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Brick Wall Comedy
Brick Wall Comedy
Cover image credit: Thumbnail: YouTube · Brendan Sagalow

Thin Lips

Brendan Sagalow

YouTube · 2024 · 45 min

An anxious New Yorker on sobriety, dating, and Rikers Island.

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Brendan Sagalow’s debut special gets its best mileage out of a specific kind of low-stakes anxiety that only a neurotic New Yorker could nurture. The set focuses on his struggle with newfound sobriety and dating in New York City, where being sober is treated as a severe character flaw rather than a healthy life choice. Instead of treating his lifestyle pivot with heavy-handed gravity, Sagalow uses it to fuel self-deprecation about his weight, his therapy, and his lingering paranoia that everything is a scam.\n\nFilmed at the New York Comedy Club in December 2023 and released on YouTube in August 2024, the 45-minute set showcases Sagalow’s decade-plus tenure on the club circuit. It features a strong chunk comparing the New York subway system to the waiting room of a mental hospital, alongside a story about performing a stand-up set for inmates at Rikers Island. He also touches on growing up on Long Island with an unearned affinity for hip-hop, putting his self-doubt on display before a hometown audience that has watched him climb from a 2022 Just For Laughs New Face to a regular guest on podcasts like Tuesdays with Stories and Are You Garbage?

The set list

5 bits

  1. Wondering who feels safe in a public restroom

    Observational humor on bathroom safety

  2. Comparing the subway to the waiting room of a mental hospital

    Observational social commentary on New York transit

  3. Doing stand-up comedy at Rikers Island

    Recalling the experience of performing in a jail

  4. Receiving a full-blown sleep apnea diagnosis and being told to use a CPAP mask

    Worrying about wearing a CPAP mask around future children and imagining them being terrified like Bane

  5. Getting into a confrontation on the street while attempting to lose weight

    Responding to being insulted as fat by pointing out he is not as fat as he used to be

How it plays

On stage
Equal parts confident social observation and cutting self-deprecation.
Pace
Described by an audience review as hopping around between bits rather than staying in and riffing longer.
About
public restrooms, the subway, performing at Rikers Island, weight loss and health, sleep apnea, street interactions and scams

What the critics said

Received critical acclaim by audiences and comics alike.

Summed up from reviews, articles and listings. Sources: standupd.com, weownthelaughs.com, screensearch.co.uk, open.spotify.com, letterboxd.com, brendansagalow.com, sorrycomedyfest.com.

Details

Released
Taped
2023, The New York Comedy Club
Runtime
45 min
Where
YouTube
Director
Nicole Lyons
Topics

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