's pretending he lives in so that always like just kind of bugged me and still bugged me on this one I get the sense there was a lot of discourse around that like when it came out

really I don't know I don't remember notice that was i was like googling around and i encountered kind of the detritus of 2021 discourse about like i didn't mind i get what you're saying i didn't mind it as much but i do get the point that it's like if if he's presenting inside as like his suffering is our suffering and he's actually got a little bit easier right is that. That is genuine, but... Yeah, I don't know. But I also understand why he's doing that. And it also feels like it references back to how his career started, which was also in a very small room by himself. Like, it makes sense, I think, in like the broad scheme of what he's trying to do.

But I feel like there maybe was a way to just reference the fact that like, this is not his home where I feel like- You could address it with that line. It's funny. It's an interesting point. I hadn't thought about that before. I think it kind of goes back to what I was saying about like, it to me was less about being stuck in the pandemic

and more about like being stuck in your own head. And so it was more like, you didn't have to know that he was living there to get the aesthetic. But I know it's an interesting point. I think I did take the ADU as mostly like the experience of interiority in this time. Like freaky liminal space. Yes.

And it works as that too. And that same house also appears at the end of his last special, Make Happy, Bowheads Will Know. So again, very rewarding for bow bowheads are you going to be on the the bowhead discourse later answering any questions i'm gonna get torn to shreds on r bowheads it would have been very like of the special though to make a joke about his mansion next door it's true next door is my mansion and someone who loves me so much which is like great i don't begrudge him that but i don't know but i think

yeah it like goes into what you're saying john of like this is it's more of a sort of manifestation of being trapped in the internet and not just a pandemic um i don't have any big things okay uh i really struggled i wanted to find one and i'm like why am i looking for a criticism for a big criticism if i don't have one? Am I a bad critic? Maybe. I don't know. There's a small thing. Small thing is

and this might just be a personal thing. I don't think turning 30 is when you get to have an existential crisis. You got to at least wait till 40. I would say I had a tiny one

when I got there. I was like so at 30. I was like, great, 30. I did. I loved turning 30, but I didn't do it in the pandemic. So it was easier

i thought this came out before i turned 30 and then i i'm over 30 now so i was like hmm if when i first saw it i think that provoked some severe anxiety in me i'm like what it's so i've time the whole year of 27 has been stolen from me and then watching it now, you're like, man, he's fine. He's full personal. Like, he's... It's definitely just me being old, but I was like,

because then it really got me. I'm like, I'm fucking 42 now. All right? How do you think I feel? I actually have pains and existential angst. Yeah, when he was being really upset

about not being in his 20s anymore, I was like, all right, buddy. Okay. You're going to be okay. You have. Oh, you're going to be OK. You have three days. You're going to be through. All right.

We're skipping a couple of categories because I think this is going to be this is a big one for me. The moment you most related to personally. I mean, the entire movie for sure. Every second of it. One that really resonated for me when he was talking about that, like, he took a few years off comedy because he was having panic attacks. And then he was like planning in January 2020 to come back. I think it had not occurred to me that we probably all have something like that, that we were really excited about in the weeks before the pandemic hit that we just like never got to have. Like I moved to New York right before the pandemic and was like so excited to live in New York and just like kind of never got it. And I think I'd like not really process that that's probably something we all went through, but like really

related to it. I mean, March of 2020, I was like, this is an election year. We're going to go out on the road and we're going to do all these live shows and it's going to be so fun. And then it was like, and it was like, I'm pregnant and also there's a pandemic. And I was like, we're going to have a much different 2020 than I expected.

