Underneath the Steve Martin-like formal trickery has always beaten the heaving heart of a flamboyantly dramatic theater kid. 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 So in "Inside," when we see Burnham recording himself doing lighting set up and then accidentally pull down his camera was that a real blooper he decided to edit in? Mid-song, a spotlight turns on Burnham and shows him completely naked as a voice sings: "Well, well, look who's inside again. I think this is something we've all been thinking about. And they're biting, but he's also very talented at these little catchy pop hooks. The whole song sounds like you're having a religious experience with your own mental disorder, especially when new harmonies kick in. I did! But by using this meta-narrative throughout the whole special, Burnham messes with our ability to know when we're seeing a genuine struggle with artistic expression versus a meticulously staged fictional breakdown. (For example, the song "Straight, White, Male" from the "Make Happy" special). And it's important to remember, you know, this is a piece of theater. Disclosure: Mathias Dpfner, CEO of Business Insider's parent company, Axel Springer, is a Netflix board member. MARTIN: And I understand you were saying that it moves between genres. Now, five years later, Burnham's new parody song is digging even deeper at the philosophical question of whether or not it's appropriate to be creating comedy during a horrifyingly raw period of tragedy like the COVID-19 pandemic and the social reckoning that followed George Floyd's murder. 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.". One of the most encouraging developments in comedy over the past decade has been the growing directorial ambition of stand-up specials. It also seems noteworthy that this is one of the only sketches in "Inside" that fades to black. Bo Burnham 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. 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. The arrogance is taught or it was cultivated. WebBo Burnham's "Inside" special on Netflix is an incredibly detailed musical-comedy artwork. 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. He is now back to where he was, making jokes alone in his room, an effort to escape his reality. Get up. Not a comedy per se, but a masterpiece nonetheless. newsletter, On Parasocial Relationships and the Boundaries of Celebrity, Bo Burnham and the Trap of Parasocial Self-Awareness.. Having this frame of reference may help viewers better understand the design of "Inside." But, like so many other plans and hopes people had in the early months of the pandemic, that goal proved unattainable. The final shot is of him looking positively orgasmic, eyes closed, on the cross. While he's laying in bed, eyes about the close, the screen shows a flash of an open door. 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. According to the special, Bo decided he was ready to begin doing stand-up again in January 2020, after dealing with panic attacks onstage during his previous tour, the Make Happy Tour of 2015-2016. He decided to stop doing live performances, and instead set out to write and direct his first feature film, the critically-acclaimed 2018 movie "Eighth Grade." Similarly, Burnham often speaks to the audience by filming himself speaking to himself in a mirror. "Truly, it's like, for a 16-year-old kid in 2006, it's not bad. There's also another little joke baked into this bit, because the game is made by a company called SSRI interactive the most common form of antidepressant drugs are called selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, aka SSRIs. 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. Like he's parodying white people who think that by crucifying themselves first they're somehow freed from the consequences of their actions. All Eyes on Me takes a different approach to rattling the viewer. I've been singing that song for about a week NOW. While this special is the product of evolution, Burnham is pointing out its also a regression. Its a stupid song, and, uh, it doesnt really mean anything. The video continues. If we continue to look at it from the lens of a musical narrative, this is the point at which our protagonist realizes he's failed at his mission. One comment stuck out to me: Theres something really powerful and painful about, hearing his actual voice singing and breaking at certain points. 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. So when you get to the end of a song, it often just kind of cuts to something else. Like, what is it? I got better. HOLMES: It felt very true to me, not in the literal sense. A harsh skepticism of digital life (a life the pandemic has only magnified) is the dominant subject of the special. 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. It's so good to hear your voice. As a subscriber, you have 10 gift articles to give each month. He tries to talk into the microphone, giving his audience a one-year update. 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 My heart hurts with and for him. But now Burnham is showing us the clutter of the room where "Inside" was filmed. 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? The song begins with a fade in from back, the shot painfully close to Burnhams face as he looks off to the side. Might not help but still it couldn't hurt. Bo Burnhams Inside: A Comedy Special and an Inspired Experiment, https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/01/arts/television/bo-burnham-inside-comedy.html. The fun thing about this is he started writing it and recording it early on, so you get to see clips of him singing it both, you know, with the short hair and with the long hair - when he had just started this special and when he was finishing it. Today We'll Talk About That Day "I'm so worried that criticism will be levied against me that I levy it against myself before anyone else can. 