Marc Maron thinks he’s comedy’s J. Robert Oppenheimer. Is he right?

It is fitting that for as much time as I’ve spent listening to Marc Maron hold forth about comedy, I can’t recall ever hearing him tell a joke. Like so many other Americans, I was introduced to the man when he was adrift in his mid-40s and coming to terms with a rapidly stagnating stand-up career. Sure, Maron had plenty to hang his hat on; his résumé was studded with Comedy Central half-hours and Conan stints, and he spoke, ebulliently, about his days grinding at the craft on the hallowed ground of Los Angeles’ Comedy Store. But by 2009, with peers like Louis C.K. and Jon Stewart soundly lapping him at the box office and on TV screens, it became clear that Maron was never going to be a star in the way he once imagined. A rebrand was the only option, and thus began WTF With Marc Maron.