And also going to run the company from remotely and everyone's going to, it was, yeah. I had thought about that. Yeah. Yeah. My whole plan for 2020 was i'd spent all of 2019 working on a solo show and uh 2020 i was gonna tour it across the united states and it was i was so excited i'd like worked on it and worked on it and then um i

i mean there was worse faith and i i became a podcaster that was the detour to podcasting, really? Yeah, well, I had been doing a weekly podcast before that, but it wasn't like my main job. But then all of a sudden it was like, well, this is the job. And all of a sudden people are actually listening to them. So, like, it was weird. But, I mean, I'm grateful for how it turned out. But, yeah, just, you know, compared to what I thought I would be doing that year, you know, I mean, no one expected to be sitting

in their own disgusting juices for a whole year. Who sees that coming? We put it that way, did not we? What else do we relate to? Yeah. There's a clip. Yeah, this is a big Jon Favreau moment. Is it necessary?

Is it necessary that every single person on this planet expresses every single opinion that they have on every single thing that occurs all at the same time? Is that, is that necessary? Yeah, so... I was like, I forgot a few answers. at the same time is that is that necessary yeah so it goes on i forgot if you answered you resonated for you because the answer is yes well right because we got it i was like i i first saw this i was by myself when i saw it in my house and i was like yelling at the tv when he said i was like yes no it wasn't yeah you got it you it. You nailed it. And just like I realized, this is what we do for a living. It just, it captures how fucking annoying the internet had become by that year.

And social media and Twitter especially, which was, you know, my drug of choice. But it was like anything that happened anywhere, the new rule was like everyone has an opinion. Expert, not expert. Experience with it, no experience. Everyone has an opinion all the expert experience with it no experience everyone has an opinion all the time everyone's an expert on everything yeah for all the stuff in the movie where it's like the degree of it has been amped down a little bit since we left the pandemic this is one where it feels like it's only grown and it's like that like pressure that everyone feels

to weigh on on everything all of the time and how we all agree that that sucks but also we still all feel that pressure individually we feel trapped in it it's like definitely still going on yeah yeah i really like i mean i think he kind of starts at this place and then comes back to it later in the movie but just the idea and i think that this is an enduring thing too if like is it okay if i try to have fun in my work is that like which is definitely like a thing where i mean i think of how poisoned my brain was at that time where i would see like other comics online just posting a joke and i'm like they should really be using that space for and then it was like well but do they know what they're talking about like what is the best use of everyone's time how can you like contribute what is it what are you supposed like him just like navigating that like i'm a comedian and comedians in spite of how many times people try to make them

into like philosophers or even like literate it doesn't always happen and that's like okay it's not the like it's just i don't know i I thought that that kind of cycling thought, but also being like having in the back of your mind, like, but if I can, I should, but I don't know how and when. And is it just taking is it just like, you know, filling a room with hot air just being like, I agree as well. Like what it I feel like we're still navigating stuff like that all the time. And he doesn't have an answer for it, which I also found refreshing because I feel like sometimes at the end of those, like I sort of expected that monologue that you pulled the clip from to end with like, and I figured it out. But no one is going to figure it out. No, it is.

It's politics infusing everything. And so every time something happens, everyone feels like they are like an elected official that must put out a statement, like a release a statement from their press office. Here's what I believe about this. And like brands did it. And like you said, like comedians feel like they have to do it. Athletes have to. And everyone has to have an opinion on every political or news development.

It's like, no, they don't. Yeah. Yeah. It's like him trying to figure out like, how do I use my voice like responsibly and like intentionally and also still do tell a joke. He just wants to tell a joke. Sometimes that's okay too. It's only a joke. But you can tell that he feels apologetic about it. Right. Right. Right. Which feels very to the of that era. But also still there's like a feeling of like, how do you adapt?

And I don't know. I just feel like anyone who pretends they're having it, they have it figured out. Like either like drop the cheat code or stop. Stop pretending because no one's figured it out. I really this is a quick one. I really related to when he was talking about, you know, the woe is me for turning 30. One point that he made that did really resonate with me is when he was like lamenting the fact that he is no longer going to get attention for being the youngest person in the room.

