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“WHATEVER UR WORRIED ABOUT DOESN’T MATTER” reads a prominent sign on the wall behind Sarah Silverman’s desk in her Los Angeles office. In the three-plus decades since Silverman began performing onstage, she’s become an icon of standup comedy, an accomplished film and voice actress, a writer of an Off Broadway show, a best-selling author, a sharp political pundit, an honorary late-night-television host, an executive producer, and one of the world’s finest purveyors of potty humor. More recently, she’s also become a fount of Zen-like wisdom. On “The Sarah Silverman Podcast,” she counsels callers on whatever issue might be nagging them that day, whether it’s a failed relationship or attitudes toward French kissing. Usually, the advice boils down to something like: It’s not as bad as you think. “Everything always works out,” Silverman told me calmly last week.
We’d been discussing a pilot she’d shot just before the pandemic that HBO had commissioned but ultimately declined to pursue. It was a disappointment, like all stalled projects can be, but it ultimately made its way onto the list of things not worth worrying about. “I have no frustration about it,” Silverman said with a shrug. “It’s their channel.” Her personal life, though, has recently put this c’est la vie mind-set to the test. In May, Silverman’s stepmother, Janice, died of pancreatic cancer, and, just a few days later, her father—Donald Silverman, a charismatic clothing-store owner who looms large in her work—passed away from kidney-related health issues. “My parents just died, so I’m not going to be, like, ‘You know, in the end, it was great!’ ” Silverman admits. But, if anyone understood the lifelong seesaw of love and grief, it was Donald Silverman. “It is the deal of life. My dad would always say, ‘It’s part of the deal,’ ” she told me. “But none of us can accept it.”
Silverman’s recent losses came during a period when she was readying her new standup special, “Someone You Love,” which premièred on HBO last Saturday. The fifty-two-year-old veteran comic likes to characterize herself as a gig worker—someone who enjoys collecting odd jobs in entertainment—and “Someone You Love” is just her fourth standup special. It will feel instantly familiar to anyone who’s followed her comedy, though. She’s as Sarah Silvermany as it gets, serving up her distinct flavor of mischievous, off-color humor delivered in wry, carefully measured bits. Recently, she spoke with me over Zoom. Our conversation has been edited for length and clarity.
I listened to the podcast episode where you discuss the death of your parents, and you included a snippet of a conversation between your father and your friend, the comedian Jeff Ross, recorded during the last stretch. Did you record everything at the end?
I recorded a bunch. My sister Susan and two of her daughters and her son were all there, staying there. My parents were in their condo, in bed, and then there’s a guest room. And everyone else was on couches and air mattresses. There’s stuff I recorded that I can’t even look at, because it’s, like . . . that’s not the stuff I want to remember now. But when Jeff came over I recorded it. They have such a special relationship, so I knew it would be nice.
Do you have a strong archival instinct in general? Are you a journal writer, or a record keeper?
I used to keep a journal. Now there are so many forms of journal in our lives. You can go through and be, like, “Oh, on this date in my phone or my calendar or Instagram page or whatever.” But lately, in the past few years, I’ve really been trying to take pictures when I’m with friends and stuff, to have. I’ve lost so many people, and I know that feeling of wishing you had something—a picture, or more tangible versions of memories. My mom always took pictures, constantly. And it was annoying, but we’re so grateful for it now. Of course, she’s in none of them. Finding a picture of my mom is like gold.
Did your dad get to see the live version of the show you recorded for the specials?
He’s seen me do standup over the years a ton of times, with a lot of this material in it. He didn’t see all of it. When I started the tour, I had thirty-six minutes. There are probably twenty new minutes that he hasn’t seen from me doing standup in town. He was exposed to lots of things. I’m not, like, “Oh, you didn’t see my last special!”
Can you talk about how and when this material took shape?
