Sony Pixel Power calrec Sony

John Mulaney Slows It Down and Soaks in the Laughs Coming off of Baby J'

20/10/2023

John Mulaney had only been working in comedy for five years when he landed a role as a writer at Saturday Night Live in 2008. Hilariously, I felt seasoned when I got to SNL, he told For the Record. And he may well have been-after four hysterical years, John left the show and went on to create his own stand-up tours, TV series (Big Mouth), and the Broadway show Oh, Hello. He's renowned for his wit and one-liners, which are what make his most recent special, Baby J, so peculiar and compelling.

Baby J is a wide-ranging conversation on John's life over the past three-plus years following a drug intervention 20 comedian friends held for him. Full of winding stories and recollections, it's a fast-paced, full-throttle hour full of laughter with a fair bit of cringe. The show is available for streaming on Netflix and the album is available on Spotify.

John's an avid lover of audio and is conscientious about the medium as it relates to comedy. He's also a podcast aficionado, which is how he discovers some of his favorite New York haunted places stories, and a music fan. He recently created a Spotify mixtape featuring the early Sun Ra song Dreaming, Television's Days, and Bo Diddley's Say Man that John wants to claim as the first diss track ever.

For the Record had the opportunity to sit down with the comedian for another wide-ranging conversation.

You spent more than four years working on Saturday Night Live. What are a few of the lessons you learned while writing for the show? The biggest thing I learned is that sometimes you have to burn the furniture, which means that if you have a really good idea and you're saving it for a couple of weeks from now and you're faced with a show that looks a little light or a host that you're having trouble coming up with ideas for, sometimes you have to use your best idea right then and there and not save it for the future.

You have to make decisions. When you write a sketch at Saturday Night Live, you're the producer of it. You're in charge of the sets, the costumes, the look of it, any pre-tapes, any special effects. And you have a couple hours, max, to make most of the decisions on a sketch, because then you have to get into the actual doing of it.

This has played out in other career aspects. Just make decisions-you might make the wrong one. What seems to unnerve other people and what seems to shake the confidence of something is when you can't make decisions. If someone asks you, This one or that one? just say, That one! You might be wrong, but you have to move forward. A lot of things die on the vine of indecision.

Who are some of your biggest comedic influences and inspirations? Comedian Taylor Negron. He passed away close to 10 years ago, but he had a monologue he did for The Moth, and it's about how he had a pet monkey as a kid. It's really slow. There's a real presence he has, and a real pace that I love. He even steps back from the microphone during laughs in a way that I've always liked. But I'm trying not to rush through things as much, which is what I did for the first 20 or so years.

But I think about Taylor a lot onstage. His pace has a real warmth to it. I think much less about drawing inspiration from people's material or their point of view. Just stage presence stuff. That's always been a little more interesting to me.

That seems to be apparent in your latest work. In your earlier stand-up specials, your bits are often no longer than two minutes. Meanwhile, your Baby J stories consistently clock in over five minutes. Was this an intentional style shift? The New in Town special I did for Comedy Central a handful of years ago had a mix of one-minute jokes and then one pretty long story at the end. I followed a model of having these very concise tracks-a way to talk fast if you're listening while driving and it comes up on shuffle-and then less snappy, big chunks.

And then with Baby J, I found I wanted to string together as many moments as I could per track, because I've found that people have a memory for what joke went into what joke. People say, Wait I remember he went into something else from that! So if they're on shuffle, the moments feel cut off. So I tried to keep as much stuff married to each other as possible, to keep all the jokes that were the same orbit as each other together.

It's interesting to hear you talk about the way you've thought about your work in audio versus filmed. Why do you find it beneficial to have your shows on multiple types of streaming platforms? There were two things that really marked when I was lucky enough for my career to take off. One was when the New in Town special went to Netflix. The other was when I started to become the second-most-played Pandora station when people would search, say, Jim Gaffigan. And it happened with a few other very big comics at the time. And I just found that a lot of people were listening to the first couple albums that I had because of that. And they were hearing them on shuffle. And I thought, Oh, any of these tracks could be the absolute first introduction someone has to me. Each of these has to talk fast.