Like that was me. Like I'm sure a bunch of like front row A students in the room, like that was me for a long time. And people would always be like, wow, you're so young to be doing this job or in this space. And I remember the specific moment when there was fucking Patrick Kingsley, who is like six years younger than me, was in the room and he was getting the attention for being younger. And I was like, wow,up lineup where there was someone who was like 25, you're like, yeah, right. Like there,

I don't think there it's, it's scary. And I also think that him like responding to that by getting defensive and being like, well, one day you'll be old too. It's like, Oh,

that was the, yeah. When he said, now all these fucking zoomers are telling me that I'm out of touch. Oh yeah. Well, your fucking phones are poisoning your mind. So when you develop an associative mental disorder in your late twenties,

don't come crawling back to me. That's how I was like, yeah. And they will. That's most crooked media staff meetings. I went from being like, oh, youngest White House speechwriter to like,

my staff thinks I have the politics of Mitt Romney. It's a weird moment when you go from, because you get so used to like, I'm the young one, I'm the left wing one, to all of a sudden

there's someone who's like, and that's why you just got to stamp them out. It's the natural order. What would be different if this came out today? Like kind of weird ones is like there's no pandemic. But some of this stuff I feel like he would put differently. White women Instagram, you would say basic women. Yeah, I think there would be tweaks.

And I think maybe just like, I don't know if the questions he's asking would be different, but probably, I can't even put my finger on like the cadences would be different, the specifics would be different because they feel so rooted in 2020, 2021 brand. I was wondering if it would, it might reflect more of the like splintered parties over vibe of social media where it's become like a bit more of

a wasteland now and so it's a little more desperate and there's and also like he he's he's good about not getting into politics too much he does mention like bezos and zuckerberg just small thing but you'd imagine like an elon musk reference in there that's true if it was today and some kind of a you know what's like a little more of the Nazis have invaded social media kind of thing, you know, like just because

that's a bigger deal now than it was then. Yeah. That was my only thought. Yeah. I loved the Jeff Bezos. You did it. I love it.

I love it. I love it. I love it. CEO entrepreneur born in 1964. Jeffrey. Jeffrey Bezos. The recurring Jeff Bezos song was really something special. That's great.

I kept thinking, like, how would this be different post-TikTok? Like, would there be a song about, like, diagnosing people with made-up mental disorders? Like, I feel like some way you'd have to try to, like, wrestle with it because it's so huge now. And I was really kind of feeling its absence. I was like, this is really pre-TikTok internet that he's talking about. Or at least pre, like, everyone using TikTok. I'm sure. Yeah.

I guess it was around. Like, mass adaptation. Yeah. I don't know. Yeah. I feel like the most modern he edged up to was Twitch. And also, not to, to like call out my boyfriend. My boyfriend was like,

he's got Twitch all wrong. I'm sure he does. I'm sure he does. Now he knows how it feels after going after white women's Instagram. Yeah. Now we're going after

the boys on Twitch. The boys on Twitch are being persecuted by Bo Burnham. Yeah, that's probably what it would be different. There would probably be a little bit more careful selection about like who we're singling out. And probably gamers are going to get a mention.

Gamers need to answer for their crimes. I feel like there would definitely be less white guy commenting on the experience of feeling weird about being a white guy commenting on race while also still being a white guy commenting on race. You don't think we don't do that one so much anymore? No. I wouldn't say I miss that. I'm okay with race. You don't think we don't do that one so much anymore? No. I wouldn't say I miss that. I'm okay with it. I didn't love it when it was happening. The one really true thing he says that sort of references that

is when he goes, self-awareness does not absolve anyone of anything. Right. That was really... That was a pretty good... Yeah. It was a good... Although I think it gives you a little credit. Oh, yeah. That was a pretty good. Yeah. It was a good. It was a good. It was a good. Although I think it gets you a little credit. Oh, yeah.

Yeah. It's progress. Yeah. Not much progress, but it's progress. It's a step in the right direction. With self-awareness, I feel like sometimes you're like, well, at least he feels like shit about himself. At least he has the dignity to feel. That's how I feel.