I never think about doing a special. I never write standup aiming for a special. I just never think about it. This is my fourth special, and I’ve been doing standup for thirty-three years! I did a pilot for HBO right before the pandemic, and part of that deal was a special. And then they didn’t pick up the pilot, but I still owed them a special. And then the pandemic happened, and I didn’t do standup for the longest I have ever gone without doing standup. And then standup came back. And we get a call [from HBO], like, “It’s time.” I’ve never owed a special like that. Usually, I’ll have an hour and someone says, “Can you do a special?” And I go, “Yeah, O.K.”
I had to assess what I had, take the stuff pre-pandemic and say, “Is this relevant? Is there a whole new meaning to a lot of this stuff?” I had to pick through it and build on that. I had to build it out on the road—which so many comics do, but I never did before. I had to work from show to show and figure it out. I’ll always wish I had a few more months, but even if I had a few more months I would wish I had a few more months. Having a deadline is helpful for me.
It’s interesting because I shot two nights. And the first night felt really stiff. The second night was super loose. And I got a couple heckles the second night, which were really fun, and in the moment. I thought, That’s going to be so cool in a special, to have all this unplanned audience stuff. But it really didn’t play. Even though it was totally off the cuff, it just doesn’t play that way.
But I do feel like this special feels very loose and natural, with some completely organic impromptu moments.
Definitely. I’ve always been very meticulous, but then meticulous in order to be loose. I know all the little nooks and crannies of a show, but then I can just throw it away and be loose. But it’s a controlled chaos. It’s like the Heisenberg principle. You do standup and, ironically, you do it in front of people. They’re part of it. But, as soon as the cameras are there, no matter how long you’ve been doing standup, something changes that makes it less organic. Over the years, I’ve learned to relax and let it be. I went in knowing, This will not be the best night of the tour. It just won’t be. And I have to be O.K. with that.
Nowadays, there’s a ton of stylizing that happens with standup specials. It almost seems as if there’s a race to see who can have the biggest-name director or the artsiest interludes.
I am of the belief that standup comedy needs to be the thing. And not cool shots. John Mulaney had this move in his new special, which I just watched. The camera goes through his legs, and it just starts the special. It’s really filmic, and there are some interesting choices. I know the director, Alex Timbers, who works on Broadway. It didn’t overpower it. But it was just a little neat thing. I like to have bookends—a little something at the beginning, and at the end. The standup just needs a plate to be on. It doesn’t need a million garnishes, in my opinion. I’m open to the standup-comedy-special form changing and growing, but, ultimately, you’re at a mike, and you’re just capturing it as simply as you can without getting in the way.
At this stage in your career, are you ever surprised by what the audience thinks is funny?
Every crowd is pretty different. And as I’ve changed my crowd either changes with me, or they fall off and new people are interested. I’m not very political in my standup. I’m socially political. They seem to be into that stuff. But there’s incredible relief having an equal component of aggressively stupid, silly, fucking juvenile humor. Which is my favorite. I like aggressively dumb stuff, and to me it’s all about portions.
In “A Speck of Dust,” from 2017, you reveal, near the end of the show, that you had a brief health scare and joke about your own eagerness to describe it as “trauma.” This new special is very lighthearted. There’s a certain expectation—or a trend—in today’s comedy ecosystem that a special should have a big reveal, or discuss a big idea. Do you feel pressure to raise the stakes?
I don’t know. I probably should, but I never really look at it as needing certain elements in order to be complete. Hopefully, you want it to be somewhat cohesive, even if what makes it cohesive is me.
The title of your tour was “Grow Some Lips,” but the title of the special is “Someone You Love.” That comes from a joke where you imagine a dead loved one reassuring the living that Hell isn’t real. Was that a title you decided on during the final days of your parents’ lives?
Oh, my God. That didn’t even occur to me! And I couldn’t think of a title. They [HBO] kept pressuring me for a title, and I’m literally taking care of my parents in their tiny apartment, and I landed on that one. You know, I think my subconscious makes so many decisions for me that I don’t make connections to until later. Oh, my gosh! Yeah! I wasn’t conscious of that. But it really connects. “Grow Some Lips” was a fun title, but I wanted something a little bit cohesive with all my specials. The three previous ones were “Jesus Is Magic,” “We Are Miracles,” and “Speck of Dust,” and “Someone You Love” just felt like it fit in with that more than a joke title. I thought about calling it “The Struggle,” but I just thought, It’s too obnoxious. Even for me. I felt like [the special] had a seventies vibe, and “Someone You Love” felt like a seventies album title.
