Artist Hannibal Buress

Mindy Tucker

Website
Hannibal Buress

Chicago-raised stand-up (and 30 Rock writer) Hannibal Buress had to overcome a few things early in his career: His delivery is the epitome of patience-trying—it sometimes takes a few minutes of his wry monotone to figure out what the hell he’s talking about—and the material is mostly left-field observational stuff that’s equal parts inviting and off-putting. (“I’d love to kick a pigeon,” begins one head-scratcher.) But Buress has gotten sharper by the day, to the point where his jokes about fire SUVs and “the next big blind guy” are no longer odd, but instead seen as windows into his wonderfully skewed sensibilities. He’s gotten substantially more popular fairly quickly too, headlining shows and impressing fellow comics like Louie C.K., who featured him in Louie’s season one pilot. Buress is definitely one to watch.

Updated 01/04/2012