He's the writer, director, editor, and star of this show. And you know what? our ranking of all 20 original songs from the special here. During the last 15 minutes of "Make Happy," Burnham turns the comedy switch down a bit and begins talking to the audience about how his comedy is almost always about performing itself because he thinks people are, at all times, doing a "performance" for one another. Open wide.. BURNHAM: (Singing) Does anybody want to joke when no one's laughing in the background? 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. Most of the comments talk about how visceral it is to hear Burnhams real voice singing the upsetting lyrics. ", And last but not least, for social media he put "sexually pranking unsuspecting women at public beaches" and "psychologically abusive parents making rube goldberg machines" alongside "white people using GIFs of Black people widening their eyes.". Burnham is an extraordinary actor, and "Inside" often feels like we're watching the intimate, real interior life of an artist. He was only 16. BURNHAM: (Singing) Could I interest you in everything all of the time, a little bit of everything all of the time? "And so, today, I'm gonna try just getting up, sitting down, going back to work. The special was nominated for six Emmy Awards in 2021, of which it won three: Outstanding Writing for a Variety Special, Outstanding Directing for a Variety Special, and Outstanding Music Direction. You can tell that he's watched a ton of livestream gamers, and picked up on their intros, the way the talk with people in the chat, the cadence of their commentary on the game, everything. Even when confronted with works that criticize parasocial attachment, its difficult for fans not to feel emotionally connected to performers they admire. I actually felt true mutual empathy with someone for the first time, and with someone Ive never even met, its kinda funny.. The penultimate song, "All Eyes On Me," is the best in the whole special, in this writer's opinion. Unpaid Intern isnt just about unpaid internships; when your livelihood as an artist depends on your perceived closeness with each individual fan, fetching a coffee becomes telling someone theyre valid when they vent to you like they would a friend (or a therapist). Bo Burnham: Inside, was written, edited, and directed by the talent himself and the entire show is shot in one room. BO BURNHAM: (Singing) If you'd have told me a year ago that I'd be locked inside of my home, I would have told you a year ago, interesting, now leave me alone. HOLMES: So before he was this celebrated filmmaker, Bo Burnham was himself a YouTube star. Now, the term is applied to how viewers devote time, energy, and emotion to celebrities and content creators like YouTubers, podcasters, and Twitch streamers people who do not know they exist. (For example, the song "Straight, White, Male" from the "Make Happy" special). Burnham wrote out: "Does it target those who have been disenfranchised in a historical, political, social, economic and/or psychological context?". 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. Is he content with its content? And it's important to remember, you know, this is a piece of theater. The reason he started making this special, he explains in the show, is to distract himself from shooting himself in the head, the first of several mentions of suicide (including one in which he tells viewers to just dont). "Goodbye sadness, hello jokes!". 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? It chronicles Burnhams life during the pandemic and his journey creating the special. Down to the second, the clock changes to midnight exactly halfway through the runtime of "Inside.". 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. ", The Mayo Clinic defines depersonalization-derealization disorder as occurring "when you persistently or repeatedly have the feeling that you're observing yourself from outside your body or you have a sense that things around you aren't real, or both. But what is it exactly - a concert, a comedy special? The song begins with a fade in from back, the shot painfully close to Burnhams face as he looks off to the side. Theyre complicated. This is when the musical numbers (and in-between skits) become much more grim. An astronaut's return after a 30-year disappearance rekindles a lost love and sparks interest from a corporation determined to learn why he hasn't aged. Burnham lingers on his behind-the-scenes technical tinkering handling lights, editing, practicing lines. Went out to look for a reason to hide again. "A part of me loves you, part of me hates you," he sang to the crowd. of the internet, welcoming everyone with a decadent menu of options while disco lights twirl. WebA Girl and an Astronaut. Or was it an elaborate callback to his earlier work, planted for fans seeking evidence that art is lie? Burnham has said in interviews that his inspiration for the character came from real YouTube videos he had watched, most with just a handful of views, and saw the way young women expressed themselves online. Is he content with its content? Though it does have a twist. HOLMES: Well, logically enough, let's go out on the closing song. Not only is this whiteboard a play on the classic comedy rule that "tragedy plus time equals comedy," but it's a callback to Burnham's older work. It's like Burnham's special has swallowed you