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    STAND UP SLEEPWALK

    Funny man Mike Birbiglia talks Broadway, sleepwalking and marriage proposals

    Kelly Dearmore
    Jan 11, 2013 | 10:30 am
    • Mike Birbiglia will perform Saturday January 12 at the AT&T Performing ArtsCenter.
      Photo courtesy of AT&T Performing Arts Center
    • Mike Birbiglia performing a Comedy Central special.
      Mike Birbiglia/Facebook

    Few comedians of late have been more vulnerable than Mike Birbiglia, who puts the lessons he's hilariously learned the hard way on stage for all to see. More and more people have been seeing him, too. His one-man show, My Girlfriend's Boyfriend has been a hit pretty much anywhere he's taken it, and his other one-man show, Sleepwalk With Me, was developed into a movie that's packed many an art-house movie theater.

    On Saturday January 12, Birbiglia will perform My Girlfriend's Boyfriend to what is sure to be a pretty full Winspear Opera House in Dallas. We recently caught up with Birbiglia to discuss the artistic and strategic elements of being an actor, playwright and comedian.

     Culture Map: You've got two successful Off-Broadway productions under your belt. Are you aiming for "On-Broadway" with your next one?

     Mike Birbiglia: That’s a good question! I’ve never been asked that. We actually talked about doing My Girlfriend’s Boyfriend on Broadway, and there was a lot of interest from backers, but I decided to make my movie version of Sleepwalk With Me instead of that.

     

      "For the next show, Broadway is definitely a possibility," says comedian Mike Birbiglia

    But for the next show, Broadway is definitely a possibility. I just saw a great Broadway show this week, Once, the musical.

    The lead actress, Cristin Milioti, who plays my sister in Sleepwalk With Me, puts on one of the best Broadway performances I’ve ever seen.

     CM: What are the key differences between a one-man show like My Girlfriend's Boyfriend and the more standard stand-up sets?

     
     MB: Well, I try to kind of straddle the line between a stand-up comedy show and a one person play. My roots are in stand-up comedy, so my one-man shows are very joke-dense. They have as many jokes as my regular stand-up shows did, but the jokes add up to something that’s more emotional and hopefully more impactful.

     
     CM: Stand-up comedy seems to be a very competitive field. Everyone wants better gigs and higher pay. Is the one-man show a good way to find a niche that helps you stand out?

     
     MB: Again, really good question. How about CultureMap Dallas? CultureMap Dallas is two-for-three in unique questions, which is hard because I’ve done the show in 70 American cities and abroad in Australia, London, and Canada, so you answer a lot of the same questions over and over. But to answer your question, I didn’t intend it that way. It’s just sort of what happened.

    I studied screenwriting and playwriting in college, and I started doing stand-up comedy at the same time. I always wanted to create things that were a blend of those things, which is why I started working with Seth Barrish, the theater director on this show and Sleepwalk With Me. And I started working with Ira Glass of This American Life and with The Moth, which is this great storytelling series and radio show out of New York.

    What's evolved is this thing where, basically, it’s a series of stories that add up to a single story and there’s an arc and it’s emotional and it builds. I’m very proud of it. And it’s oddly not higher in pay because there’s a set, and lighting design and all of these expenses that come with it, but it’s very gratifying because I feel like the audience is getting a full meal of comedy.

     

      "I fear even telling you this because now I feel like I’m going to get requests from people to propose in Dallas," Birbiglia says.

     CM: Were there any artistic obstacles for you in turning Sleepwalk With Me into a movie from a one-man show?

     
     MB: It was a two year writing process. The most challenging thing about turning a one-man show into a film is that there’s all these characters in a film and there’s only the one narrator in a one-man show.

     
    When you’re performing a monolog, you can always kind of bring the audience back if you sense their minds are wandering. With film, you shoot it and you hope that the audience is going to follow the narrative, and that they’ll be engaged and think it’s funny. Then you get into the edit room and you realize, “Oh, they’re not as engaged here, or here,” and you try to clean that up in creative ways.

     
    Our editor, Geoffrey Richman (The Cove, Sicko), is brilliant and he did a really extraordinary job of coming up with creative solutions with parts of the story that didn’t feel as concrete. We did a bunch of test screenings in New York, so in a way, those screenings are kind of like "open-mic-ing" new comedy material in the sense that you could see what was and wasn’t working.