There's a tendency on comedy albums to shorten laughs after tracks. But to me, I was like, no, I need that person who's hearing me for the first time to go, Oh that joke killed. What was that again?

Baby J is a departure from some of your previous work when it comes to subject matter. What's the role of comedy in tackling difficult topics? I don't think about it. All I thought in this one was, I'm looking to make the funniest special possible, and these are the topics. And these are the parts of my life I'm going to share. I did not want to lean on the pregnant pause of Isn't this serious? That bored
LINK: https://newsroom.spotify.com/2023-10-20/john-mulaney-slows-it-down-and...
See more stories from spotify

Most recent headlines

09/11/2025

Dalet Unveils Agentic AI Media Workflows at IBC2025

Dalet today announced a transformative leap forward for media operations: Agentic Artificial Intelligence (AI) that unifies the Dalet ecosystem under one natura...

06/10/2025

France Tlvisions Wins Prestigious 2025 EBU Technology & Innovation Award in Groundbreaking Collaboration with Dalet

France T l visions, France's leading broadcaster, has received the 2025 EBU ...

15/09/2025

Get to Know This Fall's Filmmakers Through These 27 Sundance Institute-Supported Titles

Steve Zahn, Winona Ryder, Ethan Hawke, and Janeane Garofalo star in Ben Stiller&...

15/09/2025

aespa and Spotify Invite Fans to Unlock Their Inner Rich Man' With an Immersive MY VAULT Experience

Global K-Pop sensation aespa is redefining what it means to be rich with the r...

15/09/2025

Spotify's Free Experience Is Even Better-Here's How to Make the Most of It

Every day, millions of people around the world turn to Spotify to enjoy the audi...

15/09/2025

Brembo SGL Carbon Ceramic Brakes (BSCCB) successfully expands production capacity by 50% in Germany and Italy to meet rising demand

After months of intensive planning and implementation, Brembo SGL Carbon Ceramic...

15/09/2025

L3Harris Receives Multi-Year Javelin Solid Rocket Motor Contract

A U.S. Marine launches a Javelin shoulder-fired anti-tank missile during a training exercise. (Photo credit: U.S. Marine Corps)...

15/09/2025

TV Tech Unveils Best of Show Winners at IBC 2025

AMSTERDAM TV Tech has named its Best of Show Awards winners for IBC2025, which wraps up today. Entrants were judged by a panel of industry experts on the criter...

15/09/2025

SES SCORE Surpasses 600,000 of Transmission Hours, Delivering 900 Hours of Major Sports Content Daily

Unique sports content orchestration platform builds momentum among SES's cus...

15/09/2025

The Great Flood' Teaser Trailer Previews A Gripping Struggle for Survival

Back to All News The Great Flood' Teaser Trailer Previews A Gripping Struggle for Survival Entertainment 15 September 2025 GlobalSouth Korea Link copi...

15/09/2025

From Hardship to Hope: Typhoon Family' Presents a Tale of Youth, Crisis, and Resilience on October 11

Back to All News From Hardship to Hope: Typhoon Family' Presents a Tale of...

15/09/2025

Gloom Goes Global as Wednesday's' The Doom Tour Hits Five Continents for Season 2

Back to All News Gloom Goes Global as Wednesday's' The Doom Tour Hit...

15/09/2025

New study reveals overwhelming support for a more sustainable future

-- Opens door to growth in renewable energy New Delhi, India - 15th September -- Global business and industry leaders from around the world are joining technol...

14/09/2025

AMWA and EBU Form JT-DMF Joint Task Force on Dynamic Medi...

Partnership to address business and technical challenges of DMF adoption he Advanced Media Workflow Association (AMWA) and the European Broadcasting Union (EBU...