You even had some flare in the jeans.
I spent all this money on renting a designer suit and getting it tailored. The director said, “The outfit does matter! You want the special to be, like, ‘The one where she’s in the yellow suit!’ ” And I was totally down with that. But then I did what I always do, and said, “I don’t feel like me!” And I got rid of it. The day before the special I went to Nordstrom Rack and got a pair of shoes, and ordered the jeans online, and wore an old T-shirt. I spent so much money on that suit, but then I spent a hundred and three dollars on what I ended up wearing.
What was the pilot you made that HBO didn’t pick up?
It’s funny, because I was really bummed about it. I was, like, “They need this show!” It was a great pilot. A political half-hour weekly. And it was, like, a John Oliver- or Bill Maher-type show. I was gutted. I was so bummed. When a pilot doesn’t go, you’re always bummed. I was, like, “I can’t believe they’re blowing this opportunity!” Every shit I take is the greatest thing ever made, in my view. And then the pandemic happened and I couldn’t do standup, so I said, “Now I will do a podcast.” I started my podcast, and it satiated that desire. Now that I’ve got this podcast where I can get any of that out, I want to act! I want to do other odd jobs and stuff. The pilot, of course it didn’t air and no one will see it, but two years later everything we were talking about came to the fore. Now it seems trite, but it was about the algorithms of social media.
How do you decide what projects you want to take on?
There have been a couple of things that I did for money. You know, I get this amount of money and hopefully no one will see it. Or two months on this project for no money, but it’s going to be so fun, or such a challenge. All sorts of variables go into decisions. Doing a rich guy’s daughter’s quinceañera? Fuck yeah. That’s a money gig. Great. I got to do a commercial for Uber Eats that was a godsend. It was awesome. A small part in a movie that I think is awesome? That’s great. I keep my overhead low. I am not one for purses. [Holds up backpack.] It gives me an incredible amount of freedom. There could be something where I go, “Yeah, this looks good, but there are so many crowd scenes and those take so long.” I make decisions based on quality of life. Sometimes I say no to stuff because maybe I’m scared or lazy. I’m trying not to do that so much, but I also love being home.
It is unusual and refreshing to hear you say money is a real factor. Oftentimes, you’ll notice people will be compelled to spin a sponsorship as an expression of their truest creative impulses.
Listen, I probably use Uber Eats four to five nights a week. But that’s not why I did it. I did it because I’ve never done a commercial and been paid a shit-ton of money. I got to be funny doing it. They let me write it. It was fucking . . . I don’t know why I’m swearing so much. It was great. In show business, especially now, we count on those, because they subsidize the stuff we care about.
Are you working on anything that’s been impacted by the writers’ strike?
Not right now. I’m in kind of a sweet spot, because the next thing I’m working on, writing-wise, is my musical, and that does not fall in the purview of that. Purview? La-di-da. But I do need to go on the picket line. And hopefully SAG is going to join, which will really make a dent. All these companies knew the strike was coming, so they had everything written beforehand. Now, with an actors’ strike, we’ve got some power.
Do you feel as if the strike is completely dominating conversation in Los Angeles right now?
Yeah, and everywhere you drive. You don’t realize how many studios there are until you see all the Writers Guild people. It’s interesting, because my boyfriend has been going every day. I’m going to start on Monday. But he’s, like, “Everyone gets out of the way when cars go in and out. Shouldn’t we be disrupting things? We’re being so polite and not making their lives hard at all.” It’s so funny because, six months ago, my boyfriend asked if we could throw stuff away, including signs in storage in the garage from the 2007 strike. I was, like, “I’m going to pull these out, because they’re basically the same signs.”
