So this is how it ends. Bo Burnhams latest Netflix special, Inside, is a solo venture about the comedian and filmmakers difficult experience in quarantine thats earned enthusiastic critical acclaim. The clean, tidy interior that first connected "Inside" with "Make Happy" is gone in its place is a mess-riddled space. WebStuck in a passionless marriage, a journalist must choose between her distant but loving husband and a younger ex-boyfriend who has reentered her life. Bo Burnhams Inside begs for our parasocial awareness The comedians lifetime online explains the heart of most of his new songs By Wil Williams @wilw_writes Jun 28, 2021, 11:01am EDT But Burnham is of course the writer, director, editor, and star of this show. Still, its difficult not to be lulled back into, again, this absolute banger. And many of them discuss their personal connection to the show and their analysis of how Burnham must have been thinking and feeling when he made it. The first half is dominated by sharp, silly satires of the moment, like a visually precise and hilarious song about social media vanity, White Womans Instagram, and a commercial for a woke brand consultant. It also seems noteworthy that this is one of the only sketches in "Inside" that fades to black. "Trying to be funny and stuck in a room, there isn't much more to say about it," he starts in a new song after fumbling a first take. How how successful do you think is "Inside" at addressing, describing kind of confronting the experience that a lot of people have had over the past year? Burnham had no idea that his song would be seen more than 10 million times,nor that it would kick start his career in a niche brand of self-aware musical comedy.
Bo Burnham Feelings of depersonalization and derealization can be very disturbing and may feel like you're living in a dream.". Trying to grant his dying father's wish, a son discovers an epic love story buried in his family's distant past. Bo Burnham: Inside is a devastating portrait of the actor-director-singer-comedian's dysfunctional interiority and 2020's unyielding assault on mental and social health. .] The structured movements of the last hour and half fall away as Burnham snaps at the audience: "Get up. "This show is called 'what.,' and I hope there are some surprises for you," he says as he goes to set down the water bottle. So when you get to the end of a song, it often just kind of cuts to something else. The song's melody is oddly soothing, and the lyrics are a sly manifestation of the way depression convinces you to stay in its abyss ("It's almost over, it's just begun. When we saw that projection the first time, Burnham's room was clean and orderly. I've been hiding from the world and I need to reenter.' MARTIN: This special is titled, appropriately enough, "Inside," and it is streaming on Netflix now. Burnham lingers on his behind-the-scenes technical tinkering handling lights, editing, practicing lines. Exploring mental health decline over 2020, the constant challenges our world faces, and the struggles of life itself, Bo Burnham creates a wonderful masterpiece to explain each of these, both from general view and personal experience. With menacing horror movie sound effects and hectic, dreamy camerawork, what becomes clear is Burnhams title has a double meaning: referring to being inside not just a room, but also his head. The tension between creator and audience is a prominent theme in Burnhams work, likely because he got his start on YouTube. Tell us a little bit more about that. In this time-jumping dramedy, a workaholic who's always in a rush now wants life to slow down when he finds himself leaping ahead a year every few hours. And like those specials, Inside implores fans to think about deeper themes as well as how we think about comedy as a genre.
Bo Burnham The video is an hour-long edit of footage that was deleted from the making of Inside. Look at them, they're just staring at me, like 'Come and watch the skinny kid with a steadily declining mental health, and laugh as he attempts to give you what he cannot give himself.