14/09/2025

Mantis' Trailer Previews High-Stakes Rivalries to Be No. 1 Contract Killer - Premieres September 26

Back to All News Mantis' Trailer Previews High-Stakes Rivalries to Be No. ...

13/09/2025

Cox Media Group's Misti Turnbull Inducted into the NATAS Silver Circle

ATLANTA Cox Media Group has announced that the company's vice president of news, Misty Turnbull has been inducted into the National Academy of Television Ar...

13/09/2025

Shotoku Debuts Swoop Cranes for Studio Robotics at IBC2025

AMSTERDAM Shotoku Broadcast Systems, a major developer of robotic systems, has announced plans to take studio robotics to the next level at IBC2025 by debuting ...

13/09/2025

Riedel Unveils Ultra-Light Bolero Mini Wireless Intercom...

At IBC2025 in Amsterdam, Riedel Communications unveiled Bolero Mini, the company's lightest and flattest wireless intercom beltpack to date. Designed to del...

13/09/2025

Shotoku Takes Studio Robotics to New Heights with IBC Deb...

Shotoku Broadcast Systems, the international developer of dependable, userfriendly robotic systems, is taking studio robotics to the next level at IBC 2025 with...

13/09/2025

The Bitmovin Video Developer Report 2025-26 Reveals Cost...

Bitmovin, a leading provider of video streaming solutions, today released the 9th annual Video Developer Report 2025/26, offering an in-depth look at the evolvi...

13/09/2025

Bitmovin and StreamShark Partner to Deliver High Quality...

Bitmovin, the leading provider of video streaming solutions, today announced a strategic partnership with StreamShark, the trusted video platform for enterprise...

13/09/2025

Ikegami Announces VFE-P711AD 7-inch OLED Multiformat On-C...

Ikegami has chosen IBC 2025 in Amsterdam as the launch venue for a major addition to its range of viewfinders. The new VFE-P711AD is a 7-inch high resolution OL...

13/09/2025

KitBash3D and Greyscalegorilla Announce Merger

Founder-led Merger to Fast Track R&D, Asset Library Upgrades, Tools and More; No Disruption to Pricing or Support for Users Today, KitBash3D, a pioneer in 3D a...

13/09/2025

Mavis Puts Itself at the Heart of Mobile Production

With NDI certification, Atomos integration, Grass Valley collaboration, and a new Monitor app, at this year's IBC, Mavis is showcasing a series of powerful...

13/09/2025

Creamsource Expands Vortex Family with Vortex24 Soft

Creamsource, maker of artisan LED lighting for film and television, has unveiled the Vortex24 Soft (V24S), a 1950W native soft light and the largest soft source...

13/09/2025

DAZN streams 2025 FIFA Club World Cup to billions of fans...

When international sports streaming service DAZN secured the global rights to the 2025 FIFA Club World Cup football tournament, it set out to deliver an unmatch...

13/09/2025

Riedel Communications Acquires hi human interface

Riedel Communications today announced the acquisition of hi human interface from Broadcast Solutions, bringing a powerful, vendor-agnostic control system to it...

13/09/2025

RTW chooses Calrec as technology partner for its AI ready...

Building on its long-term relationship with audio metering specialist RTW, Calrec has integrated the company's brand new TMxCore metering platform across it...

13/09/2025

Calrec unveils 48 fader Argo M at IBC2025 and demonstrate...

Calrec is expanding its family of future-ready self-contained Argo M control surfaces at IBC2025, with the addition of a brand new powerful 48-fader console. Co...

13/09/2025

Reaching Across the Isles: UK-LLM Brings AI to UK Languages With NVIDIA Nemotron

Celtic languages - including Cornish, Irish, Scottish Gaelic and Welsh - are the U.K.'s oldest living languages. To empower their speakers, the UK-LLM sover...

13/09/2025

SKY Perfect Modernizes Playout-to-Delivery with Harmonic

Harmonic's Software-Based XOS Advanced Media Processor Provides Unparalleled Efficiency and Unlocks New Business Models SAN JOSE, Calif. - Sept. 13, 2025 -...