What are your memories of that strike?
I was in the thick of it, because I was making “The Sarah Silverman Program.” I feel guilty having very happy memories of the strike, but I do. We all struck, and I would bring a joint. Young writers, old writers, they’d all be, like, “I’ll have some!” Just the unity and having very clear lines of what we were fighting for. Technology is the Wild West, so every time it changes . . . at that time, they were, like, “We’re only streaming! We’re only just trying! We’re not the networks.” Now the networks are, like, “We’re just the networks! We’re not streaming.” They have to grow in order to survive, and so do we. You have to change and adapt. You can’t force the world to have VHS tapes so Blockbuster can stay open. But in that growth you need writers. You can’t have narrative television or movies without writers.
In terms of promoting this special, I’m lucky to be able to talk to you and have my own social media. But I can’t do any of the talk shows. I can’t promote it, really. On Instagram, you know how you can do a “collaboration post”? I was even told not to do a collaboration post with HBO or anything because of the strike. And, with what’s happened with my parents, I didn’t really get a chance to really promote this special. But, also, it’s different now. It’s not about the numbers on Saturday night at ten. It’s about people seeing the special over time and it just being there. The lack of appointment TV is wonderful as a viewer but not as wonderful as an artist. But it’s also cool that the special is out there, always. My first HBO special was on when it was on, and then you couldn’t see it.
Back to what you were saying about promoting the special on late-night shows. You’re almost an honorary late-night host—you recently did a week of subbing in on “The Daily Show.” Have you ever been in conversations to host your own late-night show, or take over from one of the existing hosts?
No. I had a blast doing it. But that has never been something that I wanted in my life. I love doing odd jobs. “The Daily Show” was so exhilarating, and such a lesson in immediacy. You’re sitting with a producer, and she’s, like, “Use it or move on.” She’s keeping you on track. I remember when I hosted “S.N.L.” At the after-party, I was sitting with Lorne Michaels. This is real name-dropper heaven for me. And Martin Short. And Lorne said that Marty was going to do a thing on “Update” tonight. I was, like, “Oh, my God! That would have been incredible.” Lorne said, “Martin’s problem is that he wants everything to be perfect, when the truth is it just has to be good.” And I thought that was so funny. But, when I guest-hosted “The Daily Show,” I immediately understood it. Perfect is the enemy of the good. It’s about using what works and making it the best it can be.
I listened to you on Bill Simmons’s podcast a few years ago, and you said you would never start a podcast because you’d hate the feeling of asking people to come on. But you started a podcast over the pandemic, and you resolved that anxiety by making a call-in show. What does your podcast do for you, creatively?
First of all, it’s way messier and more immediate than my standup. And I talk about anything I want. And then, the calls are the trajectory of the show. It just scratches an itch for me where it doesn’t have to be funny. And it definitely scratches the itch of my interest in human dynamics and connection. The things that make us all very much the same, even though we think we’re so different. The last thing I want in my life is to have to ask famous friends for favors. It’s not fun or comfortable for me. This was great, because anyone can call in. I don’t want to talk about so-and-so’s project on TBS or whatever. You know what I mean? I love TV, but I’m not interested in that. I’m interested in working out problems and finding out patterns in things. I’m someone who goes to therapy, and everything I learn in therapy I want to utilize.
You did an episode of your podcast where you spoke at length about Dave Chappelle’s “S.N.L.” monologue, and you talk about it in a nuanced way, where you say that he’s your friend but some of the monologue was antisemitic. Did he hear that episode, and did you have the chance to discuss it directly with him?
No. We haven’t talked about it. I have no idea if he heard it. I also feel, like, I was so affected by it [the monologue], and now I’m so over it, because that’s what talking about things does. I’ve known him since he was seventeen and I was nineteen. But he texted me out of nowhere and he said, “I love you.” And I said, “I love you, too.” So, you know, I don’t know if that means he listened to it. It didn’t matter.
