Bo Burnham said there is just one topic too taboo and sacred to laugh at during his comedy show: white people.
“I think we’ve been through enough,” he said Sunday night in Pick-Staiger Concert Hall during A&O Productions’ spring speaker event.
The 19-year-old comedian poked fun at Jews, women, Asians, Sarah Palin, blacks, Tourette Syndrome, hermaphrodites, Jesus, Native Americans and fraternities: No one was safe from the piano-playing, singer-songwriter YouTube sensation.
Burnham stepped onto the stage and sat down at the piano, immediately launching into a series of songs, haikus, stand-up comedy and acoustic guitar-fueled satirical renditions of Shakespeare.
“I’m a stand-up comic and I always sit and slouch, and I got my girlfriend pregnant on my sterile uncle’s pull-out couch,” he said in a song about irony. He also asked some of life’s unanswerable questions, including, “Where are the Sour Patch parents?”
Karlee Nussbaum said Burnham was “awesome.”
“He’s hilarious, and I love him and everything about him,” the Weinberg sophomore said. “I want to meet him right now, but I can’t, which is sad.”
The comedian was an equal-opportunity offender, she said.
“He’s trying to be offensive,” she said. “I’m Jewish and he made Jew jokes, and I thought it was funny.”
Student musical comic duo Pat Bishop and Chris Poole-both Communication seniors-opened the show with three songs about sleeping roommates, selling drugs and taking the future away from the children “before it’s too late.”
They were followed by a performance from Communication senior Brad West, who began by telling the audience he was “kinda new to this whole stand-up thing.” He warmed up the crowd with awkward lines about a dead best friend and a detailed description of sex.
“Don’t you hate it when you’re playing basketball?” he asked, receiving raucous laughter before spilling water all over himself.
But it was Burnham who had the audience alternately roaring and groaning at his no-holds-barred jokes for about an hour.
“It was hilarious,” A&O Chairman Barry McCardel said. “Comedy wouldn’t be comedy if it was always tame and inside the lines. We bring acts that people want to come out to see, and it’s part of the job we do. But it’s the risk you take, whenever you come to a comedy show, that the comedian is going to explore an area that may be a little touchy.”
The tickets sold out in less than a day and A&O was able to put more tickets on sale, which McCardel said the organization tries to do whenever possible. A&O’s winter speaker, Tracy Morgan, also sold out quickly and toed the line of propriety.
“They have different styles,” McCardel said. “I hope people had a good time at both of them.”
Burnham quelled the audience’s fears with a justification for his racist remarks.
“Guys, it’s 21st century racism, OK?” he said when the audience groaned at a joke. “It’s racism in light of itself. The only reason I’m making these crazy statements is because the stigmas about race are already there, and I’m just playing off that, and they understand that. So if after the show you see a black guy beating me up, he’s doing it ironically.”
