Whenever comedian Hannibal Buress performs in Chicago, chances are he’s going to bring out a local rapper. Over the past few years, Chance the Rapper, Vic Mensa, Tree, Leather Corduroys (Joey Purp and Kami de Chukwu) and more have all shared the stage with him.
“It’s just a natural thing,” the 33-year-old Chicago native tells me over the phone from Los Angeles. “At Southern Illinois University, I used to host this open mic called Sunday School Sessions that my boy DJ Tony Trimm used to have in his house, where acts like Open Mike Eagle would perform and a lot of other people would do poetry or rap.”
He continues, “My roots from when I first started in 2002 just comes from being around music and rap all the time. I just like putting on a full show. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. Sometimes people are like, ‘We didn’t ask to see rap, Hannibal, what the fuck is this?’ “
For his new tour, the Hannibal Montanabal Experience, which hits the Chicago Theatre on Wednesday, Buress hadn’t picked an opener yet as of this interview. “I don’t have one yet, but I am looking into having somebody open. Especially with my biggest shows, I like to have something extra for the crowd and support some local artists,” he says. For the record, I suggested recent RedEye cover star Saba, who, like Buress, is from the West Side neighborhood Austin. Buress mentions how much he loves Chance the Rapper’s “Angels,” which features Saba. (Later on in our interview, he said Chance the Rapper’s “Smoke Break” was his favorite Chicago song of the year. “I play ‘Smoke Break’ off of Chance’s album a lot,” he says. “That’s a crazy track.”)
“It’s funny, the crowd came to see comedy,” he says about bringing rap acts to his shows. “Sometimes, shit is tough. People are sitting down and you’ve gotta command ’em. If there’s an act that I’ve been super excited about and I’d be watching the crowd and they’d not be into it at all, I’ll just be so frustrated, like, ‘Y’all don’t like this? You know I paid $2,000 for this.’ “
Buress is unquestionably a prolific comic and a busy man. Following stints on Comedy Central’s “Broad City” and his own variety talk show, “Why? With Hannibal Buress,” which aired last year for one season, he’s also released two 2016 Netflix specials, “Comedy Camisado” and the documentary “Hannibal Takes Edinburgh,” and is the co-host of Adult Swim’s absurd and funny “The Eric Andre Show.” On top of that, he’s had roles in films such as “Neighbors 2,” “The Secret Life of Pets” and “The Angry Birds Movie.”
While that seems like a lot, his summer has been surprisingly relaxing for the always-working Buress. “It’s been a lot of chilling and drinking. Idle hands are the devil’s something something, what is the saying?” Buress jokes. “I don’t know, but I’m not good left to my own devices. I mean, I haven’t done anything on the acting side [in] a couple of months. I’ve been writing jokes, figuring out different things for this show and going to UFC fights.
“Lately, I’ve been in Chicago way more. I just feel better being in Chicago than I do in New York lately,” continues Buress, who’s been spotted at music festivals like Pitchfork and Lollapalooza this year. While he lives in New York, he’s been back to his hometown a lot more than usual. He explains, “I bought a building in Wicker Park, so I come back to handle stuff with that to just rent it out. You gotta buy shit, man, I’m grown up. You get to a point where you have money and you’re like, ‘This is in checking? I can’t have this in checking! I need to smarten up and invest for the future.’ ” Though this tour will have Buress on the road until mid-November, because his building’s already full of tenants, he’ll still be popping back into Chicago frequently.
On the road, he’ll also be starting a podcast. When asked how the idea started, Buress laughs, “Well, I took a look at my ticket sales, and I said, ‘How can we change this?’ I took a look and said, ‘Oh, this has to stop. Boy, we need to do something!’ ” But unlike many other comedians’ podcasts, where it’s a longform interview with another comic, this podcast will be shorter and more casual. “I just thought it’d be fun with downtime on the road to talk about what’s happening that day, the news and the previous city’s show. It’s more of a ‘dudes shooting the shit on the road,’ maybe talking some current events, but yeah, that type of thing, and keep it around 30-40 minutes.”
Along with the tour and the podcast, there are several upcoming projects, both in film and on TV, that’ll feature Buress. First is “High Maintenance,” due out Sept. 16, a hilarious web series-turned-HBO show about a New York pot dealer and his quirky clients in which Buress will reprise his role as himself. “The way I got on it when it was a web series was one of my friends, who was actually in the episode with me, Carlen Altman, she sent over a link to it on G-chat. I clicked on it and started watching it and got hooked,” Buress explains, noting that he knew show co-creator Katja Blichfeld when she worked as a casting director for “30 Rock.”
He’ll also be on “Easy,” an incredible Chicago-set Netflix series from director Joe Swanberg. He has a small part as a journalist for NewCity who’s writing a story on an upstart brewery. Buress says of the experience, “I was excited just to film something in Chicago. I was not excited to film something in the middle of January. It was rough.” Noting how Swanberg relies largely on improvised dialogue from his actors, he adds, “Improvin’ when it’s below zero is not an ideal situation.”
Perhaps Buress’ most high-profile upcoming role is as Coach Wilson in “Spider-Man: Homecoming,” which is due out July 7, 2017. “I finished ‘Spider-Man’ in May or June. I’m playing one of those dumbass characters who don’t realize he’s Spider-Man,” he laughs, before admitting, “I’m actually more of an X-Men Gambit or a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles dude even though Spider-Man is obviously iconic.”
Live: Wednesday, Sept. 14, at the Chicago Theatre.
@joshhterry | jterry@redeyechicago.com