He doesn't really bother with any kind of transitions. At various points, the gamer is given the option to make the character cry. To save you the time freeze-framing, here's the complete message: "No pressure by the way at any point we can stop i just want to make sure ur comfortable all this and please dont feel obligated to send anything you dont want to just cuz i want things doesnt mean i should get them and its sometimes confusing because i think you enjoy it when i beg and express how much i want you but i dont ever want that to turn into you feeling pressured into doing something you don't want or feeling like youre disappointing me this is just meant to be fun and if at any point its not fun for you we can stop and im sorry if me saying this is killing the mood i just like ". "I was in a full body sweat, so I didn't hear most of that," Burnham said after the clip played. And if you go back and you look at a film like "Eighth Grade," he's always been really consumed by sort of the positive and the negative of social media and the internet and the life of of young kids. WebBo Burnham's new Netflix comedy special "Inside" is jam-packed with references to his previous work. But in both of those cases, similarity and connection would come from the way the art itself connects people, not any actual tie between Burnham and myself, Burnham and the commenter. The global pandemic and subsequent lockdown orders of March 2020 put a stop to these plans. That's when the younger Burnham, the one from the beginning of his special-filming days, appears. Finally doing basic care tasks for yourself like eating breakfast and starting work in the morning. Relieved to be done? Its folly to duplicate the feel of a live set, so why not fully adjust to the screen and try to make something as visually ambitious as a feature? "And I spent that time trying to improve myself mentally. It's like Burnham's special has swallowed you whole, bringing you fully into his mind at last. .] And it's important to remember, you know, this is a piece of theater. Got it? Photograph: Netflix Its a measure of the quality of Inside 1.0 that this stuff could end up on the cutting-room floor. WebBo Burnham's Netflix special "Inside" features 20 new original songs. Open wide.. I've been singing that song for about a week NOW. Went out to look for a reason to hide again. I have a lot of material from back then that I'm not proud of and I think is offensive and I think is not helpful. He's the writer, director, editor, and star of this show. He tries to talk into the microphone, giving his audience a one-year update. The penultimate song "All Eyes on Me" makes for a particularly powerful moment. Then he moves into a new layer of reaction, where he responds to that previous comment. While he's laying in bed, eyes about the close, the screen shows a flash of an open door. It's full circle from the start of the special, when Burnham sang about how he's been depressed and decided to try just getting up, sitting down, and going back to work. Soering New insights from various parties come to light that raise questions about Jens Sring's conviction of the 1985 murders of his then-girlfriend's parents. As someone who has devoted time, energy, and years of research into parasocial relationships, I felt almost like this song was made for me, that Burnham and I do have so much in common. Inside is the work of a comic with artistic tools most of his peers ignore or overlook. Released on May 30, 2021, Bo Burnham wrote, recorded, directed, and produced Inside while in lockdown during the COVID-19 pandemic of 2020. Comedian Bo Burnham recently a new comedy special for Netflix aptly titled Inside which was filmed entirely by himself while under lockdown during the Coronavirus Pandemic in 2020. There's no more time left to add to the camera's clock. Come and watch the skinny kid with a / Steadily declining mental health, and laugh as he attempts / To give you what he cannot give himself. Like Struccis Fake Friends documentary, this song is highlighted in Anuska Dhars video essay, Bo Burnham and the Trap of Parasocial Self-Awareness. Burnhams work consistently addresses his relationship with his audience, the ways he navigates those parasocial relationships, and how easy they can be to exploit. An ethereal voice (which is really just Burnham's own voice with effects over it) responds to Burnham's question while a bright light suddenly shines on his face, as if he's receiving a message from God. BURNHAM: (Singing) Could I interest you in everything all of the time, a little bit of everything all of the time? begins with the question "Is it mean?" "Inside" feels like the creative culmination of Bo Burnham's career over the last 15 years, starting with his first viral YouTube video in 2006. At the end of the song, "Inside" cuts to a shot of Burnham watching his own video on a computer in the dark. Parasocial relationships are neutral, and how we interact with them is usually a mixed bag. In his new Netflix special, Inside, Bo Burnham sings about trying to be funny while stuck in a room. HOLMES: Thank you. Burnham reacts to his reaction to his reaction: Im so afraid that this criticism will be levied against me that I levy it against myself before anyone else can. The video keeps going.
