What's Wrong with People?

A man in a sharp suit is deeply bothered by the general public. Before he was selling out arenas, Sebastian Maniscalco planted his flag with a rigid set of social rules he learned from his Italian-American upbringing, contrasting them with a modern world that simply refuses to behave. He performs with the frantic exasperation of a guy who just watched a stranger finger a muffin out of a brown bag at a coffee shop and cannot let it go. His physical act is already fully formed here, pacing the stage and relying on exaggerated facial expressions to sell his disgust.

Filmed at the Margaret A. Webb Theater in Santa Ana, California, the 2012 hour captures a working comic hitting his stride before his transition to major movie roles. The premises rely on the minutiae of daily friction. He channels genuine anger over the lost etiquette of answering a doorbell, the irritation of dodging retail kiosks in the middle of the mall, and the struggle of teaching his immigrant father how to use the internet.