{"id":3784,"date":"2017-02-01T13:52:01","date_gmt":"2017-02-01T18:52:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cfa-magazine\/?p=3784"},"modified":"2017-05-03T13:18:22","modified_gmt":"2017-05-03T17:18:22","slug":"baron-vaughn","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cfa-magazine\/2017\/02\/01\/baron-vaughn\/","title":{"rendered":"Baron Vaughn Uses Comedy to Dig Deep"},"content":{"rendered":"

Baron Vaughn of Grace and Frankie<\/em> uses comedy to dig deep<\/h2>\n

By Corinne Steinbrenner<\/h4>\n
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Banner image: In March 2016, actor and comedian Baron Vaughn (\u201903) performed at SXSW Comedy during the 2016 SXSW Music, Film + Interactive Festival at The North Door in Austin, Texas. Jealex Photo\/Getty Images Entertainment\/Getty Images
\n<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Baron Vaughn\u2019s list of current projects is as long as it is impressive.<\/strong> Vaughn<\/a> (\u201903), an acting major, plays Frankie’s adopted son, Nwabudike “Bud” Bergstein in the hit Netflix series Grace and Frankie<\/em><\/a>. He\u2019s also producing and hosting the Comedy Central show, The New Negroes<\/em>. This year\u2019s revival of the cult classic Mystery Science Theater 3000<\/em> features his writing and voice acting. Fatherless<\/em>, Vaughn\u2019s documentary about meeting his father for the first time at age 35, recently aired on the Fusion Channel. His second comedy album, Blaxistential Crisis<\/em><\/a>, is available on iTunes.<\/p>\n

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\"Baron<\/p>\n

Among many other projects, Baron Vaughn (\u201903) appears in the hit Netflix series Grace and Frankie<\/em>, produces and hosts The New Negroes<\/em> on Comedy Central, and released two comedy albums. Eric Charbonneau\/Invision for Netflix\/AP Images<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

While the variety of these undertakings reflects Vaughn\u2019s wide-ranging skills, the projects are united by his sharp-witted humor. Even the documentary, with its ostensibly sober subject matter, elicits more laughter than tears.<\/p>\n

\u201cHumor is the number-one way that I process things,\u201d says Vaughn. \u201cThere are a lot of people who are funny who use humor as a deflection device, but I use it as a drill to go deeper into things.\u201d<\/p>\n

Vaughn gravitated to stand-up comedy at an early age. The monologue he delivered at his first acting audition\u2014which earned him entrance to Las Vegas\u2019 magnet arts high school\u2014was structured like a stand-up routine. \u201cIt was something about how I was at an age where I was too old for some things but too young for other things,\u201d Vaughn recalls. \u201cIt set up a thesis, and then all the things that supported it were essentially jokes. I guess that\u2019s why I was attracted to it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Vaughn first performed his own stand-up material as a college student in Boston, appearing on open mic night at Dick Doherty\u2019s Beantown Comedy Club<\/a>. \u201cIt was a two-person bringer,\u201d he says: in order to be allowed on stage, he had to bring along two people willing to pay the show\u2019s $7 cover. \u201cAll of my friends were college students, so that was very difficult to organize,\u201d he says. \u201cIt was basically, \u2018I can either see Baron tonight or eat a sandwich. Hmm. Decision made. One burger, please.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

After graduating from CFA, Vaughn moved to New York to pursue acting and comedy, both of which he loves, but for different reasons. While acting offers the joy of collaborating with fellow actors, stand-up affords him full control of his subject matter and its delivery. \u201cI get to take people on a ride,\u201d he says of stand-up.<\/p>\n

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\u201cHumor is the number-one way that I process things. There are a lot of people who are funny who use humor as a deflection device, but I use it as a drill to go deeper into things.\u201d\u2014Baron Vaughn (\u201903)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Vaughn honed his stand-up skills performing hour-long comedy shows at colleges throughout the country. His stage presence and jokes about familiar subjects\u2014parents, dating, cable TV\u2014made him a popular act from Vassar to UConn to Appalachian State.<\/p>\n

\u201cColleges were my bread and butter for four or five years,\u201d Vaughn says, \u201cand then as I got older, I started talking more about life\u2014like rent and bills and trying to actually be in a relationship\u2014stuff that college students couldn\u2019t really relate to. They wanted more high-energy stuff that was silly, which I do, but now I wrap that around a perspective.\u201d<\/p>\n

Today Vaughn lives in Los Angeles and travels the country to appear at comedy clubs and festivals. His latest comedy album showcases his love of puns and his theatrical style. He breaks into song mid-sentence. He chirps like the crickets who\u2019ve invaded his apartment. He meows \u201cThe Imperial March.\u201d Vaughn calls himself a kitchen-sink comedian, \u201cmeaning that I throw everything at you, including the kitchen sink,\u201d he says. \u201cI use everything that\u2019s at my disposal in my act. I use the fact that I can do characters, act, do different voices and accents, do interesting things with my body, do sound effects.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\"Grace<\/p>\n

In the hit Netflix series Grace and Frankie<\/em>, Vaughn (right) plays Nwabudike “Bud” Bergstein, adopted son of Frankie and her former husband, Sol (Sam Waterston, left). Melissa Moseley\/Netflix<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

The sillier segments of the album balance out more serious bits about defaulting on his student loans and developing a life-threatening allergy to dairy. He told a version of the allergy joke during a recent Comedy Central appearance: \u201cI\u2019m actually going to stop calling my allergies that because it\u2019s a wimpy name for something that might kill you out of nowhere. So I\u2019m now going to call my allergies my police.\u201d<\/p>\n

Vaughn says he tackles thorny subjects like racism, gun violence, and his own intimacy issues because he\u2019s interested in the \u201cwhys of humanity\u201d and the whys of himself. \u201cEssentially, all stand-up comedy is, ‘Why do people do things?’,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

When he drills into a particular human behavior to discover its core, what he finds there often leaves him shaking his head, he says, and thinking, \u201cThat is silly.\u201d In that absurdity, he finds comedy.<\/p>\n

By exploring serious subjects on stage, Vaughn hopes to give audience members permission to delve deeper themselves. \u201cIt\u2019s not that I want to tell people what to think,\u201d he says, \u201cas much as I want to tell people it\u2019s okay to think, and it\u2019s okay to apply those thoughts to your life, and ask questions, and to say what you feel, and express your fears.\u201d And it\u2019s okay to laugh at yourself in the process.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Baron Vaughn of Grace and Frankie uses comedy to dig deep By Corinne Steinbrenner Banner image: In March 2016, actor and comedian Baron Vaughn (\u201903) performed at SXSW Comedy during the 2016 SXSW Music, Film + Interactive Festival at The North Door in Austin, Texas. Jealex Photo\/Getty Images Entertainment\/Getty Images Baron Vaughn\u2019s list of current […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10779,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[34,31],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cfa-magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3784"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cfa-magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cfa-magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cfa-magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10779"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cfa-magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3784"}],"version-history":[{"count":31,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cfa-magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3784\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4479,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cfa-magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3784\/revisions\/4479"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cfa-magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3784"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cfa-magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3784"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cfa-magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3784"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}