Anna Przy Makes Falling Apart Funny
Watching an Anna Przy video is like watching the world’s most optimistic mental breakdown in action. Typically, she runs around her backyard in Michigan screaming about how scary the world is in a high-pitched voice that sounds like it’s on the verge of cracking. Sometimes she waves BBQ tongs at the camera while imploring the audience to “keep it up, cutie.” Other times, she obsessively vacuums the soil (she says because it’s dirty outside). Her advice is genuinely uplifting (“all of this is made up, and you can make up better stuff for yourself!”) but delivered as if she is hanging onto sanity by her fingernails.
It’s a weird way to do comedy, but it has built up a rabid following of over a million people across TikTok and Instagram. Now, she’s on her first national tour, the Big Dumb Crybaby Tour, bringing her unique mix of trauma dumping and jokes to Houston.
After being an event planner in Michigan for 13 years, Przy, found herself utterly adrift during COVID with no events to plan and slowly going crazy from isolation and anxiety. In 2020, she released the first of her manic affirmation videos to almost immediate acclaim. The rest of the world was falling apart, too, and she at least put a happy face on the madness.
“The pandemic hit, and I was pretty catatonic, actually,” she said in a phone interview as she drove to her gig in Baton Rouge. “But it was kind of the mental health crisis I needed to break me out of that mode. I was talking to myself while I was shouting about it outside.”
Przy’s style evolved over the next five years as audiences grew to understand her particular approach to comedy. It’s the sort of act that is hard to explain but instantly recognizable as funny when you see it in action. Przy’s absurdist physical comedy provides the laughs, from rolling down hills as she speaks to twirling brooms like a baton. Like a walking embodiment of chaotic good, her capering lightens the mood as she acknowledges modern woes like burnout, negative self-talk, and fear of the future.
It’s oddly motivational, like a clown who is also a therapist. Once Przy built her following online, people encouraged her to adapt her act to the stage in 2023. It’s been a surprisingly seamless transition that allowed her quit her job to pursue comedy full-time.
“People don’t end up on a stage unless they have a traumatic backstory,” she said. “The first show? I did not intend for it to be funny, but these moments hit really hard to where even I was giggling. Laughing is what makes you feel more normal about these big, scary pieces of your life. I can go up there and tell the world’s most traumatic story and get people to laugh and at the same time, making you feel less alone.”
That realness wrapped in silliness has made Przy one of the great parasocial figures on the internet. All along her 16-city tour, fans come up to her with hugs and tears because her act reached them beyond just making them laugh.
Part of it is that Przy’s act grew out of a collectively traumatic time for everyone. COVID cost millions of people their lives and tens of millions of people their sense of safety and security. Between conspiracy theories and financial struggles, many of us felt like screaming. So Przy screamed, and it was like a homeopathic catharsis. It might not be a good sign for the world that her act just keeps getting more popular, but it’s definitely still having an impact.
“I find that no matter what I say, somebody’s going to say they relate to that so hard,” she said.
Anna Przy performs Sunday, October 19 at 3:30 p.m. at Punch Line Houston, 1204 Caroline. $32 – $45. For more information, visit PunchlineHTX.com.
This article appears in Jan 1 – Dec 31, 2025.
Related
Reign Bowers is an outdoor enthusiast, adventure seeker, and storyteller passionate about exploring nature’s wonders. As the creator of SuperheroineLinks.com, Reign shares inspiring stories, practical tips, and expert insights to empower others—especially women—to embrace the great outdoors with confidence.
Post Comment