Josh Gondelman is a Peabody winning and Emmy nominated comedy writer, author, and stand-up comedian who currently lives in New York City, where he works as a writer on HBO’s Last Week Tonight with John Oliver. Raised in Boston, Gondelman has also written for Billy on the Street and is the co-author of the Shorty Award-winning Modern Seinfeld Twitter account. Oh, and his own Twitter feed, @joshgondelman, was named the best account of 2015 by Paste Magazine. In summary, Josh Gondelman is very good at everything. This spring he’ll be appearing on Conan and Night Train with Wyatt Cenac to spread the word about Physical Whisper, his breathtakingly hilarious sophomore comedy album, which is out via Rooftop Comedy on March 18. Here, Josh and I discuss how well things are going, hanging out with his dog on off-days, how America is doing right now, how great Canada is doing right now, a golden or easy age of comedy, comedian versus citizen, the position Last Week Tonight with John Oliver took against the election news cycle and Donald Drumpf, the now crowded field of delivering fake news on television, everything is news, the making of and story behind Physical Whisper, when material is material, comedy peer support, how a second album by New York Josh Gondelman might relate to a first album by Boston Josh Gondelman, his style as a comedian and relationship with stand-up, Gary Gulman, becoming a more confident performer, his comedy nerd level, the Modern Seinfeld Twitter account that Josh co-writes, the way Seinfeld would name things, create a lexicon of its own with distinctive characters, and influence comedians, breaking down a Jerry Seinfeld joke, breaking down his own joke “The Entire Spectrum of Human Potential,” German Chancellor Otto von Bismarck, when it hit him that this real life thing might be fodder for a bit, delayed realizations, downtime, balancing life and work, future plans, the album cut “Surprise!” and that was the end of a very nice conversation.
Related links: twitter.com/joshgondelman vishkhanna.com
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