Bo Burnham On May 30, 2022, Burnham uploaded the video Inside: The Outtakes, to his YouTube channel, marking a rare original upload, similar to how he used his YouTube channel when he was a teenager. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Down to the second, the clock changes to midnight exactly halfway through the runtime of "Inside.". The title card appears in white, then changes to red, signaling that a camera is recording. Now we've come full circle from the start of the special, when Burnham sang about how he's been depressed and decided to try just getting up, sitting down, and going back to work. "Goodbye sadness, hello jokes!". But he's largely been given a pass by his fans, who praise his self-awareness and new approach. But when reading songs like Dont Wanna Know and All Eyes On Me between the lines, Inside can help audiences better identify that funny feeling when they start feeling like a creator is their friend. But the cultural standards of what is appropriate comedy and also the inner standards of my own mind have changed rapidly since I was 16. The question is now, Will you support Wheat Thins in the fight against Lyme disease?). See our full breakdown of every detail and reference you might have missed in "Inside" here. But I described it to a couple of people as, you know, this looks like what the inside of my head felt like because of his sort of restlessness, his desire to create, create, create. At just 20 years old, Burnham was a guest alongside Judd Apatow, Marc Maron, Ray Romano, and Garry Shandling. This special spoke to me closer and clearer than Ive ever felt with another person. "That's a good start. Let's take a closer look at just a few of those bubbles, shall we? Because there's also a little bit Bo Burnham the character in this almost. Back in 2010, Burnham appeared on Showtime's "The Green Room," a comics round table hosted by Paul Provenza. In the song Problematic, Burnham sings about his past problematic behavior, asking the audience, Isnt anyone going to hold me accountable? The specials intermission looks like a clear view into Burnhams room, until Burnham washes a window between himself and the viewer an explicit, but invisible, boundary between creator and audience. Burnham quickly shifts from the song to a reaction video of the song itself in the style of a YouTuber or Twitch streamer. "You say the ocean's rising, like I give a s---," he sings. On the Netflix special, however, Josh Senior is credited as a producer, Cooper Wehde is an assistant producer, and a number of people are credited for post-production, editing, and logistical coordinating. Or DM a girl and groom her, do a Zoomer, find a tumor in her HOLMES: And this is what the chorus of that song sounds like. The song is a pitched-down Charli XCX-styled banger of a ballad has minimal lyrics that are mostly just standard crowd instructions: put your hands up, get on your feet. HOLMES: That was NPR's Linda Holmes reviewing Bo Burnham's new Netflix special "Inside." The picturesque view of sun-soaked clouds was featured in "Comedy," during the section of the song when Burnham stood up and decided that the only thing he (or his character in the song) could do was "heal the world with comedy.".
Bo Burnham With electro-pop social commentary, bleak humour and sock-puppet debates, the comics lockdown creation is astonishing. For all the ways Burnham had been desperate to leave the confines of his studio, now that he's able to go back out into the world (and onto a real stage), he's terrified. Its an uncanny, dystopian view of Burnham as an instrument in the soulless game of social media. While this special is the product of evolution, Burnham is pointing out its also a regression. But unlike many of us, Burnham was also hard at work on a one-man show directed, written and performed all by himself. And it portends and casts doubt on a later scene when his mental health frays and Burnham cries in earnest.
Bo Burnham Something went wrong. Social media; it's just the market's answer to a generation that demanded to perform so the market said, here, perform. Burnham spoofs a PewDiePie-like figure a YouTuber who narrates his playing of a video game with a dead-eyed smugness, as shown in an image at the bottom-right corner of the screen. The special is set almost entirely in one cluttered room. ", He then pulls the same joke again, letting the song play after the audience's applause so it seems like a mistake. Burnham reacts to his reaction of the song, this time saying, Im being a little pretentious. Now get inside.". When Burnham's character decides he doesn't want to actually hear criticism from Socko, he threatens to remove him, prompting Socko's subservience once again, because "that's how the world works.". Its a lyrically dense song with camerawork that speeds up with its rhythm. Then, the video keeps going past the runtime of the song and into that reaction itself. The penultimate song "All Eyes on Me" makes for a particularly powerful moment. But it doesn't. And its easier to relax when the video focuses on a separate take of Burnham singing from farther away, the frame now showing the entire room.
