8
HBO · 2017 · 59 min
An intimate, slow-paced hour of quiet tension and heavy silences.
Jerrod Carmichael begins his second HBO hour with a deep sigh, a long silence, and a simple question for the crowd: “Are we gonna be OK?” Released in March 2017 and directed by Bo Burnham, the special works at an incredibly deliberate pace, letting the quiet moments hang in the air until the tension becomes a part of the performance. Carmichael taped the show in the round at the Masonic Hall in New York City, creating a highly theatrical yet intimate atmosphere with moody, dim lighting. At the time, Carmichael was running his NBC sitcom, The Carmichael Show, but on this stage, he works without a cast to balance his perspective. He offers thoughts on Donald Trump’s election, the reality of supporting the troops, and why he finds Jay-Z more personally influential than Martin Luther King Jr. Other bits touch on climate change through the lens of how future children will view Tony the Tiger once real tigers go extinct. Some viewers at the time found the deliberate pacing too slow, comparing the hour to a therapy session rather than a stand-up show, while others praised the willingness to sit in silence and force the crowd to live with difficult questions.
The set list
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Reacting to Donald Trump's presidential victory and wondering if everyone will be okay under a 'new king'.
Explores the tension in the room after expressing a darkly sympathetic joke about Trump having all the weapons at his disposal, immediately asking the audience if it was 'too dark'.
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The exhaustion and excessive effort required to be a good boyfriend through texting.
Shares an intricately crafted, supportive text message drafted for a partner, revealing it took six hours to write when he could have started curing cancer.
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Apathy towards global warming and environmental causes.
Admits that without immediate direct consequences, he cannot bring himself to champion environmental causes or care about tigers.
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A personal method for avoiding rape accusations.
Addresses his fear of accusations by explaining his practical strategy of simply never raping anybody.
How it plays
- Tone
- Subversive, dark, intimate, thoughtful, and deliberately tense.
- On stage
- Introspective, casual, and deliberately vulnerable; speaks softly and slowly while projecting calm apathy to subversively draw the audience into uncomfortable truths.
- Pace
- Slow, contemplative tempo with extended pauses, comfortable dwelling in prolonged room silence and unscripted exchanges with spectators.
- About
- apathy versus caring, Donald Trump's election victory, climate change and animal rights, monogamy and the labor of relationships, race and civil rights icons, personal and existential fear
What the critics said
Universally praised by critics as an artful, singular expression of comic vision that broke free from standard stand-up formulas through an intimate conversational approach and patient delivery.
In the room: Surrounding the comic in formal suits and cocktail dresses in the round, reacting with strained hushes, tension, and gradual complicit laughter as Carmichael directly addressed individual audience members.
Backstory
Filmed shortly following Donald Trump's 2016 presidential election victory, set amidst national political anxiety and modern cultural tensions.
Details
- Released
- Taped
- Masonic Hall (Grand Lodge Room), New York City
- Runtime
- 59 min
- Where
- HBO
- Director
- Bo Burnham
- Honors
- 100% Tomatometer score on Rotten Tomatoes
- Topics
- Before
- Love at The Store (2014)
- After
- Rothaniel (2022)
More from Jerrod Carmichael
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Don't Be Gay
HBO
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Rothaniel
HBO
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