whole, bringing you fully into his mind at last. Other artists have made works on the wavelength of Repeat Stuff, but few creators with a platform as large as Burnhams return to the topic over and over, touching on it in almost all of their works. You know, as silly as that one is, some of the other ones are more sedate. Web9/10. HOLMES: Right. The song is like having a religious experience with your own mental disorder. But, of course, it tangles that right back up; this emotional post was, ultimately, still Content. Later in Inside, Burnham thanks the audience for their support while holding them at knifepoint. Burnham's earlier Netflix specials and comedy albums. TikTok creator @TheWoodMother made a video about how Burnham's "Inside" is its own poioumenon thanks to the meta scenes of Burnham setting up lights and cameras, not to mention the musical numbers like "Content" and "Comedy" that all help to tell the story of Burnham making this new special. So for our own little slice of the world, Burnham's two time spans seem to be referencing the start and end of an era in our civilization. For fans who struggle with panic attacks (myself included) its a comfort to see yourself represented in an artist whose work you respect. But unlike many of us, Burnham was also hard at work on a one-man show directed, written and performed all by himself. 1 on Billboards comedy albums chart and eventually climbed to No. 20. Its an uncanny, dystopian view of Burnham as an instrument in the soulless game of social media. So when you get to the end of a song, it often just kind of cuts to something else. Bo Burnhams 2021 special, Inside. . Maybe we'll call it isolation theater. But also, it's clear that there's a lot on his mind. Anything and everything all of the time. "), Burnham sang a parody song called "Sad" about, well, all the sad stuff in the world. But Burnham doesn't put the bottle down right, and it falls off the stool. Like he's parodying white people who think that by crucifying themselves first they're somehow freed from the consequences of their actions. Poioumenon (from the Greek word for "product") is a term created by author Alastair Fowler and usually used to refer to a kind of metafiction. 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. Burnham makes it textual, too. Finally doing basic care tasks for yourself like eating breakfast and starting work in the morning. Using cinematic tools other comics overlook, the star (who is also the director, editor and cameraman) trains a glaring spotlight on internet life mid-pandemic. This is a heartbreaking chiding coming from Burnham's own distorted voice, as if he's shaming himself for sinking back into that mental state. But on the other hand, it is lyrically so playful. "The world needs direction from a white guy like [you] who is healing the world with comedy. And like those specials, Inside implores fans to think about deeper themes as well as how we think about comedy as a genre. Inside takes topics discussed academically, analytically, and delivers them to a new audience through the form of a comedy special by a widely beloved performer. WebBo Burnham has been critical of his past self for the edgy, offensive comedy he used to make. See our analysis of the end of the special, and why Burnham's analogy for depression works so well. See our full breakdown of every detail and reference you might have missed in "Inside" here. It's an emergence from the darkness. So we broke down each song and sketch and analyzed their meaning and context. Its a feat, the work of a gifted experimentalist whose craft has caught up to his talent. As energetic as the song "S---" is, it's really just another clear message about the mental disorder that has its grips in Burnham (or at least the version of him we're seeing in this special). He's showing us how terrifying it can be to present something you've made to the world, or to hear laughter from an audience when what you were hoping for was a genuine connection. The structured movements of the last hour and half fall away as Burnham snaps at the audience: "Get up. WebBo Burnham: Inside is a 2021 special written, directed, filmed, edited, and performed by American comedian Bo Burnham. When the song starts, the camera sitting in front of Burnham's mirror starts slowing zooming in, making the screen darker and darker until you (the audience member at home) are sitting in front of the black mirror of your screen. 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. Also, Burnham's air conditioner is set to precisely 69 degrees throughout this whole faux music video. newsletter, On Parasocial Relationships and the Boundaries of Celebrity, Bo Burnham and the Trap of Parasocial Self-Awareness.. When you're a kid and you're stuck in your room, you'll do any old s--- to get out of it.". 