Thoughts and Prayers
Netflix · 2015 · 59 min
A calculated hour of dark, unapologetic stand-up from San Francisco.
Anthony Jeselnik starts his 2015 Netflix special by testing his crowd at The Fillmore in San Francisco, a city he cheekily targets for its reputation of being easily offended. He warms them up with a story about a baby locked inside a hot car, and once they laugh, the bargain is struck. For the next hour, Jeselnik adopts his usual onstage persona—an elegant, narcissistic sociopath who delivers carefully paced, two-line setup-and-punchline dark jokes about death, tragedy, and disease.
What makes this hour different from his previous specials is the final fifteen minutes. Jeselnik drops his villain act to talk about the mechanics of controversy and the social utility of his brand of humor. He breaks down the aftermath of the Boston Marathon bombing, when his immediate, dark tweets prompted public outrage. He explains that posting online condolences is less about helping victims and more about self-satisfaction, comparing the practice of sending “thoughts and prayers” to masturbation.
He also details the corporate panic that surrounded his canceled Comedy Central series, The Jeselnik Offensive. He walks the audience through his refusal to apologize for a sketch celebrating a real-life shark attack in New Zealand, illustrating the friction between his uncompromising joke-writing and network standards. Filmed during a period when online outrage culture was solidifying, the special serves as both a collection of grim, highly crafted punchlines and a defense of the right to make them.
The set list
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Jeselnik talks about seeing a baby in a car as an early joke in the set.
Frames the joke as an intentional diagnostic test to gauge whether the audience is 'cool' enough to handle the darkness of the rest of the show.
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Forgetting his mother's 60th birthday celebration.
Misdirects the audience by blaming drugs, alcohol, and bad decisions not for tragedy, but simply for the family forgetting the birthday.
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His grandmother giving him a Bible when he left for college and his later remarks at her actual funeral.
Transitions into the special's final autobiographical section, recounting the horrible mistake of agreeing to speak at his grandmother's service.
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Tweeting dark jokes on the day of national tragedies, specifically the Boston Marathon bombing.
Explores getting into trouble with the public and network executives, contrasting authentic comedic reaction against hollow social media platitudes.
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People posting 'thoughts and prayers' on social media after catastrophic events.
Deconstructs the phrase as an empty, narcissistic performance of sympathy that costs nothing, offers no real help, and centers the commenter rather than the victims.
How it plays
- Tone
- Dark, deadpan, irreverent, provocative, and combative.
- On stage
- An unapologetically offensive, arrogant villain with a morally bankrupt onstage demeanor, characterized by an unflappable presence and a sly, smirking grin.
- Pace
- Slow swagger with deliberate, deadpan timing designed to build tension and misdirect audiences before shocking punchlines.
- About
- death, public performance of sympathy, social media hypocrisy, political correctness, religion, animal cruelty
What the critics said
Critically acclaimed; reviewers praised Jeselnik's masterful misdirection and singled out the closing section's meditation on hollow public sympathy as a thrilling, substantive evolution of his stand-up style.
In the room: Eager and receptive to his villainous persona, shifting between shocked silence, discomfort, and explosive laughter as expectations were subverted.
Backstory
Filmed in San Francisco, which Jeselnik addressed as 'the most politically correct city in the world.' Grounded in backlashes against his offensive tweets following national tragedies (such as the Boston Marathon bombing) and the ubiquitous social media platitude 'thoughts and prayers.'
Details
- Released
- Taped
- The Fillmore, San Francisco
- Runtime
- 59 min
- Where
- Netflix
- Director
- Adam Dubin
- Honors
- 100% Tomatometer score on Rotten Tomatoes
- Topics
- Before
- Caligula (2013)
- After
- Fire in the Maternity Ward (2019)
More from Anthony Jeselnik
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Bones and All
Netflix
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Fire in the Maternity Ward
Netflix
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Caligula
Paramount+
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