Comedian, actor and writer Caleb Hearon will take part in a moderated conversation at IU Auditorium at 7 p.m. Tuesday.
The event is presented by the Union Board in collaboration with the IU Arts and Humanities Council as part of the annual Granfalloon Festival.
Hearon began his comedy career in college at Missouri State University, where he pursued a degree in sociopolitical communication. He ended up joining an improvisational comedy troupe, which made him pivot from his intended career in law to comedy.
After graduating, he moved to Chicago where he began performing at various weekly and monthly comedy shows, including his own stand-up show “At What Cost?” He started gaining attention on social media for his comedy in 2019, which opened the door to his acting career. Hearon has since appeared in the shows “Work in Progress” and “Fargo” and movies like “I Used to Be Funny,” “Sweethearts” and the upcoming “The Devil Wears Prada 2.”
What cemented his role within the comedy industry and propelled him to fame was his podcast “So True with Caleb Hearon,” which he started in February 2024. The podcast now has over 400,000 subscribers on YouTube.
Sarah Warf is a senior studying arts management at IU and the president of the local comedy group Boy in the Bubble. She will introduce Hearon at the event alongside IU psychology student Katherine Stalmah.
“When I found out he was coming here, I was, like, ‘what an absolute privilege to get to hear him talk and get to introduce him,’” Warf said.
Stalmah is part of the local improv group Full Frontal and also expressed excitement about getting to introduce Hearon.
“It is sort of, like, the dream, you know?” Stalmah said. “My comedy group performed at the Comedy Attic, I want to say earlier this year or last year. Like, to do stuff like that and stuff like this, like introduce Caleb Hearon, it stops you in your tracks, like, ‘wow.’ It makes it seem more understandable that, like, people like Caleb Hearon got to be where they are today by doing what we’re doing.”
Lucy Gray, the director of lectures on the Union Board who will be moderating the event, said students can learn a lot from the conversation and Hearon’s experiences since he was once in the same place in life students are in now. Gray said she wants the conversation to feel relatable and extend further than just comedy.
“I think a lot of people are expecting to laugh a lot, of course, and I want them to keep an open mind, you know, and think it’s not just gonna be a funny thing,” Gray said. “Hopefully, they come away with some new insights, some new thoughts about things, thoughts about who Caleb Hearon truly is.”
Hearon’s visit is part of the new, expanded Granfalloon. This year, the festival will span from April to September so that events are more accessible to students. Natalia Almanza, the program and operations coordinator for the IU Arts & Humanities Council said Granfalloon is a festival inspired by Kurt Vonnegut, taking on his ethos around the arts and humanities being accessible and inevitable to everybody. The festival includes concerts, lectures and theater performances.
Each year, the festival is themed around one of Vonnegut’s works, with this year’s focus being his 1976 novel “Slapstick.” The novel addresses themes of loneliness, as well as comedy and politics. Almanza said the IU Arts and Humanities Council is leaning into the book’s comedic elements, which is why they chose Hearon to speak as part of the festival.
“When we were all brainstorming folks that we would love to bring, he was just at the top of our list,” Almanza said. “The way that Caleb Hearon just is, one, like, so funny, just the funniest person that I feel like I’ve heard in a while, but then, two, is just really civically minded. I feel like every, you know, podcast or interview that I’ve listened to of his, you can tell that he’s really passionate about civic engagement and then also just making the spaces that he lives in and works in better for folks.”
The event is free but ticketed for IU students and $25 for members of the general public, with tickets on sale now on the IU Auditorium website.
