Matt Bellassai reveals his "hangriest" moment, 2016 elections and how much wine he drinks
Matt Bellassai has what some might call a dream job, and others, a Friday night at home after a long week -- drinking wine and ranting about his pet peeves. Bellassai first gained attention for his popular viral Buzzfeed videos where he would dish on everything from relationships to the regular annoyances of everyday life.
Now, for the past seven months, he has left the popular site to go solo, launching a stand-up career and appearing on Chelsea Handler’s Netflix show. Once each week, he takes to Facebook with his “To Be Honest” video series and is partnering with Soy Vay -- yes, the sauce company -- to promote its new Popped Rice Clusters where he complains about what makes him “hangry.” Bellassai, who won Favorite Social Media Star at the 2016 People’s Choice Awards, talked to CBS News about his “hangriest” moment, the 2016 elections, and why he thinks squirrels are the worst.
I was looking at some of your Soy Vay Snack Hour videos. What is your “hangriest moment?” You’ve talked about a lot of different things. What is the one that stands out the most?
If I recall correctly, there was one where I was complaining about “reply-all” e-mails that people send at the office, where only two people need to get any given e-mail, but then one person keeps replying.
Very recently you moved on from your Buzzfeed role, earlier this year, and then jumped into these individual projects. What has that transition been like to go from a normal day-to-day job and then move on now to your standup work and doing these videos with Soy Vay, and then, of course, “To Be Honest”?
It was sort of stressful at the beginning and took a little bit to get used to. It’s a matter of thinking what I wanted to do in the long term. I started performing live, and then started thinking about writing a book, you know, some of those bigger things that I’ve always thought about doing. I made the tougher decision to leave and go on my own. It’s been great -- it’s been about seven months, over the summer I went on a comedy tour of 30 show and 20 cities. It went really well, and I still make weekly videos “To Be Honest” that appear on my Facebook page, and I’m now partnering with Soy Vay.
Is there one “To Be Honest” moment that really stands out to you? Any particular pet peeve?
I just did one a couple of weeks ago -- why squirrels are the worst! I live in New York City and I had a run-in with a squirrel. It broke into my apartment, and stole some cookies. I was not very happy about that.
I don’t think many people would be. What kind of cookies?
Plain old sugar cookies. I was very upset about that.
What’s next for you?
I’m working on my partnership with Soy Vay and I have my own Tumblr page with them. Then I’m doing my live shows. I’m going to be around handful of places this fall and I’m thinking about a new tour next year. Some of the bigger projects involve a book, hopefully, a television show and a few other things!
I was looking through your Twitter and saw you have been tweeting about politics this season, like the vice presidential and presidential debates. This election year has been rife with material for any comic. Any thoughts on the election?
There are too many thoughts to capture right now. There is a certain point when it stopped being funny and now I’m kind of scared.
So, it stopped being funny and now it’s a little too real?
Yes, exactly. My message is to go out and vote, register and vote. It’s an insane year. I’ll be drinking extra during all of this.
How many bottles of wine do you clear through in a week? You film so many of these videos -- that’s a lot! You must be your local wine store’s favorite customer.
When I started making videos, I would drink a full bottle of wine. Then, when I started performing live, I would drink a bottle of wine on stage. Then I would perform a couple of times a week, then you start thinking, okay that’s a problem [laughs].
You’re probably immune to it now.
Exactly!
Not that long ago you launched all of these projects, but you only graduated from college in 2012. That isn’t that long ago. What would 2012 Matt think about what 2016 Matt is working on now?
I would probably be excited on the one hand that getting drunk turned into a job. I would probably be in a lot of disbelief. I would not think that this is what I would be doing. I moved to New York to become a writer. That is what I thought my career would be, but now, there is this whole other element to it, of creating projects for a whole lot of people and creating stuff on camera. I’m now partnering with these great companies. I think “don’t freak out” would be my advice to myself. “It’s going to be fine, and keep drinking.”