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Brick Wall Comedy
Brick Wall Comedy
Patton Oswalt

Patton Oswalt

High-vocabulary analogies delivered with sputtering, red-faced indignation.

Portrait credit:

Photo: Gage Skidmore / CC-BY-SA-3.0

16 specials · 1998–2026

Start with Talking for Clapping, the breakout (2016 · 65 min · Netflix)

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He treats a small irritation like a zoning dispute, escalating it into a dense, multi-layered analogy. He often starts a bit sounding like a weary literature professor and ends it hunched over, face red, screaming into the mic about a fast food menu item. The vocabulary is deliberately dense. He will drop words like “eldritch” or “geometry” to describe a bad gig or a depression nap.

Specials

On stage

He is an elder statesman of the alternative comedy scene. Twenty years ago, he helped drag standup out of brick-wall clubs and into rock venues. He remains a comic other writers watch to see how a premise gets built out to its absolute limit. He survived the transition from underground hero to theater act without losing the essential, defensive posture of a guy arguing at a convention.

His older sets were built on pop culture arguments. As he got older, that same obsessive energy turned toward aging, politics, and survival. After his first wife died, he spent a full hour wrestling with the flat absurdity of profound grief, using the exact same tonal shifts he once used to dissect action movies. The tension on stage usually comes from watching his pure joy over something trivial crash headfirst into his underlying pessimism.

He built his voice in Los Angeles, and while he works constantly in sitcoms and animation, he keeps the standup strictly separated from the Hollywood day job.

Turning points

  1. Formation of The Comedians of Comedy

    Oswalt formed an alternative comedy tour alongside Zach Galifianakis, Brian Posehn, and Maria Bamford that avoided conventional comedy clubs to perform in rock venues.

  2. Emmy and Grammy Wins for Talking for Clapping

    Oswalt earned a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Writing for a Variety Special and a Grammy Award for Best Comedy Album for Talking for Clapping.

At a glance

Born
, Portsmouth, Virginia
On stage
since 1988
Style
observational, satire, deadpan, storytelling
Breakout
Talking for Clapping
Influences
Jonathan Winters, Richard Pryor, Emo Philips, Blaine Capatch, Jim Goad, Bill Hicks, Bobcat Goldthwait, Sam Kinison, Steve Martin, Louis C.K.
Topics
Elsewhere
Website, Wikipedia

Fans also like

  • Brian Posehn

    Co-founded The Comedians of Comedy tour with Oswalt, sharing a distinct alternative comic sensibility and passion for nerd culture.

    Photo: Damon D'Amato from North Hollywood, Calfornia / CC-BY-2.0

  • Maria Bamford

    Toured alongside Oswalt in The Comedians of Comedy, matching his unconventional performance venues and inventive comedic voice.

    Source

  • Zach Galifianakis

    Collaborated frequently with Oswalt on The Comedians of Comedy tour and co-headlined the split release Patton Vs. Alcohol Vs. Zach Vs. Patton.

    Photo: CleftClips from Los Angeles, CA, United States of America / CC-BY-2.0

  • David Cross

    Shares an acerbic, politically conscious, and sharply intellectual alternative stand-up perspective from the same generation.

    Photo: Greg2600 / CC-BY-SA-2.0

Also on screen

1998–2007
The King of Queens Spence Olchin
Ratatouille Remy (voice)
Big Fan Paul Aufiero
Young Adult Matt Freehauf
2013–2023
The Goldbergs Adult Adam F. Goldberg (Narrator)

A clip to start with

A clip of Patton Oswalt