Cashing in with T.J. Miller

Cashing in with T.J. Miller is built on a loose interview setup. Cash Levy asks, his friend T.J. Miller answers, and neither seems in a hurry to stick to the question. Both are working stand-ups. The recent episodes here begin with a plug for their club dates, and the web address given for T.J. Miller's schedule announces that he does not have a website. That joke is a fair guide to the show's register. Much of it is committed nonsense. Two episodes, 'Naked and Afraid: Wolf Edition' and 'Naked and Afraid Part 2: Tokyo Drift', borrow the same name, and in them the pair build an improvised survival scene out of almost nothing: a whittle stick, an approaching crew, a question about sleeping in wolf pants and a pitch-dark aside about cannibalism. Both of them commit fully to the scene. A separate gag goes after people who manage to work Harvard into every story, and it turns up in more than one conversation. Then the tone shifts. In one stretch the talk turns to taping a comedy special. One of the two has already shot two others, in a Nashville club and a full-size theater in Tampa, and this time he wants close quarters in a room that seats 200. He admits that at an earlier show he came in with a 'now I'm doing my special' energy and mentioned the taping a few too many times, and he suspects the crowd could smell it. That kind of candid shop talk is the show's quieter payoff. There is philosophy too, of a homemade sort: the happiest stretch of life comes right after getting through something difficult, lasts two or three days, and then the next challenge has to be set up. Vegans come up in the same vein, as people who mention their diet because it is harder than what everyone else eats. Smaller detours cover the awkwardness of getting a massage, pajamas with enough pockets for a phone and a pack of cigarettes, and whether one of them has ever lit a cigar with a hundred-dollar bill. He does not think he has, though he is open to the experience. Talk about the gigs themselves runs through it as well, including praise for good crowds and a moment where one of them loses his point and blames being high. The in-joke '12 and a half' labels the people the pair hope to see at their shows, and a shirt with the phrase on it gets a mention. Titles stay playful, from 'Fabrics, Go.' to 'Worst of Episodes 121 to 126', and the back catalog runs deep. For the bits, the 'Naked and Afraid' pair is the natural place to start. For the stand-up craft, 'Smooth Jazz with Cash Levy' has the conversation about the special.