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: Inside "Oh Jesus, sorry," Burnham says, hurrying over to pick it up. Once he's decided he's done with the special, Burnham brings back all the motifs from the earlier songs into "Goodbye," his finale of this musical movie. Burnham achieved a similar uncanny sense of realism in his movie "Eighth Grade," the protagonist of which is a 13-year-old girl with extreme social anxiety who makes self-help YouTube videos. 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. 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. The song brings with it an existential dread, but Burnham's depression-voice tells us not to worry and sink into nihilism. Under stand up, Burnham wrote "Middle-aged men protecting free speech by humping stools and telling stories about edibles" and "podcasts. MARTIN: This special is titled, appropriately enough, "Inside," and it is streaming on Netflix now. Bo Burnham: INSIDE | Trailer - YouTube 0:00 / 2:09 The following content may contain suicide or self-harm topics. The song is like having a religious experience with your own mental disorder. Bo Burnham: Inside review this is a claustrophobic masterpiece. He also costarred in the Oscar-winning movie "Promising Young Woman," filmed in 2019. "Got it? 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.". Bo Burnham The first comes when Burnham looks directly into the camera as he addresses the audience, singing, Are you feeling nervous? For fans who struggle with panic attacks (myself included) its a comfort to see yourself represented in an artist whose work you respect. Some of this comes through in how scenes are shot and framed: its common for the special to be filmed, projected onto Burnhams wall (or, literally, himself), and then filmed again for the audience. BURNHAM: (Singing) Does anybody want to joke when no one's laughing in the background? At the second level of the reaction video, Burnham says: "I'm being a little pretentious. Went out to look for a reason to hide again. We're a long way from the days when he filmed "Comedy" and the contrast shows how fruitless this method of healing has been. And it has a lot of very clever and very quick wordplay about the specific things you can get on the internet. Disclosure: Mathias Dpfner, CEO of Business Insider's parent company, Axel Springer, is a Netflix board member. WebBo Burnham: Inside is by far one of the riskiest and original comedy specials to come out in years. "Robert's been a little depressed," he sings (referring to himself by his birthname). "I didn't perform for five years," he says. Bo Burnham Bo Burnham "), Burnham sang a parody song called "Sad" about, well, all the sad stuff in the world. Years later, the comedian told NPR's Terry Gross that performing the special was so tough that he was having panic attacks on stage. It's a hint at the promised future; the possibility of once again being able to go outside and feel sunlight again. But also, it's clear that there's a lot on his mind. A series of eerie events thrusts an unlikely trio (John Boyega, Jamie Foxx and Teyonah Parris) onto the trail of a nefarious government conspiracy. 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. HOLMES: Well, logically enough, let's go out on the closing song. MARTIN: You know, about that, because it does move into a deeply serious place at some point. 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. Most creator-made content online is available for free, meaning creators usually have to rely on their fans for income via crowdfunding like Patreon. 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.". At first it seems to be just about life in the pandemic, but it becomes a reference to his past, when he made faces and jokes from his bedroom as a teenager and put that on the internet. jonnyewers 30 May 2021. WebBo Burnham's new Netflix comedy special "Inside" is jam-packed with references to his previous work. Perform everything to each other, all the time for no reason. While the other songs have abrupt endings, or harsh transitions, "That Funny Feeling" simply fades quietly into darkness perhaps the way Burnham imagines the ending of it all will happen. This is when the musical numbers (and in-between skits) become much more grim. that shows this exact meta style. Social media; it's just the market's answer to a generation that demanded to perform so the market said, here, perform. It's a hint at the promised future; the possibility of once again being able to go outside and feel sunlight again. Well now the shots are reversed. 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.". 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. he sings as he refers to his birth name. Burnham wrote out: "Does it target those who have been disenfranchised in a historical, political, social, economic and/or psychological context?". That's when the younger Burnham, the one from the beginning of his special-filming days, appears. 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. Good. Bo Burnham On June 9, Burnham released the music from the special in an album titled Inside (The Songs), which hit No. When you're a kid and you're stuck in your room, you'll do any old s--- to get out of it.". Bo Burnham It's conscious of self. Inside 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?. 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. Bo Burnham Open wide.. our ranking of all 20 original songs from the special here. 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. 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. This sketch, like the "White Woman Instagram" song, shows one of Burnham's writing techniques of bringing a common Internet culture into a fictionalized bit. We're a long way from the days when he filmed "Comedy" and the contrast shows how fruitless this method of healing has been.