Taylor Tomlinsons old-school act is a hit onstage and on TikTok.
And shes only getting bigger.
Look at Youis available to stream on Netflix.
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Taylor Tomlinson came to comedy through church.
Taylor was 8 when her mother died, and her faith in the Lord began to wane.
Tomlinson works with the intensity of someone who learned early that life can be short.
Once she decided to have a performing career, she went into it full tilt.
In college, she moved away from family-friendly comedy, chafing against staying clean.
No one is surprised that out of our group of friends, she blew up first.
Eventually, she dropped out of school to do a series of gigs at colleges around the country.
In her new special, she compares the Old Testament to a Swift album.
You dont believe in me?
Im a 20-something white woman, Tomlinson concludes.
Obviously, Im gonna compare T. Swift to the Lord.
The parallels between Tomlinson and Swift are obvious.
This is a professional.
This performance will be ultraproduced.
You do not need to be anxious.
Tomlinson is more subdued than the presence she projects onstage.
She is noticeably cautious and chooses her words carefully.
Im just very like whats going on in my life right now?
What, in my experience and personally, do I feel like I have some authority to talk about?
Its not that shes worried about alienating an audience.
Especially with the internet now, she says, there is no such thing as being unrelatable.
Tomlinson has 1.5 million followers on TikTok.
The people who work hard and write polished jokes are shining, Cummings tells me.
Everyones attention span is so short that you need tight jokes.
At the same time, she is shaped by the language and ideas she finds online.
Its this idea that you have to walk around picturing yourself as the main character in a movie.
And act like you are.
And approach life that way, she says.
It is easy to make fun of, but it appeals to her.
This is an obstacle I, the main character, am overcoming.
I ask, for instance, if there are things shed say no to in her career.
But her face is serious: It seems scary, she says, to become a celebrity that fast.
Her ascent to fame may have been more controlled, but Tomlinson is clearly on the way up.
The movie, she says, is a side project, as is the podcast and her TikTok presence.
I tried to do jokes about my mom dying much earlier, Tomlinson says.
Theres one joke about how she used to lie and tell people her parents were separated.
(Well, they were!
There is one line inLook At Youthat stands out for how it reflects back on Tomlinson.
I know dead-mom jokes make people uncomfortable.
And if you are uncomfortable …
I dont know what to say.
You shouldve worked harder so it was you up here.
The punch line gets a huge laugh, but its also Tomlinson at her most serious.
Something that nakedly ambitious could have a girlboss emptiness to it if it werent also true.
For a brief second, she is defiantly inaccessible.
Then she pivots back.
No, she says, I would never want you to be uncomfortable.
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