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Voluptuous Boy

Sarah Tollemache

YouTube · 2020

Dry New York stand-up about terrible landlords and avocado anxiety.

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Sarah Tollemache operates in the specific, low-key panic of the modern New Yorker—the kind of person who is simultaneously trying to practice body acceptance and worrying about getting murdered. She treats life’s minor annoyances with the same gravity as its existential crises, like her bit on the impossible physics of avocados requiring calling out of work because they might hatch at any second. Filmed at the New York Comedy Club in March 2020, just days before the city went into lockdown, this debut hour captures Tollemache with the calm confidence of a seasoned club comedian. She covers her terrible landlord blaming her for a broken shower head by suggesting she was swinging from it, her medical debt from colitis, and the late-2010s mainstream preoccupation with eating ass. In doing so, she delivers a dry, steady set that finds humor in the inescapable friction of everyday adulthood.

The set list

6 bits

  1. Avocado ripeness anxiety

    Treating the razor-thin window of avocado ripeness as a high-stakes crisis that justifies calling out of work or scarfing three over the sink.

  2. Colitis diagnosis

    Reframing an embarrassing chronic condition as a status symbol by calling it 'one of the more expensive diarrheas.'

  3. Living with debt

    Explaining that paying off debt caused a loss of purpose, prompting her to go right back into debt so she had goals to live for.

  4. Inverting Marie Kondo

    Envisioning an American woman traveling to Asia to force people to buy more junk instead of decluttering.

  5. Eating ass trend

    Addressing the widespread stand-up topic through a comic friend who worried it was becoming a problem for him and his family.

  6. Dominatrix vs. therapist

    Arguing that instead of a therapist, she needs a dominatrix to step on her back and force her to run mundane errands.

How it plays

Tone
Flippant, conversational, angst-ridden, and warm.
On stage
The quintessential modern New York woman characterized by angst, flippancy, self-described lack of confidence, and relatable silliness.
Pace
Low-energy, cool, conversational delivery backed by surgeon-like precision in word choice.
About
Everyday anxieties and mundane New York struggles, Debt and socio-economic pressures, Health issues and colitis, Dating and marriage later in life, Therapy and lack of motivation

What the critics said

Praised as a bravura performance highlighted by meticulous, surgeon-like joke construction and low-key delivery that makes specific urban neuroses universally relatable.

In the room: Raucous laughter in an engaged comedy club room.

Summed up from reviews, articles and listings. Sources: newjerseystage.com, tv-tea.com, omny.fm, pastemagazine.com.

Backstory

Recorded in New York City on March 8, 2020, immediately before the United States entered COVID-19 pandemic quarantine.

Details

Released
Taped
New York Comedy Club
Where
YouTube
Topics
After
Butthole Money (2024)

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