Stand-up specials will never be as good as attending a stand-up performance in person

Paste Magazine

"Filming a great stand-up special is like trying to capture lighting in a bottle," says Olivia Cathcart. "Whereas unconventional, sketch and prop heavy pieces like (Bo Burnham's) Inside or Julio Torres’ My Favorite Shapes thrive with a more cinematic structure, traditional stand-up is harder to authentically recreate. Stadium shows are a slog as a 30 second joke takes five minutes to tell so as not to get drowned out from the laughter of thousands in attendance after every line. Cable broadcasts are subjected to momentum-killing edits that cut to commercial mid-joke, and then there’s the arthouse specials directed by style-over-substance 'auteurs' full of dutch angles and lens flares. While most of us were introduced to stand-up this way, once you’ve seen it live, you can’t see it on your screens in the same light ever again."