Not So Musical Monday: The New One
By title and law, I am an attorney. By blood, I am a son and a brother. By residency, I am a New Yorker. Deep down inside, though, I think I will always consider myself a comedian. Comedy is something I hold in very high esteem and my favorite stand-up comedy is that which is personal, intimate, and vulnerable. I love so many types of comedy, and just about anything clever I will truly appreciate, but there is something about the intimate and vulnerable that reflects my own style of stand-up and hits close to home. Though I am not making any statements about the quality of my own comedy, I have always enjoyed Mike Birbiglia for this personal story telling type of comedy. When his one-man show, The New One, went from Off-Broadway to Broadway, I was ecstatic to see it.
Seeing such an intimate show on the perils of fatherhood—from never wanting to have a kid to the real shittiness of having a young kid to, of course, the tender joys. I do not have a child, I have no immediate plans to have a child, and I have no certainty if I’ll ever have a child. Even with all of those facts, Birbiglia is so genuinely funny in the way he tells stories, and the content is so damn funny, that I felt like I could relate to every single thing he discussed. Could I truly relate to being in your early 20’s and trying to find furniture on the street? Yes. Could I truly relate to the feeling of stress over my wife’s morning sickness? No. Both parts were equally funny.
The best part about The New One is the simple feeling that when I left the theater I felt good. It was light, feel good comedy that reminded me that there is some good. That isn’t to say that it was oblivious of what is happening in the world around us—it actually was very aware, and Birbiglia ties it together with his personal stories of the path of fatherhood. It works really well. There are a few parts that I think didn’t work as well as others, and sometimes diving into darker moments take some risks, but overall, I did enjoy it.
I do think explaining what makes something funny is a pointless task. One of my favorite quotations of all time is from E.B. White who wrote in a 1941 book of humor that “[h]umor can be dissected, as a frog can, but the thing dies in the process and the innards are discouraging to any but the purely scientific mind.” Explaining why I truly think my favorite jokes worked so well would work better over a drink than in a review, so I will save that for people willing to buy me one.
It’s encouraging to see different things on Broadway, and I am really excited The New One is currently running in its limited engagement. Here’s to more comedy on stage.