Great piece on NPR about Demetri Martin, despite the reference to him as “the voice of generation Y.” Though the comparison isn’t made in the piece, I’ve always seen Demetri Martin as kind of a successor to Steven Wright. They both have similar rhythms to their jokes - one-liners that have “a-ha” moments where the sudden perspective shifts are combustible. Of course this was before, I caught his new one-person show “Spiral Bound” in June.
Spiral Bound features a journey of Demetri into his notebook. (You can take kind of a similar journey at Demetri’s website.) The show describes the decisions and situations that led Demetri to performing stand-up instead of being a lawyer, and the effects it has on his highly-driven medical student fiancee. It’s surprisingly confessional and quite a bit removed from one-liners.
The NPR interview confirms Demetri is kinda undergoing a focus shift in his comedy. He mentions how he feels audiences don’t really know much about you if you’re just throwing out jokes. And he’s right. How much does anyone know about someone like Steven Wright, who seems to cultivate a sense of removal from human behavior (something Demetri never had with his one-liners.) Someone who can write the joke, “I got some pajamas with pockets in them. Which is great because before that I used to have to hold stuff when I slept” has definitely got a very interesting internal life that audiences would love to be brought into.