The Comic's Comic Presents Last Things First

In the movie Most Likely To Murder, Adam Pally wants everyone in his hometown on Long Island to believe he's still the king of his high school, now making it big in Las Vegas when in reality, he's still stuck working as a bathroom attendant. Over a holiday weekend, he drags them all into his murder-mystery comedy, including Rachel Bloom, John Reynolds and Vincent Kartheiser. The film premiered at SXSW 2018, and will be released May 1 by Lionsgate on demand and on digital platforms. I sat down with the cast, as well as with the writers Doug Mand and Dan Gregor, to find out what stories they told their friends and families back home to explain their fledgling comedy careers before they were stars. So let's get to it!

Bo Burnham is the quintessential YouTube comedy star. While still a teen, Bo went from recording funny songs in his bedroom to best-selling artist with Comedy Central. Burnham become a successful touring stand-up comedian as well as an actor, appearing on the big screen in Funny People and The Big Sick, and starring on the small screen in MTV's Zach Stone Is Gonna Be Famous. After directing two of his three comedy specials, he turned to directing others, including Jerrod Carmichael's 8 and Chris Rock's Tamborine. Burnham has now written and directed his first feature film, Eighth Grade, which debuted to raves at the Sundance Film Festival. The film depicts the agony of surviving middle school and social media pressures as an eighth-grade girl in 2018. Burnham sat with me during a screening of the film at SXSW to talk about his own experiences with social media, and what it all means. I'm honored to welcome him as the guest for my 200th episode of Last Things First. So please sit back, enjoy and spread the love of this podcast far and wide, and let's get to it!

Rachel Bloom is the creator and star of Crazy Ex-Girfriend on The CW, for which she has won the Golden Globe and the Critics Choice Award for best actress in a comedy series. Bloom's first big break in musical comedy came in 2010, when she made a music video celebrating author Ray Bradbury. Along the way, she has written and/or performed for Allen Gregory, Robot Chicken, and BoJack Horseman. She's taking Crazy Ex-Girlfriend on a live theater tour this spring, and she next co-stars in Most Likely To Murder, a movie written and directed by her husband, Dan Gregor. He joins in our discussion, so let's get to it!

Bill Hader was nominated for three Emmy Awards for acting during his eight seasons as a cast member on Saturday Night Live, has written for South Park, lent his voice to animated hits such as Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs and Inside Out, and served up memorable supporting roles in the films Superbad, Tropic Thunder and Trainwreck. After co-creating the great IFC mockumentary series Documentary Now! He now stars as Barry in HBO's Barry, about a Marine veteran who becomes a hit-man, but realizes his true potential, or disastrous end, could come by pursuing an acting career in Hollywood. Hader created, wrote, directed and executive produced Barry with Alec Berg, no stranger to HBO as a past EP on Curb Your Enthusiasm and current EP on Silicon Valley. Hader and Berg sat down with me during SXSW in Austin to explain how and why they made Barry. So let's get to it!

Sharon Houston punked Magic Johnson, Too Short, and 18 other celebrities on Punk'd, fooled Kim Kardashian's fans on Celebrities Undercover, and has filmed hidden-camera pilots for VH1, E!, Disney Channel, Style Network and Dick Clark Productions. Sharon has been a fixture in clubs and cabarets since the 1990s, first in New York City and more recently in Los Angeles. Her podcast, Daytime Justice, looks under the robe at daytime court TV shows and reveals behind-the-scenes stories from her work as a show producer. Sharon has performed stand-up on Comedy Central, Last Comic Standing, MTV and VH1, and she appeared on Nick Swardson's Pretend Time. She released her first comedy album, "Shuran Shuran," in late 2017. And in early 2018, she sat down with me in Hollywood to talk shop. As Jon Stewart once told her: "Stop complaining. This is the fun part." So let's get to it!

Brian Volk-Weiss is the founding president of Comedy Dynamics, which grew out of New Wave Entertainment to become the largest independent stand-up comedy production and distribution company. You see the Comedy Dynamics logo on almost every new stand-up special you see these days, no matter where you see it. Since 2016, his company also has produced series such as History's Join or Die with Craig Ferguson, Animal Planet's Animal Nation with Anthony Anderson, There's Johnny… which started at Seeso and ended up at Hulu. I caught up with Brian in his offices in Burbank, California a few days before the Grammy Awards, where he had an 80 percent chance of being responsible for the Grammy-winning Best Comedy Album of 2017. So let's get to it!

Candice Thompson is a former finalist on Stand Up NBC's talent search who has performed on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon and served as a correspondent on the E! series, The Comment Section. She has starred in her own YouTube sketch comedy series, and written for the game show Smart, Funny and Black. Thompson just launched her own podcast, The Struggle, but first, she sat down with me to talk about overcoming her own personal and professional struggles, so let's get to it!

Benji Aflalo is a stand-up comedian, who alone together with comedy pal Esther Povitsky, created, executive produces and stars in the sitcom Alone Together — which already has been picked up for second season by Freeform. They play versions of themselves, friends from different backgrounds trying to find love and success in Hollywood. Alone Together is also executive produced by The Lonely Island guys. Benji met Esther at The Comedy Store, where he's part of a grand tradition of comedians who were former doormen at the club. He's also written for The Burn with Jeff Ross, Not Safe with Nikki Glaser and the Comedy Central Roasts of James Franco and Justin Bieber.

So let's get to it!

Jade Catta-Preta is a Brazilian-born comedian and actress who you can see on the truTV series, Those Who Can't, and in person frequently at The Comedy Store when she's not touring as a feature act for Bobby Lee, Kevin Nealon or Bill Burr. In 2014, she co-starred as a regular on three different series, MTV's Girl Code, Showtime's Californication, and ABC's Manhattan Love Story. She's also appeared on TV as a host on VH1, co-star of MTV's Ladylike, and guest on shows such as @midnight, Comedy Knockout, and Getting Doug With High. She recently returned to her native Brazil to perform there in Portuguese, and she tells me what happened and what's next for her, so let's get to it!

Jeff Dye was a finalist on Last Comic Standing only three years into his comedy career. Since then, Dye has hosted two MTV series – Numbnuts, and Money From Strangers – one Spike game show, That Awkward Game Show, appeared frequently on ABC's Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, and competed against other celebrities on both Lip Sync Battle and I Can Do That. For two seasons now, he has served as tour guide for William Shatner, Terry Bradshaw, George Foreman and Henry Winkler across the globe on NBC's celebrity bucket list travelogue, Better Late Than Never. We've known each other for years, but this is his first sit-down on my podcast. Better late than never, right? So let's get to it!