Interview with Bob Odenkirk

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/25/magazine/bob-odenkirk-interview.html

by wslh • 3 months ago

178 121 3 months ago

nytimes.com

wslh• 3 months ago

https://archive.is/zPqra

anshumankmr• 3 months ago

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/25/magazine/bob-odenkirk-int...

alexose• 3 months ago

I liked the shoutout to On Cinema at the Cinema. Truly one of the most hilarious and fascinating pieces of comedy in the last couple of decades.

davexunit• 3 months ago

It's my favorite comedy of all time. It's been going for over 10 years with a lot of little spin offs along the way. For those that want to take the plunge you can watch the first first ten seasons, Oscar specials, Decker, etc. for free on YouTube. Use this playlist to watch everything in chronological order.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=qFHLfmoLchI&list=PLRT5PdjVF-ip...

jackweirdy• 3 months ago

Same. I have found it impossible to explain to the uninitiated so I delight in finding others who’ve found it!

Hikikomori2• 3 months ago

Can't believe that Heidecker keeps getting away with murder.

Rooster61• 3 months ago

Oh boy, another one of these jackoffs. Rosetti the Rat couldn't get him convicted because HE DID NOTHING WRONG. You people need to let it go.

prngl• 3 months ago

This was an interesting interview. Like a lot of great comedians, Odenkirk has a very grounded and bleak view of the world. I suppose a lot of art, comedy included, is a way of coping with their perspective, for themselves and for the audience.

toyg• 3 months ago

I think it has more to do with Comedians having to work their way up the chain.

rickdeckard• 3 months ago

I think it's less about comedy being the outlet to "cope" with what you see, and more about seeing the comedy because you are able to see the world for what it really is.

Most of timeless comedy simply describes the mundane reality of the audience in a way that they realize the absurdity of it.

kakacik• 3 months ago

A lot of comedians, ie standup ones but not only, have had hard lives, suffer from depression, anxieties and so on. The better the ones the more (ie Robin Williams). Making people laugh is their coping, validation and approval mechanism for the world and life.

Such people have different perspectives on life, success and happiness, for better or worse.

palmotea• 3 months ago

Like a lot of great comedians, Odenkirk has a very grounded and bleak view of the world. I suppose a lot of art, comedy included, is a way of coping with their perspective, for themselves and for the audience.

IIRC, I've heard it said that comedians are not happy people and usually had pretty difficult childhoods where "being funny" was a coping mechanism.

kjkjadksj• 3 months ago

Some of the famous ones like Carlin seemed like they had some mental patterns that favored the line of work. Famously if he wasn’t performing he was thinking of new material virtually every waking minute. Pathological dedication to the craft.

dang• 3 months ago

[stub for offtopicness]

[article authors don't write these headlines, you guys - let alone interview subjects]

nozzlegear• 3 months ago

When the zeitgeist is overwhelmingly nihilist, dare to be an absurdist.

mapontosevenths4• 3 months ago

I came here to say this.

Once you realize that life has no meaning, except that which we arbitrarily assign, you can only go a few ways with it. Of all the 'ism's you could choose in that moment, absudism is perhaps the least worst.

"Credo quia absurdum est."

svieira2• 3 months ago

Auberon Quinn, is that you?

mamonster• 3 months ago

Absurdism (of the Camus variety) is boomer nihilism.

styluss• 3 months ago

The world is like a ride in an amusement park. And when you choose to go on it you think it's real because that's how powerful our minds are. And the ride goes up and down and round and round. It has thrills and chills and it's very brightly colored and it's very loud and it's fun, for a while. Some people have been on the ride for a long time and they begin to question: "Is this real, or is this just a ride?" And other people have remembered, and they come back to us, they say: "Hey, don't worry, don't be afraid, ever, because this is just a ride."

Bill Hicks

Fixed name

frereubu• 3 months ago

The title reminded me of this too, but it was Bill Hicks, not Richard Hicks.

aswegs8• 3 months ago

So basically, Buddhism?

robofanatic• 3 months ago

The world is like a ride in an amusement park

only difference is, in real world there may be consequences that you may not be able to undo so you may have to be little careful while riding.

BLKNSLVR• 3 months ago

Return to Monkey Island.

bradhe• 3 months ago

When you're successful and rich (enough, at least), this is a nice whimsical thing to say. When you're suffering in the trenches, this isn't very helpful.

bell-cot• 3 months ago

Yeah - but it may be a good way to articulate a bleak, from-the-trenches perspective on the world.

sph4• 3 months ago

Your comment is exactly what successful and rich people say. You can find a lot of joy and acceptance among the poorest of people: the mind is remarkably adaptable, yet it's only those that always strive for more that cannot enjoy life's little moments.