He’s not antisemitic. All of his best friends are Jewish. But it hit hard because he’s so influential. He influenced me! And it wasn’t any of the jokes. I thought the jokes were fucking hilarious. It was the two serious things [he said] that really frightened me in this current landscape.
In that podcast, I think you paid him the ultimate respect by saying that you made a point to stay up and watch “S.N.L.” to see him host. Giving someone your undivided attention is the highest compliment you can pay a friend, regardless of how you feel about the thing.
Oh, it was appointment TV for me.
You’re someone who speaks a lot about social and political issues and you work hard to provide context for most things you discuss. Your variety show, “I Love You, America,” was all about getting outside of whatever ideological bubble you’re in. But I go to your TikTok page and the commenters are all: You’re a woke liberal snowflake! or You did blackface in 2007! Do you ever get disheartened and feel like it’s not even worth it anymore to try to achieve some nuance if the conversation still gets reduced to that?
I’m never on TikTok. This comic at the Comedy Cellar, Jon Laster, took my phone and signed me up. But it didn’t take hold for me. I don’t read the comments. People have always reacted like this, but they didn’t have a voice on social media. I can’t control what people think, or the hurt or anger they feel that makes them comment. It’s easy to do that with people you don’t know. In a million years, they wouldn’t think that I would read that and be hurt. But I really try not to read that stuff. Because . . . does it exist? You know what it is? It’s none of my business.
I’ll see the picture of me in blackface with no context. And now there’s no way to find the context because it’s been taken out of existence, that whole episode. Of course, there is no context that makes it O.K. But it existed in a time when comedy was different. I’m not arguing that I’m glad I did it. But, certainly, the whole thing about art and what makes it art is that you can look at the same thing every day, and what makes it different is that you’re different and the world around you is different. Certainly, that’s the case with that.
I’ve put a lot of stuff out there talking about it, and addressing it, and anyone can find it if they wanted to. So people who don’t don’t want to. And that’s none of my business. People really pick and choose. What I think of myself can’t be at the whim of someone I’ve never met who doesn’t know me. That’s crazy.
I always tell friends who are affected by what’s online, people who are famous or whatever—I say, “Nobody is Googling you the way you are. And definitely not organizing it by date the way you are. Nobody is thinking about it.”
You’ve been involved in the public discourse around recent elections quite a bit. Do you have any plans for how you’re going to approach the 2024 election cycle?
No idea. I never plan in any way. I am worried about today and tomorrow, and possibly this weekend, and don’t really look beyond it. Sure, like anyone I’m thinking about Trump and DeSantis, and very concerned about both. And Biden, and concerned about him, too.
I’ll admit that, in 2015, I loved watching Trump in those Republican debates. In a million years, I didn’t think he’d be elected. He was spitting some truth in there, and also just being so irreverent and hilarious. And then when it got real . . . he can just say, “I’m not going to do debates” and just throw parties for himself. So many people on the right only run, they never serve. They just perpetuate enough fear in people to make them malleable. I’m exhausted from both sides of it. I’m a lifetime member of the Democratic Socialists of America, but they drive me batty. They’re so élitist, so ironically élitist, to me. So black and white. They should be going, “Hey, join us!” Perfect is the enemy of the good, again.
You’re known to be a longtime basketball player. Do you also follow the N.B.A.?
I love going to games. My sister, who’s a hockey nut, is now into basketball. But more than that I love playing it. I think those days might be over, which makes me so sad. I’m feeling it in my bones. It was really my biggest joy, playing pickup games.
It’s an incredibly physical sport.
For the past few years, I would stretch before, then quit a half hour early and stretch for that half hour. But I’m fifty-two and I don’t want a fucking injury. But I miss it so much. But I’ll play a half-court game and it’s just as fun. Also, what you can do is play totally on the outside. Passing, being at the three-point line. But I was getting really excited about my inside game. I can’t hack it anymore, I don’t think. I got a wicked concussion about four years ago, going up for a rebound and getting smashed in my head. ♦
Sourse: newyorker.com
