MHA's Blog: Chiming In

Comedy and mental health have always gone hand in hand. There’s an old saying that comedians need to be miserable to be funny. In recent years, more comedians have been vocal about what’s making them miserable.  Comedians have been more open about their mental health conditions and trauma they’ve suffered. Maria Bamford’s Special Special Special takes it to a new level, though.

Special Special Special was recorded in 2012 in her home, with her parents as the only audience members. Bamford’s specialty is wacky voices, which she goes through quickly and hilariously. She starts the set by discussing how Paula Deen’s new recipes sound like suicide notes, and goes through a number of different topics, including vegetarianism, cooking and dating before getting to the discussion of her mental illness, suicide attempts and hospitalization. 15 minutes of the hour long set were about these topics, and the discussion was hilarious. When discussing how mental illnesses make you feel alone, her comforting thought was: “Whatever horrible thing you think you’re alone in doing, Google it. Someone’s done the same thing and are now on a book tour.” Her reasoning for not committing suicide: “If you stay alive for no other reason, do it for spite.” She went through a great bit responding to people’s well-meaning platitudes about mental health. “’You just need to get back to nature.’ ‘Sure. There’s lots of trees I can hang myself from.’” She finally ends the set describing playing a game called joy whack-a-mole with her family, where everyone puts everyone else’s achievements down. It’s a pretty brutal observation, especially with her parents sitting right there.

Bamford is just one of a group of comedians openly discussing mental health issues. Jeffery Tambor, star of the cult TV show Arrested Development (and entertainer at our benefit in June!), discusses his addiction issues in his standup. Marc Maron, host of the comedy insider podcast The Marc Maron Show, openly discusses his depression and anxiety. Paul Gilmartin hosts the wonderful Mental Illness Happy Hour, an hour long podcast where guests discuss their mental illnesses, addictions and traumas. Guests have included Adam Carolla and Doug Benson. Dan Harmon, creator of the hit NBC show Community, talks about his issues during his Harmontown podcasts (and created the loveable, likely autistic Abed on Community). Chris Hardwick, host of the Nerdist and the Talking Dead, has discussed his drinking issues in the past.  David Granirer, a stand-up comedian speaking at our conference in June, uses his life experiences as material.  The list goes on and on.

I think it’s very telling that mental health groups haven’t rushed to embrace these comedians. There are two reasons I can think of: the history that mental illness has as the butt of jokes and the potential for offending people is high. Even today, using mental illness or people with mental illnesses as a joke is common, and very mean spirited. No one deserves to be mocked for having an illness, but somehow, people with mental illnesses are still far game. Will Ferrell and Anchorman’s Adam McKay are making a movie with Kirstin Wigg about a woman with Dissociative Identity Disorder winning the lottery and getting a reality show. Calling someone “loony” or “crazy” is a common way to write someone off, usually trying to get a laugh from an audience. The stigma attached to mental illnesses is still so strong that these jokes are a laughing matter. (Bamford gets a wonderful comment about that ignorance: “I heard a DJ in San Diego talk about how since I do voices, I must be schizophrenic. No idiot, schizophrenia is hearing voices, not making them.”) She even gets the chance to tell that one horrible person who thinks that people who attempt suicide should be allowed to die that they’re horrible and that they shouldn’t be allowed around children and other humans.

The idea that someone could get offended by these discussions is a real issue, and a sticky one. Because of the issues discussed, people may be offended (which tells people how far those jokes can go). I know I cringed a few times at some of the suicide jokes. The mental health movement, for what it’s worth, want people to discuss mental health in a certain way, for many reasons (the history of being the butt of jokes is one; ensuring people’s dignity is another). As a whole, we are quick to discount honest discussions happening without that language. It’s possible to have a meaningful discussion about mental health using old terms that may offend people. It’s undoubtedly mental health advocate’s job to work to get those terms out of use, but what’s being said is still relevant. In addition, sets may go into other areas that could be offensive. Bamford has a whole section about being so awkward that people believe she’s developmentally disabled. It’s a funny image in a funny bit, but potentially offensive (I don’t think it is, since the joke is clearly on her, but others may not agree). So everyone stays away from those discussions.

Bamford’s Special Special Special is a truly funny hour of comedy that has some really powerful things to say about mental illness. Because of the comedy aspect, I hope more people are exposed to what she has to say about being in a mental hospital in a nonthreatening way. Most importantly, she’s hilarious. I know I plan to use her line about life in general: “We’re all doing the best we can, and some of us aren’t doing that good.” Truly a great, forgiving idea about humanity, from someone making us all laugh.

You can get the Special Special Special on Chill: https://chill.com/mariabamfoo/the-special-special-special. (And you can get tickets to see Jeffery Tambor at our A Night in the Limelight event in June here: http://www.mentalhealthamerica.net/go/nightinthelimelight.)

Next week, we’ll be discussing mental illness in Winnie the Pooh. Have seen the Special Special Special? Do you have any favorite comedians who discuss mental health?