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. And he's done virtually no press about it. He's almost claustrophobically surrounded by equipment. And it has a lot of very clever and very quick wordplay about the specific things you can get on the internet. A harsh skepticism of digital life (a life the pandemic has only magnified) is the dominant subject of the special. The voices of the characters eventually blend together to tell the live Burnham on stage, We think we know you.. When he appeared on NPR's radio show "Fresh Air" with Terry Gross in 2018, the host played a clip of "My Whole Family" and Burnham took his headphones off so he didn't have to relisten to the song. It's a hint at the promised future; the possibility of once again being able to go outside and feel sunlight again. At the beginning of "Inside," Burnham is not only coming back to that same room, but he's wearing a very similar outfit: jeans, T-shirt, and sneakers picking up right back where he left off. ", "On September 17, the clock began counting down from seven years, 103 days, 15 hours, 40 minutes and seven seconds, displayed in red," the Smithsonian reported. MARTIN: And it's deep, too. Burnham's hair is shorter in those initial behind-the-scenes moments, but his future-self has a longer, unkempt beard and messy hair. Social media; it's just the market's answer to a generation that demanded to perform so the market said, here, perform. Partway through the song, the battery icon switches to low and starts blinking in warning as if death is imminent. that shows this exact meta style. Known as "Art is a Lie, Nothing is Real," there's a bit Burnham did at the start of his 2013 special "what." This special spoke to me closer and clearer than Ive ever felt with another person. 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. Linda Holmes, welcome. Its a visual that signifies a man exposing himself, until you realize hes in a spotlight. Likewise. Copyright 2021 NPR. And that can be a really - if you're not very good at it, that kind of thing, where there's a balance between sort of the sarcastic and ironic versus the very sincere can be really exhausting. Don't overthink this, look in my eye don't be scared, don't be shy, come on in the water's fine."). The song, written in 2006, is about how his whole family thinks he's gay, and the various conversations they're having trying to figure it out. I mean, honestly, he's saying a lot right there. 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.". In one interpretation, maybe the smile means he's ready to be outside again. Burnham then kicks back into song, still addressing his audience, who seem unsure of whether to laugh, applaud, or sit somberly in their chairs. But look, I made you some content. While he's laying in bed, eyes about the close, the screen shows a flash of an open door. Theres always been a tension in his comedy between an ironic, smarty-pants cleverness and an often melodramatic point of view. I got better. He puts himself on a cross using his projector, and the whole video is him exercising, like he's training for when he's inevitably "canceled.". Relieved to be done? Simply smiling at the irony of watching his own movie come to life while he's still inside? So this is how it ends. ", Right as Burnham is straightening up, music begins blaring over the speakers and Burnham's own voice sings: "He meant to knock the water over, yeah yeah yeah, but you all thought it was an accident. Burnham says he had quit live comedy several years ago because of panic attacks and returned in January 2020 before, as he puts it in typical perverse irony, the funniest thing happened. Next in his special, Burnham performs a sketch song about being an unpaid intern, and then says he's going to do a "reaction" video to the song in classic YouTube format. Burnham watching the end of his special on a projector also brings the poioumenon full circle the artist has finished their work and is showing you the end of the process it took to create it. Burnham reacts to his reaction to his reaction to his reaction, focusing so intently on his body and image that he panics, stops the videoand then smiles at his audience, thanking them for watching. Burnhams eyes are sharply in focus; the rest of him faded out subtly, a detail you might not even notice with how striking his eyes are. By inserting that Twitch character in this earlier scene, Burnham was seemingly giving a peek into his daily routine. Here's a little bit of that. Well, well, buddy you found it, now come out with your hands up we've got you surrounded.". So he has, for example, a song in which he adopts the persona of a kind of horror movie carnival barker, you might call it, who is trying to sell people the internet. Who Were We Running From? It's as if Burnham knows there are valid criticisms of him that haven't really stuck in the public discourse around his work. MARTIN: You know, about that, because it does move into a deeply serious place at some point. I'm talking to you, get the f--- up.". Its an instinct I have for all my work to have some deeper meaning or something. 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. And finally today, like many of us, writer, comedian and filmmaker Bo Burnham found himself isolated for much of last year - home alone, growing a beard, trying his best to stay sane. And you can roughly think about this, I think, as a series of short videos that are mostly of him singing songs and that are sewn together with a little bit of other material, whether it's shots of him lying in bed or setting up the cameras. While sifting through fan reactions to Inside, the YouTube algorithm suggested I watch a fan-made video that pitch corrects All Eyes on Me to Burnhams actual voice. Then, of course, the aspect ratio shrinks again as the white woman goes back to posting typical content. The song untangles the way we view peoples social media output as the complete vision of who they are, when really, we