I truly dislike this recent trend of making people feel bad if they have learned to just slow down and be content with life. "It's privilege being able to take a break and smell the roses, I'm too busy for this nonsense" is protestant crab mentality that I find revolting.

reedf1• 3 months ago

I'm not sure what you are trying to express here. Is it "rich people shouldn't express their worldview" or "the idea that life is inherently meaningless is incorrect"? A younger me ingested this sentiment as a call to action to create the meaning I wanted in the world.

julienmarie• 3 months ago

On the contrary, read the piece. He's not saying it from comfort, he's saying it after a heart attack, after his kids grew up, after the form he loved became a young man's game. The farce isn't a punchline delivered from above; it's what's left when the registers that used to hold you don't anymore. And his answer isn't despair, it's "we've got to keep trying… there's a breeze beneath my wings." That's not whimsy. That's the thing the trenches actually teach you, if you survive them.

lo_zamoyski• 3 months ago

Strictly speaking, meaninglessness is opposed to farce. You can’t have both utter meaninglessness and farce, because meaning is intrinsic to farce.

Comedy presupposes meaning, because comedy hinges on the absurd, but the absurd is a departure from meaning or a deviation from it. Something is absurd when it fails to be meaningful and fails to satisfy the rational in the broader context of rational meaning.

There is no laughter in the utterly meaningless. There cannot be silliness without an overarching context of seriousness.

mrleinad• 3 months ago

I doubt Bill Hicks was that rich. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KgzQuE1pR1w

coldtea5• 3 months ago

That's backwards: it is helpful to keep that in mind precisely when you're suffering in the trenches.

Rich and succesful people try to forget that, which is their hubris.

AndrewKemendo• 3 months ago

Having been in both, literally and metaphorically, it’s a useful mantra both places

You can also use “this too shall pass” if you want a lighter version

djeastm• 3 months ago

Did you read the interview? He basically says as much.

There’s no question that the security that you feel from not being afraid of a health issue or housing is a great comfort and helps you to be more at peace with life. It’s just not as much help as you think it should be.

raffael_de2• 3 months ago

I agree. I'm quite sure even Bob would agree. He never even used the words "farce" or "meaning(less)". He just agreed to "life is a farce" in a context that mostly reflected on his work as a comedian. Also the entire interview reads quite performative. This whole emotions-are-just-molecules, life-is-just-a-game etc perspectives fall flat as soon as the doctor tells the armchair-nihilist he has cancer ... suddenly life feels like something more important than a game and the feelings are no longer just molecules.

AntiUSAbah• 3 months ago

The thing is, if you never question anything, just lifing is worth it in itself.

If you do think too much about everything, and you survive this, you will land somewhere and this somewhere will be content.

I'm thinking about happiness and what I want for so long, that I now have crossed my half life point.

You also need to have a certain amount of freedom to even have this problem which makes it weird for others not having this. Oh you are not happy? But you have money?! I would be happy with money, i'm struggling.

Its weird if you sometimes think it would be interesting to struggle.

fiftyacorn• 3 months ago

American or British farce?

saberience6• 3 months ago

This is the kind of thought that only rich and successful people can have.

If you're working every day in a coal mine so you can feed your children otherwise they will go hungry, then you don't have these kind of thoughts.

Similarly, if you're fighting in a war so your family isn't raped or murdered then you don't have these kind of thoughts either.

Basically, you're lucky if you live in a situation that gives you the leisure and time to sit around and think about life being a farce. Probably he should be sitting around thinking, "boy, i'm so lucky I get to sit in this nice coffeeshop with no reason to work, no threat to my life, just chilling, so I can ponder on what a farce life is"

Edit: Because some people start criticising my comment, here's an addition:

How many people who were living in the 1700s do you think sat around thinking life is a farce?

Ponder on that question. Out of everyone living in the world today, how many people do you think sit around thinking life is a farce, who are those people? Why do you think they are thinking this?

I think it's an important question to ask and think about. It's saying something about our society, way of life, way of seeing the world.

In my opinion, life is for living, being with people, engaging in the world, taking action, connecting with people, and giving back. When you stop living, engaging with the world, and spend too much time alone, you start thinking this way.

I think if Bob Odenkirk lived on a community farm where everyone had to work together to survive he would be far happier and think life is far more meaningful.

sph4• 3 months ago

Already ranted about comments like yours: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47919820

It's shows true ignorance about what happiness is and where it's found. You can probably find more smiles and hope for the future in the Ukrainian trenches than reading comments from Silicon Valley workers making $150k a year.