13/09/2025

September 11, 2025

Researchers find brain region that fuels compulsive drinking Study by Scripps Research scientists shows how the brain learns to seek alcohol for relief, not jus...

12/09/2025

College Football Kickoff 2025: Fox Sports Ups Look as Canon, Sony Power Shallow Focus Coverage

College Football Kickoff 2025: Fox Sports Ups Look as Canon, Sony Power Shallow ...

12/09/2025

ABC/ESPN Excited For WNBA Postseason Coverage In Revamped Format

ABC/ESPN Excited For WNBA Postseason Coverage In Revamped FormatThe Finals moves to a best-of-seven series in 2025By Mark J Burns, SVG Contributor Friday, Sep...

12/09/2025

Rabbit Trap Pulsates With Folklore Dread

(L-R) Jade Croot, Rosy McEwen, and Bryn Chainey attend the 2025 Sundance Film Festival premiere of Rabbit Trap at Eccles Theatre on January 24, 2025, in Park ...

12/09/2025

Spotify's The Drop Weekly' Brings You the Week in New Releases, Straight From Our Editors

For fans, we know how important it is to stay plugged into music culture and dis...

12/09/2025

Agama and Consult Red announce RDK Accelerator integration

Link ping, Sweden and Shipley, United Kingdom, September 12, 2025 - Agama, the expert in video observability and analytics for service quality and customer expe...

12/09/2025

IBC2025 Opens for Business

IBC2025 began on Sept. 12, with exhibits and conferences running through Sept. 15 at the RAI Amsterdam Convention Center. Explore the full TV Tech coverage of t...

12/09/2025

The Best Fictional Bands (and the Artists Who Make Them Great)

The Best Fictional Bands (and the Artists Who Make Them Great) With Spinal Tap II: The End Continues hitting theaters and songs from KPop Demon Hunters ruling...

12/09/2025

Tom Baldassare Joins Advanced Systems Group

Industry veteran Tom Baldassare has joined Advanced Systems Group, LLC (ASG), a technology and services provider for media creatives and content owners, as a Se...

12/09/2025

Maxon Unveils a Brand New Look for its Growing Family of...

Maxon, maker of powerful, approachable software solutions for creators working in 2D and 3D design, motion graphics, visual effects, and more, today announced a...

12/09/2025

PlayBox Neo US Partners with AI-Media to Deliver Scalable...

PlayBox Neo, a leading provider of media playout solutions, has partnered with AI-Media, pioneering developers of AI-powered captioning technology, to integrate...

12/09/2025

Dalet Unveils Agentic AI Media Workflows at IBC2025

Dalet today announced a transformative leap forward for media operations: Agentic Artificial Intelligence (AI) that unifies the Dalet ecosystem under one natura...

12/09/2025

Keepit and Ingram Micro launch strategic sales agreement...

New alliance strengthens the IT channel in Germany and Switzerland in protecting business-critical SaaS data. Keepit, the world s only independent, cloud-nativ...

12/09/2025

Mediaset selects Fincons Group AllRights to evolve rights...

Fincons Group, an international IT business consultancy and systems integrator company with more than 40 years of experience in the market, is proud to announce...

12/09/2025

EVS Acquires XD motion

Following its acquisition of Telemetrics, EVS continues its push into robotics with an announcement at IBC2025 that it is acquiring XD motion....

12/09/2025

Televisa Executive Joins NABA Board

TORONTO The North American Broadcasters Association (NABA) has announced the appointment of Eduardo Ruiz Sanchez, deputy director, broadcast operations at Telev...

12/09/2025

Ed Miller, Former SBE President, Has Died

Ed Miller, a longtime broadcast engineer in Ohio and a former national president of the Society of Broadcast Engineers, has died....

12/09/2025

IBC2025: Dynamic HDR Gains Traction

AMSTERDAM At this year's IBC2025, the Advanced HDR by Technicolor initiative will be pushing broadcasters to adopt a more dynamic, frame-by-frame conversion...