cannot know the full extent of someones inner world, especially not just through social media. While platforms like Patreon mean creators can make their own works independently without studio influence, they also mean that the creator is directly beholden to their audience. Thank you so much for joining us. He is leaving it to speak for itself in terms of what it says about isolation and sadness. Parasocial relationships can be positive too, as outlined in culture critic Stitchs essay On Parasocial Relationships and the Boundaries of Celebrity for Teen Vogue. He slaps his leg in frustration, and eventually gives a mirthless laugh before he starts slamming objects around him. The clean, tidy interior that first connected "Inside" with "Make Happy" is gone in its place is a mess-riddled space. MARTIN: And I understand you were saying that it moves between genres. Netflix did, however, post Facetime with My Mom (Tonight) on YouTube. But he meant to knock the water over, yeah yeah yeah, art is a lie nothing is real. "And I spent that time trying to improve myself mentally. "I don't know that it's not," he said. 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. "The poioumenon is calculated to offer opportunities to explore the boundaries of fiction and reality the limits of narrative truth," Fowler wrote in his book "A History of English Literature.". "All Eyes On Me" starts right after Burnham's outburst of anger and sadness. I don't know exactly how it tracks his experience, Bo Burnham, the person, right? A gift shop at the gun range, a mass shooting at the mall. Burnham spent his teen years doing theater and songwriting, which led to his first viral video on YouTube a song he now likely categorizes as "offensive.". Burnhams 2013 special, what., culminates in Burnham, the performer, reacting to pre-recorded versions of himself playing people from his life reacting to his work and fame, trying to capitalize on their tenuous relationship with him. The hustle to be a working artist usually means delivering an unending churn of content curated specifically for the demands of an audience that can tell you directly why they are upset with you because they did not actually like the content you gave them, and then they can take away some of your revenue for it. Back in 2010, Burnham appeared on Showtime's "The Green Room," a comics round table hosted by Paul Provenza. Please enter a valid email and try again. Instead, thanks to his ultra-self-aware style, he seems to always get ahead of criticism by holding himself accountable first. But it doesn't. I have a funky memory and I sometimes can't remember things from something I've watched, even if it was just yesterday. That's when the younger Burnham, the one from the beginning of his special-filming days, appears. I like this song, Burnham says, before pointing out the the lack of modern songs about labor exploitation. "Oh Jesus, sorry," Burnham says, hurrying over to pick it up. 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. While talking to the audience during the opening section, Burnham takes a sip out of a water bottle. "Robert's been a little depressed," he sings (referring to himself by his birthname). Burnham watching the end of his special on a projector also brings the poioumenon full circle the artist has finished their work and is showing you the end of the process it took to create it. The video is an hour-long edit of footage that was deleted from the making of Inside. 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. . Bo Burnham: Inside review this is a claustrophobic masterpiece. It's like the mental despair of the last year has turned into a comfort. All Eyes on Me takes a different approach to rattling the viewer. 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. Thematically, it deals with the events of 2020, rising wealth inequality, racial injustice, isolation, mental health, social media, and technologys role in our lives. 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. At the start of the special, Burnham sings "Content," setting the stage for his musical-comedy. It is set almost entirely within one room of his Los Angeles guest house, the same one shown in the closing song of the June 2016 Make Happy special, titled Are you happy?. Burnham's career as a young, white, male comedian has often felt distinct from his peers because of the amount of public self-reflection and acknowledgment of his own privileges that he does on stage and off screen. It has extended versions of songs, cut songs, and alternate versions of songs that were eventually deleted; but is mainly comprised of outtakes. Its a lyrically dense song with camerawork that speeds up with its rhythm. The whole song ping pongs between Burnham's singing character describing a very surface-level, pleasant definition of the world functioning as a cohesive ecosystem and his puppet, Socko, saying that the truth is the world functions at a much darker level of power imbalance and oppression. MARTIN: So Bo Burnham has had a lot of different identities lately. Transcript Comedian and filmmaker Bo Burnham used his time alone during the pandemic to create a one-man show. "The quiet comprehending of the ending of it all," is another of Burnham's lyrics in this song that seems to speak to the idea that civilization is nearing collapse, and also touches on suicidal ideation. 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. Not only has his musical range expanded his pastiche of styles includes bebop, synth-pop and peppy show tunes Burnham, who once published a book of poems, has also become as meticulous and creative with his visual vocabulary as his language. Like most of Burnhams specials, it includes comedic songs and creative lighting effects. Just as often, Burnhams shot sequencing plays against the meaning of a song, like when he breaks out a glamorous split screen to complement a comic song about FaceTiming with his mom. I think this is something we've all been thinking about. A weekly roundup of the best things from Polygon, By submitting your email, you agree to our, Bo Burnhams Inside begs for our parasocial awareness, Sign up for the 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. Burnham uses vocal tuning often throughout all of his specials. Its called INSIDE, and it will undoubtedly strike your hearts forevermore. Apathy's a tragedy, and boredom is a crime. Hes been addressing us the entire time. This line comes full circle by the end of the special, so keep it in mind. Let's take a closer look at just a few of those bubbles, shall we? Each of the songs from the first half of the special are in line with Burnham's earlier Netflix specials and comedy albums. jonnyewers 30 May 2021. The piece also highlights Bos anxieties with becoming older and his legacy as a comedian. I've been singing that song for about a week NOW. The scene cuts to black and we see Burnham waking up in his small pull-out couch bed, bookending the section of the special that started when him going to sleep. The penultimate song "All Eyes on Me" makes for a particularly powerful moment. But then the video keeps playing, and so he winds up reacting to his own reaction, and then reacting yet again to that reaction. BURNHAM: (Singing) Start a rumor, buy a broom or send a death threat to a Boomer. It's self-conscious. You can stream "Inside" on Netflix now, and see our ranking of all 20 original songs from the special here. For those who are unaware, Bos real name is Robert Burnham. ", When asked about the inspiration for the song, like if people he knew thought he was gay, Burnham said, "A lot of my close friends were gay, and, you know, I wasn't certain I wasn't at that point.". 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? If the answer is yes, then it's not funny. We're a long way from the days when he filmed "Comedy" and the contrast shows how fruitless this method of healing has been. Only he knows. .] The whole video is filmed like one big thirst trap as he sweats and works out. In another scene, Burnham gives a retroactive disclaimer to discussions of his suicidal ideation by telling the audience, And if youre out there and youre struggling with suicidal thoughts and you want to kill yourself, I just wanna tell you Dont! Look Whos Inside Again is largely a song about being creative during quarantine, but ends with Now come out with your hands up, weve got you surrounded, a reflection on police violence but also being mobbed by his fans. HOLMES: So, as you'll hear there, on the one hand, there's a lot of sadness in what he's talking about there. His 2014 song Repeat Stuff and its music video parodies how boy bands and other corporately-owned pop stars prey on young fans desire to feel loved by writing songs with lyrics vague enough anyone can feel like it was written specifically about them. 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. But then the music tells the audience that "he meant to play the track again" and that "art's still a lie, nothing's still real.". "I'm so worried that criticism will be levied against me that I levy it against myself before anyone else can. Burnham is also the main character in the game, a character who is seen moving mechanically around a room. In his new Netflix special, Inside, Bo Burnham sings about trying to be funny while stuck in a room. That YouTube commenter might be understood by Burnham if they were to meet him. Bo Burnham: INSIDE | Trailer - YouTube 0:00 / 2:09 The following content may contain suicide or self-harm topics. Having this frame of reference may help viewers better understand the design of "Inside." Its horrific.". But by the end of the tune, his narrative changes into irreverence. It's prison. A distorted voice is back again, mocking Burnham as he sits exposed on his fake stage: "Well, well, look who's inside again. Some of the things he mentions that give him "that funny feeling" include discount Etsy agitprop (aka communist-themed merchandise) and the Pepsi halftime show. Yes, Amazon has a pre-order set up for the album on Vinyl. Burnham may also be trying to parody the hollow, PR-scripted apologies that celebrities will trot out before they've possibly had the time to self-reflect and really understand what people are trying to hold them accountable for. All rights reserved. Not in the traditional senseno music was released prior to the special other than a backing track from Content found in the trailer. Then he moves into a new layer of reaction, where he responds to that previous comment. Anyone can read what you share. On the other two sides of that question ("no" and "not sure") the flowchart asks if it could be "interpreted" as mean (if so, then it's "not funny") or if it "punches down.".
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