In the past few years, the comedian Nikki Glaser has breathed new life into the well-worn comedic form of the roast. Last year, she performed a roast of the football legend Tom Brady for a Netflix special, to much acclaim—with Conan O’Brien opining that “no one is going to do a better roast set than that.” Glaser has been on a hot streak since then, hosting the Golden Globes in January and touring the country with a new show. But rising to the top of the comedy world, Glaser tells David Remnick, hasn’t settled her insecurities, or her impostor syndrome. “It just never goes away— that feeling of not being worthy, or being thought of as less than,” Glaser says. It’s why, as Remnick notes, she insists on leading her set with a joke right out of the gate. “Part of it is I just know that people think women aren’t as funny, so I have to prove it right away . . . and then, ‘Can we all just relax and you can trust me?’ ”New episodes of The New Yorker Radio Hour drop every Tuesday and Friday. Follow the show wherever you get your podcasts.
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From the online spectacle around Leo XIV's election to our favorite on-screen cardinals. This week on Critics at Large, we're talking all things Pope.
The Catholic Church was made for this moment. I think 2,000 years ago, the Catholic Church basically anticipated TikTok, Instagram, X. You don't have those little Swiss guard outfits and think they're not being photographed. Oil painting is not enough.
I'm Vincent Cunningham. Join me and my co-hosts for an episode on what can only be described as Pope Week. New episodes of Critics at Large drop every Thursday. Find us wherever you get your podcasts.
This is the New Yorker Radio Hour, a co-production of WNYC Studios and The New Yorker.
This is the New Yorker Radio Hour. I'm David Remnick. Now, a comedy roast is a pretty strange ritual. A celebrated person submits to public humiliation voluntarily. Old wounds are poked out, foibles are mocked, scandals re-aired, usually with great obscenity. The celebrity just sits there showing what a fantastic sport they are, but the discomfort is obvious.
The roaster can't pull a punch if the thing is going to work. Over the past few years, Nikki Glaser has breathed some new life into this old ritual. In fact, she really owns the roast form these days. I probably needn't tell you about Glaser's roast of the quarterback Tom Brady. It's a phenomenon, and if you haven't seen it, it awaits you happily on Netflix.
Nikki Glaser has been on a hot streak ever since, hosting the Golden Globes earlier this year and touring the country with a new show. So I knew your work just a little bit here and there. You'd be on this show and that show. And one night I just I was I was fried. And so I went on Netflix looking for something to watch. And there's this Tom Brady roast.
And I thought, you know, this seems particularly mindless. Let's do this. Exactly. And then there you were. And I kind of barely knew you. And you killed it. Killed it. I hadn't seen anything like that since, I don't know, Prince playing While My Guitar Gently Weeps on an awards show 20 years ago. Oh, I know what you're talking about. Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. That's it. With Danny Harrison.
That's it. And Tom Petty. You got it. What a comparison. That's so nice. Overnight sensation. What goes into being an overnight sensation?
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