I mean, do you guys even know Buddhism any more? It was such a hip thing in the 70s over there.

pillefitz• 3 months ago

So you're saying that life isn't a farce? Or that it is, and poor people don't ponder it? Just expressing disapproval of rich people?

watwut3• 3 months ago

Miners had elevated suicide rates and alcoholism rates. And when you read stories of families from such environments, similar thoughts were present. Yes, they did had these kind of thoughts. It is not just perfectly possible to be poor hard worker with family and have depression or missing meaning of life, but entirely common.

Tade0• 3 months ago

I believe he addresses this point:

There’s no question that the security that you feel from not being afraid of a health issue or housing is a great comfort and helps you to be more at peace with life. It’s just not as much help as you think it should be.

keybored2• 3 months ago

Your last sentence claims that he should appreciate how lucky he is. But this is a different question from what, at face value, the statement that life is meaningless or absurd is about. The two choices (first being operative in this thread):

1. Life is meaningless: descriptive claim

2. You ought to appreciate life to the best of your ability: normative claim

Your argument has no bearing on the first claim.

3s• 3 months ago

I think if Bob Odenkirk lived on a community farm where everyone had to work together to survive he would be far happier and think life is far more meaningful.

So you think everyone was happier in the USSR? /s

mapontosevenths4• 3 months ago

How many people who were living in the 1700s do you think sat around thinking life is a farce?

The name for this view of the universe is "absurdism". It was first espoused, as far as I can tell, when the discourse of Qohelet was recorded in the book of Ecclesiastes. So yes, they had it in the 1700's although perhaps not by that name.

If you're working every day in a coal mine so you can feed your children otherwise they will go hungry, then you don't have these kind of thoughts.

This is almost the opposite of the truth. Those with careers that do not occupy their minds do not sit around with their brains idling and empty all day. They spend much of that time thinking about exactly this sort of thing.

Fricken• 3 months ago

Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player That struts and frets his hour upon the stage And then is heard no more. It is a tale Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing

-William Shakespeare

Dumblydorr• 3 months ago

Did you read the article? He struggled for many years before achieving fame, and his main source of purpose was having young children. The HN headline doesn’t give the context that he feels outside of Mr Show and raising children, and after a near death experience, he feels less purpose than ever.

0xbadc0de5• 3 months ago

Bob Odenkirk's publicist would like the gullible public to think that his client is some sort of deeply thoughtful intellectual because he's trying to line up his next gig and having his name in the public zeitgeist will land him a fatter paycheck.

Giorgi• 3 months ago

Easy to be philosopher when you are millionaire.

red-iron-pine• 3 months ago

he didn't get to millionaire without doing comedy for a while, lot of digging into the human condition there.

easy to be a philosopher when you're forced to portray pathos and bathos, on camera, for years

monideas• 3 months ago

Genesis 25:32

Esau replied, "Behold, I am going to die; so why do I need this birthright?"

an0malous2• 3 months ago

“It is a tale, told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing”

throwpoaster• 3 months ago

Booo, nihilism is dumb.

t0lo• 3 months ago

This is a very new york times headline.

swed4202• 3 months ago

For real. The headline ought to be "NYT would like to remind you that life is a meaningless farce":

Interviewer: There’s a holistic observation I want to make about our conversation. You talked about how the best times in your life were when your kids were little. Those times are over. You said the art form you love the most, sketch comedy, is a young man’s game. That’s over for you. Life? It’s a farce.

Odenkirk: Yeah.

coolThingsFirst• 3 months ago

life sucks and then we die

kjshsh123• 3 months ago

You can really tell from the comments those who didn't read the article and who are taking the headline extremely literally.

He quoted Shakespeare's MacBeth, "It is a tale, Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing." when talking about he thinks sketch comedy is the greatest form of self expression, even moreso than poetry from people like Shakespeare.

It's not that deep.

swed4202• 3 months ago

It was forced by the interviewer for a clickbait flair. The headline ought to be "NYT would like to remind you that life is a meaningless farce":

Odenkirk: Yeah.

grouchomarx• 3 months ago

Bob Odenkirk Would Like to Remind You That Life Is a Meaningless Farce

yea yea we get it

Rendello• 3 months ago

This interview has been edited and condensed from two conversations.

Interesting, I wonder how common this is and how the interviewees feel about it.

timnetworks• 3 months ago

mr. show was an amazing bit of media

Interview with Bob Odenkirk

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