It is only an hour long, but it might forever change how you see comedy shows.
In the last few days, Netflix added a new stand-up comedy show that was recorded in the Sydney Opera House back in 2017.
It is performed by comedian Hannah Gadsby, who doesn’t really have much of a following in this part of the world.
Her new show Nanette kicks off regularly enough, as she comes out on stage and begins to go through the reaction to her most recent tour, in which she was told by a paying customer that there “wasn’t enough lesbian material”, to which Gadsby perfectly responds with “But I was on stage the entire time”?
It is a clever, and seemingly off-the-cuff remark that actually sows the seeds for the direction the rest of the show will go in, one that ultimately ends with Gadsby announcing that she will be quitting comedy forever, as her life’s calling needs her to do more than tell jokes.
Over the next hour, Gadbsy lays bare her soul, and her past: coming from Tasmania, where homosexuality was illegal until the very end of the 1990s. Where, in her neighbourhood, seven out of ten people had voted that homosexuality should remain a crime. And further personal revelations that will genuinely have viewers in tears.
Gadsby also comes knocking on the door of Straight White Men, to hammer home the fact that while she is aware that now is probably the worst time in all of history to be a straight white man, they are still in the most powerful position out of everyone:
the hysterical chorus of cis men who can’t wait to hop in the mentions of anyone talking about Hannah Gadsby’s Nanette to say they didn’t laugh at it and it’s just not funny is peak 'I am feel uncomfortable when we are not about me?' pic.twitter.com/QbLjUtU49U
— Kay Taylor Rea (@kaytaylorrea) July 4, 2018
In the days since the show has been released on Netflix, the huge landswell of support both it and Gadsby has received is almost unparalleled, because not only does she not forget to bring the funnies, but there are also so many incredibly powerful messages being delivered in such a short amount of time.
It truly is incredible, and deserves as large an audience as it can possibly get.
Nanette by Hannah Gadsby is available to view on Netflix right now.
So I watched @Hannahgadsby’s #Nanette to see what the buzz was all about.
I started off thinking I wasn’t the target audience and ended up thinking I was probably 100% the target audience.
And then I watched it again.
Powerful doesn’t even begin to go there.
— Eric Young (@RealEricYoung) July 3, 2018
https://twitter.com/kumailn/status/1014943170990301184
https://twitter.com/GiaDmnq/status/1013755873959731200
please go watch “nanette” by @hannahgadsby on netflix as soon as you can. i cried laughing. i cried from heartbreak. i cried i was so inspired. im actually exhausted.
— Scott Hoying (@scotthoying) July 4, 2018
Nanette by @Hannahgadsby on Netflix should be required viewing for high school students…especially male students.
— Yashar Ali 🐘 (@yashar) July 4, 2018
Omg “Nanette”
Oh my god oh my god oh my god.
I do not care who you are. It doesn’t matter. It just doesn’t.
Watch it.
— Daniel Summers (@WFKARS) July 5, 2018