Yeah. Okay. Well, that is a nice lead into our last segment because that was going to be one of my choices for true or false. So true or false is where I will read out a series of rapid fire quotes or plot points from the movie. And you tell me if it's true or false. Are we ready?

So ready. True or false. It's a very exciting time to be a brand, but also a scary time. I think. I think now it's false. Yeah, I think false. I think I think now it's false. Yeah, I think false. I think the brands are doing fine.

The brands have got they've gotten over it. They're not scared anymore. Yeah. False. Yeah, they can they can double down on whatever at this point.

Dewey, a sub true or false. True or false. JP Morgan is against racism in theory. I'm also going to say false. False. I don't know that they're affirmatively for it, but if they said they were against it. I don't know that they're affirmatively for it,

but if they said they were against it, I don't know if I'd believe it. I don't think they would go out of their way to say they were against it. I don't know if I can even characterize the entity

that is Jamie. That's how they like it. That's the brand consultant that they really wanted. Exactly, yes. True or false, if you drew a Venn diagram, as Bo Burnham does

in this movie, with Weird Al Yankovic on one side and Malcolm X on the other, the overlap would be Bo Burnham. I think that's false and he meant it to be false. I think. I think it's Randy Newman. I think Randy's up in there. I mean, I love Weird Al, but I feel like Randy Newman's a more apt pick.

What I'm saying is he's Randy Newman in Malcolm X. That's right. Well, I thought about it and I decided this movie is the Venn diagram of Hamilton and Crooked Media. Wow.

That's very funny. True or false, the scariest part of turning 30 is realizing now you have to think about the day when you're going

to turn 40. True, actually. That was part of my gripe. Yeah, that rated true for me. I thought that was the scariest part. Interesting. I would say false, but I appreciated the part that came after that where he's like, when I'm 40, I'm going to kill myself.

And then spent the next two minutes being like, but I definitely wouldn't and you shouldn't. But like, I get it. That part I connected with. That was really good. I love the way he shot that too. The projected on his shirt. Some really creative choices. It was really cool.

I really loved that. Of all the things in his... Because he leaves out a lot of... He makes it sound like he did nothing between 2016 and 2021. He directed 8th Grade. He directed all these great comedy specials. He did that in the same period? Yeah, that was 2018. He directed 8th Grade. He directed all these great comedy specials. Yeah, in the same period? Yeah, that was 2018.

He directed a lot of really, he directs, I think, a bunch of stand-up. He directed a Chris Rock special. He directs a lot. He's a really good director, but he's not super loud about it. But I was like, yeah, he knows what he's doing. He's great.

Okay, true or false, the internet in 1999 was, quote, catalogs, travel blogs, and a chat room or two. I think true. I thought about it. I think half true. I think we forgot about, first of all, stock images. Really big in 99. We forgot about piracy. That was at least half of the internet in 99. That was Napster. And we forgot about geocities. That was like least half of the internet in 99. Yeah, I guess that was 99. That was Napster. And we forgot about GeoCities. That was like Angel Fire vibes. Yes. Yeah. Right.

We had some MySpace. I think give the 99 internet its due. True or false, FaceTiming boomer moms hold their iPhone 5s no further than six inches from their faces. True. Yeah, I think that's true. That's scientifically proven, I believe. I think true. But I felt like Android-owning moms were really erased in this narrative.

My mom has an Android, and so I would have to set up Google meetings for us. And then she would have it on her computer and her phone, and it would start making that scary sound that the devices make when they're too close together. I'm so glad that Microsoft didn't make a phone and we didn't have to spend the pandemic trying to teams each other over the phone. My parents have iPads. So the FaceTime with the iPads is like, you're seeing them from the bottom up

and they're like very close, they're twins. And I'm just like, guys, move it. And now Charlie FaceTimes with them, my three-year-old. And he's not holding it right. The conversation between him and my parents is just a mess. I don't know if anyone understands each other. I know we always talk about, I hate to do millennial supremacy on this podcast. However, welcome to the Millennial Supremacy Podcast.

