The Half Hour

Drew Michael approaches neurotic misery with the tone of a forensic investigator. He refuses to treat cheating as an accidental slip, breaking infidelity down into a tedious sequence of deliberate decisions: hailing the cab, buying the drink, getting in the elevator. The jokes work because the logic is airtight, even when the person speaking is obviously unhinged.

He questions why depressed people take prescription medication when they are the only ones seeing reality accurately. To him, relentlessly cheerful people are the ones suffering from a chemical delusion that needs medical intervention.

The 21-minute set was recorded at the Civic Theatre in New Orleans in June 2016 and aired that September on Comedy Central as part of the fifth season of The Half Hour. On the day of the broadcast, Michael released the companion album Funny to Death and started a writing stint on the forty-second season of Saturday Night Live.