Tig Notaro has had a tumultuous few years. In a period of just four months in 2012, she was diagnosed with an intestinal disease and breast cancer, had a double mastectomy, dealt with her mother’s death and ended a relationship. Just three years later, she is killing it: she is the star of two separate documentaries on Netflix and Showtime, will be the subject of a Diablo Cody-penned comedy, is engaged, just adopted a new kitten and has an HBO special—Boyish Girl Interrupted—airing on Saturday, August 22. That’s a lot.
The special, which is the first hour-long one she’s released, was recorded in Boston, which seems like a weird decision, given that Boston is not a traditional comedy-friendly city and that Notaro is actually from Mississippi. But she explains the decision in a way that both mocks the desperately boring city and tells people who have a problem with it to get lost.
“Why did I film my special in Boston?” she asks. “I wanted to show you my rug.”
The rest of her set is fairly slow and rhythmic—Notaro’s stand-up isn’t the kind of hyper laugh-a-minute kind of joke making that you see from some of her contemporaries. She is just cool, and I am pretty sure she knows it, and allows her stories to take on a kind of slow-burn, simmering quality. They are good stories, about a real-life Santa Claus, and bargain burial plots and eating ice cream, and people will wait for their inevitably gratifying conclusion.
“I was diagnosed with bilateral breast cancer,” she says at one point. “But I have not told anyone yet.”
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