688 - Writing Jokes with Mike Birbiglia
05/27/25 • 65 min
2 Listeners
John and Craig welcome back writer, director, and comedian Mike Birbiglia (Don’t Think Twice, Sleepwalk with Me) to take a look at several true news stories and ask, how would this be a joke? Stories include run-club haters, a conflicted bone marrow donor, and the coyotes roaming San Francisco.
We also look at how Mike developed his new Netflix special, The Good Life, and answer listener questions on taking an idea from a podcast and knowing when you’ve broken a story.
In our bonus segment for premium members, Mike walks us through how he’s able to market his work without it feel like marketing.
Links:
- Mike Birbiglia
- The Good Life on Netflix
- Mike’s previous episodes: 121, 168, 261, 427, 443, and Working it Out: Screenwriting Advice You’ll Actually Use
- Episode 660 – Moneyball
- Ira Glass on Mike’s podcast Working it Out
- Elizabeth Gilbert TED Talk
- The Run Club Haters by Melissa Dahl for Curbed
- I Hadn’t Heard From My Dad in Over a Decade. Now He’s Returned With a Brazen Request. I’m Actually Considering It. from Slate’s Care and Feeding
- The Coyotes of San Francisco by Heather Knight and Loren Elliot for NY Times
- Coyote Vest
- Everybody’s Live with John Mulaney
- Chris Fleming
- Blue Prince
- Get a Scriptnotes T-shirt!
- Check out the Inneresting Newsletter
- Become a Scriptnotes Premium member, or gift a subscription!
- Subscribe to Scriptnotes on YouTube
- Craig Mazin on Instagram
- John August on Bluesky and Instagram
- Outro by Nick Moore (send us yours!)
- Scriptnotes is produced by Drew Marquardt with help from Sam Shapson. It’s edited by Matthew Chilelli.
Email us at [email protected]
You can download the episode here.
John and Craig welcome back writer, director, and comedian Mike Birbiglia (Don’t Think Twice, Sleepwalk with Me) to take a look at several true news stories and ask, how would this be a joke? Stories include run-club haters, a conflicted bone marrow donor, and the coyotes roaming San Francisco.
We also look at how Mike developed his new Netflix special, The Good Life, and answer listener questions on taking an idea from a podcast and knowing when you’ve broken a story.
In our bonus segment for premium members, Mike walks us through how he’s able to market his work without it feel like marketing.
Links:
- Mike Birbiglia
- The Good Life on Netflix
- Mike’s previous episodes: 121, 168, 261, 427, 443, and Working it Out: Screenwriting Advice You’ll Actually Use
- Episode 660 – Moneyball
- Ira Glass on Mike’s podcast Working it Out
- Elizabeth Gilbert TED Talk
- The Run Club Haters by Melissa Dahl for Curbed
- I Hadn’t Heard From My Dad in Over a Decade. Now He’s Returned With a Brazen Request. I’m Actually Considering It. from Slate’s Care and Feeding
- The Coyotes of San Francisco by Heather Knight and Loren Elliot for NY Times
- Coyote Vest
- Everybody’s Live with John Mulaney
- Chris Fleming
- Blue Prince
- Get a Scriptnotes T-shirt!
- Check out the Inneresting Newsletter
- Become a Scriptnotes Premium member, or gift a subscription!
- Subscribe to Scriptnotes on YouTube
- Craig Mazin on Instagram
- John August on Bluesky and Instagram
- Outro by Nick Moore (send us yours!)
- Scriptnotes is produced by Drew Marquardt with help from Sam Shapson. It’s edited by Matthew Chilelli.
Email us at [email protected]
You can download the episode here.
Previous Episode
687 - How to Not Ruin Your First Film
John and Craig dig through the mailbag to answer some of our trickiest listener questions. They lay out their best advice for first-time feature directors — from picking department heads to making sure your movie actually gets seen — and look at how to adapt Craig’s “How to Write a Movie” for structuring a TV series.
But that’s not all! Do you owe your writer’s group access to your contacts? How do you break out of the mailroom? Where should high-school students start? How far can adaptations stray from the source material? And how do you remain professional in the middle of a dumpster fire?
We also follow up on tariffs, mysterious birds, and a different set of 36 Questions.
In our bonus segment for premium members, we play John’s new game, Strong Opinions, where we all have to guess each other’s true feelings about things we didn’t know were controversial.
Links:
- Scriptnotes on YouTube!
- Strong Opinions game
- Hollywood Unions letter to President Trump
- The Curious Case of the Pygmy Nuthatch by Forrest Wickman
- Foggy Brume on Twitch
- 36 Questions, the podcast musical
- Austin Film Festival
- My First Movie: 20 Celebrated Directors Talk about Their First Film
- Orange T-shirts are back!
- Aqua voice dictation software
- Ghost Town by Fireproof Games
- Get a Scriptnotes T-shirt!
- Check out the Inneresting Newsletter
- Become a Scriptnotes Premium member, or gift a subscription!
- Craig Mazin on Instagram
- John August on Bluesky, Threads, and Instagram
- Outro by Nick Moore (send us yours!)
- Scriptnotes is produced by Drew Marquardt with help from Sam Shapson. It’s edited by Matthew Chilelli.
Email us at [email protected]
You can download the episode here.
Next Episode
689 - The Old New Video Problem
New forms of video creation are coming to disrupt the entertainment industry, but will they succeed? John and Craig look at verticals and Veo 3 to see where we might be heading, and what our industry’s past innovations might tell us about about the future.
We also look at Memorial Day’s banner box office, and answer listener questions on bereavement during production, momentum, scene geography and how to fight motion smoothing.
In our bonus segment for premium members, John and Craig travel back in time to find which moments in history they wish they could see in person.
Links:
- Highland Pro student licenses!
- Collaborate on a tabletop RPG with John!
- Tom and Jerry and Hanna-Barbera
- Accidental Triplets with the Billionaire on Reel Short
- A Mistaken Surrogate for the Ruthless Billionaire on GoodShort
- WebToon
- Werewolf Billionaire CEO Husbands are Taking Over Hollywood by EJ Dickson for Rolling Stone
- Veo 3 fake news example by Alejandra Caraballo on Bluesky
- More Veo 3 examples by Promptastic on Bluesky
- Play Everyday Lotion SPF 50
- The Last of Us
- Get a Scriptnotes T-shirt!
- Check out the Inneresting Newsletter
- Become a Scriptnotes Premium member, or gift a subscription
- Subscribe to Scriptnotes on YouTube
- Craig Mazin on Instagram
- John August on Bluesky and Instagram
- Outro by Steve Pietrowski (send us yours!)
- Scriptnotes is produced by Drew Marquardt with help from Sam Shapson. It’s edited by Matthew Chilelli.
Email us at [email protected]
You can download the episode here.
If you like this episode you’ll love
Episode Comments
Featured in these lists
Generate a badge
Get a badge for your website that links back to this episode
<a href="https://goodpods.com/podcasts/scriptnotes-podcast-11499/688-writing-jokes-with-mike-birbiglia-92100677"> <img src="https://storage.googleapis.com/goodpods-images-bucket/badges/generic-badge-1.svg" alt="listen to 688 - writing jokes with mike birbiglia on goodpods" style="width: 225px" /> </a>
Copy