Comedy Bytes With Aparna Nancherla

Please welcome.

[upbeat music]

Hi, hi.

Hi.

How's it going?

Good, how are you?

Thank you so much for doing that.

Oh, thanks for having me.

Sorry we were all cracking up backstage.

Oh, no, no, no.

All right, let's start with the wanting

to be uploaded to the cloud.

Yes.

I generally think that the wrong assumption here,

do you have any anxiety about the digital age and AI?

Yeah, I mean, I think as a person in the creative arts,

there's obviously a lot of collective anxiety

around AI right now.

And just like, people's work being subsumed

into kind of this unregulated ma.

I think for me, like the cynical part of me is like,

okay, we're all like going to be obsolete,

kind of the end point of AI,

is a truly frictionless society where the real problem,

the whole time was humans and we don't need them.

But I do think, I don't know, as a performer,

I just think I've gotten a little bit more

guarded about my work.

I was on Twitter in the early days,

when it felt more like a creative playground

and now I feel like I'm a little more wary about

what I'm putting online.

I kind of think twice

before I just add something, yeah.

Well, it's forever, like the internet never forgets.

So like you just said, I'm curious

how you think standup comedy has changed kind of in the age

of TikTok and Instagram

and how you can have one bit

but that will follow you around forever?

Yeah, I mean, one thing I've noticed,

'cause I kind of went the opposite with a lot that a lot

of comedians did where like during the pandemic a lot

of live performance moved online,

and it became like Instagram live or Zoom comedy shows

and I did a couple of those,

but I noticed more comedians these days have been

gravitating towards Instagram reels

and TikTok sort of sound bites of your act

where it can yeah, be circulated kind of en masse

and reach more people that way.

I think I've been, a bit of a Luddite in not really

getting on that train

and not putting myself online in those little clips.

And I see like it can really help with ticket sales

and things like that.

And also I've noticed comedians have also been gravitating

a lot more towards audience interaction

because a bit with a crowd member is sort

of something you can put online

where you're not burning material.

It's kind of just this little organic interaction you had.

And if you just put that online, people kind of get an idea

of you, but you aren't putting all of your act on there.

But I think the trade off there is sometimes when people go

to shows now, they kind of as an audience expect you

to just be interactive with them for most of the show.

And so I think that's kind of created a bit

of a skewed version of what you might want out

of a standup comedy show.

Has that been your experience when you are performing

with folks?

They kind of expect a little bit more hands-on?

I think they're kind of primed

for it in a way that I think in the past maybe they weren't.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So in terms of your material

and kind of being protective of it,

have you tried to ask chat GPT write a joke

like Aparna Naja?

No, I mean I still, this feels like heretical to say,

but I still haven't tried ChatGPT,

but I think I'm like so insecure

that I'm afraid I think if it wrote a joke like me,

I'd be like, well this is better.

You're better than me, go forth and prosper.

So, okay, speaking of ChatGPT,

the SAG agreement just got signed.

Yes.

There, that has an AI and our, in terms of not

just like scanning digital spaces,

but the Writer's Guild also.

Yes.

There are lots of protections there against AI.

What are your thoughts on how to kind of

have creative control over your work in this kind

of environment?

There's a risk that you could write something

and then someone could run it through an AI

and then just keep regurgitating it.

Yeah, I mean I think that risk,

this is probably a bit of a stretch,

but I do feel like even in early Twitter days,

like people would take someone's tweet

and with a bigger platform

and then say it was theirs

and kind of have it have more of an engagement online.

And I think this is like even more exponentially that,

and I don't know, like I think I'm, like I said,

trying to be wary about what I'm putting online,

but I think to some degree it's like we're all,

a lot of our data is already in the cloud

so I can't take it back.

So I think it's sort of like, okay, well knowing that,

a lot of my tweets from the past are like in there already,

where do I want to go from there?

Knowing that now.

Have you deleted your Twitter account?

No, I need to.

So all of that is still there?

I think it's all still there, yes.

The history is there.

Would you ever delete it, you think?

Yeah, I think I'm just, I had this book come out

so I think I was like, I'll do,

after the book comes out I'll delete the Twitter.

Okay, and the book is Unreliable Narrator.

I'm really curious again, in terms of having to do with

like what you were just saying about having your body being

uploaded, there's a real tension there

between your physical form

and your mental creativity, it can't live, you don't want it

to live like completely online.

But there doesn't really seem

to be any place else to go.

Yeah, I mean there is like the little introvert in me

who is like, oh cool, you can make my likeness

and then it can go like, do my work for me.

That sounds great, like I can stay home.

That sounds wonderful.

But then yeah, if I think two steps past

that I'm like yeah this is pretty Black Mirror ish.

In terms of are you on TikTok,

Instagram, anything like that?

I'm on Instagram, I'm not on TikTok.

Okay, and have you found that it's kind

of helped you with your career?

Like TikTok has or Twitter had?

Yeah, I mean I think, like I said,

it's like for any artist,

any platform to kind of expose a bigger audience

to your work is helpful.

But I think I have not maybe leveraged it the way

I see comedians doing now more with the sort

of short video bites of material.

I haven't really jumped on that train

but I do feel like that is the current phase that we're in

of like that being really the way

people are getting momentum.

It kind of has seems to just,

has it changed standup though

that it's like people are now just doing jokes instead

of having to do like an entire like 30 minute set

or like an 90 minute set.

I mean I will see comedians like go to shows

and then just tape it

and then chop it all up and put it online.

So I think that is kind

of the way it's being translated online now instead

of like people watching a full hour special, it's kind

of like, oh I like these three things

that they have circulating online.

I don't want to get like nostalgic or anything,

but do you think it was easier

before the internet to get into standup comedy?

I don't think it was easier, I think it's been

democratized in a certain way

where certain gatekeepers have been removed

because of the internet

but everything comes with trade-offs

and I think the trade-off

with the internet is now it's almost like a bit

of a glut and it's a little harder to weed through

and find the path.

But I will say especially

for people from marginalized communities,

it has like afforded journeys into

the industry that weren't there before.

So I think that's obviously a good thing.

Well that's great, well I look forward

to you being uploaded to the cloud at some point.

Thank you. Look for me.

Thank you very much everybody.

Thank you.