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Then, there's his television work. He is one of the best parts of Broad City—a show full of best parts—and he chews up every scene of the absurdist Eric Andre Show as the laconic sidekick who will put up with anything. Last year, he debuted Why? with Hannibal Buress, his own show on Comedy Central, a major victory after four previous television development deals had not panned out. He is also making the transition to film; in December, he killed in Daddy's Home, and he appeared in the indie action flick Band of Robbers, which saw wide release in January. And he has more IMDb credits coming: He has a role in the Baywatch film, starring Dwayne Johnson and Zac Efron, but he told me he doesn't take his shirt off. He travels everywhere with a DJ and a roving posse of friends and musicians, packs big rooms across the country, and sometimes uses "an Uber for jets" to get from place to place should he miss a flight (which he does, a lot: "I miss like, two out of every five flights I am scheduled for," he told me). When we met, he had just come back from Tokyo, where he played a last-minute show that sold out in less than a day.And yet, there's always the other hand. As Buress fiddled with his chopsticks and tried to spear slippery dumplings ("Man, I'm really struggling with these. Might have to call in a fork."), I asked him how excited he feels on the eve of so many big developments—and was surprised when he admitted to feeling less happy than he had been in a while. "I think I was my happiest right before my other special [Live from Chicago] came out," he said, a bit wistfully. " I just remember being in good spirits. I did this podcast called Champs with Neal Brennan and Moshe Kasher, and I just remember being in such a good mood when I did that. I think it was fewer responsibilities, a lighter time."Almost overnight Buress became the face of comic vigilante justice, a role he never asked to play.
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