• You Are (A Comedy) Special

  • A Simple 15-Step Self-Help Guide to Forcibly Force Yourself to Write and Perform a Full Hour of Stand-up Comedy
  • By: Maria Bamford
  • Narrated by: Maria Bamford
  • Length: 1 hr and 58 mins
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars (1,051 ratings)

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You Are (A Comedy) Special  By  cover art

You Are (A Comedy) Special

By: Maria Bamford
Narrated by: Maria Bamford
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Go Behind the Scenes of You Are (A Comedy) Special

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About the Creator and Performer

Maria Bamford is revered for her deeply personal and experimental comedy about mental illness. She starred in the surreal, semi-autobiographical Netflix comedy series Lady Dynamite, about a comedian who suffers a nervous breakdown, and is the star of three unconventional hour-long stand-up specials: Weakness is the Brand, Old Baby, and Maria Bamford, the special, special, special! Maria was the first female comic to have two half-hour Comedy Central Presents specials and starred alongside Patton Oswalt, Zach Galifianakis and Brian Posehn in the Comedy Central series The Comedians of Comedy and Netflix’s Comedians of Comedy: The Movie. She also created and starred in the cult hit web series The Maria Bamford Show, in which she plays all the characters.
Maria is often recognized for her prolific voiceover work, including characters on Big Mouth, BoJack Horseman, Summer Camp Island, Adventure Time, Talking Tom, and Friends, Bob’s Burgers, Legend of Korra, Puss in Boots, CatDog, and PBS’s Emmy-winning series Word Girl. She also stars as Tilly Mulch in Team Coco’s scripted podcast Frontier Tween. Maria played DeBrie Bardeaux on Netflix’s Arrested Development and recurred on the ABC hit series Fresh off the Boat. She is the 2014 winner of the American Comedy Award for Best Club Comic. Maria’s late night appearances include CONAN, The Tonight Show, The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, and Late Night with Seth Meyers. Her new interview series What’sYour Ailment? deals with the various mental struggles of celebrities and premieres as part of the brand new Topic streaming service in late 2019.

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What listeners say about You Are (A Comedy) Special

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love you maria!!!

just what i expected and more. thank you maria. i have been a fan for years and love her work.

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4 people found this helpful

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Creativity + Practice + Boundaries + Delivery

I was doing 5 minute open mic sets several times a week before Covid. I even started an open mic at a bar close by. So everything Maria was saying was stuff I could relate to. I like her idea of doing anything for an hour, calling it comedy, and practicing that daily in any environment. Maria talks about how to handle feedback. One needs to both be resilient and protect oneself. She is always enthusiastic and supportive, but she also explains creative frustration in an extremely accurate way, like a torture scientist explaining her favorite custom made tools to someone strapped to a table. She recommends having some nice friends outside of comedy and having interests outside of comedy. Mostly though she's very funny. She is at the tip top of standups. This book goes into the category of books like The Artist's Way, Big Magic, The War of Art, and Why We Make Things. (She mentions these books in the audio, but I've read them too and I agree). And I'm tacking this on at the end, but it's a good listen for anyone with anxiety and depression, even if you don't do anything creative.

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3 people found this helpful

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I love it!

Guys. I only downloaded this selection because I have a terrible migraine and needed to find a book written for adults that wasn't full of murder. That part worked out as planned, but then Maria Bamford convinced me to write my own comedy special, which is not at all how I saw my day going. I'm pretty excited about it! So, this is a real program about writing an hour of comedy that's funny and inspirational. From experience I can say it's invalid approved. I imagine the robust would also enjoy it.

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3 people found this helpful

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🙌🙌🙌🙌🙌💪

Hope she puts this to animation!! I only paused it once!! well done!! He he!! needed extra words to qualify as a review!!

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1 person found this helpful

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Exactly what I wanted/need...

I am not a stand-up comedian, nor an aspiring one. I am a fan of Maria Bamford...and a singer-songwriter. I often feel that comedy podcasts, etc. are directly related to any performer who tries to put a show together (a show of any kind). I decided to take a pause from my Malcolm X audible (true story) to lighten up for a drive...that book is AMAZING...and I needed to laugh (Malcolm X autobiography is short on laughs). This book delivered in every way...to the point where, somehow, with 15 minutes left or so on my first lesson, when audible for some reason started over, I just went with it...and listened to the whole thing a second time less than 24 hours later. Maria...don't change a thing.

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Hilarious and helpful

I really hope Maria writes or at least reads more on Audible because this was delightful, encouraging and entertaining. If she had a podcast I would never miss it.

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    4 out of 5 stars
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Comics better watch out

I wish I hadn’t wasted my time reading this because now I have no excuses to push myself as a comic. Damn it.

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Go Maria Bamford!

Really enjoyed listening to this. I've been a fan for many years. It's nice to learn more about your process.

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Bamdord is lord

As a guy that’s been doing standup for 10 years I can say this book is exactly what you need and if you don’t need it. It will remind you what a genius she is.

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I listen to this over and over

This is my comfort listening for just about any mood. I love this. Thank you, Maria Bamford. Seriously, my quality of life is higher with this audiobook in it.

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