The only generation that knows how to correctly FaceTime. Okay, true or false, stand-up comedy sets over over zoom are and this is not the comedian's fault and i'm so sorry if i'm implicating you but a fucking bummer they're really rough true true some of those traumatic i remember logging into a couple like right after it's like we have to support comedians and i was like that's great i want to help people out and it just like watching people in their kitchens try to like get laughs so while people stare at them up from the fishbowl in the zoom it's just it was real and then the like because i would try to go and support my friends and they were like yeah they're like unmute your mic

laugh real loud so i'm like in my bedroom and like clapping like a seal And everyone's just like, well, so I want to die today. This is bad. This is really bad. I went through like a period of a lot of props. And so like on one of the Zoom shows, I like I had ordered this fake katana. And I was like, I was like, I'm not going to talk about depression. I'm going to use this katana. And I sliced my couch open. And then.

Deliberately? No, no. I just. That wasn't the bit. I didn't know how to wield a katana in my one bedroom apartment. Wow. I really hope you don't have any swords in your home anymore. I don't.

But yeah, I still have the same couch and all the cushions are flipped because the other ones are katana sliced. Wow. Bad time. All right. True or false, John, I'm hoping you can fill this one for us. As a former Obama administration insider, quote, Obama sent the immigrants to vaccinate your kids. I mean, not successfully. Yeah.

He tried. Yeah. We needed more funding from Congress on that one. As you can see, the vaccinations did not take off with everyone. So, failure. I kind of wish he had. That would have been kind of cool. Yeah.

All right. Last true or false. True or false, quote, maybe allowing giant digital media corporations to exploit the neurochemical drama of our children for profit. Maybe that was a bad call by us. Maybe the flattening of the entire subjective human experience into a lifeless exchange of value that benefits nobody except a handful of bug-eyed

salamanders in Silicon Valley. Maybe that is a way of life forever. Maybe that's not good. True or false? What do you think? I think that's a big true. When he said that, as he started saying that, when I was watching last night, I just typed Max. That's the book. he just tweeted it out i know it's true but every time he would launch into a monologue about why the internet was bad i would reflexively grab my ipad like

it was gonna take it away and i would open a mobile game and be like, well, how would I play Homescape if you took that away? So consider. I do love the idea that Bo Burnham is going to personally reach out of the Netflix app and take your phone away. Take my cracked iPad. No, I can see that. He's right, but I need my little games. As he was saying that, I was like, come on, we get it. We all know.

And then he got to calling people in Silicon Valley bug-eyed salamanders. And I was like, come on, we get it, we all know. And then he got to calling people in Silicon Valley bug-eyed salamanders, and I was like, you got me back. You got me. Alright, folks, well, that was the Offline Movie Club, Bo Burnham Inside. What a blast. Really enjoyed discussing this with you all. It was really fun watching it again, too. I highly recommend everyone

go watch it. If you have not seen it, take it from me. It is a wild ride to come into it four years later. Yeah, and I think it's been just enough time now that you won't be quite catapulted back into the existential depression of the time. I don't think I could have rewatched this last year. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. Yeah. The only one I had a hard time with was FaceTiming the mom. That was great. All right, Jamie, we'll catch you on 16th Minute. Yeah, thank you so much. Offline is a Crooked Media production. Our Movie Club episodes are written and hosted by me, Max Fisher.

The show is produced by Austin Fisher. Emma Illick-Frank is our associate producer. It's mixed and edited by Charlotte Landis. Audio support from Jordan Cantor and Kyle Sucklin. Kenny Siegel and Jordan Katz wrote our show's original theme music, and the remixed movie-specific bangers you hear at the top of each movie club are composed by Vassilis Vatopoulos. Thanks to Ari Schwartz, Madeline Herringer, and Reid Cherlin for production support.