Hannibal Buress is a hilarious stand-up comedian and actor, who stars on the hit Comedy Central series Broad City. On the other hand, I ask hard-hitting interview questions about vomiting memories, fake doctors and celebrities waiting to pee. These are 7 hypothetical questions for Hannibal Buress:
There’s a cool confidence to your comedy persona, which might make you an ideal fit for other occupations, too. Let’s say you started moonlighting as a hostage negotiator. A deranged criminal is holding 11 people hostage in a bank. What would you say to make the situation calmer and help get those hostages to safety?
I’ll have to know some stuff about him, his background. Does he like gelato? Cause gelato’s real good. That would calm me down. Yeah, I mean, if you offer somebody gelato, they’re gonna go for it.
I don’t think gelato is at the front of the mind all the time. But when you break it out to people, they get on board. I got this coffee chocolate chip gelato that I started buying. It’s by this brand… Talenti? They got nice packing, good fonts. Good graphic design. So yeah, I’d use that in my hostage negotiations.
On the hilarious show Broad City, your character is a dentist. Let’s say you got a working, fully functional MD diploma in the mail by accident. What kind of fake practice would you set-up and why?
Uh… is someone who bleaches assholes a doctor?
Sure, I think there are doctors who do that.
I would open up a place that bleaches assholes. And I would advertise it really well, and then when people came in, I would just go, “You don’t have to this! LEAVE! Why do you think you need this? Get out of here!”
You’ve acted on a number of TV shows. You’ve got a movie coming out next month, Neighbors. Let’s say you’re meeting with a new agent – who is a powerful genie – who will book you for any role you want to play. What do you tell him?
I’d just wish for a TV show where other people would give me their money, but I’m chillin’ at home and playing video games. But people just kinda give me money.
Like a religious offering. They bow in front of you and pay you money.
We’re talking genies, so yeah. I’ll be at home playing Xbox and people would just come in. They wouldn’t even say anything to me, because they would respect that I’m playing Xbox and wouldn’t wanna interrupt my flow. So I’d just make money like that, playing video games… I’ll watch a movie. That would be the show.
Let’s talk about your new standup special, Live From Chicago. You tell a story about getting caught in a lie after watching a comedy show for free, and you argue that you can’t “vomit the comedy out of your body.” Let’s say that was actually possible, and you could vomit out memories you experienced, like a grosser Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. What memory would you want to vomit out?
Oh, I would wanna vomit out… my credit history? Does that count?
Or, there was a point in Chicago when they booted my car, ‘cause I had a bunch of parking tickets and they just took the car. And I think it cost about $1500 or $2000 to get it out and I didn’t have that. And they just keep your car and suspend your drivers’ license, so that hurt. I would get that memory out.
You talk about not letting Scarlett Johansson go ahead of you in line for the bathroom, because you really had to piss. Is there any celebrity you would let go to the bathroom ahead of you? (An idol or a notable political figure…?)
Well, Scarlett didn’t ask me. It was just me writing up shit in my head about Scarlett Johansson for the sake of the joke. To be honest, if she had asked right then, I probably would’ve let her right ahead. (laughs)
But that’s not funny. There’s no joke in: “Yeah, I was waiting around for the bathroom, Scarlett Johansson was right behind me, and she says, ‘Can I go ahead?’ and I said, ‘Yeah.’” That’s not comedy. But I would let her go ahead. I would let somebody who had obviously pissed themselves go ahead. You don’t even have to be famous. If you have piss on yourself, I would let you go.
No questions asked.
No questions asked. Because you’d rather have the pee person in front instead of behind you, anyway.
On the special, you talk about going to see a lot of rap shows. Let’s say you went to a concert and got invited up on stage to perform with the rapper. What rapper would you want to be seeing and what song would you want to perform?
It would be cool if Jay-Z had me on stage, and then I’d do my own song, “Gibberish Rap” with a live band. And then, maybe I’d do a medley with Jay-Z. I wanna do a bunch of songs. I’d do one song from each album. (laughs) I would start up another song and he’d be like, “No, we’re not doin’ any more!” and I’d be like “Man, queue it up!”
You discuss not being very religious, but that people regularly try to get you to be more religious. Let’s say high-ranking representatives from the Mormon Church – looking to make its organization cooler, hipper – get in touch with you, and want to make you the new celebrity spokesman for Mormonism. They really want to make the deal work and ask, “What can we give you to convert and preach to the youth for us?”
For Mormonism? You give me about $20 million a year, plus incentives, plus since it’s the Mormon Church and they have infinite resources, they have to invest in low-income housing everywhere. If they invest in affordable, low-income housing in New York, Chicago, and other inner cities, then that would be worth the sacrifice of my soul for preaching Mormonism.
You know, I have a feeling they’re going to be reading this and that you’re going to get a call.
Geoffrey Golden is a bestselling author and Editor-in-Chief of The Devastator comedy book series. Header via.