Bo Burnham and concludes that if it's mean, it's not funny. Netflix Self-awareness does not absolve anyone of anything, he says. Teeuwen's performance shows a twisted, codependent relationship between him and the puppet on his hand, something Burnham is clearly channeling in his own sock puppet routine in "Inside.". Theyre complicated. The song begins with a fade in from back, the shot painfully close to Burnhams face as he looks off to the side. The first comes when Burnham looks directly into the camera as he addresses the audience, singing, Are you feeling nervous? Even when confronted with works that criticize parasocial attachment, its difficult for fans not to feel emotionally connected to performers they admire. Anything and everything all of the time. It's conscious of self. Daddy made you your favorite. HOLMES: It felt very true to me, not in the literal sense. Fifteen years later, Burnham found himself sheltering in place during the COVID-19 pandemic and decided to sit back down at his piano and see if he could once again entertain the world from the claustrophobic confines of a single room. I don't think it's perfectly morally defendable.". One of those is the internet itself. Years later, the comedian told NPR's Terry Gross that performing the special was so tough that he was having panic attacks on stage. During that taping, Burnham said his favorite comic at the time was Hans Teeuwen, a "Dutch absurdist," who has a routine with a sock puppet that eats a candy bar as Teeuwen sings. And it has a lot of very clever and very quick wordplay about the specific things you can get on the internet. But in recent years, theres been enough awareness of online behavior to see how parasocial relationships can have negative impacts on both the creator and the audience if left uninterrogated by both parties. And I think that, 'Oh if I'm self-aware about being a douchebag it'll somehow make me less of a douchebag.' Initially, this seems like a pretty standard takedown of the basic bitch stereotype co-opted from Black Twitter, until the aspect ratio widens and Burnham sings a shockingly personal, emotional caption from the same feed. HOLMES: Well, logically enough, let's go out on the closing song. / Are you having fun? The crowd directions are no longer stock pop song lyrics; now, the audience understands them as direct orders to them from Burnham. It's wonderful to be with you. For the album, Bo is credited as writer, performer, and producer on every song. WebBo's transcripts on Scraps From The Loft. Though it does have a twist. It's a heartbreaking chiding coming from his own distorted voice, as if he's shaming himself for sinking back into that mental state. In the same way that earlier vocal distortion represented God, the effect on his voice in "All Eyes on Me" seems to signal some omniscient force outside of Burnham. I feel very close and intimate with him in this version. Inside, a new Netflix special written, performed, directed, shot, and edited by comedian Bo Burnham, invokes and plays with many forms. And notably, Burnhams work focuses on parasocial relationships not from the perspective of the audience, but the perspective of the performer.Inside depicts how being a creator can feel: you are a cult leader, you are holding your audience hostage, your audience is holding you hostage, you are your audience, your audience can never be you, you need your audience, and you need to escape your audience. He is now back to where he was, making jokes alone in his room, an effort to escape his reality. He was alone. When that future-Burnham appears, it's almost like a precursor to what he'll have shown us by the end of the special: That both he, and his audience, could never have known just how brutal the next year was about to be.
Bo Burnham Entertainment correspondent Kim Renfro ranked them in ascending order of greatness. And you know what? Likewise. As he shows in this new sketch, he's aware at a meta level that simply trying to get ahead of the criticism that could be tossed his way is itself a performance sometimes. He was only 16. But then the video keeps playing, and so he winds up reacting to his own reaction, and then reacting yet again to that reaction. WebBo Burnham: Inside is a 2021 special written, directed, filmed, edited, and performed by American comedian Bo Burnham.
you might have missed in Bo Burnham WebA biotech genius tries to bounce back from the depths of grief with help from his son, who works to escape his dads shadow and save the family business. In Unpaid Intern, Burnham sings about how deeply unethical the position is to the workers in a pastiche of other labor-focused blues. "If greenhouse gas emissions continue at their current rate, then when the clock runs out, the average global temperature will be irreversibly on its way to 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit above pre-industrial levels.". Also, Burnham's air conditioner is set to precisely 69 degrees throughout this whole faux music video. Well, well, buddy you found it, now come out with your hands up we've got you surrounded.".