     
     CM: Your stories are as funny as they are relatable. Do people make a point to unload the details of their own love life to you when they see you after a show or out in public?

     MB: People don’t unload on me that often. But the last show of 2012 was in Bloomington and a guy asked if he could propose to his girlfriend at the show and so I obliged him. He proposed in front of a sold-out crowd of 1,000 or 1,500 people, which is an exciting way to do it.

    I fear even telling you this because now I feel like I’m going to get requests from people to propose in Dallas. That said, I am open to it. But I’m proud of that aspect of the show. It’s kind of a cynical, but at the same time, optimistic comedy show about love. And in some ways it’s romantic. It’s good for couples, girlfriends, boyfriends, husbands, wives. It ultimately packs a pretty optimistic statement about love.

     --

     Mike Birbiglia will perform My Girlfriend's Boyfriend, Saturday January 12 at the Winspear Opera House. Click here for information on ticket availability.

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    Movie review

    Early days of pandemic become a powder keg in tense movie Eddington

    Alex Bentley
    Jul 18, 2025 | 12:47 pm
    Joaquin Phoenix and Pedro Pascal in Eddington
    Photo courtesy of A24
    Joaquin Phoenix and Pedro Pascal in Eddington.

    The coronavirus pandemic had a profound impact on the entire world, one that has been shown in various ways by movies and TV shows. However, even though a number of productions have attempted to show what life was like during the early days of the pandemic, few have tried to truly reckon with the way lockdowns and restrictions changed people.

    Filmmaker provocateur Ari Aster does just that in Eddington, set in a fictional small town in New Mexico in early 2020 that proves to be a microcosm of the debates taking place worldwide at that time. Sheriff Joe Cross (Joaquin Phoenix) is not a fan of mask mandates or other restrictions imposed by the government, while mayor Ted Garcia (Pedro Pascal) tries to lead by example in an effort to keep his community safe.

    The men butt heads not just on how to deal with the pandemic, but also over a personal history involving Joe’s wife, Louise (Emma Stone). When news of the murder of George Floyd in Minnesota makes its way to town, it starts a slow simmer among the town’s youth population, putting even more stress on Joe and his small department. Conspiracy theories, white guilt, partisan politics, cults, and more combine to make the community into a powder keg that threatens to explode at the slightest provocation.

    Aster (Midsommar, Beau is Afraid) takes aim at all sides in a film that’s part satire and part thriller. No matter how each viewer reacted to the pandemic, the film offers at least a character or two that will come close to representing their viewpoint. Although opinions may differ, it seems clear that Aster is not portraying one side as “right” or more righteous than the other. What he is doing is demonstrating just how much was happening in a short period of time, and how those things could negatively affect anyone.

    On the flip side, the film also challenges viewers with viewpoints that may not match their own, which can make for an uncomfortable experience at times. The reactions various characters have to certain events range from rational to wholly unexpected, and Aster seems to delight in keeping the audience on their toes the entire time. This is especially true when violence rears its ugly head, resulting in some intense and upsetting scenes.

    Not everything in the film lands, though. A subplot involving Louise and Vernon (Austin Butler), a cult leader who preys on her fears, feels tacked on, with no relation to the film as a whole. In fact, the character of Louise is a misfire in general, one whose purpose makes little sense. Aster also lets (asks?) some actors speak in almost inaudible tones at various points in the film, a frustrating experience in a film as dialogue-heavy as this one.

    Phoenix loves to dig into off-kilter characters, and this one ranks high on that scale. Even if you don’t enjoy what his character does, it’s hard to fault the performance that brings him to life. Most of Pascal’s scenes are with Phoenix, and while he matches Phoenix’s energy, the lower key nature of his character leaves him overshadowed. The nature of the film means few others make an impact, although Deidre O’Connell as Joe’s passive-aggressive mother-in-law and William Belleau as Officer Jiminiz Butterfly stand out in their scenes.

    Few of us would volunteer to go back to the baffling days of early 2020, but Eddington does a great job of examining what was happening at the time and how events united some and divided others. It’s not a feel-good film, but it is one that will make viewers re-examine their reactions at the time and how those influenced the current reality.

    ---

    Eddington is now playing in theaters.

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