Few Hollywood films can trace their roots back to a spur-of-the-moment decision to dodge an entry fee, but that’s exactly where Bradley Cooper‘s latest film Is This Thing On? begins.
The A-lister‘s latest directorial effort, which was released in December 2025, took inspiration from an unlikely source – British comedian John Bishop and the night he unknowingly rewrote his own life.
Bishop has described the experience of watching a film echoing that pivotal moment as both surreal and exhilarating. Reflecting on the project, he told the BBC it felt “so weird [that] this is happening, but so brilliant at the same time.”
How did Bradley Cooper hear John Bishop’s story?
Twenty-five years ago, Bishop wasn’t a stand-up comedian at all.
He was working as a salesman when he walked into Manchester’s Frog and Bucket comedy club during a temporary separation from his wife. On a whim, and partly because he didn’t want to pay to get in, he signed up for an open-mic slot.
That single performance launched a comedy career he never planned.
That story eventually found its way to Hollywood after Bishop met actor Will Arnett on a canal boat in Amsterdam in 2022.
“He told me the story of how he became a stand-up comedian. He was going through a divorce, went into a bar, didn’t want to pay the cover charge for the open mic night and so he put his name down,” Arnett told W magazine in January. “He ended up getting called on stage and, for the first time in his life, he admitted what he was going through.”
The cathartic experience helped Bishop get his groove back and it also inspired Arnett to take a risk of his own as he then went on to develop a screenplay with Cooper and writer Mark Chappell based on the amazing story.
What is the plot of Is This Thing On?
The film shifts the action to New York and centres on Alex, a middle-aged finance professional played by Arnett, whose marriage to Tess (Laura Dern) is quietly unravelling.
There’s no explosive confrontation to kick things off – just a soft, devastating acknowledgment that something fundamental has ended. As Alex moves out, both he and Tess drift through their shared social circles, masking heartbreak with politeness.
Everything changes when Alex, slightly dazed after eating a weed cookie at a party, wanders into a comedy club and takes the mic. His rambling observations about his marriage strike a nerve, both with the audience and within himself.
What follows is a deeply personal transformation as stand-up becomes a way for him to finally articulate emotions he’s long buried.
Importantly, the film doesn’t treat Tess as a supporting player in Alex’s awakening. Dern’s performance tracks her own reckoning, rooted in the resentment she feels over abandoning her volleyball career for family life.
Full circle moment for John Bishop
For Bishop, the film’s release has coincided uncannily with his own personal milestones. He recently marked the 25th anniversary of that first Frog and Bucket gig by performing there again, only to find himself on the red carpet the very next night for Is This Thing On? at the BFI London Film Festival.
“You couldn’t write it, you couldn’t line things up like that as perfectly,” Bishop told the BBC. “It’s been odd trying to get my head around it.”
Looking back over his career, Bishop remains struck by how accidental it all feels. “I never intended to do it… I never had the dream of being in showbusiness because I never thought I would do stand-up comedy,” he said. “I was a salesman, and so somewhere in the world, it feels like there’s a comedian who is now being a salesman, and I’ve nicked his life and he’s got my life.”
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