Bo Burnham And the biggest risk Burnham takes in the show is letting his emotional side loose, but not before cracking a ton of jokes. He, for example, it starts off with him rhyming carpool karaoke, which is a segment on James Corden's show, with Steve Aoki, who's a DJ. For fans who struggle with panic attacks (myself included) its a comfort to see yourself represented in an artist whose work you respect. Right after the song ends, the shot of Burnham's guest house returns but this time it's filled with clutter. The frame is intimate, and after such an intense special, something about that intimacy feels almost dangerous, like you should be preparing for some kind of emotional jump scare. Simply smiling at the irony of watching his own movie come to life while he's still inside? But then, just as Burnham is vowing to always stay inside, and lamenting that he'll be "fully irrelevant and totally broken" in the future, the spotlight turns on him and he's completely naked. But by the end of the tune, his narrative changes into irreverence. We're a long way from the days when he filmed "Comedy" and the contrast shows how fruitless this method of healing has been. In this case, it's likely some combination of depression/anxiety/any other mental disorder. So let's dive into "Inside" and take a closer look at nearly every song and sketch in Burnham's special. I got better. Remember how Burnham's older, more-bearded self popped up at the beginning of "Inside" when we were watching footage of him setting up the cameras and lighting? After about 35 minutes of candy-colored, slickly designed sketch comedy, the tone shifts with Burnhams first completely earnest song, a lovely indie-rock tune with an ear worm of a hook about trying to be funny and stuck in a room. This is the shows hinge. Comedian and filmmaker Bo Burnham used his time alone during the pandemic to create a one-man show. He's freely admitting that self-awareness isn't enough while also clearly unable to move away from that self-aware comedic space he so brilliantly holds. The song's melody is oddly soothing, and the lyrics are a sly manifestation of the way depression convinces you to stay in its abyss ("It's almost over, it's just begun. But now Burnham is back. But, like so many other plans and hopes people had in the early months of the pandemic, that goal proved unattainable. @TheWoodMother made a video about how Burnham's "Inside" is its own poioumenon, which led to his first viral video on YouTube, written in 2006, is about how his whole family thinks he's gay, defines depersonalization-derealization disorder, "critical window for action to prevent the effects of global warming from becoming irreversible.". By inserting that Twitch character in this earlier scene, Burnham was seemingly giving a peek into his daily routine. Now Burnham is showing us the clutter of the room, where he's almost claustrophobically surrounded by equipment. Today We'll Talk About That Day Released on May 30, 2021, Bo Burnham wrote, recorded, directed, and produced Inside while in lockdown during the COVID-19 pandemic of 2020. ", From then on, the narrative of "Inside" follows Burnham returning to his standard comedic style and singing various parody songs like "FaceTime with My Mom" and "White Woman's Instagram.". When you're a kid and you're stuck in your room, you'll do any old s--- to get out of it.". 7 on the Top 200. All Eyes on Me also earned Bo his first Grammy win for Best Song Written for Visual Media at the 2022 Grammys. HOLMES: Right.
Bo Burnham It's a series of musical numbers and skits that are inherently about the creation of comedy itself. While he's laying in bed, eyes about the close, the screen shows a flash of an open door.
The album peaked at #7 on the Billboard 200 chart, #1 on the Comedy Albums chart, and #18 on the Independent Albums chart. "And so, today, I'm gonna try just getting up, sitting down, going back to work. Im talking to you. My heart hurts with and for him. It's like the mental despair of the last year has turned into a comfort. He is not talking about it very much. Theres a nostalgic sweetness to this song, but parts of it return throughout the show, in darker forms, one of many variations on a theme. It's not.
Bo Burnham: Inside For all the ways Burnham had been desperate to leave the confines of his studio, now that he's able to go back out into the world (and onto a real stage), he's terrified. This is when the musical numbers (and in-between skits) become much more grim. HOLMES: Yeah. Burnham slaps his leg in frustration and eventually gives a mirthless laugh before he starts slamming objects around him. Burnham then kicks back into song, still addressing his audience, who seem unsure of whether to laugh, applaud, or sit somberly in their chairs. In recent years, he has begun directing other comics specials, staging stand-up sets by Chris Rock and Jerrod Carmichael with his signature extreme close-ups. That cloud scene was projected onto Burnham during the section of "Comedy" when Burnham stood up right after the God-like voice had given him his directive to "heal the world with comedy."
Bo Burnham He also costarred in the Oscar-winning movie "Promising Young Woman," filmed in 2019. MARTIN: So Bo Burnham has had a lot of different identities lately. NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor.