Jacob Barr | Doug Coombe
“I put my disabilities right out in front,” says Jacob Barr, who, at twenty-eight, has become one of the city’s most distinctive standup comedians. “That was my cheat code when I started. Comedy is mostly straight white guys. Lots of guys have faces like mine, but not bodies like mine. So I use that to my advantage.”
Barr has VACTERL association, also known as VATER syndrome. It affects multiple organ systems and appears in roughly one in 10,000 to 40,000 births. Many of Barr’s disabilities are invisible, but his short forearms and unusually shaped hands are not. Those hands, however, have become his brand. On Instagram, 12,000 followers know him as @guywiththehands.
Watch: Jacob Barr: “Stick Up For Yourself” | TED Talk
For someone who’s spent a lifetime navigating disability, turning his body into material wasn’t just inevitable—it was freeing. “A big group of things is wrong with me,” he says cheerfully. “Most of it’s not a big deal. The individual parts are annoying, but my hands? They’ve only helped me. Everyone has things they’d change about themselves. Mine are just easier to notice.” He grins. “I guess it’d be cool to make a fist. I hear that’s fun.”
Barr grew up in Dundee, Michigan, the youngest child in a family that includes a sister fourteen years older and the memory of a twin brother who died shortly after birth.
He first tried standup in 2015 at Laffs Inc. Comedy Club in Toledo, where he won an open mic competition. Comedy simmered in the background as he attended Eastern Michigan University and lived in Ann Arbor’s Osterweil co-op, a move that Barr says changed his life. “Cooperative housing is such a cool thing about Ann Arbor. If you’re young and want to live here, you can. You just have to be willing to live with lots of sweaty liberals.” Barr appreciated the rotating chores and cooking responsibilities too. “You’d be shocked at how clean a house with fifteen college kids can be when part of your rent is sweeping the floor. It’s like boot camp, but they don’t hit you. They just ask you what your pronouns are.”
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After graduating from EMU in 2020 with a degree in social work, Barr went to work for Avalon Housing. As a residential support specialist for formerly unhoused residents, “I basically spend my days doing side quests,” he jokes, describing medication runs, crisis de-escalation, and goal-setting with clients. He loves his job, even when it’s heartbreaking. “I don’t get to see a lot of improvement over time,” he says. “People who get better, leave.” After four years, he’s looking for a position as a school counselor or in credit recovery. He’d like to help people move forward, not just stay afloat.
Barr never mingles the two parts of his life, and refuses to use clients as comedy material. “I could tell you hilarious stories, but it’s not ethical. And it would sound like I’m punching down. That’s not my vibe.”
He’d rather play with the audience’s assumptions. “When I’m onstage, I’m forcing my existence onto the crowd,” Barr says. When people react with pity, he feels it immediately. “I’d rather they boo. Pity means they don’t think I know what I’m saying.”
His most viral moment, however, came from something he didn’t say.
In July 2024, Barr went to Austin to try to get on the Kill Tony show, where comics are chosen at random to do a one-minute set. “If it goes well, it can help your career,” Barr says. “If it goes badly, people are really mean to you.”
In Barr’s case, it went both well and badly. That night, cohosts Shane Gillis and Adam Ray were impersonating presidents Trump and Biden. They made an ableist slur (the “r” word) to describe all the comedians who had performed up to that point. Immediately after that, Barr’s name was chosen. When he walked onstage, the hosts were speechless.
The episode has 27 million YouTube views; Barr is still incredulous. “Weirdly, that will probably be the most viral my career will ever be, and I didn’t even have to say anything! But after that, I was able to headline clubs.”
Still, he has mixed feelings about the career boost. Barr says that Kill Tony isn’t a show he supports or recommends, or even enjoys watching, but at the same time, being on the show has allowed him to do more standup, which he loves.
Barr performs several times a week at open mics and paid gigs. Locally, you can see him at Bløm Meadworks, the Blind Pig, Hear.Say Brewing + Theater, and Don’t Tell Comedy pop-ups.
Outside comedy, Barr’s life has gotten wonderfully quiet. In October, after seven years together, he married Maria Hollobaugh-Barr, a bone-marrow researcher at U-M. They met on Tinder. “I met her while sitting on the toilet,” he says. “I almost proposed outside a porta-potty to keep the theme going, but I popped the question at the botanical gardens… ten feet from the porta-potties.” They exchanged vows at Sleeping Bear Dunes in a casual ceremony that ended with beer and hot dogs on the sand.
Barr doesn’t mention Maria onstage, mostly because he hasn’t found the right joke. “No one wants to hear a comedian talk about being happy,” he insists. “‘I love my wife’ isn’t a good punchline.”
But connection—real connection—is his throughline. Onstage, he shines a spotlight on himself only to invite everyone else into it. “I’m messed up, you’re messed up. We’re all messed up together,” Barr says. “So why not laugh about it?”